This is just the task for that hard-working chap who does all the tacky trailers for upcoming disaster flicks. "In a world gone mad . . . anarchists go to posh, music, business dinners to throw buckets of ice over politicians . . . strange Danes become pop stars with songs about dolls . . . and a band called Cornershop have Number One hits."
TFI Friday certainly belongs to a world gone mad. Beamed to your TV set from west London every Friday, it's a leery playground for over-grown toddlers. Lads in un-tucked Ben Sherman shirts grin and bare it, while an endless parade of twenty-nothing girls wear very little clothing and wait hopefully to be beckoned to the upstairs bar.
There, they will be asked to applaud and cheer a man called Chris and his sidekicks Will (also called Wiiiill), Johnny Boy Revell (and his wheels of steel) and Cecil (a sixty-something who provides the show with weekly comments from the greasy spoon across the road). For one week only, Cornershop wander around the TFI universe and perform live on the show. And no, they won't be doing anything from their debut EP, In The Days Of Ford Cortina.
For chief shop stewards, Tjinder Singh and Ben Ayers, these moments are probably both sweet and surreal. Since the release of When I Was Born For The 7th Time last autumn, Cornershop have become the most sought after commodity on Planet Pop thanks to the album's funky fusion of offbeat hip-hop rhythms, Beastie Boys-meets-Beck idiosyncracies, tabla-tastic swing, soulful frolics and a vital pinch of country.
In the US, where they're signed to David Byrne's eclectic Luaka Bop label and the album was the influential Spin magazine's Album Of The Year, they've been touring with Oasis and explaining to Liam Gallagher what the line "everybody needs a bosom for a pillow" from the fantastic Brimful Of Asha means. Over here, the latter track, aided and abetted by Fatboy Slim's storming big-beat remix, went straight in at Number One in the British singles charts. Cornershop, it would appear, have arrived.
But rewind five years and join us at a rowdy gig in a northside Dublin bar called Fibber McGees. The band on stage are Cornershop but bear little resemblance to the Brimful Of Asha merchants. Instead, the ensemble on stage are showcasing discordant guitars, rough and ready rhythms and songs like England's Dreaming which combine seething politicised bile with a questionable grasp on timing and technique. The gig ends with a stage-invader trashing the drum-kit. The band join in.
On to March 1996 and let's move across the Liffey to the Mean Fiddler. Again, Cornershop are the band on stage and there are maybe four dozen people shuffling around the venue. However, on this occasion, beats have replaced the rush of white noise and there's a flow of languid, stylish and engaging grooves.
The evolution from riot-on troublemakers to the new darlings of the dinner-party set may seem remarkable but Tjinder sees it as quite an organic progression. "Our whole thing from the beginning was always to go against the grain. When we started, there were loads of bad bands playing bad music getting attention. That wasn't very inspiring so we started to do our thing. We feel exactly the same now as we did at the beginning."
He points to their second album, 1995's Woman's Gotta Have It, as the turning point. Innovative and infectious, it contains many of the templates for the funky revolution that is When I Was Born . . . More importantly for the band, it persuaded Luaka Bop to come on board with the financing to ensure the impoverished band could continue recording.
Facing a week where 40 interviews a day are set to be the norm, Tjinder is remarkably at ease with the current state of play. "You just have to dislocate yourself from it otherwise you'd go crazy. In America, it was a real slow, low-key, positive build but then on the Oasis tour, it was mad; all these people saying we were going to be massive and then hearing what was happening over here. At least, people are talking about us."
The vindication factor must be considerable - after all, they were dismissed by most at the very beginning as a messy and mouthy can't-play-won't-play shambles. Yet Cornershop have persevered in conditions which would have forced most bands to call it a day a long time ago. "Well I'm not a vindictive person but it is good to see a few people with their tails between their legs [laughs]. We've proved a lot of people wrong."
All roads lead invariably back to When I Was Born . . . While others would have hyped the presence of such A-list contributors as the late, great Allen Ginsberg (on When The Light Appears Boy) and hip-hop guru The Automator throwing production shapes throughout, this album had no need to. Instead, you'll find new revelations on each return visit: Tjinder's delightful croon on It's Good To Be On The Road Back Home Again, the bubbling funk running all the way through Sleep On The Left Side or just the uplifting, positive vibe of the whole damn thing. Funky days may be back again yet Tjinder continues to modestly insist that "what we're doing really stands out just because there's so much crap around."
He does himself a disservice. Most of the album's attraction comes from the diversity of sounds and sources, including Punjabi street jams, buckwild percussion and the search for that extra-large weird note. Such variation is perhaps attributable to Tjinder's background. "I remember at temple, there used to be a black gospel group at one end and a Sikh group in the other half of the building so you'd delve into the two and go from one to the other."
But unlike other mooted crossovers, such as bhangra or even Apache Indian, Cornershop are the first Anglo-Asian act (aside from the one-hit wonder that was Babylon Zoo and Spaceman) to make a considerable breakthrough in Britain. "We never just went for the Asian market and we could have, we've tried to keep things open and target everybody. We do get people from the Asian community saying `well done'. I think they're happy with us and what we've done."
Naturally, success on such a credible and commercial scale attracts all manner of extracurricular offers. You can currently hear Cornershop on the Caffreys beer advert, they're this year's most wanted in terms of film soundtracks and there's considerable interest in their more dance-orientated Clinton sideline and currently self-sufficient Meccico record label.
They could indeed shut up the shop if they so desired and head elsewhere. "We really don't like the music industry and there's a lot of other things we want to do which we've started, like Clinton. And we quite like DJ-ing, whenever we can, so we really wouldn't mind too much if it all folded. But that's kinda unlikely now and if the truth be known, I don't think it's such a bad thing for us to aim to have some money, seeing as we have had no money for the last five years."
Cornershop today, supermarket tomorrow, department store next week.
Cornershop play Dublin's Red Box tonight, 8 p.m.