Dead Fingers Talk are another of those bands that shone brightly for a brief moment before slipping through the cracks in the immediate aftermath of punk.

Which, when you hear them now, is a big shame because the Hull band were both behind and ahead of their time.

Firstly, they took their name from a novel by William S. Burroughs.

Seondly, they had Hull’s own guitar legend and Bowie sideman Mick Ronson producing their only album.

Thirdly, they had a repertoire of songs with gay themes – one of which inspired Tom Robinson to write his anthem Glad To Be Gay.

Fourthly, it was another Hull legend, Genesis P-Orridge, who gave their camp frontman Rob his exotic stage name of Bobo Phoenix.

Finally, and most importantly, they were really good; especially live, where Bobo come across like a mixture of Bolan and Bowie, Iggy and Jagger.

Dead Fingers Talk had formed in Hull in 1969 (as Bone) and broke up within a year, but reassembled with the same lineup in 1975.

I didn’t come across them until around 1978, the same year they released their first and last album Storm The Reality Studios,when they played a residency at the Rochester Castle in Stoke Newington, close to where they also lived after moving down from Hull.

Their sound seemed inspired more by the NYC style of punk than our own thrashier bands, and their ubiquity on the New Wave circuit earned them a loyal following that included a few famous fans – Chris Stein once wore a DFT T-shirt for a Blondie TV appearance.

It’s no surprise that Ronno mixed Jeff Parsons’ searing lead guitar lines high up in the mix, with a tone that reminds me of fellow Yorkshireman and guitar virtuoso Bill Nelson’s band Be-Bop Deluxe.

Listening now, it’s a surprise they didn’t find a wider audience with what is pretty distinctive post-punk sound built around the driving rhythm section of drummer Tony Carter and Andy Linklater’s throaty basslines, Parsons’ searing lead guitar and the fashionably sneery vocals and spiky, sarcastic lyrics of the implausibly named Bobo.

Apparently, it was their song Nobody Loves You When You’re Old And Gay that inspired Tom Robinson – then still in his band Café Society – to write his anthem Glad To Be Gay.

This tune is their album’s title track, with its memorable chorus line: “Some people want to fuck you up and some people… they just want to fuck.”