We humbly present before you this not completely dull history of Jamhed. We do this because we really care about ourselves and in no way regret our despicable past or dread our terrible future. Jamhed were formed in a bar in Wigan in 1853. It was not up James Bond's Bottom as some would have you believe (maybe delete that bit.) Three men called Michael, Joel and Adam decided to adopt different personas- Captain, King, Horse- and set off on a journey to the fabled land of Karawane. I'm not sure why they decided to do this. Please remember there are no other sources and I'm doing this all from memory. I think it was something to do with faith but not Adam Faith, the well known pop singer of the 1960s who turns up at the end of the 1961 film What a Carve Up! as Shirley Eaton's boyfriend. Shirley Eaton's the one who got painted gold in Goldfinger.

 

Anyway. Not long after, Michael died of a painful lung disease that sadly meant he couldn't live any longer. As we're not in the habit of working with ghosts, unless they're really sexy, we told him to f-club off. Anyway, we then went to Edinburgh and decided to do a working demonstration of boredom. I'm still not sure if that was a completely good idea but nonetheless it was something we did. Then we did some happenings in York and Adam married Jean and they had 14 children.

 

Anyway now we come to the really important bit. The King slowly metamorphosised into a Hermit, a bit like Buddha giving up his riches probably. An ancient scroll was discovered in the Valley Gardens, songs from Willy Wonka were sung, and the Hermit came amongst the people of Harrogate in the basement of Adam's sexy gallery rented from East Street Arts. Adam basically ran the place as the cheapest bar in town and hosted wild, libidinous parties every single night. East Street Arts were fine with this as they were in Leeds and didn't give a shit. Then suddenly we were told to p** off and we had to move everything including stuff owned by a man who painted Paul McCartney's piano.

 

Then Adam went “let's do stuff in Armley” so the now homeless Hermit followed a star in a vault in a disused bank. It was freezing f**kin cold and Ken Dodd died in that year and The Hermit put some pictures up. Adam still ran it as a youth centre but East St Arts gave more of a tuppence because they were closer and told us off a few times. They may even do so for this description but I hope it's all in good fun and that they're jolly sporting about it all.

 

They met some really lovely people who they still semi hang out with to this day. A lot more performances happened with a greater variety of acts, We had some orange hands perform courtesy of Ozzy Algar, Matt Allan, some people who run A.C.I.D, some other people who don't run A.C.I.D, the Abominable Dr Phibes, T Money, Virgil, Electromagnetic Humans, The Raven, Capoiera Jo and many more to boot! Speaking of boots they were then booted out of one space but luckily had their foot in another! They moved everything over to this new space and it was going along nicely with some wonderfully crafted exhibitions, some artists even sold some of their work which was great! They did some other events in Leeds during this time as well including: Leeds International Festival, a performance at A.C.I.D, a performance at Live Arts Bistro, an impromptu performance at Edinburgh Fringe and loads more which we can't quite remember right now.

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Anyway back to the story. And then suddenly The Hermit died and everyone was weeping, and everyone died and the sun stopped shining and everyone was crying. The new space was taken suddenly from us! This isn't meant to happen as it states in the agreement that we are to be given a minimum of 21 days, some of Adam's artwork went missing and some of his records too but all his books were okay. Anyway What of the future? Well this was written in the past and the past has kept happening and so has the present so more things have actually occured since when the history was first enscribed.

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P.S I just wanted to say that they carry on performing to this day. They are both very old & sometimes retell the stories of old that they created, if their mammaries don't fail them. You can often find them at at the corner of the universe and in all seriousness if you have found this short history purile then I suggest you stop right there, you may have stopped earlier and that's great. They do take themselves seriously in many other capacities and do really enjoy talking about many aspects of their work and the sprinklings of references littered throughout this website. Oh!  The Hermit now has a book of short stories which they have been working with the director to change into a performative book. Hopefully they will continue to make this a thing! Make sure you click on Lead Me To The Wierd Places to find out more.