"When we were much younger we used to call a certain type of person a 'Virgin Prune'. We saw a true and simple beauty in these people - but others classed them as freaks - other people were afraid and ignorant of these people - they called them 'mental', 'spaz', 'deformed' - we used to befriend them and in doing this get to see the real beauty they have... 'Virgin Prunes' are the true, beautiful people, they see the world with the eyes of a child but unlike children they are adults - adults who unlike you or me live exactly what they are - UNTOUCHED."

Have been one of the most significant acts to rise from the Post-puNk era. The PruNes formed iN mid-1977 in Dublin, Ireland. Originally Fronted by GAVIN FRIDAY, (born Fionan Hanvey in 1959) who fell with a group of like-minded individuals who dubbed themselves the Lypton Village. While some of the members of the Village included Paul Hewson and David Evans, later known as Bono and The Edge of U2, the remaining members of the Lypton Village went on to form the less commercial and more Avant-Garde group...The Virgin Prunes. The group took their name from the local slang for so-called outsiders and "freaks." This would be a recurrent theme in their music.

The Prunes were originally comprised of: GAVIN FRIDAY, vocalist GUGGI (Derek Rowen), DAVE-ID (David Watson), bassist STRONGMAN (Trevor Rowen), drummer POD (ANthony Murphy), and guitarist DIK (Richard Evans, the Edge's Brother).

The ViRgiN pRuNes baffled audiences with their first few shows, which were a mixture of punk anger, theatrical performance, surrealist art and rock 'n' roll. They were often defined as Dadaists probably resulting from the title of one of their performances The Dada Sitting Room, this label seems more appropriate than any other.

A Virgin Prunes show could include anything from men in dresses clinging to decapitated dolls, two "pig children" scrabbling in the mud, a birthday cake slowly being smashed to pieces with a crowbar, the horror of a mock abortion, a family tea party slowly turning primal, poetry and chicken bones, an insane candlelit waltz, bloody pigs' heads on sticks, plates full of feces, pseudo-religious ceremonies, rabbits playing on a bed to the sound track of a pornographic film, or even the bizarre image of a dead chicken smothered in ketchup.

After gaining a cult following the pRuNes issued their fiRst siNgle "Twenty Tens (I've been smokiNg all night)," which they independently produced. This single eventually landed them a a deal with the ROUGH TRADE label.

With the departure of POD, who was later replaced by HAA-LACKA BINITTII, the pRuNes released A New Form of Beauty. This lead to the intimidating Heresie, a french box-set released simultaneously with 1982's If I Die, I Die album. Heresie was a mixture of the pRuNes iNfamous peRfoRmaNce aRt, mixed with studio, and live recordings.

The departure of GUGGI and DIK who had become disenchanted with the music business prompted MARY D'NELLON (prune drummer POD's replacement) to take up the guitar...which allowed POD to return to the band. THe pRuNes set about to record the album Sons Find Devils, which went unreleased.

From 1983 onwards they were slowed down by their extensive tour schedule, the departure of key band members and the difficult birth of their second LP, Sons Find Devils. 1985 saw the release of a retrospective video which was confusingly titled Sons Find Devils, despite having no connection with the still unreleased album. Also a compilation album of rarities and unreleased tracks entitled Over the Rainbow was released.

The band toured further but still released nothing new. Sons Find Devils was finally released in summer 1986 as The Moon Looked Down and Laughed. The departure of Gavin Friday, who by now was the dominant creative force in the group swiftly followed in November 1986. This effectively spelled the end of the pRuNes. This was formally confirmed by a short comment at the bottom of the sleeve of a live album, The Hidden Lie, which was released in 1987.

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