In eight hours, the UK's most foremost singer-songwriter manages to accrue £13.74. He would have made at least a quid more if I’d been aware of his stunt. For at the time, I worked just around the corner.

‘Born Again’ follows and again the Boy puts himself in the picture. This time, the setting’s LA where our hero is first stalked and then kidnapped by some religious nutters before they force him into a baptism. Well, the plot fits in with the title, I suppose.

Next up is 'You Were Right', again taken from Have You Fed the Fish?. This particular video is surreal, recalling Luis Bunuel's collaboration with Salvador Dali on Un Chien Andalou, as well as the cartoons on Monty Python. Presumably director Simon Henwood took the decision to make like Terry Gilliam after hearing the single’s bizarre lyrics: “I had a dream last night/ I was married to the Queen and Madonna lived next door.” So we have people with the faces of animals, although old horseface himself, Ruud van Nistelrooy, fails to make an appearance.  

Then there’s ‘Something to Talk About’ and ‘Silent Sigh’, lifted from Gough's misguided soundtrack to the film of lit lite king Nick Hornby's About A Boy. The latter is a companion piece to the former and is easily the worst video on the collection whereas ‘Something to Talk About’ is easily the worst song.

Fans of Joan Collins (and I don’t mean Julian Clary), will appreciate the video for ‘Spitting In The Wind’, which appeared on The Hour Of Bewilderbeast with a slightly ruder title. God knows why the record company felt the need to change it. ‘Pissing In The Wind’ is so tame compared to, say, Goldie Lookin' Chain’s recently released ‘Your Mother’s Got a Penis’. In the vid, Collins appears in the bath lip-synching the lyrics whilst Badly Drawn plays guitar without opening his mouth. Weird. Later, the Boy gets to put JC's dressing gown on after she removes her towel. For men our age, that’s just about still a fantasy. 

The best video on the DVD is the one for ‘Disillusion’ where BDB plays a human cab in New York. It’s followed by the best song, ‘Another Pearl’ – possibly the single which first made the UK’s record-buying public mad about the Boy. Or maybe it was ‘Once Around The Block’ which features a video dedicated to a couple of Mexican teenagers who caused a ten-mile tailback in 1994 when their braces became entangled after a smooch on the highway. The episode is recreated, which is odd but not so strange as the sight of Badly Drawn sans beard. He looks like he could become the basis for a potential character in Little Britain. Played by Matt Lucas, rather than David Walliams.

The videos for 'It Came From The Ground', 'Road Movie' and 'My Friend Cubilas' come, like the singles themselves, as something of a disappointment. The first features a man trying to tame a horse. The metaphor is lost on me. ‘Road Movie’ is ruined by BDB teaming up with the turgid Doves. It’s a harder rock sound, which, like a Gough without whiskers, just doesn’t suit him. Meanwhile, 'My Friend Cubilas' boasts the production budget of late-night television programmes targeting the insomniac student population.

More impressive are the extras. There’s Badly Drawn Boy performing ‘The Further I Slide’ at 2002’s Glastonbury. His one-man-band act is met with a bemused reaction from the crowd. Then there’s another video for ‘You Were Right’, live in the Gough family home. Finally, there’s a further vid for ‘Pissing/Spitting In The Wind’. Overall, truly the Boy done good.
(4/5)

Release Date: 11 October 2004

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Badly Drawn Boy - The Video Collection