¡Forward, Russia! - Twelve. A Brief History of (having) a Top 40 Single Part One of an occasional series to commemorate 20 years of Give Me a Wall

20 years ago today our single Twelve went into the top 40. Tom wrote about it on his substack open.substack.com/pub/tomwoodh...

Tom Woodhead | Substack Writer, mastering engineer, former singer. Click to read Tom Woodhead, a Substack publication. Launched a year ago.

Hello everyone. I (Tom) have started a substack (sorry) and will soon be publishing a little potted history of Twelve. There are 24 footnotes. If that sounds like your kind of thing, link to subscribe here

tomwoodhead.substack.com

The cover of the Twelve single - orange exclamation marks

forwardrussia This week is 20 years since we released 'Twelve' and reached the UK Top 40 charts. It actually went in at number 19 on the midweeks! We were actually in the studio recording in Leeds Give Me A Wall when we got the news. It was the first release on Dance To The Radio distributed to UK-wide record stores. Our previous single Thirteen / Fourteen had been released through White Heat Records, the club night we loved down in London - and that had been supported by the team at Drowned in Sound. Following that record, the distributors behind it approached us that the next release could be on DTTR and they would support, and they were a massive help in helping the record reach as many people as it did. We're really struggling to patch images, artwork and photos together from this period. As we celebrate 20 years of Give Me A Wall, we'll try and post as much as we can, and if anyone wants to share anything, our DMs are open (although replies may be quite slow...!). One thing I can't not mention... I'm deeply uncomfortable about our name currently. It was seemingly relatively meaningless 20 year ago, and I worry that someone affected by world events may see our name and be negatively affected by that. We've talked about it and aren't sure how to address it, so for now I just want to mention this discomfort and we'll continue to think about the best way to approach this. whiskasx

20 years since the Twelve single was released! Here’s something Whiskas posted on the gram

More of a War Pigs guy now fwiw

T: Hearing Iron Man play shortly before we went on at Madame Jojo’s the first time we played there was one of the best feelings of my life

Four ¡Forward, Russia! t-shirts hanging on a washing line

This was really fun to do. Tried to give a little version of my own musical journey through the 00s:

New @islingtonradio.bsky.social show with @tomwoodhead.bsky.social of @forwardrussia.bsky.social as we navigate our way through 10 of his favourite songs of the 00s.. www.mixcloud.com/IslingtonRad...

I sit astride your rough-fed cigarette burns
Wondering just what you looked like so long ago

I sit astride your rough-fed cigarette burns
Begging with you, pleading you to know

Any questions for @tomwoodhead.bsky.social of ¡Forward, Russia!?

Many are saying this

And as quick as lightning the ancient flesh was reconstructed, cigarette burns and all

Bring that Jolly Roger on home

If you want to be something new, I'm coming