Jas Mann had formerly been in an indie music band, called The Sandkings, which he left in 1992, because of musical differences.

Babylon Zoo was signed to Phonogram Records after Clive Black heard their first three-track demo tape in May 1993. When Black moved to Warner Brothers Records in 1993, he took Mann's contract with him. An album had been prepared and sleeves for a single, "Fire Guided Light", were printed, but Babylon Zoo's debut was put on hold again when Black moved once more to EMI in 1995, where the band were signed on to a seven album contract.

However, promotional copies of "Spaceman" had already been distributed, and it was chosen to tie in with a new Levi's jeans advertisement. The advertisement concentrated on the speeded-up vocal section at the beginning and end of the song, which was actually the product of an Arthur Baker remix. This was not representative of the rest of the song, to the disappointment of many. The single went straight to Number 1 on the UK singles chart on 21 January 1996, selling 418,000 copies in the first week of release, at the time being the fastest selling single in the UK. The single remained at number 1 in the UK for 5 weeks, selling 893,000 copies in this period.

The single went to number 1 in the single charts in 23 countries. Appearances on BBC Television's Top Of The Pops featured several backing musicians, but the band was, in effect, centred around Jas Mann. Towards the end of 1996, "Spaceman" was approaching UK sales of one million and was the third biggest selling single of the year.

An album, entitled, The Boy With the X-Ray Eyes was produced at Mann's New Atlantis Productions music/artwork/video centre and included new-age tracks such as the self-explanatory "Is Your Soul For Sale?" and "I'm Cracking Up I Need A Pill".

Although it sold well, the comparative failure of the album and follow-up singles did, however, pose questions about Babylon Zoo's future survival. Mann's full-on adoption of glam rock on the follow-up King Kong Groover, appeared too late to cash in on the attendant furore surrounding Todd Haynes' genre tribute, Velvet Goldmine.

Given the failure of their subsequent singles, they became considered a one-hit wonder.

In 2005, it was announced that a new Babylon Zoo album, Cold Clockwork Doll, would be released sometime in the near future. In 2006 "Spaceman" featured on trailers for Ant and Dec's film Alien Autopsy, and the BBC's children's channel, CBeebies for the animated pre-school series Lunar Jim.