To my mind, it also stands out because it was mixed by the great Andy Wallace. We were obsessed with every record he mixed or produced. He was our idol. How did lil’ ole Skunk get to work with such an American legend? This was the man who had mixed Run DMC’s Raising Hell and Nirvana’s album Nevermind. Quite simply, Leigh did it. Years before, when she was starting out in the industry, working for the Rolling Stones’ booking agents, Leigh had spotted Andy’s home address on the office's Rolodex and had copied it down. When we got our first record deal, every time we had a gig she would send him a flyer, even though she knew he probably wouldn’t come. This was a piece of genius foresight because he later told us how it had sparked his curiosity. ‘I kept getting these red flyers from this English band that looked cool,’ he said, so by the time we had an American record deal, he took the meeting. He wanted to be involved, so that was the beginning of a beautiful relationship!

Everywhere we went, in every record shop in every town in the US, our album would be in the R&B section instead of rock, just because there were two black faces in the band. College radio support was vital for success and we had none. We would turn up at radio stations and DJs hadn’t listened to the album and knew nothing about us. Howard Stern bloody loved us! I did interviews with Mr Shock Jock himself! But it’s striking that the only radio play we could get was from a shock jock, because we were considered so alien.

By spring 1996, we had released a hit debut album and four singles, including ‘Weak’, and were riding a wave. We had to keep up the momentum. To capitalise on this, Leigh said, ‘You need another album out now.’ So, right in the middle of touring and the summer festivals, we went back to Linford Manor. Garth Richardson, who had worked with Red Hot Chili Peppers and Rage Against The Machine, was our producer for our follow-up album, Stoosh. We thought up the name driving from one gig to the next, when Leigh declared, ‘We need an album title right now or we’ll miss the deadline.’ (That album felt like it was just successions of crazy deadlines.) We all looked at Leigh and said, ‘Let’s name it after you.

Editing like this wasn’t a new idea, but the way Garth worked created a fresh take on it. It gave the music a pulsing energy that made it sound exciting. The downside was it blew your confidence out the window, because you had to do a million takes knowing you could never match that kind of perfection, which almost destroyed Mark. I had gone through the anxiety of multiple retakes on our debut album, so I could relate to what he was going through.

I was super happy with it, and Timo and Martin were about to release it, but then fell out over allocation of music publishing royalties, and Timo left the project. I guess they’d had some underlying issues with each other that this album brought out. The album was shelved as a result. I was very hurt by the experience. I felt I’d written some of the best material of my career, and it seemed they put it on the shelf to gather dust.