Adorable were an English alternative rock band, formed in Coventry in 1990. The band consisted of vocalist and guitarist

Pete Fijalkowski Peter Jeremy Fijalkowski (born 11 December 1968 in Surrey) is an English vocalist, guitarist and songwriter formerly with the bands Adorable and Polak, and currently plays with Terry Bickers of the House of Love in the duo Pete Fij / Terry Bic ...

, guitarist Robert Dillam, bassist Stephen 'Wil' Williams and drummer Kevin Gritton.

History

Adorable formed in September 1990. Prior to that the band was known as The Candy Thieves, and their only record included an early version of "Homeboy" and another song "Underwater" that fitted the then-current baggy trend. The single was released on Trolley Records in 1990. However guitarist Wayne Peters left the band out of frustration with their lack of success and was replaced by Robert Dillam, prompting the name change to Adorable. Adorable's first gig was in Coventry at the Tic Toc club on the night that the first Gulf War started in January 1991. After recording a 12" of "Sunshine Smile" ("I'll Be Your Saint" and "Breathless" on the

B-side The A-side and B-side are the two sides of phonograph records and cassettes; these terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or record compan ...

) that was pressed up to be released on record producer Pat Collier's 'Money To Burn' record label, the band received a positive review in the '' NME''. However, the

single Single may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Single (music), a song release Songs * "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004 * "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008 * "Single" (William Wei song), 2016 * "Single", by ...

was never released. They signed to Creation Records in 1992, and after a UK tour supporting

Curve In mathematics, a curve (also called a curved line in older texts) is an object similar to a line (geometry), line, but that does not have to be Linearity, straight. Intuitively, a curve may be thought of as the trace left by a moving point (ge ...

, they released their first single, a re-recording of "Sunshine Smile", in April of that year. "Sunshine Smile" was ''NME'' 's 'Single of the Week', and topped the UK Indie Chart. The band released "I'll Be Your Saint", "Homeboy" and " Sistine Chapel Ceiling" (another ''NME'' Single of the Week), which all went into the Top 5 in the Indie chart. The band's relationship with much of the rest of the music press though was strained and quickly soured. Their album, ''Against Perfection'' was released in March 1993, and peaked at No. 70 in the UK Albums Chart. The album's original title ''Against Creation'' was dropped 24 hours before they submitted the album to their record label, and reflected their difficult relationship with the label. The band

toured ''Toured (A Live Album)'' was a live album by Huntington Beach pop punk band Big Drill Car. The concert was recorded live at New York's CBGB's on September 3, 1991, at the beginning of a nineteen-week tour known as ''The Batch World Tour'', in su ...

the US, Europe,

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. The tour of Australia was later recalled as “disastrous” by the band where the "promoters did a runner on us and never paid us" with the money later recovered but not some of the band members' albums they had with them. The second album, ''Fake'', provided two singles " Kangaroo Court" and "Vendetta", which again entered the UK Indie Chart, but the album failed to dent the mainstream UK Albums Chart. With strained relations within the band, they were told had been dropped by Creation (now owned by Sony) before a gig in Colchester in 1994, where they were supported by the

60 Foot Dolls 60 Ft. Dolls were a Welsh rock trio active in the 1990s, known as the Cool Cymru era. Formation They were formed in Newport in 1992 by Richard J. Parfitt and Michael Cole, who met through Donna Matthews (later of Elastica), who was at the time ...

. The band undertook a European tour before announcing their split onstage at the final gig of the tour in Brussels in late 1994. A retrospective of their work entitled 'Footnotes' was released by Cherry Red in 2008, featuring extensive liner contributions from all four members of the band where they spoke candidly about their experiences whilst in Adorable. Subsequent to the band's demise, Robert Dillam moved to Scotland where he joined The Zephyrs and is teaching computer networking. Stephen Williams remained in Coventry working in the International Office at the University of Warwick before moving to

Nottingham Trent University Nottingham Trent University (NTU) is a public research university in Nottingham, England. It was founded as a new university in 1992, although its roots go back to 1843 with the establishment of the Nottingham Government School of Design, w ...

where he is currently Director of NTU Global, whilst Fijalkowski went on to form the band Polak, who released two albums on One Little Indian. Shortening his name to Pete Fij he joined up with guitarist Terry Bickers of fellow former Creation label mate The House of Love and Levitation under the title of 'Pete Fij / Terry Bickers'; Kevin Gritton is currently Headteacher of a

comprehensive school A comprehensive school typically describes a secondary school for pupils aged approximately 11–18, that does not select its intake on the basis of academic achievement or aptitude, in contrast to a selective school system where admission is res ...

in Derby. On 7 May 2019, the band announced two reunion shows to take place in the UK, one at the Hebden Bridge Trades Club on 31 October 2019 and the other at Bush Hall, London on 2 November 2019. The tour was expanded to include an additional night at the Hebden Bridge Trades Club on the 30 October and an additional night at the Bush Hall on the 1 November. A final show was added at the Scala in London on 3 November.

Discography

Studio albums

* ''

Against Perfection ''Against Perfection'' is the debut album by the British alternative rock band Adorable. It was released in the UK on 1 March 1993 on Creation Records and in the United States by SBK. The band supported the album with a North American tour. "St ...

'' (1993) No. 70 UK * ''

Fake Fake may refer to: * Deception, an act or a statement intended to deceive ** Charlatan, a person who practices deception to obtain money or other advantages ** Counterfeit, a reproduction of an item, intended to deceive ** Cover-up, an attempt to ...

'' (1994)

Compilations

* ''Footnotes: Best of 92–94'' (January 2008, Cherry Red)

Singles

* "Sunshine Smile" (20 April 1992) - US ''Billboard'' Alternative Songs No. 29 * "I'll Be Your Saint" (13 July 1992) * "Homeboy" (26 October 1992) * "Sistine Chapel Ceiling" (January 1993) * "Favourite Fallen Idol" (12 April 1993) * "Kangaroo Court" (April 1994) * "Vendetta" (September 1994) - UK No. 99

References

External links

Robert Dillam's 1993 guitar rig
Guitargeek.com
The Proper Adorable Homepage
(unofficial)
Pete Fijalkowski writes about his time in Adorable
at Creation Records (2000)

at Dead Flowers (Feb 2007)
Interview with Pete Fij and Robert Dillam
at Step On Magazine (June 2015)
Story of Adorable including interviews and press cuttings from 1990-1994
(May 2019) {{DEFAULTSORT:Adorable (Band) Creation Records artists English alternative rock groups British shoegaze musical groups Noise pop musical groups Jangle pop groups Musical groups from Coventry Musical groups established in 1990 Musical groups disestablished in 1994 Musical groups reestablished in 2019 1990 establishments in England