Atomic pollution interview from Oct 2010

• 
  
  1: So your quite outspoken about the whole suicide girl thing? what about the argument that its sisters doing it for themselves and its empowering not to mention a cheap and easy way to pay the bills compared to being exploited in a factory or whatever? also the point that its up to no one but themselves what they do with their bodies? besides, dont even try to tell me you've not had a quick one off the wrist over internet porn?!

   

  A.P.: Yep man, well, I didn’t know about this “suicide girls” before the question in the other intie, so I searched a little around about this and came across some comments of ex suicide girls who had bad experience in this business.

  So I advised girls not to become one. Of course it’s up to everyone what they do, and if you really want to do a job like this I can’t be against it . It indeed pays the bills better than a regular job if you like to do this kind of work. If you think you like it coz you’re attracted/fooled by money/fame it can cost you, coz I can imagine that you would have to commit a contract violation if you want to quit. Besides, at the end of the day, whether jobs pay more or less, in this world most jobs are exploitation. Also, the link with punk is misplaced coz they think the look resembles punk but it’s got nothing to do with it as punk is not a fashion or a trend but a state of mind. SG is just another company trying to make money off a subculture.

  
  

  
  
  

  2: So your a 'one man band' eh? no mates? to be honest i think its great that punks can do it DIY even if theres no likeminded people in their locality, or is there tonnes of punks around you but your an elistist cunt?! i like the look of your graphics too, very crass inspired? i think the pay no more than $0.00 on your cd cover is a clever touch, mind you, you'd have a cheek to charge for it!

   

  A.P.: Yep mate, a one man band. I actually had this idea for a very long time now. Just never had all the stuff to do it and always been too busy playing in bands, but to be honest a have never met punks likeminded enough in my locality. The punks I meet over here like to shout along with the classic punk songs and claim that they are anarchists but in fact they are only happy when they are completely drunk and don’t have to care about politics at all. If you know the song “stop thinking and pogo” by A//Political then you should know what I’m talking about because it’s a perfect description of every punk I know in Belgium.

  Sadly enough ignorance, apathy (booze) is their bliss. 

  Glad you like the artwork. Crass is indeed a big inspiration to me.

  About the “no charge” for my cd’s: I never looked at it as a clever touch.

  I mean it more as a big fuck off to capitalism, companies, power, greed as they destroy our world/earth. I realize a bit of money is needed in this world to live, but keep it decent, if you get my meaning.

  
  

  
  
  3: Belgium was the first European country to ban the Burkah, do you think this was the right thing to do? is it not a major infringement into another cultures rights? or do you think its time to challenge outdated misogynistic rites even if it does step on a few toes along the way?

   

  A.P.: Although I dislike religion very much as it often means oppression, war and evil like that, I don’t think it was the right thing to do for Belgium to ban the burkah. It could only be right if they had banned it from the beginning coz it would be normal for a foreigner to blend in and adjust to a new land where he/she is gonna stay/live. But, if ye tolerate it for years until it’s become a “problem” and then take it away, it’s not right and disrespectful. Now it just seems that our government is pushing this law because they want to join the “Islam is evil” trend.

   

  Thx for the intie Fraser. Wish you the best of luck with 3PRQ. If people want to check out my music/art:

   

  www.myspace.com/atomicpollution

  
  

  
  
  Like he says, check out: www.myspace.com/atomicpollution

Rob Filth interview from November 2010

Rob has been continuing to colourise the old FILTH comics, go to facebook and search filth comic to have a look.....

I first saw Rob’s work in the centre pages of old UK punk zine ‘Problem child’ in about 1987, I got to know him through writing for the FILTH comic and catching him at gigs and so forth, the cunt’s been making jokes about shagging my mum ever since. Anyhoo, Filth has been appearing in Facebook in coloured format and I thought 3 questions would shed light on wether the yuppie cunt is back in the publishing game….....

 ....

 ....

Okay Fraser here's the answers to your "three questions" except they ain't three questions, it's actually more questions than your mum gives me if I neglect to phone her for more than a few nights......

 ....

 ....

1: So back in the 90's you drew and published your own alternative comic, Filth, how many issues/copies did you do? Was most of your punters comic fans or punks? punks are notoriously devoid of humour, did any of the stuff in FILTH upset the PC brigade? there was a glut of more mainstream comics of that ilk at the time, Smut, Pulp, Viz etc, didnt you work for them too? you must have made a fucking killing you yuppie cunt?....

1. Filth was actually published regularly in the late 80's and not the 90's, the first issue was printed up on 24 Aug 1987and had 500 copies. Filth 2 had 1,000 copies, Filth 3 had 1,000 copies but had to be re-printed another 2 times because they were selling faster than I could collate them at that point and so ended up having about 3,500 done in the end, Filth 4 had 5,000 printed and the final Filth 5 which DID come out in the 90's several years later after the initial run in 1996 had 1,000 printed up. Originally the comics readership WERE punks and crusties because Filth 1 and 2 were mainly sold exclusively via gigs and the zine network, however by Filth 3 when I started to get the comic in to various comic shops the readership widened beyond just this audience. I don't think punks ARE devoid of humour, only perhaps the fashion "sceney" conscious ones who take themselves too seriously maybe. Don't forget there are a lot of jokey punk bands around not just the political ones and even Crass had a very situationalist/surreal and satirical sense of humour despite the fact that most people seem to think anarchopunk equates as having to be a miserable depressive cunt carrying the weight of the worlds ills on your shoulders. Also Chris Donald of Viz drew the first Toy Dolls album cover too I believe and toilet humour had always been rife in Punk ever since the fucking 70's.

 ....

Yes, Filth did on occasion upset a few of the politically correct brigade, most memorably the feminist lot who branded it "sexist shit", disappointingly it never got a reaction from the vegan nazis however which is strange considering that myself and Steve(one of the other artists in the comic) were often on occasion depicting animal cruelty. I say disappointing because someone getting irate over the fates of fictional cartoon animals would have amused me cos everyone knows that cartoon animals don't feel pain like real ones do.
The more mainstream comics such as Smut and Pulp etc all came out after Filth, Viz itself was not mainstream when Filth was first launched and it was only Filth, Doodlebug and Poot which were the first Viz-cloned comics. Once Richard Branson hyped up Viz and gave them a national distribution getting them in all the large newsagent chains like WHSmith and Menzies and when Viz broke the mainstream and national consciousness, other larger properly distributed clones cropped up in competition such as Brain Damage, Gas, Smut, Ziggy, Pulp, Zit, Spit and Top Banana. There were quite a few others such as UT, The Trout, Gutted, The Gutter etc, but these ones were the most notable titles in my mind. 
I jacked in Filth to work for several of these comics because it afforded me not only to concentrate on drawing cartoons(Filth comic had become 90% distribution and 10% creativity work wise by that point), but it also allowed me a bigger audience and the chance to actually for the first time make a bit of money from my cartoons. Beforehand I was struggling just to claw back the print money with Filth comic and never made a penny from it.
I worked as a regular on Ziggy, Pulp, Zit, Spit and Top Banana and did a few very brief stints on Smut and Elephant Parts(formerly Brain Damage). As for "making a killing", I think the woman at the checkout in Sainsburys got more by the hour than I was making, I would say about 30% of the comics I contributed to and got published in, I didn't receive any payment for, but I did manage to make enough to get off the dole for about a year and was paying myself an average wage of £60 a week(which was £20 more than a giro at the time which was around £40 a week), in today's terms with JSA being around £65 a week I suppose that works out at about £100 a week - hardly a huge wage for what was basically a full time job.

 ....

....

 2: Your also known for your involvement with punk band Throw Bricks At Coppers, and some other noisy outfit i cant remember the name of... what happened to those bands? and your very critical of the punk scene in general, despite looking like your stereotypical punk yobbo, why? now your into the goth scene it seems, surely you must agree that 99%, no, 100%, of that music is SHITE... havent  you even been doing some goth modeling, looking morose in churchyards n' that? pay well does it you fucking yuppie cunt?....

2. Basically Throw Bricks At Coppers are no more, they were gigging on the punk scene for 7 years between 1997 and 2004 and notched up close on 100 gigs and it's highly unlikely that the band will reform. I do often get people still asking me to reform TBAC, but I'm simply not interested. It was an interesting experience but being in a band is basically living the life of a fucking travelling alcoholic tramp, unless you have extremely rich parents, and that just doesn't appeal to me. I don't think I do look a stereotypical punk, I consider myself alternative as I hate the punk label applied to me. The dictionary definition of "punk" is "cheap, nasty and worthless", well I don't consider individualistic artistic and creative self-expression of appearance and free thinking to be any of those things, and so I reject the label. Also for something which is supposed to be anarchistic it's kind of laughable that the punk scene seems to have the biggest fucking rule book in existence on how people should and shouldn't look and what consists of being a "poser" and "fake" etc
Yes I do hang around mainly "goth" clubs nowadays and that's basically because the punk scene is just an alcoholics scene with people crashing cider bottles around each others heads because they're a poser or a nazi scumbag.....

 ....

....

 ....

people generally just seem a bit more mature on the Goth scene and basically, I got sick of the retarded double-standards which are rife in the Punk Scene. The Goth scene I consider to be more progressive musically than Punk at the moment too, because most punk bands nowadays seem to be obsessed with wanting to sound and look like they're from 1982(which I personally think was an incredibly shit year for punk incidentally) and are completely introverted musically and politically. The best years of punk in my mind were the late 80's and the late 90's. I agree with you that Goth was utter dire shite when it was mainstream in the late 80's, especially when compared to the intelligence and political significance of Anarcho-punk during that same time period, however the later fusion of the Gothic aesthetic  with things like Grindcore/Death metal which created Black Metal and the later Gothic Metal and Gothic Doom genres have a far harder edge than the campy lightweight mainstream wimpy goth stuff in the 80's, much of which was like a piss-poor watered down punk anyway.
Personally I'd just rather listen to a Cookie Monster Serenading a Soprano Opera Singer to a blast beat string orchestra and find it more amusing to hear and progressive than a barely literate pissed up twat chanting out "Oi! Oi! We're Punks and Proud" to a shit tinny distorted guitar in front of a load of identical looking twats all doing their drunken damnedest to find a TARDIS to transport them back to 1982 again. Call me a traitor if you like, I don't care - I was in 1982 and punk and I have no desire to return back there again.
Ha ha, and no, I don't do "goth modelling", for a start I'm too fucking ugly. However, at most social functions there will always be cameras, just like there always was on Kings Road or in Camden. As for whether such things pay well or not, well I have to be able to afford to the red carpet upholstery cleaning for my fleet of Rolls Royces hidden around the back of my house somehow! I could be wrong, but I don't think you can make benefit claims for that one.  ....

 ....

....

3: You've taken a step into the 'proper' art world recently, even hosting your own exhibit?, hows that panning out? is it still cartoonish stuff you do or what? sold much? bet your making a fucking killing you yuppie cunt? i notice on facebook you've been posting all the old FILTH stuff, there still much interest in that? and why no FB page full of your newer art? is it shite or something?
cheers!....

3. By a step in to the "proper" art world I assume you mean me getting Filth comic in to The Tate Britain for the "Rude Britannia" exhibition? Basically, I saw on the "Rude Britannia" website that they were asking for underground humorous magazines for the Reading Room part of the exhibition, and seeing as they were displaying a giant Viz comic there, I sent in some copies of Filth which they accepted. I have recently hosted a Filth Exhibition too, however because of Buffoon Boris who hasn't a fucking clue on how to run Public Transport since he became Londons Mayor the tubes weren't working on the stretch of line where the exhibition was hosted and so the turn out was extremely piss poor which was frustrating given the work I put in to the exhibition. Amazingly, however I did manage sell a few pieces never the less which was enough to break even and pay off the set up costs of the exhibition - hardly "making a fucking killing" but then I'm forgetting, unless you are in a punk band paying through the nose and losing money by flushing wads of it down the toilet by performing to one man and his fucking dog in some shithole toilet of a pub pissed out of your head every single night then you simply haven't any punk kudos. I really should roll in dog shit a few times and sleep in a hedge for a year or two whilst I'm at it eh? I mean unless you are wearing the same fucked up falling apart clothes with your bollocks hanging out for at least 10 years and have pissed and shat your trousers and neglected to follow any kind of hygiene regime then you are simply not a punk and just one big fat fucking rip-off millionaire capitalist poser instead.   ....

 ....

....

I have made a Filth comic page on Facebook, it's basically because I decided to colour in all of my cartoons now that I finally have a full understanding of Adobe Photoshop and I have been publishing the results there because many people never got to see Filth Issues 1 and 2 which sold out donkeys years ago and which were never reprinted. I have always wanted my work to be in colour too, but when it was originally drawn up, the very idea of it ever being seen or printed in full colour was a completely inaccessible and unaffordable dream. In that manner, it IS "newer art" as each page often takes as long to colour as it did to originally draw up. As for my other "newer art", most of it is either my Art Diploma stuff which I did a few years ago or Photoshop stuff which doesn't really relate to the Filth comic stuff and which most people would find boring anyway. I am contemplating maybe one day either reprinting all of the Filth stuff in colour(when it's all completed and IF it ever gets all completed as we are talking about a huge body of work there) or reprinting it in a big book. Bands re-release their albums from decades ago all of the time to a new audience, so why the fuck shouldn't I do the same for my cartoons? Considering most people want everything for free nowadays I could be just wasting my time and money however. As for new cartoons? Well considering I have over 100 pages of Black and White art to colour in and that I am also presently trying to hold down a full time job at the same time too, that could be some time away yet unless some fucker wants to commission me to draw shit up because I'm not about to give up the day job to arse around drawing cartoons for jack shit at the moment. Then again, perhaps I shouldn't worry about that and just go out in the fields and graze grass and live off that like a fucking cow instead? Oh, I forgot, I'm supposed to hold a big sign telling idiotic tourists to ask me where to buy Doctor fucking Martins from instead aren't I? Good, I'm glad we've finally worked out my true vocation in life purely from personal appearance alone, it's so incredibly gratifying for me. Thank you. Would you also like me to roll in that dog shit now or later perhaps

Black Fag Interview October 2007

BLACK FAG do limp wristed Black Flag cover versions, not only a classy idea, sounds pretty good too!. They were however cheeky enough to split my '3' questions into parts A, B & C on occasion but we can forgive them i suppose....

1: So (most of) you obviously love the cock and love black flag, so it makes sense to blend the two, but why no 'queered up' lyrics? the songs you've posted are just straight covers, what gives? 
The whole point of the band is that Black Flag's lyrics were as queer as a 3 dollar bill to begin with! If you sing the same lyrics with a lisp and a sassy attitude, they take on a whole new dimension. "Nervous Breakdown"? "Jealous Again"? Does it get much bitchier than that...? In fairness, we do change up the lyrics on occasion just to spice things up. "TV Party" has a whole new list of TV shows during the chorus..."I Don't Care" includes the line "I Don't Care / If your parents still think you're straight"...and "My War" becomes a song about fashion design entitled "My Wardrobe". It's not about cock. It's about ATTITUDE!
1a.) Theres a wealth of cover bands around so why become one? why not just do your own band?
"Straight" cover bands are pretty pointless, but we're doing a parody and trying to put our own twist on the music, so we figured it would be worth the time and effort it has required. So far people seem to appreciate it overall! Everyone in the band has other musical projects that they're working on, Black Fag is just for fun.

1b.) the reviews ive read on your blog all love the cd, but is it not gonna wear thin after a while?
When the joke wears thin we'll stop playing, but so far we've found ways to keep up the interest. No two shows are ever the same, we always change our song order or plan out some little skit or do something to keep people coming back and to prevent ourselves from getting bored.
1c.) are you gonna cover the entire black flag catalogue?
Probably not. We're huge Flag fans, but truth be told they DID write one or two really shitty songs... We have 17 songs in our repetoire, only 10 of which are on our CD (available through interpunk.com!!). We will probably learn a few more and if someone puts up the dough maybe we'll release them!

2: We know that TSOL are fans!, but what about any of the original black flag? you met any of them? or Rollins, he's a pretty macho kinda guy, reckon he'd be a fan? you had any feedback from any of those old fucks?Keith Morris is the only member who's responded to us directly. He said our CD was "awesome/hilarious!" (again: available at interpunk.com!) We also got a compliment out of Raymond Pettibon, who did all of the artwork for Black Flag. Our drummer handed Rollins a CD, but we never heard anything back from him. I get the feeling that if he listened to it on the right day he'd love it and if he listened to it on the wrong day he'd hate it. I don't know what day he got the CD... We've had some great feedback from other old schoolers and punk personalities, though. Adam Stern from Youth Brigade once told me drunkenly that he was going to call in to Henry Rollins' radio show and tell him that we blow the real Black Flag away!
2a.) I read your gonna give 10% of any money made to gay charities? thats pretty cool, how much you given away so far? 
Zero, unfortunately. We haven't made a profit off the record yet, so there's nothing to donate. But we're really close! If we sell another 10 or 20 CDs we'll have broken even and soon after that we'll make out our first check. People can buy the CDs at our shows or, if I haven't mentioned it, through interpunk.com!

éééééé

3: It must be kinda hard to try and be original when your a cover band and you must've played with a fair few other tribute bands? who do you rate? i was looking through your top friends and hardly any of them have any songs up, you can tell us, is it cos theyre all shite?Our favorite tribute band to play with is the Bitchfits because they're the most fun. One band that I would love to play with is Black Flab, the all-fat Black Flag cover band, but they live all the way up in Canada, so I don't know if it will ever happen. I can't say for sure why other bands don't put up songs, but it's probably because recording is a chore and being in a cover band is supposed to be fun, so why deal with the hassle?Thanks for the interview and tell everyone to catch us on our EUROPEAN TOUR this December!!! Dates and info on our website. Live proud and RISE ABOVE!

Many thanks to Liberace Morris for the replies, you really ought to check them out at:

www.myspace.com/blackfag

AMEBIX interview Oct 2007

Amebix interview from 2007. I wouldn't normally bother to transfer one with such short answers but this is worth a read for the sheer hypocrasy contained within.. i think it was a month or two till they were on a U$A tour and punting records for £18... which i have heard is good, but fuck me, £18....

Another one with longer questions than answers! its a quick chat with Rob from the legendary AMEBIX.

1: so from the chapter on Amebix in the Day The Country Died book it seems your early days with Amebix were chaotic to say the least!, whatever happened to the characters from back then such as the guy who got sent to an institution after you all occupied his parents mansion? or that drug dealer woman? do you still have contact with any of the old squater lot like disorder? you now make a living making swords and have built a rather impressive looking house, what is everyone else up to nowadays?

Martin is doing a bit better,i visited him in Devon a couple of months ago,first time in many years.stig has just had his second child,Spider is still a builder in Bath.Boobs from Disorder went to prison for ten years,whilst steve is a bigshot DVD guy in Denmark.

2: i read an interview ages ago where you (or one of Amebix) was saying what a shit deal you had with Alternative Tentacles, saying you got, like 7 or 12 pence from each copy of Arise sold? did they sweeten the deal with the reissue then? i read something about a dvd and discography cd coming out on AT soon? are AT better to deal with now? you said you'd never made money from the stuff you did, do you think that's maybe got something to do with it not being in print long enough, demand is certainly outweighing supply when you see the prices some of your records sell for on ebay and such, i saw a monolith lp sell for over £100 a few years ago!

A.T are the only label that have actually paid us properly,southern ripped us off entirely,John Loder paid himself our royalties.The DVD will be out by next summer,we have been doing extensive interviews with all members,plus fans and Neurosis/jello etc,it is going to be definitive,plus never seen live footage.
Monolith is an album i would like to entirely re master,but the master was destroyed

3: In the DTCD book you said you felt that no one really 'got' Amebix at the time and was suprised to see how popular you actually were on the internet?, has there been any temptation to do a cash in reunion? i bet you'd make a mint! has any of the bigger metal bands ever covered your stuff? the anwl reckon they've made more in royalties from the Metalica cover than all there own stuff put together!, who would you like to see do a cover version of an Amebix song? what did you make of the Japanese tribute lp?

I liked the Japanese tribute,unusual at times but still good.Amebix will not re-form,that is totally antithetical to what we were about,leave it to the wankers to squeeze money out of their dried up dugs,we will be remembered as one of the very few Bands that had the integrity not to sell their asses.

There we go then, thanks to Rob for taking the time to reply....

Deviated instinct interview from 30/7/07

Deviated instinct interview from 30/7/07. I like this one, Mid put some effort in which was nice!

Strap on your wellies, Deviated Instinct are getting back together for the upcoming Feeding of the 5000 gig in London, what better time to fire off 3 questions..........many thanx to Mid for the replies

1: Deviated instinct used to get called deviated INSTINK and were credited with all this stenchcore stuff, what's the longest you've been without having a wash then? or changing yer pants? 

Hmmm, I don't think anyone called us Instink, you just made that up to court controversy and scandal. As we said in a trillion interviews and seven back in the day we came up with the 'stenchcore' tag on our demo as kind of a joke as there were so many ridiculous 'cores' going about at the time and people used to comment on our general dishevelment. We never imagined it would be taken so seriously and become some sort of sub genre of it's own.
Our general state of disarray was purely down to the lazy, good fer nuthin' life style we were leading. Living in cruddy squats, bedsits etc, being drunk and falling in shrubberys, hitching all over the country and sleeping under motorway bridges and so forth. It was all genuine filth from filthy living. Them's were the days indeed. I mainly used to change my clothes when the one's I was wearing disintegrated. I didn't have a bathroom in my house. Well, there was a shared shower which was shared between a bunch of bedsits but it was rank so I just used to have a bath if I went to visit my parents which was normally only every few months.
Now I have a very nice flat with a very nice bathroom and a washing machine and so I am bright and shiny as a button and there really is no need to look like a tramp. Huzzah.

2: Was reforming something that you were thinking of anyway or was it just because of the upcoming crass gig? Being a bit later than that early 80s anarcho scene, how come you ended up doing that gig? What's your opinion of the crass/ignorant gig thing anyway? I hear a lot of shouts of 'rip off' and 'sell out'? 


No there were no plans at all to reform. In fact if I was ever asked about it I said it would be a cold day in hell before we did. I didn't see any reason for it. The closest we'd come was that until we started having terminal drummer problems Bait had been thinking about sorting out an American tour and we figured if we did play in the US we'd probably throw in a few old D.I songs at the end for fun.
The way this all came about was that I received an email from Leggo saying he'd been approached and asked if he was interested in reforming D.I for a one off gig playing with Steve Ignorant, Flux etc in London. It was good to hear from him as we'd lost touch some 13 or so years ago. But my initial response to his query was a flat 'no'. But then I got to thinking about it some more and talked it over with Snapa and posted a thread about it on the Profane Existence message board just to see what peoples opinions were and who would be interested. The response I had from there and all my friends I spoke to was mostly very positive and almost everyone was saying, "yeah …DO IT". We had to give an answer pretty quickly so we just thought, what the fuck, why not. It happened very quickly and now there's no going back, he he.
To be honest I'm just stoked that so many people are travelling from all over the world to see us and I'm meeting up with friends old and new from all over. Plus, to be honest it's just an experience. I mean there's no way I'd ever get another chance to play in a venue that size to potentially thousands of people. It's crazy. I'm used to playing to 3 dwarves and a goat in the toilet of a pub with Bait.
Regards my views on the whole thing. Well, yeah I know the punk police are there moaning on about it, and there are many valid points. I had already heard about the event before we were asked to play, to be honest I just didn't think anything of it, it didn't really interest me. If we weren't playing I very much doubt I'd have been going. But I wasn't bitching about it and for fucks sake, it's just a gig, there are more important things in life to get hot under the collar about. People are making a fuss about the £17.50 ticket price, but I paid more than that to see Neurosis in the same venue recently and didn't think anything of it. Sure, I know it's the whole Crass and 'pay no more' thing that leaves a bitter aftertaste and seems more than a little ironic, but still. This isn't 1983 or something. An event this size was always going to pull way too many people for any DIY space to cope with. Big venues have big overheads etc and the ticket price is going to reflect that. But no one's forcing anyone to go.
I'm under no illusions about the nature of the gig. For a lot of people I know it's nothing more than a big nostalgia fest. I'm really not a fan of the whole cult of bands reforming and trying to re-live their glory days or whatever. I'm more about the here and now, so maybe this all makes me a bit hypocritical, but fuck it who cares. I contradict myself on an hourly basis.
Personally I'm just taking from it what I want. That mainly being able to meet up with so many friends from around the globe, play some old tunes as a celebration of a band that I'm really proud to have been in and am chuffed that this many years after we fell to bits that people still care about. It's a pretty awesome feeling. And I don't doubt I'll be getting screaming drunk and singing along to every word of Feeding the 5000 by the end of the night. Hell, it's not gonna change the world or bring the government to it's knees. But when I first heard that record, and more so Stations of the Crass back in the early 80's I can't stress how much it changed my life and helped shape the person I am now and the way I live my life, the same goes for Flux of Pink Indians. I have no idea of the personal motives of the various members of those bands for doing this, but I know that it's not going to change the way I feel about their records and the message they spread 20 odd years ago. I know a lot of younger punks who were way too young to have been there first time are excited about this event so why not eh ? I'm sure even though the world has changed somewhat the words on those records still meant as much to them as me.
But at the end of the day, it's just a gig and will soon be forgotten and those whinging on about it now will have found something else to sit at home and grumble about.

3: is this a one off performance then or will there be more in the future? Does this mean you'll be throwing away your soap?! Peaceville have reissued all your stuff on CD so there's still a market for DI stuff? (In fact I saw your rock n roll conformity LP selling on ebay for £30 odd the other day, and some clown was asking £70 for the orgy 7"!) 


Throwing away the soap? HA HA, I have to say if people are coming along expecting to see a bunch of people in filth ridden rags and dreads on stage they're gonna be disappointed. Is anyone else still dressing exactly the same as they did 20 years ago? Although I realise the whole crusty image is a lot about what people identify with the band, but hopefully it's about the music/lyrics too. As for if it's just a one off, well we're not looking any further ahead than this. We might do a small warm up gig somewhere beforehand if we can get anything sorted just because it's a bit daunting to go straight in cold to an event of this size. But we're not looking at it being a long-term thing, but then I said we'd never reform in the first place so It's best I don't make any rash statements. As of now we haven't even rehearsed yet, I guess it all depends on how it feels etc and I guess if the opportunity came up to go somewhere like the US or Japan that'd be a blast and pretty difficult to turn down. But who knows. There does actually seem to be more of a market for D.I stuff now than when we were actually going. I mean when we split in 91 it was because we felt like we were banging our heads against a brick wall. No one was interested. The last tour we did with Prophecy and Doom and Decadence Within quite a few of those dates the bands ended up just playing to each other and when people did show up they'd often be "What ?? I didn't even know you guys were still going." Peaceville had made it clear they weren't interested in doing another record etc. So it's pretty bizarre now, all these years later to have the albums re-released and received so well, and for so many distros to be printing and selling D.I shirts and patches etc. I seriously thought we would just be forgotten within a couple of years of splitting up. I just got on with Spine Wrench and then Bait. Bait is still very much my priority, we've just got a new drummer (Cooper, who incidentally is gonna do drum duties for the D.I shindig) and are writing new stuff at last and have some new releases in the pipeline so we're all excited about that.
Okay, thanks a lot for the interest. Mind you I think you should rename your page, as it's not technically 3 questions is it? I counted 8 question marks there you sneaky beggar ;o)

 

There you have it, thanks again to Mid 

Flux of Pink Indians Interview 6/9/07

FLUX OF PINK INDIANS 6/9/07
Flux of pink Indians... 

NEEDING NO INTRODUCTION.....FLUX OF PINK INDIANS.

1: So why reform? is it just for this 1 gig or what? why reform to play a support slot? you could easily pack out your own gig? were you involved in the conception of this gig or just asked to play? were you suprised to see the venue, ticket price and tickmaster involvement? this gig is getting a lot of criticism as a ripp off/sell out, mainly directed at Steve Ignorant, have you had any grief for doing it?

1/ We decided to reform for a one off gig after being asked to be part of steve's feeding of the 5000 event in November. I don't really see it as a support slot, more a part of the whole weekend. I liked the idea of playing our early stuff written when politics hadn't totally taken over the 'music' and punk still felt very much alive. Of course the venue and ticket price is a bit shit but the music business is shit, I hate it, but I love being involved with bands and want to go on stage and make a racket so I'm stuck in the middle on this one. If the gig could have been arranged somewhere less commercial then that would have been better but we said yes so we're doing it. I've seen some of the criticism directed at the gig on various forums and they're valid points but there have been just as many people who aren't taking it quite so seriously and are looking forward to it.

2: Steve Ignorant is planning on doing the Feeding of the 5000 12" in its entirety, i hope your not planning to do likewise with your Fucking Cunts lp??!! seriously though, what can we expect from you? any new stuff or is it all Strive era? do you think the Strive era stuff is still relevant or is it just a nostalgia thing? i mean, does punk still belong to the punks not the businessmen when your playing the Empire for £17.50 a go?

2/ Yeah, it'll be 'strive' and 'neu smell' and the line up is mainly from 'strive'. I'm not sure if anyone is ready for 'the fucking cunts' yet in its entirety, it used to cause a riot when we played it back then. Sadly most of 'strive' is still relevant today, the things we sang about are still with us, we didn't end up changing the world like we thought we could. After living your life for all those years thinking everything is crap, the world's gonna end any minute and we're right and everyone else is wrong it kinda takes it out of you. In the end you change to survive, I still agree with all our songs but I don't wanna ram it down anyone's throat anymore. And from the contact we've had from people since agreeing to this gig I would say punk still belongs to the punks but the empire @ 17.50 is a big compromise.

3: Reading the Day The Country Died book i was suprised to read how much disharmony there was in flux?, was there a lot of pressure to act in a particular way due to being at the forefront of the anarcho punk scene? was the anarcho punk scene really as devoid of humour and free thinking as it appears sometimes? apart from ex member Derek, who else from back in the day was a stuck up wanker?? go on, you can tell us, they're probably bank managers by now and will never read this!!

3/ The interviews with me and kev give that impression which is a shame as I don't think it's actually true. The day the country died was our first chance in years to get a few things off our chest. There are things I said about Derek which surprised me when I read the book, I can only think that it was said in the heat of the moment. I'd known Derek since school and we were in bands together for nearly ten years so when I finally left flux to start another band Derek never spoke to me again, I don't know why, but because of that I called him a wanker in Ian's book which I shouldn't of cos he was actually a great bloke.

Thanks to Ian Glasper for sorting this interview out and thanks to Colin Latter for taking the time to reply, i dont have a contact for Colin Latter, but if you really feel the need to get in touch with him, try going through Ian Glasper,
(his url is under his interview on here somewhere)