The first cover we ever did and it's our then South coast neighbours, t'Chip. Playing a gig in Brighton with the ever funular The Hat, we decided we needed something toe-tapping to stick in our then fairly ballad-heavy set.
Went down a storm - as, of course, did The Hat - and became the first song we evere released - as a freebie on this here Interwave.
Still free!


Over and Over (Hot Chip cover) by The Miserable Rich.

I still remember going to the National Gallery with my mum as a boy with this in my head, and something about the harpsichord and the light in the Dutch Masters fusing. 
When we decided to to do an e.p. of covers between albums, i suggested this one to the band and we had it worked out in about an hour.
Still gets a lot of requests when we are out and about.

Golden Brown (The Stranglers Cover)

New single: Anything's Possible
Release date: 19th June 2011
Download only

The Miserable Rich have long been fans of the work of the legendary John Barry: it is a compliment indeed to have anyone say your work sounds a bit Barryesque...

Holed-up in a countryside retreat, looking for new sounds and recording a new album, the band heard of John Barry's death and spent a booze and nostalgia-fuelled evening searching YouTube to find the best of the legend's work, sharing their favourite pieces and soundtracks.

Getting together for a jam later that night, they couldn't help but be influenced by the slinky, sexy Barry style, and Anything's Possible was born.

The lyric and title - a long-dead lover trying to rekindle the sexual flames of his past life, using music to get under the skin of his partner left on the other side - was directly influenced by the oft-noted sexual nature of Barry's themes.

Anything's Possible is both a tribute to the much admired maestro and an introduction to a new, bolder sound for T

Anything's Possible

For A Day - Bonobo remix

The Miserable Rich - Crows

Former Hazelwood Vinyl Plastics supremo - and current Lotte Lindenberg head honcho - Wolfgang Gottlieb gives this all-time TMR favourite from the debut album a garage soul reworking. Takes you to the top of the tree.

Monkey - Gottlieb Club Mix

The Miserable Rich, from Brighton, have made a name for themselves over the last four years, becoming renowned for their beautiful string arrangements, addictive melodies, compelling but humourous lyrics and the haunting, compassionate voice of James de Malplaquet.

They have released two critically acclaimed albums and been single of the week on iTunes. The band have been been championed by 6Music (album of day and 4 sessions with Marc Riley) as well as gaining strong support from Radio 2 (Steve Lamacq, sessions on Dermot O'Leary and Mark Lammarr's God's Jukebox), Radio 4 (Loose Ends) and XFM (Jon Kennedy).

They have recently completed a third album, recorded in the UK's most haunted stately home, Ann Boleyn's birthplace of Blickling Hall. Released at Halloween 2011, it is lyrically based on ghost stories, and presents a more dynamic sound than their first two outings, with drums and electric guitar added to their trademark cello, violin and double bass.

The Miserable Rich's music has been used on several

On A Certain Night

One of the live favourites from the latest album, a jazz-tinged behemoth with a title and story to match:

James:

'My dad tells me he doesn’t believe in ghosts. Somewhat oonfusingly however, he also says he’s heard one.
When he was in the army, stationed in France as a military musician and stretcher-bearer, he was once stationed at a chateau not far from the front. It seems the old castle was haunted and many of the soldiers reported seeing apparitions of ladies in medieval garb, walking along the halls then turning to walk through a wall that hadn’t been there in times of yore.
One night my dad, a young man then and a bit of a lightweight when it came to alcohol, went out on leave to a bar in town with the guys he was billeted with. I’ve never known him to be a big drinker, and it seems back then he was just the same, quickly getting squiffy and deciding to stumble back to the digs.
He and two other guys were sharing a turret room on the side of the chateau, with access via some perilous winding stone steps which wound around the outer wall. He fell asleep quickly, and was woken sometime later by the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs towards the room. They stopped outside and there were three soft knocks on the door. 
Thinking it was his roommates, he shouted that the door wasn’t locked, feeling too tired and tipsy to get up and go to the door. After a couple minutes, to his surprise he heard the footsteps continue up past the door, winding up to the roof. They crossed the roof deliberately and stopped.
My father panicked. He thought his roommates had got so drunk they’d somehow missed the room and toppled off the roof. He jumped out of bed, ran up to the roof and looked around. 
Nothing.
Running downstairs to the sentry post, he raised the alarm, and a search party bearing torches went all around the grounds, looking for someone who had fallen from the roof in a drunken haze. While this was happening, the roommates returned from the bar in town, drunk, confused but very much alive and wondering what all the fuss was about. They had not been back to the barracks all night.
The mystery went unexplained for several days, and the reputation of the castle and the strange things that had been witnessed there saved my young pa from the worst of the teasing about ‘hearing things in the night’. 
As he recounted the story in the same local bar in town later that week, an old man listened intently, nodding sagely to himself at each new detail. When the story was told, he rose from his seat and cleared his throat.
He told the young British soldiers, in near-faultless English, the chateau’s tragic love story. It seems the turret bedroom was once occupied by the beautiful daughter of the local baron. She fell in love with a poor young peasant neighbour, and planned to run away with him. 
The night of the planned eloping, her father found the love letters and locked her away, deep inside the castle. Her lover came to her room that night, knocked three times on the door, but heard no reply.
Night after night he returned. Night after night he was disappointed, until one night he went past the room, crossed the roof and threw himself from the ramparts. Ever since, he returns on the night of his death, retracing his steps, vowing his undying love, and disappointed once more, throws himself back to his doom.'


True Love

Pisshead

Boat Song

Monkey

Chestnut Sunday

The Mouth Of The Wolf

Oliver

Let Me Fade

The Miserable Rich are a band who take music fairly seriously, while at the same time finding themselves utterly ridiculous.
Their string-led music makes some people very happy, some very sad, and doesn't seem to have all that much impact on still others again.
Since words are words, and music's music, it's probably best just to have a listen yourself and see which category you find yourself in.

Popular tracks by The Miserable Rich