Formation The band members met through the club/pub music scene in Irvine. The original band members included Frank Reader (bass), Davy Hughes (guitar and vocals), George McDaid (guitar) and Paul Forde (drums). By late 1986/early 1987, the line-up had changed to include Paul Livingston (guitar), John Douglas (guitar) and Stephen Douglas (drums), along with Frank Reader moving to vocals and Davy Hughes to bass. While the band has included other members for short periods of time over the years, this is the line-up that would record the bulk of the Trashcan Sinatras' music to date.
Cake era The band was spotted by Simon Dine in 1987 and quickly signed to
Go! Discs. Using their signing advance, the band purchased a recording studio in
Kilmarnock, naming it Shabby Road. Work began on their debut album, which was eventually released in 1990.
Cake featured the band's largest worldwide
hit single, "
Obscurity Knocks" as well as a couple of other alternative music hits ("
Only Tongue Can Tell" and "Circling the Circumference"). The band were often compared to
The Smiths and the success of
Cake in the United States, where it spent three months in the
Billboard 200, led to extensive
touring in both the UK and North America in support of the album.
''I've Seen Everything'' era The follow-up record, ''
I've Seen Everything was released in 1993. The song "Hayfever" made an appearance on the MTV animated series, Beavis and Butt-head''. The band released two singles ("Hayfever" and "I've Seen Everything") and toured the UK, North America and Japan in support of the album.
A Happy Pocket era The band's third album,
A Happy Pocket, followed in 1996. AHP was released in the UK and Japan, but was unavailable in the U.S. after the band's American distributor declined to release the record. The band released four singles from AHP ("The Main Attraction", "Twisted and Bent", "How Can I Apply...?" and "
To Sir, With Love", the latter a cover of the 1967
Lulu U.S.
number one hit). The Trashcans did not tour in North America, only the UK and Japan. Their record label, Go! Discs, had made a successful short film for the band
Portishead and greenlit the production of
Spooktime, a film of stories based on characters from The Trashcans' lyrics. The 15-minute film was to be shown in cinemas before screenings of
Terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys. After their record company Go! Discs was acquired by
Universal in 1996, the band was dropped from the label and subsequently forced to sell their Shabby Road recording studio and declare bankruptcy. The Trashcans kept a low profile in the following years, not playing any concerts until early 1999 (in Japan and Ireland). The Japanese concerts occurred at the same time the band was recording a new single, "Snow" (a cover of the
Randy Newman song), which was released by Sony Japan in December 1999.
Weightlifting era In March 2000, the band set up camp in
Hartford, Connecticut to
record their fourth album. Between March and June, the band recorded around a dozen songs and played a handful of shows in the northeastern United States, their first shows in America since 1993. After returning to Scotland, the band decided to scrap the album. The band only performed four concerts in the UK in 2001. Instead they focused on writing additional songs and recording
demos for their fourth album. In March 2002, recording began at Riverside Studios in
Glasgow. The band recorded a dozen songs on and off over the course of a year. In 2003, the band started to raise its profile by playing concerts and festivals in Scotland. They hired New York City based record producer and musician
Andy Chase (of the band
Ivy) to
mix the new album tracks, which was completed by the end of the year. With a new album ready for release, the Trashcans stepped up their activity in 2004. The band played in Spain and London, before heading to the United States in March. They appeared on the
Morning Becomes Eclectic radio show with
Nic Harcourt in March, the day of their sold out show at the Troubadour in Los Angeles California (their first appearance on the west coast of the U.S. in 11 years). From there, the band headed off to
Austin, Texas for five appearances at the
South by Southwest music festival. The Trashcans garnered quite a bit of press (
Billboard staffers named the Trashcans one of the top 10 acts at SXSW) and record label attention.. which led to a licensing deal with New York-based
spinART Records. The Trashcan Sinatras finally released their fourth album in August 2004.
Weightlifting was warmly received by critics and the band completed a 25 date U.S. and Canada tour in September and October 2004. They had follow up U.S. tours in December 2004 and in April and May 2005, while also extensively touring Scotland, England, Ireland, Japan and Australia during 2004–2006. The
Weightlifting album included the song "All the Dark Horses", which was featured prominently in the first episode of the
ABC Family Channel series
Wildfire.
In the Music era The band's fifth studio album,
In the Music, was recorded with producer
Andy Chase between November 2007 and February 2008, at Stratosphere Sound in New York and in
Martha's Vineyard. In July 2008,
Carly Simon recorded backing vocals for the song "Should I Pray?" The single "Oranges and Apples" was released as a download-only single on 13 October 2008. The song was inspired by
Syd Barrett, one of the founding members of
Pink Floyd. The single was released in connection with The City Wakes, a festival in tribute to Syd Barrett that took place in Cambridge and London in October 2008. The album was released (with bonus track "Astronomy") in Japan on 22 April 2009 (on
Victor Entertainment), in the United Kingdom on 14 September 2009 (on Lo-Five Records) and 27 April 2010 in North America (also on Lo-Five Records, with digital distribution by
Ingrooves and physical distribution by
Fontana Distribution). The North American release includes eight live bonus tracks, which are live acoustic recordings taken from the band's November 2009 UK tour. Lo-Five also released a limited, numbered deluxe edition of the album in July 2009, which featured two additional bonus tracks ("I Can't Stand Tomorrow" and "I Just Don't Know How") and an in-depth booklet of liner notes, photos and a listing of everyone who pre-ordered the release. The album received strong reviews from print and online media with
The Guardian describing it as "Gentle, grown-up popcraft that reveals more with each listen", and the
BBC calling it " . . . tender, affecting music which impresses with increasing listens." The band supported the 2009 album release with nearly 40 concerts and promotional appearances in the United States, Japan and the United Kingdom between July and November 2009, and with a follow-up tour of Japan in March 2010. On the follow-up Japanese tour, the band was supported by Japanese act
Sunny Day Service, with whom they also recorded and released English-language and Japanese-language versions of the single "Town Foxes/yume iro no machide". The band also completed an 11 date USA promotional tour in June 2010. A live acoustic album
Brel (recorded in Glasgow in 2009), a follow up to the band's 2005's acoustic live
Fez (recorded in New York City).
Brel was released on 9 November 2010. This was set to be followed by the release of
Earlies... a 4 album box set marking the 20th anniversary of the release of
Cake, comprising the 3 Go!Discs albums and
Weightlifting, digitally remastered with additional tracks and packaging including mementos reflecting the band's distinguished career. However, to date
Earlies... has not been released.
Wild Pendulum era In October 2014 the band announced through social media that it would begin recording its sixth album in the coming months and offered fans the opportunity to pre-order it through PledgeMusic with a series of "exclusives" offering unique content, merchandise and updates throughout the recording process. On 21 October 2015, the first track, "Best Days On Earth," was released to the band's PledgeMusic supporters in a project update on the site. In the same update, the band confirmed that the new album would be titled "Wild Pendulum." In an August 2015 project update, the band announced that the new album would be released in January 2016. A second track, "Ain't That Something," was later released to PledgeMusic supporters, and the album's release was pushed back. On a 1 March 2016 project update, the band announced that a digital download of the complete album would be made available to supporters on 22 April 2016, with the album's release on physical CDs and vinyl to follow. ==Other activity==