Babylon Zoo was an electro rock band of the mid 1990s. The band was the brainchild of Jas Mann, and were based in Wolverhampton, England.Jas Mann had formerly been in an indie music band, called The Sandkings, which he left in 1992, because of musical differences.Babylon Zoo was signed to Phonogram Records after Clive Black heard their first three-track demo tape in May 1993. When Black moved to Warner Bros. Records in 1993, he took Mann's contract with him. An album had been prepared and sleeves for a single, "Fire Guided Light", were printed, but Babylon Zoo's debut was put on hold again when Black moved once more to EMI in 1995, where the band were signed on to a seven album contract.However, promotional copies of the song "Spaceman" had already been distributed, and was chosen to tie in with the release of a new Levi's jeans TV advert. The single went straight to Number 1 on the UK singles chart and also went to Number 1 in the single charts in twenty three countries.An album, entitled, The Boy With the X-Ray Eyes was produced at Mann's New Atlantis Productions music/artwork/video centre. It was released in 1996 and included new-age tracks such as "Is Your Soul For Sale?" and "I'm Cracking Up I Need A Pill". The album sold multi-million copies, but subsequent singles fared relatively badly in the charts.Three years later, 1999, a follow up album was released entitled King Kong Groover, but both singles from it failed to chart, with the second not even getting beyond the promotional copy stage. By this time, Mann had adopted Glam Rock as a new style, but it appeared all too late to cash in on the attendant furore surrounding Todd Haynes' genre tribute, Velvet Goldmine.Given the failure of their subsequent singles, they became considered a one-hit wonder.In 2005, it was announced that a new Babylon Zoo album, Cold Clockwork Doll, would be released sometime in the near future. Mann collaborated on this album with Cliff Jones of former brit-pop band Gay Dad This album has yet to be released.In 2006 "Spaceman" featured on trailers for Ant and Dec's film Alien Autopsy, the BBC's children's channel, CBeebies for the animated pre-school series Lunar Jim, and Network Ten's advertisement for Battlestar Galactica . Spaceman is also used in Eesti otsib superstaari (Pop Idol Estonia).
Albums
Singles
Audio sample
- Promo version video (Alternatively go onto YouTube.com and type in Babylon Zoo and you will see many Spaceman videos.)
External links
Babylon ZooBabylon ZooWolverhamptonBabylon ZooBabylon ZooBabylon ZooBabylon Zoo
