Early years (1982–1984) performing in 2012 Chumbawamba formed in
Burnley in 1982 with an initial line-up of
Allan "Boff" Whalley, Danbert Nobacon (born Nigel Hunter), and Midge – all previously members of the band Chimp Eats Banana – shortly afterwards joined by Lou Watts. The band made their live debut in January 1982. They were initially inspired musically by bands as diverse as
the Fall,
PiL,
Wire, and
Adam and the Ants and politically by the anarchist stance of
Crass. By the end of 1982, the band had expanded to include
Alice Nutter (of Ow My Hair's on Fire), and
Dunstan "Dunst" Bruce (of Men in a Suitcase), who also moved into the Leeds house. Harry "Daz" Hamer and Mavis "Mave" Dillon (aka David Mills, Man Afraid) – members, along with Whalley, of Barnsley punk band Passion Killers – joined soon after. They made several songs about the
UK miners' strike, including the cassette
Common Ground and a song dedicated to the
pit village of
Fitzwilliam, which was one of the worst cases of economic decline following the strike.
With Agit-Prop Records (1985–1992) By the mid-1980s Chumbawamba had begun to release material using the
vinyl format on their own
Agit-Prop record label, which had evolved from an earlier project,
Sky and Trees Records. The first release was the
Revolution EP in 1985, which quickly sold out of its initial run, and was re-pressed, reaching No. 4 in the
UK Indie Chart, and staying in the chart for 34 weeks. Cobie Laan, formerly sound engineer for The Ex, joined Chumbawamba as live sound engineer, and was also credited as a vocalist on 1988's
English Rebel Songs 1381–1914. for the "
Let It Be" song release that parodied a version of the
Beatles song recorded by the popstar supergroup
Ferry Aid to raise money for victims of the
Zeebrugge ferry disaster. The song also topped
John Peel's
Festive Fifty for 1993. They followed this up with "
Timebomb" which hit 59 on the singles chart and 23 on the Festive Fifty. Both singles featured on the band's sixth album,
Anarchy (1994), with lyrics addressing issues such as
homophobia, the
Criminal Justice Act and the rise of
fascism in the UK following the election of
Derek Beackon, a
British National Party councillor in south-east London in 1993. The album was the band's biggest success to date, reaching number 29 in the
top 30. Third single "
Homophobia" (featuring the
Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence) also entered the low end of the
UK Singles Chart. The live shows to support the album were recorded and went to make up their first live album
Showbusiness!, released in 1995. One Little Indian also re-released Chumbawamba's back catalogue, which meant that the first three albums were released on
CD for the first time, with the first two (
Pictures of Starving Children Sell Records and
Never Mind the Ballots) repackaged as one disc under the title
First 2. Chumbawamba parted with One Little Indian during the recording of the 1996 album ''
Swingin' with Raymond, although they did release one last CD entitled Portraits of Anarchists'', which came with copies of
Casey Orr's book of the same name.
With EMI Records (1997–2001) Controversy over EMI signing Chumbawamba signed to
EMI in Europe in 1997, a move that was viewed as controversial by many of their followers. They had been involved with a compilation LP called
Fuck EMI in 1989, and had criticised the label in many of their earlier songs. The anarcho-punk band
Oi Polloi (with whom Chumbawamba had previously toured and worked with on the 'Punk Aid'
Smash the Poll Tax EP) released an 'anti-Chumbawamba'
split EP with Riot/Clone,
Bus Station Loonies, Anxiety Society, The Chineapple Punks, Love Chips and Peas, and
Wat Tyler, called
Bare Faced Hypocrisy Sells Records (
Ruptured Ambitions 1998). Chumbawamba argued that EMI had severed the link with weapons manufacturer
Thorn a few years previously, and that experience had taught them that, in a capitalist environment, almost every record company operates on capitalist principles: "Our previous record label One Little Indian didn't have the evil symbolic significance of EMI however they were completely motivated by profit." They added that this move brought with it the opportunity to make the band financially viable as well as to communicate their message to a wider audience.
Tubthumper – mainstream success and political controversy (1997–1999) In 1997, Chumbawamba scored their biggest chart hit with "
Tubthumping" (UK No. 2, US No. 6), which featured an audio sample of actor
Pete Postlethwaite's performance in the film
Brassed Off on the album version. The single was followed by the album
Tubthumper, which incorporated elements of
pop rock,
dance-pop, and
alternative rock. The album was the first to feature Jude Abbott on trumpet, wind instruments and vocals, replacing Mavis Dillon. In early 1998, "
Amnesia" was released as the second single from the album, and reached No. 10 in the UK. During this period Chumbawamba gained some notoriety over several controversial incidents, starting in August 1997 when Nutter was quoted in the British music paper
Melody Maker as saying, "Nothing can change the fact that we like it when cops get killed." The comment was met with outrage in Britain's tabloid press and was condemned by the
Police Federation of England and Wales. The band resisted pressure from EMI to issue an apology and Nutter only clarified her comment by stating, "If you're working class they won't protect you. When you hear about them, it's in the context of them abusing people, y'know, miscarriages of justice. We don't have a party when cops die, you know we don't." A few weeks later, provoked by the
Labour government's refusal to support the
Liverpool Dockworkers' Strike, the band performed "Tubthumping" at the 1998
BRIT Awards with the lyric changed to include "New Labour sold out the dockers, just like they'll sell out the rest of us", and vocalist Danbert Nobacon later poured a jug of water over
UK Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott, who was in the audience. According to the band, the decision took approximately "30 seconds" to make. In the
EA Sports soccer game
World Cup 98, the song "Tubthumping" is one of the soundtrack titles. In 2002,
General Motors paid Chumbawamba a sum of either $70,000 or $100,000 to use the song "
Pass It Along" from the
WYSIWYG album for a
Pontiac Vibe television advertisement. Chumbawamba gave the money to the anti-
corporate activist groups
Indymedia and CorpWatch, who used the money to launch an information and environmental campaign against GM. EMI released the band's first collection album which featured a mixed bag of songs from between 1985 and 1998 under the title
Uneasy Listening. Also in 1998 came a Japan-only mini album,
Amnesia, consisting of
country and western style versions of recent hits "Tubthumping" and "Amnesia" alongside earlier songs like "Mouthful of Shit". In 1998, Chumbawamba also contributed to the album released by the Polish
"Never Again" Association as a part of its Music Against Racism campaign. In 2021 the album was reissued as vinyl record
One Race – Human Race. Music Against Racism: Part 2. As a millennium present, Chumbawamba sent out a limited edition single to everyone on their mailing list. The song was a shoop-shoop-style ballad, "
Tony Blair", which read like a heartbroken letter to an ex-lover who had broken all his promises. The band would send another free single out two years later, this time a re-worked version of
the Beatles' song "
Her Majesty" to coincide with the
Queen's Golden Jubilee, with lyrics denouncing royalty.
WYSIWYG and leaving EMI (2000–2001) Chumbawamba released the album
WYSIWYG in 2000, which included a cover of the early
Bee Gees song "
New York Mining Disaster". The single "
She's Got All The Friends That Money Can Buy" was backed by "Passenger List For Doomed Flight 1721", a song that listed all of the people that the band would like to see "disappear". The list of unfortunates included Tony Blair,
Ally McBeal and
Bono. Chumbawamba parted from EMI in 2001. The band later said that they got what they wanted from the deal with EMI: "we released some great records, we travelled all over the world, appeared on all these TV programmes, and we made loads of money, a lot of which we gave away or ploughed into worthwhile causes".
With No Masters Records (2005–2011) In 2005, Chumbawamba moved to a cut-down acoustic lineup. This saw the departure of long-time members Danbert Nobacon, Alice Nutter, Harry Hamer and Dunstan Bruce, leaving a 4-person lineup featuring founder members Lou Watts and Boff Whalley with later additions Jude Abbott and long-term producer Neil Ferguson.
No Masters Records released Chumbawamba's
A Singsong and a Scrap in 2005. In January 2007 it was announced that Chumbawamba would be playing at the
Glastonbury Festival that year. That February, Nobacon and Bruce rejoined the band for a 25th anniversary gig at
Leeds City Varieties. However, the band emphasised that this was a one-off appearance, and the cut-down acoustic lineup would form the basis for a new acoustic album to be recorded later that year. The result was
The Boy Bands Have Won, released on 3 March 2008 in the UK and 14 March in mainland Europe. The record contained 25 tracks, some of them full-length songs, some of them no more than a minute long and was again acoustic folk in style. The album is the debut of Phil Moody as a band member, and features the
Oysterband,
Roy Bailey and
Barry Coope amongst others. In late 2009 Chumbawamba toured northern England in their self-penned pantomime, a comedy musical entitled
Riot, Rebellion & Bloody Insurrection with the Red Ladder Theatre Company. In late February 2010 they released their 15th album, titled
ABCDEFG. In September 2011, past and present band members protested when the
UK Independence Party used "Tubthumping" at their annual conference.
Break-up and post-breakup activities (2012–present) On 8 July 2012, Chumbawamba announced that they would be disbanding at the end of the year. On their website they opened the statement with "That's it then, it's the end. With neither a whimper, a bang or a reunion." They stated they would continue with individual efforts, and ended their official statement: We do, of course, reserve the right to re-emerge as Chumbawamba doing something else entirely (certainly not touring and putting out albums every 2 or 3 years). But frankly, that's not very likely. Thirty years of being snotty, eclectic, funny, contrary and just plain weird. What a privilege, and what a good time we've had. In December 2012, the final UK show, filmed at the
Leeds City Varieties on Halloween night, was released as Chumbawamba's only live DVD, entitled
Going, Going – Live at Leeds City Varieties. A mail-order EP,
In Memoriam: Margaret Thatcher, was released on 8 April 2013 to mark
the death of the former UK Prime Minister. The CD had been recorded around 2005 and made available for pre-order at gigs and on the group's website, to be issued when Thatcher died.
Post-breakup band member activities and
Hope & Social for the launch of the
Leeds 2023 year of culture After leaving Chumbawamba, vocalist Dunstan Bruce founded Dandy Films, an independent film and video company whose projects have included a "video blog" of
the Levellers' UK tour during 2010 and
Sham 69's tour of China. In 2012 former Chumbawamba members Dunstan Bruce and Harry Hamer formed a new band, Interrobang‽, with guitarist Stephen Griffin of London-based
Regular Fries. In August 2017, Dunstan Bruce, Boff Whalley and Jude Abbott were interviewed on
BBC's
The One Show from the Leeds City Varieties and near their former home celebrating 20 years since the release of "
Tubthumping". Chumbawamba is a member of the Canadian charity Artists Against Racism and participated in a 2018 Radio PSA for them. Former member Alice Nutter has had a number of plays performed at the
Leeds Playhouse, where she took a writing course in 2006. A neon sculpture on the side of the theatre features the lyric "I get knocked down but I get up again" from the band's single "
Tubthumping". In 2025,
Rebellion Festival announced that band members Dunstan Bruce, Mavis Dillon, Lou Watts, Harry Hamer, Boff Whalley, Alice Nutter and Danbert Nobacon would appear on an "in conversation" panel at their 2025 event, which would also feature the first performances since 1984 of pre-Chumbawamba band Passion Killers (Dillon, Whalley and Hamer).
Documentary On 1 July 2015 Dunstan Bruce started a
Kickstarter to fund a documentary titled
I Get Knocked Down (The Untold Story of Chumbawamba) that told the band's entire history from different members' perspective. He surpassed his £40,000 goal. That same year, Chumbawamba was the featured subject on two
podcasts produced by
Gimlet Media:
StartUp #16 "The Secret Formula" and
Surprisingly Awesome #4 "Tubthumping". ==Musical style and legacy==