Never Gonna Trigger You

Never Gonna Trigger You was the lead single from Alan Seymour's 1996 album Whenever You Retweet Somebody, produced by Hoe Mygawd Records. The single entered the charts at number 7, remaining in the spot for three weeks before moving down to 12 in week four and dropping from the top 20 completely by week five. It holds the distinction of being the only track in the charts at that point not to be recorded by Adele.

Recording
The track was recorded over one night recording in Softly Galoshes studios in late 1995; Whenever You Retweet Somebody was the final album to be recorded there prior to the studios closing and reopening in 1996. Seymour gave his band a demo recording produced that morning using his hearing aid interference and armpits as instruments, then went for a coffee and a piss while the band set about producing the music to which he would later record vocals. As was standard with Seymour's recordings, his producer Philp Scofiled spent the next two weeks carefully cancelling out the hearing aid signals and piecing together the separate layers.

Only three days before the track was due to be released commercially, Seymour and his band - in a different recording booth, this time owned by Merrick &amp; Larner Inc - created new experimental chord progressions to use during a lengthy interlude in the song. However, owing to Orange's restrictions on single releases - requiring a length of four minutes or under - the new twenty-five minutes of atmospheric instrumental forming the song's centrepiece had to be removed once more. Thirty seconds of this scrapped music was re-used in a later track on the album, Rock That Bed (Tonight) and a kazoo loop was recycled into the core framework of the title track.

Unbeknownst to Scofiled, on the evening before the single's release, Seymour re-recorded the chorus vocals in his bedroom using a converted shower system intending to overwrite the originals. Due to his failing eyesight, Seymour actually recorded over his Recycle GB advertisement narration and was forced to make a public apology on their behalf the following day, the news coverage of the blunder overshadowing any reports on his latest single and album announcement.

Video
To help the album recover from that disastrous announcement day, Seymour and Scofiled privately funded the production of a music video featuring iconic dancer Dancey McDanceface. Ever ones to push the boundaries of art and social experimentation, Seymour and Scofiled had shipped to the studios seventeen gallons of Stroppy goo, which they applied to McDanceface's skin to give her a glowing green complexion and, as they put it, an &quot;otherworldly, sexy look&quot;.

Dressed in a black spandex catsuit, Seymour told luminous McDanceface to improvise a routine to the music. She accepted the challenge, but asked Seymour to remove her catsuit first. Once the change was made, Seymour set the stereo playing while he and Scofiled went for jam buns in the station cafe. Seymour, unable to hear the stereo, failed to turn the volume up, but McDanceface professionally overcame the hurdle and danced to the silence, giving the final video a disjointed feel.

Seymourand Scofiled, too, had failed to note the safety hazards of using such a large quantity of Stroppy goo and returned to the studio thirty minutes later to find McDanceface encased from head to toenails in the hardened substance. Not wishing to fill in the stacks of paperwork that would come their way as a result of the health and safety infringement, Seymour and Scofiled hastily left the studio with their camcorders and footage and disguised the entrance as a brick wall, leaving McDanceface frozen within.

Dancey McDanceface is still there behind those doors. She'll never move again.

Live Performances
To date, Never Gonna Trigger You has only been performed live once, when Seymour and Scofiled - having celebrated in the local pub the sales success of their latest album - drunkedly duetted the single to the closed doors of the local police station. The performance was halted and the doors quickly flung open when the pair stripped for the final rendition of the chorus, and the two were held overnight for indecent exposure.