GRIMMS were an English pop rock, comedy, and poetry group, originally formed as a merger of The Scaffold with two members of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and the Liverpool Scene for two concerts in 1971 at the suggestion of John Gorman.
[3] The notoriously mercurial Stanshall, meanwhile, had essentially already left the group before the LP was recorded, but although he consequently never appeared on any of the band's albums, the line-up remained flexible enough to allow him to occasionally return for guest spots at concerts afterwards.
During this busy period McGough, McGear, Gorman and Roberts also remained a going concern on their own terms as The Scaffold, releasing the album Fresh Liver, also on Island Records.
Ostensibly a Scaffold album, the lines between the two bands became increasingly blurred as Innes, Halsall, Megginson, Money and Conway all made significant musical contributions to the LP.
GRIMMS' own second LP of 1973, the studio album Rockin' Duck, received generally favourable press,[citation needed] but shortly after its release tensions among the band's leaders reached breaking point, preventing the group from capitalising on the good reviews.
Halsey had a highly developed sense of comedic timing honed during his days in Patto which brought much to GRIMMS' live performances of the period.
Although Sleepers proved to be the band's swansong, in the liner notes of the expanded CD reissue of the album the key members are reported as considering it their best and most cohesive recorded statement.