1. Tell us of your musical background and how you became involved with ROTPM.
I first met the others at the TNS nights. At the time I was getting nowhere trying to get various bands off the ground so decided to try and join an already established band. I'd always been impressed by the energy and enthusiasm of Revenge Of..., but thought their sound lacked a little beefiness and aggression so I approached Andy about joining as a lead guitarist. A couple of days later Andy rang to say they'd discussed it as a band and all 3 members wanted a second guitarist and within a week I was rehearsing with them. It was kinda like that shit film about the singer from Judas Priest, but with more studded leather and moustaches.
2. What are you personal musical influences and how does this manifest itself in the bands music?
My personal tastes do not always reflect themselves in the band, for example, some people look at us and assume we're a psychobilly band - we've even been billed as a psychobilly band at some gigs - and even though I listen to a lot of psychobilly, it just doesn't work to play that way in a band like Revenge Of... cos its all about big beefy rock n roll riffs and catchy melodies. In terms of my lead playing, my biggest influences are Mick Jones and Nicke Andersson (of The Hellacopters) who both play in a sort of similar way - lots of major-scale blues style lead, but played really fast, kinda like a fucked up Chuck Berry way of playing. My biggest influence when it comes to songwriting though is Dillinger Four who mix the beefy rock n roll riffs with singalong melodic vocals, the aggression of punk, and the humour of idiots.
3. Edward Jacobean has been jailed for 6 months for try ing to pass himself off as a human fruit machine. You put 50p in his slot (anus to you and me), hold his plums (Testicles) and pull his one arm (erection). Payouts are all excrement/urine based. Would you risk money on this one armed arse bandit and would nudging conflict with your religious beliefs?
As a 3rd level Scientologist, I couldn't possibly answer that for fear of having a car battery attached to my nipples.
4. Tell us about your highs and lows as a punk performer and what pleases and pisses you about todays scene?
The highs are when you go to a gig, quite often in some shitty little town, where you've never played before, and people go off the fucking wall to your music. No pretentions, no poseurs, just raw fucking energy and enthusiasm. What pisses me off is how many people latch onto 'scenes' for the wrong reason -to be popular or get laid or whatever. Its so destructive because it waters down the creativity and ruins any sense of unity that exists. Its been happening to punk since Steve Jones swore at Bill Grundy and made the front of the Daily Mirror, but its funny how all of a sudden a scene as goofy and unfashionable as the psychobilly one is suddenly 'chic', and all these people who were emo last weeks are getting flat tops and wearing all this 'designer' psychobilly bullshit.
5. Describe your fellow band 'erberts in 3 words apiece!
Dave - Fat, Single and Readytomingle
Andy - Craig David beard
Big Hands - Big Handed Bastard
6. If you were a promoter for a day - where would the gig be, who would be on it and who would you ban from attending?
It would be at a venue we played in Southport called Casablancas which was in a shit amusement park and was decked out like a Moroccan banquetting hall, complete with 20ft plastic camel and was possibly one of the surrealist gigs we've ever played. It would be free to get in, and I would lay on buses from every city in the UK, and the line-up would be as follows
The Hellacopters
Dillinger Four
The Beltones
Zeke
Th'Legendary Shackshakers
Hank Williams III and the Damn Band
Revenge of the Psychotronic Man
If its allowed to include dead people it'd also feature
The Clash
Carl Perkins
Johnny Cash
and
Hank Williams
Banned from the gig would be the people I was talking about in question 4.
7. Eric Window has had 90% of his buttocks removed and replaced with double glazing. Basically he is now a see-through shitting machine preyed on be deviants of the bowel. Apparently its £4 a watch when he's on the bog. Sounds very reasonable but the question is - would you ever consider smoking a leopard?
Possibly if it was dried on a radiator first. You'd have trouble smoking a fresh leopard...
8. Best ROTPM track to date, why, who wrote it and what have you up your sleeve for the future?
Personally I like all the songs on our forthcoming EP best because they're a 3 way effort, rather than just being the work of one songwriter. For the future, I think its a tug of love between writing orchestral film scores and a rock opera.
9. Your live performances just seem to be getting better - whats the key to your ever improving stage craft?
Learning to play! Writing better songs and having lots of vocal practices seems to help too. We've got our 100th gig coming up, so I guess we've had lots of practice as well!
10. Geoff Floorboard has invented the first rubber house. If you drop anything it can take up to a week to catch it and falling downstairs can be even more dangerous. What is your view on this and would you take out a mortgage on such a building?
You wouldn't ever have to worry about the roof leaking in a rubber house, and if you got any answers wrong on your homework, you could just use the walls. Yes, if it has a rubber garage, rubber double glazing and rubber central heating, I'll take it.
11. Tell us about any pre-gig rituals you have and after show wind-down techniques.
Eat sugary foods and listen to Zeke! My wind-down techniques usually extend to changing my t-shirt and drinking lots of water. Davey Psychotronic likes to unwind by NOT loading in the van.
12. Finally - give us all a message to live by and inform anyone reading why they should check out ROTPM?
Because we are the biggest idiots in all of Christendom, and we rock like bastards! Yeeeah!
