The Carpettes formed in the Spring of 1977 in Newcastle Upon Tyne, released two amazing and highly collectable punk singles ‘How About Me And You?’ and ‘Small Wonder’ for Small Wonder Records, before moving to London and signing to Beggars Banquet.
Since reforming in 1996 The Carpettes have been the subject of much attention with their ‘Best Of’ compilation on Anagram, their first two albums reissued by Captain Oi!, their inclusion on numerous compilations and a new album ‘Fair Play To ‘Em’ released in Japan where the band are about to tour for a second time.
Much of this interest was undoubtedly the result of the band playing some mighty fine live performances, including ‘Holidays In The Sun’, tours of the UK and Germany and many of the top punk festivals.
In 2005 Neil Thompson left the band and was replaced with Jimmy Devlin, a member of the Glasgow-based Just Another Dream. A final album was recorded featuring Paul Thompson playing drums on several tracks and another Glaswegian, Jim Cosgrove on the rest of the album. This was released on the Texas-based NDN Record label followed by a tour of Germany.
In 2009 George and Jimmy collaborated to record three new Carpettes songs, “When I`m Gone”, “The Only Way to Be” and a cover of the Tom Waits song “Hold On” which were made available online.
In the Summer of 2011 The Carpettes toured The USA for the first time supported by Houston-based band The Shadow, led by Henrik Poulsen. With George on bass, Jimmy on guitar and Nick Raver, from Texas, on drums they covered 4000 miles and did 12 shows in Houston, Austin, San Antonio, El Paso, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego and Phoenix.
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