Early Years and Formation
Skint & Demoralised began when Wakefield teenager Matt Abbott started doing stand-up performance poetry in late 2006. With comical themes such as tales from Seaside towns and tragic nights-out, he was often a hit with a pleasantly surprised audience. This was mainly in the West Yorkshire area, and included support slots for Reverend and the Makers, Last Gang and The Research. He also performed for Love Music Hate Racism and his unusual style soon earned him a name locally.
Abbott temporarily ceased to perform poetry when he was contacted on MySpace by MiNI dOG, with whom he began to write. MiNI dOG began to turn Abbott's poetry into songs by chopping them apart and laying them over backing tracks before the two had even met. However, after meeting the pair developed a strong songwriting partnership, with Abbott writing lyrics and MiNI dOG writing the music and producing the demos. His poetry soon evolved into a more lyrical style, although the spoken word delivery and also the style in which they are written remained very true to his poetic beginning.
After uploading demos onto MySpace, free download sites and also posting CDs out to DJs, the band were played and interviewed on various radio shows including Steve Lamacq on BBC Radio 1 and BBC 6 Music, Shamir Masri's 'Raw Talent' on BBC Radio Sheffield and on Yorkshire Radio. The band also received airplay on BBC Radio 1 from Colin Murray and Huw Stephens and played a Maida Vale live session for Steve Lamacq on 3 March 2008.
One of the most notable features of the band's initial success was the sheer volume of free downloads from their site. Demo recordings were uploaded as soon as they were finished and from June 2007 to March 2008 they had over 8600 downloads in total.
Having originally planned to release a limited edition single on Stiff Records, the band signed to Mercury Records on 18 March (part of the Universal Music Group). However, over the summer of 2010 the act parted company with the label.
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