Derek Smalls, the bassist for heavy steel greats Spinal Faucet, has launched a brand new single, “Should Crush Barbie,” aimed on the blockbuster sensation of the summer season. “Been spending the final yr or in order Model Ambassador for BruegelCoin, the Dutch cryptocurrency,” Smalls defined in an announcement. “Because it was cratering this previous spring, I used to be following the information greater than regular, which is the place I received bombarded by all of the Barbie BS. I don’t know which angered me extra, however it’s actually arduous to write down a tune about crypto. However the overwhelming shroud of pinkness undoubtedly deserved a serious pricking. And that’s the place I got here in.”

Smalls — wonderful, comic Harry Shearer — launched a solo album again in 2018, that includes many real-life basic rock guys, together with David Crosby, Donald Fagen, Peter Frampton, and extra. Final yr, it was reported {that a} sequel to the 1984 mockumentary This Is Spinal Faucet was in improvement. The phrase on the time was to launch it to coincide with its fortieth anniversary in March 2024, although it’s unclear if the Hollywood strikes have impacted these plans.

Hear “Should Crush Barbie” under.

And right here’s Smalls’ cheeky press bio in full:

The Highway of Rock is a rocky street, and nobody’s life exemplifies that extra totally than that of Derek Albion Smalls.

Derek was born 1 April “a whole lot of years earlier than the daybreak of historical past,” having to endure rising up as an “April Idiot’s Child.” His father, Donald “Duff” Smalls, raised Derek after his mom, Dorothy, left residence to hitch a touring all-girls jazz band, The Hotten Totties.

Whereas Derek had a quiet faculty profession in his hometown of Nilford, on the River Null within the West Midlands, Duff carried on his work as a phone handset sanitizer, working for the pioneering agency within the commerce, Sani-Cellphone, till it was absorbed by the previous British Telecom, primarily, in accordance with reviews on the time, for its “sturdy bill-collecting operation.”

At age 17, Derek enrolled within the London Faculty of Design, primarily, as he later defined it, “due to the initials.” Like many art-school college students of the interval, he was extra keen on music and shortly discovered himself a member of the all-white Jamaican band Skaface. “I by no means even tried to play the guitar, as a result of it had too many strings they usually have been too small. Bass felt excellent,” he informed Ska Information.

Strolling in the future in 1967 via the then-tatty Soho district of London, Derek noticed a Bass Participant Wished discover on one of many neighborhood’s lampposts. It seems Ronnie Pudding had simply left the band Spinal Faucet for a solo profession after their first single, “Gimme Some Cash,” had didn’t chart. Derek match proper in and made a notable contribution to the band’s soar on the Flower Energy bandwagon, mouthing a silent “We love you” on the finish of its efficiency of “(Pay attention To) The Flower Individuals” on the short-lived TV music present, Bob’s Your Uncle.

Faucet then went on to carve a repute as considered one of England’s loudest bands. Its sequence of mishaps – breakups and reunions, drummers perishing in weird methods – was chronicled in a 1984 movie. “A hatchet job,” Derek calls it dismissively. “There have been loads of nights after we discovered our solution to the stage, however after all, they didn’t present you that.”

Within the late Nineteen Eighties, as Faucet’s fortunes waned, Derek joined a Christian heavy-metal band, Lambsblood. Their best-known tune, “Entire Lotta Lord,” made a good displaying on the Christian charts. To cement his relationship with the band members, all of whom have been Individuals, Smalls received a Christian “fish tattoo.” As luck would have it, Faucet quickly reunited for 1992’s Break Just like the Wind album and toured throughout America. Involved that he must cowl up the tattoo, Derek employed an artist to repair it, and the piece now featured a satan consuming the fish.

Following that tour, Faucet broke up and reunited twice extra, as soon as in 2000 for an American tour that included a historic New York venue that Derek described onstage as “Carnegie Fuckin’ Corridor,” and in 2009 for appearances on the Glastonbury Competition and Wembley Area. In between, Derek cultivated a near-thriving profession on digital camera, constructing upon his cameo function within the 1979 Spaghetti Jap, Roma ‘79. He appeared in TV commercials for the Belgian snack meals Floop and served for a time as a choose (alongside the lead singer for the Europunk band Scorching Storage) on the Dutch actuality competitors present RokStarz earlier than the present was rebooted as Tomorrow’s HipHop Hero. Derek stepped ahead as a composer throughout this time; his jingle for Floop, “I’m within the Floop Group”, was a daily earworm on European tv till the writer of “The In Crowd” threatened a plagiarism lawsuit.

Derek’s fortunes have fluctuated along with his romantic entanglements. His long-time girlfriend Cindy Stang went via share of his again royalties to launch her ill-fated tech start-up, macrame.com. Of that mission, Smalls now says ruefully, “It was forward of its time. Or behind the curve. Or each.” He’s additionally had his share of non-public struggles, having twice sought remedy for web dependancy.

In 2019, Smalls parlayed his movie star within the Low Nations of Europe ready as Model Ambassador for BruegelCoin, a Dutch-based crypto coin. He made private appearances outdoors branches of conventional banks and did TV and press interviews selling the cryptocurrency. In 2022, BruegelCoin collapsed in a wave of lawsuits. Derek, who had been paid within the novel forex, was out of luck…