Despite a prolific career that spanned over 25 years, English iconoclast Nikki Sudden is best remembered for his early and brief tenure with Swell Maps ("Let's Build A Car"), an influential post-punk band he formed with his brother, Epic Soundtracks. His longest running alliance, though, was the Jacobites, a band Sudden formed in 1984 with Dave Knusworth, playing aggressive rock that owed more to the Faces or Rolling Stones than the angular pop of the Swell Maps. Sudden met Kusworth in 1980 while the latter played with the Subterranean Hawks. In 2004, Sudden recalled, "Dave and I agreed that if the Hawks ever broke up we'd get a band together. But when I turned up at Dave's house a few days after the Hawks had deceased, Dave said, 'I've already got a band together with Slim,'" meaning the Rag Dolls (who eventually disappeared without a trace) and Slim Cartwright (Kusworth's brother-in-law). Undeterred, Sudden convinced Knusworth to play in both bands. The Rag Dolls are only relevant to our present discussion because, in Sudden's words, "We stole two Rag Dolls' songs and made them our own," one of which was "Teenage Christmas" (now credited to Sudden, Kusworth, and Cartwright).

Initially, the Jacobites recorded a number of singles and EP's, plus two full albums including the acclaimed Robespierre's Velvet Basement which also featured Epic Soundtracks (who died mysteriously in 1997). They didn't release "Teenage Christmas," however, until 1996 after they returned from a lengthy hiatus, and then only in an acoustic version as the b-side of a split 7" single given away with an issue of Presto Magazine. Eventually, this version of "Teenage Christmas" showed up on the 2002 CD reissue of Twin Tone Records' 1986 Jacobites compilation The Ragged School.

The electric (and electrifying) version of "Teenage Christmas" came out in 1998, both on the band's final studio CD, God Gave Us Poor Sinners (Bomp, 1998), and as a limited edition 7-inch single on Chatterbox Records. Lyrically, I'll admit, "Teenage Christmas" is no great shakes (note that the words to the acoustic and electric versions vary somewhat). But this definitive electric recording is magnificent, if altogether obscure - a non-stop thrill ride of guitars and hooks.

Nikki Sudden once said, "The Jacobites are Nikki Sudden and Dave Kusworth. The Jacobites will continue as long as we are both alive." Kusworth and Sudden did, in fact, play together on a semi-regular basis until March 26, 2006 when Sudden died in his sleep from a brain hemmorage after a solo gig at New York's Knitting Factory. The Jacobites were scheduled to play in Lonon just three days later. In writing of Sudden's sudden death, English writer Kirk Lake recalled, "He figured in one of my favourite rock moments of all time - storming the stage to join Dave Kusworth's Rag Dolls playing 'Teenage Christmas' at a club in Birmingham with the promoter and the bar staff holding on to the speaker stacks so they didn't topple over on to the tiny stage."