Dionysus, God of Enjoyment and Merriment, sat in his marble recliner chair, which itself sat within his modest three bedroom condominium, and pondered his existence. He cast his eyes around his opulent surroundings; past the trophies, the discs on the wall and the certificates that littered his vision. Brit Awards, Emmys, Mobos, Q Awards, gold discs, platinum discs, byzantium discs, kryptonite discs – he had them all. Except one. His eyes rested on the empty plinth, baiting and ridiculing him. Everything else he created had been a success, everything except the tricky and lucrative progressive music genre. What was it about the fans of this genus that was so different? Why had he managed to create so many successful bands in every other field except this one? The powerful thought storm he had created and sent to the weak minded and impressionable Cowell was supposed to implant an idea, which would eventually formulate in Cowell creating a national televisual delight. This TV programme would gather the cream of Britain’s musical talent into one place and from where the ultimate progressive musical group would naturally be formed. But something went wrong. Dionysus gave Cowell too much power and, worst of all, the belief that he held the ultimate governance on what people should listen to and buy. He blighted his misfortune. “Damn! If only the Gods weren’t so pernickety in their rules about not directly influencing matters on Earth”. He cursed the rule which had been introduced after the near cataclysmic disaster that befell when Hermes, God of Hives, Mischief and Irritating Sidekicks wielded his power over the writers of Godzilla and forced them to decide that Godzukey would be a good addition to the program. Dionysus glanced over at his pet and familiar, Dee the Cat. “What am I to do, Dee?” he inquired. Dee glanced at him and, as is a cat’s wont, promptly fell back asleep. Dionysus wandered over to the map of the world, a place where he could view all and everything, as one with a microscope studies very little things. He moved his hand over it, divining for a source of inspiration. As his hands moved over the North of England, a spark of electricity shot out from the map and up his arm, singeing his blonde goatee and drying his milk tache. He willed the map larger and zoomed in to the area (a bit like a celestial Google Earth™, if you will) and looked from whence the spark came. “Wolsingham?!” he whispered in disbelief.

Dionysus rifled through the boxes in the spare bedroom, flotsam and jetsam flying over his shoulders until his hand rested on what he sought. He pulled out the dusty display box and wiped away the smear from the façade. “North East Musicians with a Modicum of Talent (Collectors Edition)” He carried the box carefully into the lounge and sat at the small work desk in the corner, peeling back the frayed corners of the box lid. He cautiously pulled out the first figurine and inspected it closely. Foppish of hair was this statuette and Dionysus turned it over to read what was inscribed on the base – “Andrew Ditchfield, multi-instrumentalist” it said. “Hmmm, interesting” thought Dionysus as he put it to one side and pulled out the next figurine. Tall, handsome and striking was this one and underneath was written “Tony Wright, vocalist”. He moved back over to the map of the world, gently placed the two figurines in the centre of Wolsingham and stood back. Nothing happened. He pondered and postulated, mused and deliberated, reflected and cogitated until finally... “Eureka!” He popped to the fridge, took out a bottle of Deuchars Pale Ale and a can of Fosters lager, and then slowly drenched each figurine with the liquids. He sat back, watched and, sure enough, the sparks began to, well, spark.

Time and tides go by. Dionysus double checked the recipe he’d found on the internet for the perfect prog band and tallied it with his own adapted version of same. For the last year he had liberally doused our dynamic duo in alcohol, life experiences, acclaimed musical influence and strong coffee. For an added bit of spice he had even arranged for a bee to sting Tony on the ear, for no other reason than to give Andy a laugh. Now it was time to hear the fruits of his labour. He moved to the map of the world, zoomed in again on Wolsingham and turned up the volume. The dulcet tones that caressed his ears brought him paroxysms of joy. “At last!” He screamed, “No-one could argue that that is not 100% genuine 40% progressive rock music!” A word with his good mate Bacchus followed and with his help, a listening party of much joy was held, where all present agreed that Dionysus had cracked it. All was not perfect though, as each guest to a god asked the same question – what was to be the name of this ball-busting brace? “Rats’ Cocks!” Dionysus cursed to himself, “I’d forgotten about naming them.”

Dee the Cat absent-mindedly lapped at a discarded half full glass of Baileys as Dionysus moved around his condo collecting up the empty glasses, paper plates and other detritus left behind by his fellow Gods who had long since left the listening party, each whistling the hook line from track 3 on their departure. He looked for inspiration in his surroundings, a tactic which had worked so well when naming his other bands in the past; like “The Rolling Stones” whom he’d named after the time Eros lost the bet with him where Eros said he’d use his own testicles as marbles if Dionysus could make a frontman out of a half man/half chicken. Dionysus verbalised what he could see as he pottered about.
He spied the ornamental tank full of tiny fish – “ReallySmallFish? – Nah.”
He spied the buffet and the half-eaten magic pie – “Enchanting Pie? – Nope.”
He spied the dragon shaped pen on his desk – “Dragonpen? – Hmmm”
He looked at his digital cordless telephone and its dual tone multi frequency dialling mode – “Touchtone? Aaarrgh”
Dionysus’ musings were rudely interrupted as he tripped over the prone form of Dee on the floor, and landed face first in a plate full of vol-au-vents. “Curse you Dee, you lazy fupper!” He screamed. He moved to castigate said moggy, however it suddenly dawned on him that Dee had not responded with the usual angry ball of rapidly spinning fur, claws and facial lacerations that an inadvertent interface with him usually brought. Dionysus gingerly prodded Dee with his toe. “Dee? Dee? DEE!” He screamed, as realisation dawned that the cat’s responses were all firmly in the negative. Dionysus picked up the limp body of his erstwhile familiar and held him to his chest, gently weeping and lamenting at the loss of his best friend. He gently cradled the still form for several minutes, then rose to his feet, walked to the balcony that overlooked the thronging square beneath and held the cat aloft in the dazzling sunlight. “Subordinates!” He shouted, “Today is a sad day. A sad day indeed! My friend, my aide, my confidante, my scratcher of furniture, is no more! I command you all, as is my right as a God; pray silence for Dee, departed cat! Dee, inert feline! Dee, immobile moggy! Dee, Ex Puss!

At this point Dee droopily opened his eyes, said a meow that equated in human speak to “That Baileys is strong shit. Anyone fancy getting a kebab then goin’ to a disco?” and from his lofty position, promptly threw up sweet, cream coloured barf all over Dionysus’ toga, drowning out the sound of the second S in Puss.

So, that was the name sorted. DeeExpus. The vomit-drowned second S proving to be a boon, in that people didn’t emphasize the “Puss”. Dionysus took stock: debut album – sorted, band name – sorted, worldwide critical acclaim – sorted, what next, then? “Better get these buggers on the road” He mused. A few thought storms later and the band had their first few gigs booked. A debut performance in a nice local venue for friends and family, a quiet little gig in a small pub to get the dreaded and notoriously bad luck strewn second performance out the way, and the third gig in a country 2000 miles away, in front of hundreds, in a historical theatre, recorded for worldwide release on DVD and CD. “Yep, that seems a reasonably fair itinerary” he deduced, “Right, best get them in a rehearsal room”.

Immediately he noticed a problem. He thought he’d solved the initial quandary of how to reproduce Andy’s multi-instrumental performance on the album by giving Andy six pairs of arms, akin to Ganesha. The new problem was Andy’s attention span was limited and instead of managing drums, keys, bass, and twin guitars simultaneously; he had delighted in the discovery that one set could play guitar, one set could make and drink coffee, one could smoke tabs and drink beer, one could play X-Box, one could worry at his beard and the last pair could fettle with his nethers, all at the same time. No, not good, mainly because it was distracting Tony from his singing. Dionysus zoomed out of the map of the world and popped back into the spare room to see what he could find. Several hours and emptied packing crates later, he had assembled a makeshift band. A figurine of Gimli, the Rook from a Lord of the Rings chess set would do for the bassist, along with an Uruk Hai (pawn) as the guitarist and a Gollum (Bishop) would make a more than adequate drummer. They could all hum instead of the keyboards. Gimli, Uruk Hai and Gollum wouldn’t do for names, though, seeing as how the band weren’t Norwegian in origin, so he renamed them Ian, Phil and Leigh – as he was sure that these were the names J R R had originally meant for his literary creations before editorial interference. He placed them next to the other two on the map, doused them with alcohol and again sat back and waited.

Things were not going well. Although Giml-Ian seemed to have settled well and wowed the lads with his unique brand of bass playing, modelled on an ancient martial art known as “The Way of the Menacing Quiche”, the other two were of concern. Uruk Hai Phil had become majorly distracted by the club band he had recently formed as a side project and spent the entire rehearsal time muttering about meat draws, leek shows and bingo. Gollum-Leigh had shown an innate aptitude for drumming, due to his loitering in dank underground caves where he had kept himself entertained by banging rocks with sticks, however he had become obsessed with a quest to find “the ring”. Sadly Leigh’s quest was ultimately cut short and his heart couldn’t cope with the frantic pace he lived his life, although he crammed a hell of a lot of living into his short time. He touched the minds and hearts of all that he came in contact with and this was not lost on Dionysus, who duly employed him as his Olympian King of the Kit.

So, it was time for a final forage in the spare room. Dionysus had all but given up, until his eyes fell upon a box simply entitled “Mattell Rejects”. Ah yes, the box of defective action toys he’d bought from a car boot sale in Muggleswick. First out of the box was an action figure of “Stone Cold” Steve Austin, although this was obviously a reject as it had been based on his post wrestling career when he had let the muscle turn to flab. Steve the Guitarist sorted. Next out was a speaking toy doll of Starsky of “Starsky and Hutch” fame, however the voice box was defective, and instead of saying “do it” in that inimitable comedic style, it said “Goooogle it” in a rather effeminate Geordie accent. Starsky the drummer was too much like Starkey the drummer, so Dionysus changed his name to Kevin, for the hell of it. A final pot luck forage unearthed a sinewy, deformed model of indiscriminate origin, possibly identifiable as some hideous mutation of a Roger Moore-era James Bond doll, due to the constant up and down motion of the doll’s eyebrows. “You shall be Mark, and you will play keys.” And so, the final live band line up was born.

Dionysus had slipped into his human guise and wandered freely amongst the crowd at the Forum in Darlington, safe in the knowledge that his true identity would remain a secret. He studied the faces of those in attendance and saw only joy etched in same, the whole audience seemingly transfixed in aural hypnosis from the 40% prog that emitted from the band on stage. He could see he may have to tweak the odd bit here and there, like trying to make Steve not pull that “having a poo too big for his nipsy” face when he was soloing, and trying to encourage Tony that good stage presence did not consist of screwing your eyes tightly shut for the entire performance. Marc needed to wiggle his eyebrows more, too. Other than that things were good. Things were very good.

The second gig passed without incident, well, without incidents unexpected in the historically curse-ridden second gig. So now, time to give these boys a proper test. A simple flight in and out of Poland would most definitely not be character building, so Dionysus arranged for the lads to fly from Newcastle to Amsterdam, Amsterdam to Warsaw, Warsaw to Swindon, Swindon to Brussels, Brussels to Gdansk, Gdansk to Warsaw. Then they could get the train from Warsaw to Katowice. That should have them nice and fresh for the soon to be recorded concert and also something for Tony to keep the crowd entertained between songs as he recounted the journey. At 5pm on 19 February 2009, six warrior poets entered the stage at the Wyspianski Theatre and played their socks off. With the exception of Tony, whose socks had disintegrated from wearing hiking boots the entire duration of the trip. It is still whispered in hushed tones throughout Poland of the Ghost of Wyspianski theatre; the strange presence that lurks outside of changing room two; the supernatural bouquet that causes all who smell it to have eyes that water and uncontrolled gagging. Rumour has it that it’s the spirit of a disgruntled actor who committed suicide after there was no bowl of M and M’s with all the brown mutha’s taken out in his changing room. In truth, if they looked a little closer, they would find the discarded pair of fungi-ridden Hi-Tech Happy Walkers that the rest of the band forced Tony at gunpoint to leave outside the changing rooms under a dust sheet. The return journey passed without incident, with the exception of Marc giving a Polish Train Hostess some less than gentlemanly English lessons. Someone also broke wind in the Taxi from the airport almost wiping out everyone inside, although strangely, the culprit was never identified. Dionysus knew though, and giggled from on high from where he viewed

Dionysus decided that before he sent the band out on some real adventures, he’d better blood them with a few other seasoned Proggies in order to see how they behaved in company, so they did various tours of duty under the tutelage of some of the UK’s finest proggers; Pendragon, Tinyfish, Manning, Touchcloth and other mighty makers of melodic merriment. Unfortunately at some point they forgot to pack Kevin in the van and it wasn’t until they got back oop North that they realised they’d picked up a small novelty Hoover instead. Thankfully the device proved to be a dab hand with a pair of sticks so the guys put it down to Karma and carried on in their merry way. Dionysus felt he’d played a blinder in surreptitiously swapping the drummer, especially as he could now put in a note for a new vacuum cleaner as his Henry Hoover was looking a bit battered and he fancied a Dyson anyway.

The gigs, he felt, had the boys chomping at the bit. Time to set them off on a real adventure. He directed the boys to London to go and fill in a form that stated they weren’t terrorist, pimps, criminal masterminds or Welsh. Henry took on responsibility of fucking up his form filling, as is tradition in such situations, and all was done. Time for them to go to that America (fuck yeah!).