Ham it up at Pacific Road Arts Centre – blues-rock band The Hamsters performing next week

Mar 9 2011 by Lorna Hughes, Birkenhead News

Ham it up at Pacific Road Arts Centre – blues-rock band The Hamsters performing next week

CULT blues-rock band The Hamsters are returning to Wirral next week.

Now in their 24th year together, the three-piece have played almost 4,500 concerts and their celebrity followers include former racing champion Damon Hill and BBC Radio 2 DJ “Whispering” Bob Harris.

Although primarily performing their own brand of material, they are widely regarded as leading interpreters of the music of Jimi Hendrix and ZZ Top.

Snail’s-Pace Slim, Rev Otis Elevator and Zsa Zsa Poltergeist have been voted one of the UK’s best unsigned bands by Kerrang magazine (“We already have a record deal, but it’s a nice compliment,” says guitarist Slim)

And years of dedicated touring prompted Top Gear magazine to feature them in an article on in-car entertainment because “they’re always travelling somewhere”.

Slim said: “This time in Birkenhead, we'll be supporting ourselves by opening the show with a set of our usual brand of rock, Americana and blues.

“Then we're looking forward to playing two full sets of Jimi Hendrix and ZZ Top songs, complete with our instrument-swapping finale.”

Originally forming for their own amusement (and taking their name from the Sex Pistols, who once used it as a pseudonym to outwit hostile councils), the Hamsters enjoy the irony of being an aggressive band with a cuddly name.

They don’t take themselves too seriously – but they’re serious about music.