I first heard about FOXY when I was talking to an old friend about The Damned and he mentioned that their former bass player, Stu West, was now playing in a Californian punk band of that name. We both assumed that this must also mean that he was now living over there, although it turned out that this wasn’t the case. Anyway, intrigued as I was, I tried to find out more information about the band and discovered that they had originally been together between 1999-2002, releasing an EP and an album, ‘Stay Foxy Por Vida’, during that time. The two consistent band members are singer/guitarist Lisa Parker-Meredith and guitarist Greg Antista, while drummer Richie Mendez joined the band while the album was being recorded and Stu West joined them shortly after its’ release. The band went on hiatus while Lisa was raising her family, although they all stayed in touch and maintained intentions to reinstate the band once it was appropriate to do so. During much of this time Stu was playing bass in The Damned, but as chance would have it, he had just decided to retire from their ranks when Foxy were offered the chance to support the legendary ‘X’ during their 40th Anniversary concerts. Lisa and Greg decided that the time for Foxy to return was right and as soon as they told Stu, he readily agreed to play with them again. Together with Richie they played three initial gigs which went very well, so the band were quickly back in action, writing new songs and returning to Europe for a tour in 2018. Unfortunately on that occasion, they didn’t make it to the UK but 2019 saw more activity including the release of two EPs (‘Can’t Stop Us’, featuring six new tracks, and the ‘X-Ray Spex’ tribute EP, featuring covers of ‘Oh Bondage Up Yours’ and ‘I Am a Cliché’.) Hot on the heels of these releases, Foxy headed back for further touring in Europe but this time made a point of adding three UK dates. Conveniently for me, their London gig was at the Birds Nest in Deptford, so I decided to get there early and ask the band some questions. I find Lisa whilst she’s watching the opening band and she quickly gathers the other band members together.
It’s a little difficult finding a reasonably quiet spot to do the interview, but we eventually settle in the back-room and I start by asking them about the formation of the band back in 1999…
Lisa ; Me and Greg are the two surviving members from the very first line-up… Before that I’d been in an all-girl band called 4-Gazm and Greg was in a band called Joyride, with Steve Soto from The Adolescents…
Greg ; We were still in our other bands, but we were both hanging out a lot with John Maurer from Social Distortion. At some point we found that we all had time-off from each of our bands and decided that we wanted to start something new, so we created Foxy together. John was still in Social Distortion but he just happened to be available as they were on a break while Mike Ness was supporting his solo album. So we started playing together and released the first EP…
Lisa ; Our bands had played together a little bit, so we already knew each other and wanted to do something new. We both knew John and he’d said he’d like to play with us, so it was just really good timing when it all came together.
Stu ; I saw 4-Gazm in Harlow when their album came out, back in 1999…
Lisa ; Yeah, that’s how we met Stu ! 4-Gazm came over here to tour and we met Stu at one of the shows. Here’s a fun fact - Stu and I both sport the 4-Gazm tattoo on one arm & the FOXY tattoo on the other ! Anyway, we’ve always stayed in touch and been really good friends ever since. Just after we recorded the Foxy album, we needed a permanent bass player so Stu joined us and stayed with us until we went on the break.
But it was strange when 4-gazm toured in Europe, because we didn’t know any other bands who had toured over here before then, so for four girls to come over pretty-much on their own, it was quite an achievement. By then, Foxy had also started playing together, so later in the year we came over here as well.
Did you intend the band to be an ongoing project rather than just a one-off thing while your other bands weren’t so busy ?
Lisa ; Oh, yeah. I mean, back then it only lasted a few years but that was only because other things happened along the way. But we always wanted to carry on playing together.
Greg ; Initially, we just wanted to see what it would be like to write some songs together and we recorded some demos to see how they would come out. Then we made the first record and by then, we were really enjoying playing together and knew that we wanted to be a full-on band.
Lisa ; We were pretty-much a full-time band for the next two years, but then I fell in love, got married and had twins, so obviously that’s when we had to stop. Things just worked out that way, but we never stopped wanting to play together. That was why we took so much time-off, but my kids are now teenagers and they even have their own band, called Ruthless Youth, so it was good-timing once again. Stu had spent most of that time playing in The Damned, as well as playing with the English Dogs for a while, but he became available and Richie, our drummer, had been in a band called The Pushers…
Richie ; We already knew each other and it just worked out that I was able to play with them at that time. The Pushers had been releasing records on the Hostage label but hadn’t done anything for a while… Spencer from Shattered Faith had been playing with us for a while and some of the other guys were also involved with Duane Peters and The Hunns, so everyone was always busy with other things and eventually The Pushers just kind of dissolved.
Greg ; At which point, we got to snap-up Richie from the ashes of The Pushers !
Lisa ; Me and Greg are the two surviving members from the very first line-up… Before that I’d been in an all-girl band called 4-Gazm and Greg was in a band called Joyride, with Steve Soto from The Adolescents…
Greg ; We were still in our other bands, but we were both hanging out a lot with John Maurer from Social Distortion. At some point we found that we all had time-off from each of our bands and decided that we wanted to start something new, so we created Foxy together. John was still in Social Distortion but he just happened to be available as they were on a break while Mike Ness was supporting his solo album. So we started playing together and released the first EP…
Lisa ; Our bands had played together a little bit, so we already knew each other and wanted to do something new. We both knew John and he’d said he’d like to play with us, so it was just really good timing when it all came together.
Stu ; I saw 4-Gazm in Harlow when their album came out, back in 1999…
Lisa ; Yeah, that’s how we met Stu ! 4-Gazm came over here to tour and we met Stu at one of the shows. Here’s a fun fact - Stu and I both sport the 4-Gazm tattoo on one arm & the FOXY tattoo on the other ! Anyway, we’ve always stayed in touch and been really good friends ever since. Just after we recorded the Foxy album, we needed a permanent bass player so Stu joined us and stayed with us until we went on the break.
But it was strange when 4-gazm toured in Europe, because we didn’t know any other bands who had toured over here before then, so for four girls to come over pretty-much on their own, it was quite an achievement. By then, Foxy had also started playing together, so later in the year we came over here as well.
Did you intend the band to be an ongoing project rather than just a one-off thing while your other bands weren’t so busy ?
Lisa ; Oh, yeah. I mean, back then it only lasted a few years but that was only because other things happened along the way. But we always wanted to carry on playing together.
Greg ; Initially, we just wanted to see what it would be like to write some songs together and we recorded some demos to see how they would come out. Then we made the first record and by then, we were really enjoying playing together and knew that we wanted to be a full-on band.
Lisa ; We were pretty-much a full-time band for the next two years, but then I fell in love, got married and had twins, so obviously that’s when we had to stop. Things just worked out that way, but we never stopped wanting to play together. That was why we took so much time-off, but my kids are now teenagers and they even have their own band, called Ruthless Youth, so it was good-timing once again. Stu had spent most of that time playing in The Damned, as well as playing with the English Dogs for a while, but he became available and Richie, our drummer, had been in a band called The Pushers…
Richie ; We already knew each other and it just worked out that I was able to play with them at that time. The Pushers had been releasing records on the Hostage label but hadn’t done anything for a while… Spencer from Shattered Faith had been playing with us for a while and some of the other guys were also involved with Duane Peters and The Hunns, so everyone was always busy with other things and eventually The Pushers just kind of dissolved.
Greg ; At which point, we got to snap-up Richie from the ashes of The Pushers !
The band seem to be quite fond of touring, both now and back when you were first together…
Lisa ; Oh yeah. Originally we were touring in Europe, like, twice a year…
Greg ; I think we actually played in Europe five times in three years. And they were long tours, like, six weeks at a time. But that’s what we wanted to do back then. We really liked playing in Europe and it seemed to be where we got the most interest, so once we started playing together again, we decided that we should go back and see what it would be like now.
Lisa ; And it’s been pretty great, although I do think it’s a different kind of scene in Europe now. Back then, there was a really big club scene and people would go out to see bands on tour, but now it seems that people are more interested in just going to the big festivals. We used to be able to come over, play some shows in the UK to begin with, then go all around Europe before coming back to England and maybe playing a few more shows here before we finally went home. We did pretty well doing things that way, because there were no cell-phones or social media back then and the only way you could become known to people was to play live as much as possible.
Was there any particular reason that your reformation happened when it did ?
Lisa ; We were asked if we’d like to play with X, at their 40th anniversary show. Of course, we weren’t going to turn down an opportunity like that and it turned out to be so much fun ! It was as if we’d never stopped playing together.
Greg ; The next thing we knew, we were playing more shows and making a new record.
Lisa ; We got in touch with an agent in Europe and booked a tour, which was last year, to see how things would go. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to arrange any dates in the UK that time, but the tour was still quite successful so, this time we were determined to play a few UK shows…
Greg ; We took a chance because we’d heard that it’s a lot more tough for smaller bands over here, now.
Lisa ; We weren’t expecting lots of people to come out to see us. A lot of American bands don’t play in the UK these days because of that, but we just wanted to play here again, to let at least some people know that we’re back…
You’re based in Fullerton, Orange County which has a very distinctive style of punk rock. I’ve always thought that a lot of the bands there seem to have been influenced quite a bit by earlier British bands…
Lisa ; Well, we’ve always loved a lot of British bands, but I think that at the same time that punk rock was evolving in the UK, it was also evolving in New York and out on the West Coast and we all developed our own style and sounds. I think, in Orange County, we were influenced by bands from all of the different scenes but, as we were a little bit separate from Los Angeles and San Diego, we were able to have a music scene all of our own. There have always been tons and tons of bands in Orange County and the scene has always been very close-knit. We all came-up together…
Richie ; I think when the punk scene in Orange County originally started, a lot of the people involved had initially been into Seventies rock bands but then they heard the first Ramones albums and saw them live, so they suddenly wanted to do something that was more their own thing.
Lisa ; Yeah, I’d say there was definitely more of an East Coast influence in Orange County, especially in the late Seventies. For me, as I was a bit younger, I was getting into punk rock in the early Eighties so I was listening to the earlier punk bands as well as bands like The Exploited and GBH, as that was when those kind of bands were coming over from England to play in the States. Gary Tovar at Goldenvoice was bringing all of those bands over, so I went to see a lot of those shows. But at the same time, I was really into the Adolescents, DI, TSOL, China White and all of the Orange County bands of the time.
Lisa ; Oh yeah. Originally we were touring in Europe, like, twice a year…
Greg ; I think we actually played in Europe five times in three years. And they were long tours, like, six weeks at a time. But that’s what we wanted to do back then. We really liked playing in Europe and it seemed to be where we got the most interest, so once we started playing together again, we decided that we should go back and see what it would be like now.
Lisa ; And it’s been pretty great, although I do think it’s a different kind of scene in Europe now. Back then, there was a really big club scene and people would go out to see bands on tour, but now it seems that people are more interested in just going to the big festivals. We used to be able to come over, play some shows in the UK to begin with, then go all around Europe before coming back to England and maybe playing a few more shows here before we finally went home. We did pretty well doing things that way, because there were no cell-phones or social media back then and the only way you could become known to people was to play live as much as possible.
Was there any particular reason that your reformation happened when it did ?
Lisa ; We were asked if we’d like to play with X, at their 40th anniversary show. Of course, we weren’t going to turn down an opportunity like that and it turned out to be so much fun ! It was as if we’d never stopped playing together.
Greg ; The next thing we knew, we were playing more shows and making a new record.
Lisa ; We got in touch with an agent in Europe and booked a tour, which was last year, to see how things would go. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to arrange any dates in the UK that time, but the tour was still quite successful so, this time we were determined to play a few UK shows…
Greg ; We took a chance because we’d heard that it’s a lot more tough for smaller bands over here, now.
Lisa ; We weren’t expecting lots of people to come out to see us. A lot of American bands don’t play in the UK these days because of that, but we just wanted to play here again, to let at least some people know that we’re back…
You’re based in Fullerton, Orange County which has a very distinctive style of punk rock. I’ve always thought that a lot of the bands there seem to have been influenced quite a bit by earlier British bands…
Lisa ; Well, we’ve always loved a lot of British bands, but I think that at the same time that punk rock was evolving in the UK, it was also evolving in New York and out on the West Coast and we all developed our own style and sounds. I think, in Orange County, we were influenced by bands from all of the different scenes but, as we were a little bit separate from Los Angeles and San Diego, we were able to have a music scene all of our own. There have always been tons and tons of bands in Orange County and the scene has always been very close-knit. We all came-up together…
Richie ; I think when the punk scene in Orange County originally started, a lot of the people involved had initially been into Seventies rock bands but then they heard the first Ramones albums and saw them live, so they suddenly wanted to do something that was more their own thing.
Lisa ; Yeah, I’d say there was definitely more of an East Coast influence in Orange County, especially in the late Seventies. For me, as I was a bit younger, I was getting into punk rock in the early Eighties so I was listening to the earlier punk bands as well as bands like The Exploited and GBH, as that was when those kind of bands were coming over from England to play in the States. Gary Tovar at Goldenvoice was bringing all of those bands over, so I went to see a lot of those shows. But at the same time, I was really into the Adolescents, DI, TSOL, China White and all of the Orange County bands of the time.
I think one of the big distinctions about punk rock in Orange County was that the bands tended to be a lot more melodic…
Lisa ; Yeah, I think that’s definitely an Orange County thing…
Greg ; I would say that a lot of the early Orange County bands were into The Damned, The Clash and The Ramones, but then played their songs with a little bit more of a hardcore influence. Back in the Seventies, there was only one record store in Fullerton and the first Damned album was one of the first UK punk records that landed there, so I think it probably influenced a lot of the people who heard it.
Actually, as you just mentioned The Damned, it’s a bit of a coincidence that Stu is currently playing with you guys, whilst Rat Scabies and Paul Gray of The Damned have recently been playing with another Fullerton-based band, Professor and The Madman… There’s obviously a Damned connection embedded in Orange County !
Greg ; It’s a really crazy coincidence, especially as my very first band was with Alfie Agnew when he was just 12 years old, so we’ve known each other through most of our lives. But I really don’t know how their whole thing with those guys from The Damned happened. It’s just insane that they should be doing at almost the same time as we started playing with Stu again… It’s funny that something seems to be sucking all of those old Damned members into Orange County...
Stu : I think it’s just a case that once you’ve been in The Damned, you’ll only go where the quality is !
The other thing about a lot of the Orange County bands is that they were often rather good musicians and weren’t ashamed to show that they could play pretty well…
Greg & Lisa ; Exactly !
Too many bands became boring pretty quickly because the tried to stick to playing no more than three chords…
Lisa ; We always refused to do that, because we wanted to sound a s good as we could be.
Greg ; When you think of bands like The Adolescents, who made some of the greatest punk rock records ever, they could play really fast, short songs but then they’d also play ‘Kids of the Black Hole’, which was over five minutes long. But that was still as punk rock as anything you could hear.
Lisa ; And when you heard bands like China White, they had Frank Ruffino who was an incredible guitar player.
Lisa ; Yeah, I think that’s definitely an Orange County thing…
Greg ; I would say that a lot of the early Orange County bands were into The Damned, The Clash and The Ramones, but then played their songs with a little bit more of a hardcore influence. Back in the Seventies, there was only one record store in Fullerton and the first Damned album was one of the first UK punk records that landed there, so I think it probably influenced a lot of the people who heard it.
Actually, as you just mentioned The Damned, it’s a bit of a coincidence that Stu is currently playing with you guys, whilst Rat Scabies and Paul Gray of The Damned have recently been playing with another Fullerton-based band, Professor and The Madman… There’s obviously a Damned connection embedded in Orange County !
Greg ; It’s a really crazy coincidence, especially as my very first band was with Alfie Agnew when he was just 12 years old, so we’ve known each other through most of our lives. But I really don’t know how their whole thing with those guys from The Damned happened. It’s just insane that they should be doing at almost the same time as we started playing with Stu again… It’s funny that something seems to be sucking all of those old Damned members into Orange County...
Stu : I think it’s just a case that once you’ve been in The Damned, you’ll only go where the quality is !
The other thing about a lot of the Orange County bands is that they were often rather good musicians and weren’t ashamed to show that they could play pretty well…
Greg & Lisa ; Exactly !
Too many bands became boring pretty quickly because the tried to stick to playing no more than three chords…
Lisa ; We always refused to do that, because we wanted to sound a s good as we could be.
Greg ; When you think of bands like The Adolescents, who made some of the greatest punk rock records ever, they could play really fast, short songs but then they’d also play ‘Kids of the Black Hole’, which was over five minutes long. But that was still as punk rock as anything you could hear.
Lisa ; And when you heard bands like China White, they had Frank Ruffino who was an incredible guitar player.
Going back to the bands’ first incarnation… what kind of reaction did you get for your first EP and album ?
Greg ; It was funny because John Maurer played on our first EP, but by the time we were making the album, he was busy with Social Distortion again so he wasn’t a member of Foxy anymore… although he did play on a few tracks and also helped out with production. But we got a really good response in the US and we were able to tour across the country… We even got ourselves sponsored by O’Neills !
Lisa ; We got a really good response from the press and a lot of people seemed to get into it… What’s nice is that, now we’ve made the new record, people who liked us first time around, like Rodney Bingenheimer, are playing the new record on the radio, which is really cool ! For us, that’s as good as it gets because he’s always been a pioneer in the Californian music scene. Apparently, he’s played songs from our new record several times, which is really exciting for us because it means he remembers us from our old records and also likes what we’re doing now. I mean, if that’s all that happens with these new records, that’ll still be great to us !
When you reformed to play with X, did your children come to that and, if so, what did they think of it ?
Lisa ; We actually played three shows when we reformed and my 20 year old and my 13 year old sons came along. I think they enjoyed it…. My 13 year old son also has his own band anyway... The thing is, I play music and my husband plays music, so everyone in the family has played at some point. And I think that’s why I’m able to be here now, because everyone understands that I want to do this and they try to be as supportive as they can. It’s funny because my kids have a really eclectic taste in music as they’ve heard the stuff that gets played on MTV and the radio, but they’ve also heard the stuff that me and my husband listen to… A little while ago, I even heard my daughter singing an Angelic Upstarts song while she was in the shower !
Greg ; It was funny because John Maurer played on our first EP, but by the time we were making the album, he was busy with Social Distortion again so he wasn’t a member of Foxy anymore… although he did play on a few tracks and also helped out with production. But we got a really good response in the US and we were able to tour across the country… We even got ourselves sponsored by O’Neills !
Lisa ; We got a really good response from the press and a lot of people seemed to get into it… What’s nice is that, now we’ve made the new record, people who liked us first time around, like Rodney Bingenheimer, are playing the new record on the radio, which is really cool ! For us, that’s as good as it gets because he’s always been a pioneer in the Californian music scene. Apparently, he’s played songs from our new record several times, which is really exciting for us because it means he remembers us from our old records and also likes what we’re doing now. I mean, if that’s all that happens with these new records, that’ll still be great to us !
When you reformed to play with X, did your children come to that and, if so, what did they think of it ?
Lisa ; We actually played three shows when we reformed and my 20 year old and my 13 year old sons came along. I think they enjoyed it…. My 13 year old son also has his own band anyway... The thing is, I play music and my husband plays music, so everyone in the family has played at some point. And I think that’s why I’m able to be here now, because everyone understands that I want to do this and they try to be as supportive as they can. It’s funny because my kids have a really eclectic taste in music as they’ve heard the stuff that gets played on MTV and the radio, but they’ve also heard the stuff that me and my husband listen to… A little while ago, I even heard my daughter singing an Angelic Upstarts song while she was in the shower !
After you played those first few reunion gigs, did you decide straight away that you would want the band to carry on playing ?
Lisa : For sure ! I mean, a band is a lot like a family and we’d all stayed close, even when the band wasn’t active. When we started playing together again, we didn’t know what to expect but it ended up feeling exactly like it had before. It was as if we’d never stopped playing together and it was so easy to do it again.
Richie ; And it’s not as if the band reformed just to play the old stuff. Right from the start, these guys were writing new songs and we all wanted to record new material as soon as we could…
Lisa ; Yeah, Greg and Stu were the ones who really wanted to get the band back together and once that happened, they started to write the songs for the new record pretty much straightaway…
Richie ; That’s what made it really exciting. The whole band wanted to move forward and that’s been great.
Lisa ; We have a lot of faith in each other and Greg is a very good songwriter, so it was great when he and Stu were able to come together and write new songs for us. Richie and I loved the songs they wrote.
Stu ; Whenever I was on tour in America with The Damned and we came to Orange County, Lisa would always be there and I’d always say, ‘Let’s do Foxy again’… She never say ‘No’, but she always said it was the wrong time. I must’ve heard that for around 13 or 14 years, until last year when she finally said, ‘Yeah, I think it’s the right time…’ And fortunately, that also coincided with me deciding to leave The Damned… I’d been playing with them for 14 years and I just felt that it was the right time for me to move on to something else. There was no big drama, it was just the way it was. But the strange thing was that, on the same day that I’d made my decision to leave The Damned, Greg sent me an email and asked if I wanted to do Foxy with them again. So it was all very serendipitous. I still live in England, so we just arrange to do things when I’m able to go over there. But of course, these days it’s a lot easier to write together as a band even at a long distance. Me and Greg are able to swap files over the internet and work on things together.
Lisa : I think the thing was, you can’t pretend to be ready before you’re really ready, because things just won’t go right if you try to do something and you’re not really in to it, so I’m glad we waited for the right time.
Your most recent release is the ‘X-Ray Spex’ tribute EP. How did that come together ?
Richie ; We were asked to record those songs…
Lisa ; It was a great honour for me, as they were some of the best songs from my youth. The producer, Mike Bennett, has been working with Poly Styrenes’ daughter, Celeste, putting together a tribute to X-Ray Spex which features lots of different styles of music, rather than just straightforward covers. They found out about us through a radio station that put us in touch… They liked the idea of a punk band from Orange County with a female singer and asked us to put our own spin on it. So it was a really fun-collaboration… we did it the way that we would do things and fortunately, they loved it.
Richie ; We were even able to get a saxophone player, Geoff Yeaton, to come in and record with us. I’ve known him for a long time and he’s a great player… he plays with bands all over Orange County.
Lisa : For sure ! I mean, a band is a lot like a family and we’d all stayed close, even when the band wasn’t active. When we started playing together again, we didn’t know what to expect but it ended up feeling exactly like it had before. It was as if we’d never stopped playing together and it was so easy to do it again.
Richie ; And it’s not as if the band reformed just to play the old stuff. Right from the start, these guys were writing new songs and we all wanted to record new material as soon as we could…
Lisa ; Yeah, Greg and Stu were the ones who really wanted to get the band back together and once that happened, they started to write the songs for the new record pretty much straightaway…
Richie ; That’s what made it really exciting. The whole band wanted to move forward and that’s been great.
Lisa ; We have a lot of faith in each other and Greg is a very good songwriter, so it was great when he and Stu were able to come together and write new songs for us. Richie and I loved the songs they wrote.
Stu ; Whenever I was on tour in America with The Damned and we came to Orange County, Lisa would always be there and I’d always say, ‘Let’s do Foxy again’… She never say ‘No’, but she always said it was the wrong time. I must’ve heard that for around 13 or 14 years, until last year when she finally said, ‘Yeah, I think it’s the right time…’ And fortunately, that also coincided with me deciding to leave The Damned… I’d been playing with them for 14 years and I just felt that it was the right time for me to move on to something else. There was no big drama, it was just the way it was. But the strange thing was that, on the same day that I’d made my decision to leave The Damned, Greg sent me an email and asked if I wanted to do Foxy with them again. So it was all very serendipitous. I still live in England, so we just arrange to do things when I’m able to go over there. But of course, these days it’s a lot easier to write together as a band even at a long distance. Me and Greg are able to swap files over the internet and work on things together.
Lisa : I think the thing was, you can’t pretend to be ready before you’re really ready, because things just won’t go right if you try to do something and you’re not really in to it, so I’m glad we waited for the right time.
Your most recent release is the ‘X-Ray Spex’ tribute EP. How did that come together ?
Richie ; We were asked to record those songs…
Lisa ; It was a great honour for me, as they were some of the best songs from my youth. The producer, Mike Bennett, has been working with Poly Styrenes’ daughter, Celeste, putting together a tribute to X-Ray Spex which features lots of different styles of music, rather than just straightforward covers. They found out about us through a radio station that put us in touch… They liked the idea of a punk band from Orange County with a female singer and asked us to put our own spin on it. So it was a really fun-collaboration… we did it the way that we would do things and fortunately, they loved it.
Richie ; We were even able to get a saxophone player, Geoff Yeaton, to come in and record with us. I’ve known him for a long time and he’s a great player… he plays with bands all over Orange County.
The EP features your versions of ‘Oh Bondage Up Yours’ and ‘I Am a Cliché’, and also features a ‘mash-up’ version of both tracks edited together… was that your idea ?
Lisa ; No, that was Mike Bennett… he thought it would be interesting to see if the two tracks would work if he edited them together and I think it came out pretty good.
This is the final date of your European tour, so no doubt you’ll be spending some time relaxing back at home before anything else. But do you have any further plans looking ahead from here ?
Greg ; We’ve already been invited to play at two, possibly three, festivals in Europe next June, so after we get home, we’re going to have to work out if and how we can do that. This tour has mostly been little clubs so perhaps it’ll be nice to do something around those festivals next time we come over. But in the immediate future, I think we all need to take some time off for other things and then I hope we’ll be able to start work on writing and recording new songs early next year. As we were saying, this is definitely something that we want to keep moving forward.
Lisa ; No, that was Mike Bennett… he thought it would be interesting to see if the two tracks would work if he edited them together and I think it came out pretty good.
This is the final date of your European tour, so no doubt you’ll be spending some time relaxing back at home before anything else. But do you have any further plans looking ahead from here ?
Greg ; We’ve already been invited to play at two, possibly three, festivals in Europe next June, so after we get home, we’re going to have to work out if and how we can do that. This tour has mostly been little clubs so perhaps it’ll be nice to do something around those festivals next time we come over. But in the immediate future, I think we all need to take some time off for other things and then I hope we’ll be able to start work on writing and recording new songs early next year. As we were saying, this is definitely something that we want to keep moving forward.
The main support band is now playing and it’s getting pretty noisy so we end the interview there. But the best thing had been discovering what a nice, friendly bunch of people this band are. I’d really enjoyed meeting them and was now enthusiastically looking forward to watching their set. There wasn’t a long wait until they were setting-up onstage. Unfortunately, there isn’t a big audience but it’s a Monday evening in Deptford and it’s been raining since the afternoon, so it’s hardly been the best circumstances to tempt people out from their homes. But Foxy aren’t too concerned… ‘This is the last date of our tour so we’re going to have fun with it and we hope you do as well’, they announce before the first song. Their enthusiasm proves to be pretty enthusiastic as within just a few numbers it seems as if everyone who has turned-up to see them is getting into it and cheering them along ! They sound really good, sorta like The Adolescents or Channel 3 but with strong, melodic vocals from Lisa, reminiscent of The Avengers perhaps ? Rather than being disappointed by the low attendance, they put everything into it and it’s a great gig. Towards the end of the set, they play their version of ‘Oh Bondage Up Yours’ and then, right at the end, deliver an excellent cover of ‘Police On My Back’. Playing for nearly an hour, they were very enjoyable and I just wish that more people had been there to see them. Hopefully, next time they come back they’ll be able to play to a larger audience because I’m sure that they could win themselves a lot of fans in London. You may have missed them this time, but in the circumstances I’ll let you off. However, next time, no excuses will be acceptable. In the meantime, you can find out more from their website –
