Critics agree that the Mercury Prize-nominated band, comprised of two pairs of siblings, are a breath of fresh air in a “cool”-obsessed music scene.

The melodic West London band are hirsute and unapologetically larger than the average anorexic chart wannabe. Their debut album has gone gold on the merits of its blissful West Coast-style harmonies rather than their stylist.

Yet the four-piece stormed out of the BBC studios just before their long-awaited Top of the Pops debut after hearing an ill-judged introduction from Richard Bacon, the presenter.

He asked: “What do you get when you put two brothers and two sisters in a band? A big fat melting pot.” The correct answer turned out to be a new Sunday night BBC Two edition of the chart show without one of its star acts. Band members Romeo (vocals and guitar) and Michele (bass) Stoddart, and Sean (drums) and Angela (vocals) Gannon, yesterday issued a statement on their walkout.

It read: “Due to derogatory, unfunny remarks made during the guest presenter’s introduction to our performance, we felt we had to make a stand and leave. It was an important day for us and should have been special. We didn’t take this decision lightly but we stand by it.” The band apologised to fans who tuned in to see them, adding: “Believe us, we were disappointed too.”

Bacon is no stranger to controversy. He was the Blue Peter presenter sacked for taking cocaine and has been given a second chance by the BBC. The BBC said that Bacon was “mortified” and tried to apologise to the band, whom he likes and had not intended to offend. “The intention was to refer to the band’s ‘big’ status, not their physical size,” the BBC said.

Stick-thin miming pop stars, regularly paraded on the chart show, are cited as negative influences on the body image of teenage girls. The BBC said that the programme did not discriminate against larger-sized musicians and appealed to the Magic Numbers to return and perform their song, Love Me Like You.

Top of the Pops has itself struggled to find an audience since being offloaded from BBC One last month. It is watched by little more than a million viewers on Sundays compared with 2.5 million on Friday nights.

The band, known for their smiling good nature, generally take comments about their size in good humour. “I think people love the fact that we’re natural,” Romeo recently told an interviewer. “I think we look great as a band,” said Angela, prompting her brother Sean to joke: “I’ve never looked better.”

Romeo replied: “I look great when I’m standing next to you guys.”

Signed to EMI, their background is more exotic than the average indie” band. The Stoddarts fled their native Trinidad after a coup and moved to New York before settling in London. The stars of this year’s Glastonbury Festival are 7-1 to win the prestigious Mercury Prize for their eponymous debut album, which went straight into the Top Ten.

Critics have devoted articles to their size. One praised them for “breaking with convention, without missing a beat”. The band have been compared to the Sixties band, Mamas and the Papas. But it was noted that Mama Cass Elliot, one of the female stars, died from a heart attack, wrongly attributed to choking on a ham sandwich.

OTHER BIG HITTERS

Mama Cass Elliot Told schoolfriends that she would become “the most famous fat girl who ever lived”. Succumbed to a heart attack, aged 33, but did not choke on a ham sandwich

Barry White The “Walrus of Love” did not let his comfortable physique interfere with bedroom technique. Died of kidney failure at the age of 58

Meat Loaf Plus-sized Texan took high-school nickname and bombastic rock into the charts. Bat Out of Hell is now half the man he used to be after weight loss

Alison Moyet Larger Essex girl added belting soul vocal to Eighties techno hits. The Chicago musical star lost 4 stone with the fitness trainer Nicki Waterman

Michelle McManus and Rik Waller Lardy Pop Idol contestants were given fleeting chance of stardom in viewers’ revenge

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