A GROUP of Hamsters are about to be unleashed on a music venue in Walthamstow.

The Essex based band, currently celebrating their 20th year (and 3,750 concerts) have been hailed as the UK's premier blues-rock attraction.

And now, for the first time in a number of years the band is returning to The Standard Music Venue in Blackhorse Lane.

The Hamsters, whose line up is Slim on guitar and vocals, Rev. Otis on drums and vocals and Zsa Zsa on bass, and vocals, will perform two full sets of Jimi Hendrix and ZZ Top songs.

The band members are no strangers to fame. Their track Taxi Driver', from their latest album Open All Hours' has been included in Classic Rock magazine's 100 Blues Anthems' in the August 2006 edition.

Slim, voted one of the top 100 guitarists of all time in a radio poll on LBC, appeared in a documentary about the Fender Stratocaster, titled Stratmasters', released earlier this year.

Since 2003 they have performed at the London Guitar Show, Wembley, and at the ExCel arena when the show moved there in the spring.

Originally forming for their own amusement (and taking their name from the Sex Pistols, who once used it as a pseudonym to outwit hostile councils), the Hamsters describe themselves as an aggressive band with a cuddly name.

Some of their most impressive claims to fame include a member of Natalie Imbruglia's band wearing a Hamster t-shirts on Graham Norton's show on Channel 4. and Formula One World Champion Damon Hill wearing one at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

The Hamsters are at the Standard Music Venue, Blackhorse Lane on Saturday December 8. For details call 8527 1966.