Neon Hearts were one
of the earliest bands to emerge in the Midlands
punk scene during 1977, and embraced the independent / DIY attitude to
self-release their first single, the excellent ‘Venus Eccentric’ /
‘Regulations’. They also ran their own punk venue Raglans in Wolverhampton,
before signing to the Satril label which (eventually) released their album,
‘Popular Music’ and two further singles. Unfortunately, their relationship with
Satril proved to be fraught with disappointment and lack of support which,
despite hard work on the part of the band themselves, eventually led to their
demise in 1980. The band members went on to various other projects, most
notably bass player Paul Raven, who became a long-term member of Killing Joke,
as well as playing with numerous other bands including Prong and Ministry.
Interest in Neon Hearts has deservedly remained over the years, with CD reissues of rare material and even a Tribute album. In 2014, initially prompted by an offer of gigs in Japan, the band reformed as a four-piece, but quickly found they were enjoying playing together again and particularly working on new material, and so have continued to play over the past year.
Typically, I missed their first London gig since reforming as it clashed with the Chrome gig (for which I’d already arranged an interview) so I had to wait a little longer for my first chance to see them. This eventually came when they played at Benefit gig for Macmillans at The Gunners pub in Highbury. Arriving early, I meet up with guitarist Martin, vocalist Tone Dial, drummer Keith and new bass player Ed, who all readily agree to an interview. We head into a back room, although the music from the main room is still blasting through, so apologies for any misheard or mis-credited quotes, but I think what follows is generally accurate !
Anyway, I firstly asked, as the band were all pretty young when Neon Hearts formed, had any of them had any musical experience prior to then ?
Keith : We were all only 17 back then, so we hadn’t really had any chance to do anything else.
Tone : I think it was pretty-much the first band for all of us. We’d only really done bits and pieces before then…
Keith : I’d played with another guy, who played an acoustic 12 string guitar, but that was just around a few pubs.
Tone : We were all only 17 or 18, so it was all really first-time stuff, you know.
Interest in Neon Hearts has deservedly remained over the years, with CD reissues of rare material and even a Tribute album. In 2014, initially prompted by an offer of gigs in Japan, the band reformed as a four-piece, but quickly found they were enjoying playing together again and particularly working on new material, and so have continued to play over the past year.
Typically, I missed their first London gig since reforming as it clashed with the Chrome gig (for which I’d already arranged an interview) so I had to wait a little longer for my first chance to see them. This eventually came when they played at Benefit gig for Macmillans at The Gunners pub in Highbury. Arriving early, I meet up with guitarist Martin, vocalist Tone Dial, drummer Keith and new bass player Ed, who all readily agree to an interview. We head into a back room, although the music from the main room is still blasting through, so apologies for any misheard or mis-credited quotes, but I think what follows is generally accurate !
Anyway, I firstly asked, as the band were all pretty young when Neon Hearts formed, had any of them had any musical experience prior to then ?
Keith : We were all only 17 back then, so we hadn’t really had any chance to do anything else.
Tone : I think it was pretty-much the first band for all of us. We’d only really done bits and pieces before then…
Keith : I’d played with another guy, who played an acoustic 12 string guitar, but that was just around a few pubs.
Tone : We were all only 17 or 18, so it was all really first-time stuff, you know.
So, how did the band actually come together ?
Martin : It was Steve, really. He’d already been in another band called Suburban Studs, but they kicked him out because they decided they didn’t want a sax player, or something like that. So he decided he wanted to set-up a band with his cousin, Paul Raven, who was our original bass player. Paul knew Keith from school, so they got him involved. I knew Keith already, so they then called me in and we tried rehearsing as a four-piece for the first few months. But after a while, we realised that, even in Punk-terms, none of us were capable of playing and singing at the same time ! We did actually try to record a few bits and pieces, just to see how we would sound with either Steve or me singing, but they weren’t ‘official’ demos or anything like that…
Keith : It was after we did that when we realised that we really needed to get a proper singer !
Tone : Next thing, one Sunday afternoon I got a knock on my door and it was Steve. He said he’d heard that I was a singer. I mean, I’d only ever done a couple of things in small pubs, so it was amazing he’d even heard about me… my first taste of fame !
Martin : So we started rehearsing as a five piece for about three or four months and it started coming together.
Did you all have similar musical interests or influences ?
Tone : Not really, we all loved all sorts of things…
Keith : When I was about five, I sorta inherited all my Uncle’s records, so from a very young age I was already listening to all sorts of music… Glenn Miller, Helen Shapiro, Billy Fury…
Neon Hearts often got comparisons with Roxy Music, probably mostly because of the saxophone, but there was also a kinda glam-rock edge…
Tone : Well, because we had a sax player, that was a really easy target for comparison. Either Roxy Music or X-Ray Spex… But I guess there was a kinda glam-influence in there as well, and especially towards the end, we were probably more glam than punk. I mean, we did that infamous photo-shoot that ended up on the album cover, where we all got glammed-up and everything. But that was really just down to alcohol ! It started-out with us being left unattended with a crate of lager, so before we knew it, we were all getting dressed-up and taking the piss out of everything. Unfortunately, the record label then thought it was a great image and decided to use it on the album sleeve. I think we’ve been trying to live that down ever since ! We were just naïve teenagers, we were having a whale of a time but we were too green to realise what the people at the record label were doing with us… I’m sure that kinda stuff still goes on to this day.
Keith : While we were making the album, they had us staying at this nice hotel and we were thinking, wow, we’ve really made it ! We thought it would never stop, but we were totally naïve.
Martin : It was Steve, really. He’d already been in another band called Suburban Studs, but they kicked him out because they decided they didn’t want a sax player, or something like that. So he decided he wanted to set-up a band with his cousin, Paul Raven, who was our original bass player. Paul knew Keith from school, so they got him involved. I knew Keith already, so they then called me in and we tried rehearsing as a four-piece for the first few months. But after a while, we realised that, even in Punk-terms, none of us were capable of playing and singing at the same time ! We did actually try to record a few bits and pieces, just to see how we would sound with either Steve or me singing, but they weren’t ‘official’ demos or anything like that…
Keith : It was after we did that when we realised that we really needed to get a proper singer !
Tone : Next thing, one Sunday afternoon I got a knock on my door and it was Steve. He said he’d heard that I was a singer. I mean, I’d only ever done a couple of things in small pubs, so it was amazing he’d even heard about me… my first taste of fame !
Martin : So we started rehearsing as a five piece for about three or four months and it started coming together.
Did you all have similar musical interests or influences ?
Tone : Not really, we all loved all sorts of things…
Keith : When I was about five, I sorta inherited all my Uncle’s records, so from a very young age I was already listening to all sorts of music… Glenn Miller, Helen Shapiro, Billy Fury…
Neon Hearts often got comparisons with Roxy Music, probably mostly because of the saxophone, but there was also a kinda glam-rock edge…
Tone : Well, because we had a sax player, that was a really easy target for comparison. Either Roxy Music or X-Ray Spex… But I guess there was a kinda glam-influence in there as well, and especially towards the end, we were probably more glam than punk. I mean, we did that infamous photo-shoot that ended up on the album cover, where we all got glammed-up and everything. But that was really just down to alcohol ! It started-out with us being left unattended with a crate of lager, so before we knew it, we were all getting dressed-up and taking the piss out of everything. Unfortunately, the record label then thought it was a great image and decided to use it on the album sleeve. I think we’ve been trying to live that down ever since ! We were just naïve teenagers, we were having a whale of a time but we were too green to realise what the people at the record label were doing with us… I’m sure that kinda stuff still goes on to this day.
Keith : While we were making the album, they had us staying at this nice hotel and we were thinking, wow, we’ve really made it ! We thought it would never stop, but we were totally naïve.
You released your first single, ‘Venus
Eccentric’ / ‘Regulations’ pretty soon after the line-up came together…
Martin : As I said, we rehearsed for about three or four months and then we decided to make a record. Pauls’ Dad was a local folk-singer, so he knew a bit about how to get records pressed and stuff, so he suggested we should just do it ourselves. We arranged to record some tracks in a guy’s garage – we were a real garage-band ! And once we had the tapes, we made our own record.’
Was it important to you that you released your own record ?
Martin : Yeah ! And I think it was actually one of the earliest independent punk singles… The Buzzcocks had already made a mark with ‘Spiral Scratch’ so we thought, well, if they can do it, so can we. And I’m sure there were loads of other bands thinking the same thing around that time. But of course, we made the mistake of having an 8” sleeve for a 7” single, which sorta set us apart, but at the same time caused problems because it wouldn’t fit in the singles-racks at the record shops !
Tone : Yeah, that was a complete fuck-up !
Martin : Steve went to the printers and told them we wanted a cover for a 7” single. The printer said, well, it will have to be a bit bigger than 7” to allow the record to fit-in, but then he made it 8” ! Obviously, it didn’t need to be a whole inch bigger. I mean, you would’ve thought the guy would’ve seen a 7” single before ! And, on top of that, on the very first pressing, the pressing-plant put the labels on the wrong way around, so the A-side was the B-side and all that. I mean, we couldn’t have created a better ‘limited edition’ even if we’d tried ! It had an over-sized sleeve and the labels on the wrong way around. It had everything a collector could ever want !
Tone : Maybe we should pretend that was always our intention in the first place and try to take some credit for it…
Martin : As I said, we rehearsed for about three or four months and then we decided to make a record. Pauls’ Dad was a local folk-singer, so he knew a bit about how to get records pressed and stuff, so he suggested we should just do it ourselves. We arranged to record some tracks in a guy’s garage – we were a real garage-band ! And once we had the tapes, we made our own record.’
Was it important to you that you released your own record ?
Martin : Yeah ! And I think it was actually one of the earliest independent punk singles… The Buzzcocks had already made a mark with ‘Spiral Scratch’ so we thought, well, if they can do it, so can we. And I’m sure there were loads of other bands thinking the same thing around that time. But of course, we made the mistake of having an 8” sleeve for a 7” single, which sorta set us apart, but at the same time caused problems because it wouldn’t fit in the singles-racks at the record shops !
Tone : Yeah, that was a complete fuck-up !
Martin : Steve went to the printers and told them we wanted a cover for a 7” single. The printer said, well, it will have to be a bit bigger than 7” to allow the record to fit-in, but then he made it 8” ! Obviously, it didn’t need to be a whole inch bigger. I mean, you would’ve thought the guy would’ve seen a 7” single before ! And, on top of that, on the very first pressing, the pressing-plant put the labels on the wrong way around, so the A-side was the B-side and all that. I mean, we couldn’t have created a better ‘limited edition’ even if we’d tried ! It had an over-sized sleeve and the labels on the wrong way around. It had everything a collector could ever want !
Tone : Maybe we should pretend that was always our intention in the first place and try to take some credit for it…
Most of the recent Punk retrospectives seem
to concentrate either on London or, to some
extent Manchester, but they seem to ignore the
scene that was going on in the Midlands…
Martin : Yeah, there was actually quite a bit going on, but the big problem was there wasn’t really an established Punk venue. We were once asked to support the Sex Pistols at a club in Wolverhampton called the Lafayette, but in the end they didn’t turn-up so we had to headline, which was a kinda double-edged sword. But apart from that, we couldn’t really find places to play because of Punks’ reputation in the media at the time. In the end, we started our own venue, called The Raglan, and I think that helped to build the scene. It was actually a sorta Latin-American club, run by a bloke called Chico Arnez. It was just a pub, really, but he tried to make it look like some sorta Vegas-style club. We’d book the place on Tuesday and Thursday nights, which were nights when it was never busy, but we could get maybe 200 people in there. Of course, he still kept Friday and Saturday nights for his own club, so the place was always set-up for that… in fact, there’s a great picture of us playing on the stage, while behind us there’s all this silver tinsel and foil hanging down, trying to make it look like Vegas. But it was Las Vegas in Wolverhampton, so it was never going to work ! It was all very strange and we also had a lot of problems. The meatheads and fascists from the town would come down and smash up the toilets, so I’d have to get my Dad to come down and fix the pipes and plastering for us. There were some real Neanderthals around back then and they just didn’t like punk rockers being in the club. But, you know, the punks might have looked a bit different but most of them were just nice kids trying to have a good time.
After releasing your first single by yourselves, you then signed to Satril Records. Had you not thought about remaining independent ?
Tone : We’d talked about being independent, you know. We didn’t want other people telling us how to sound or how to dress, all that kinda stuff. But the problem with the first single was, in the end, we couldn’t sell enough of them just by ourselves. So when we got offered a deal with Satril, we thought it would just be an easier way to get our records distributed. It did seem like a bit of a let-down to be signing to an established record company, but we took some advise and decided at least they’d be able to sort out the distribution for us. Of course, in the end it ended-up that they didn’t do that at all and actually held us back when it came to releasing more singles and the album.
Martin : Satril found out about us through the gigs we were doing at The Raglan. They offered to take us to a studio in London, owned by EMI, to record an album…
Tone : But basically, they told us a load of bullshit. They were a subsidiary of Warners, so we thought they’d be quite professional. But almost straight after we signed to them, we found out that Warners were just about to get rid of them, so that was a big let down for us. Warners had decided that Satril were just a waste of time, but of course, we were the last to know that.
Martin : We hadn’t had anyone advising us properly, so we fell for it.
Tone : We were dealing with two pretty young blokes so we thought the label would have a quite modern approach to promotion and stuff. But when the album came out they told us, No, we believe in the old-style of doing things. We want you to go out on tour to promote it yourselves ! I mean, we’d already been doing that for our first single… They really were a bunch of wankers.
Martin : Yeah, there was actually quite a bit going on, but the big problem was there wasn’t really an established Punk venue. We were once asked to support the Sex Pistols at a club in Wolverhampton called the Lafayette, but in the end they didn’t turn-up so we had to headline, which was a kinda double-edged sword. But apart from that, we couldn’t really find places to play because of Punks’ reputation in the media at the time. In the end, we started our own venue, called The Raglan, and I think that helped to build the scene. It was actually a sorta Latin-American club, run by a bloke called Chico Arnez. It was just a pub, really, but he tried to make it look like some sorta Vegas-style club. We’d book the place on Tuesday and Thursday nights, which were nights when it was never busy, but we could get maybe 200 people in there. Of course, he still kept Friday and Saturday nights for his own club, so the place was always set-up for that… in fact, there’s a great picture of us playing on the stage, while behind us there’s all this silver tinsel and foil hanging down, trying to make it look like Vegas. But it was Las Vegas in Wolverhampton, so it was never going to work ! It was all very strange and we also had a lot of problems. The meatheads and fascists from the town would come down and smash up the toilets, so I’d have to get my Dad to come down and fix the pipes and plastering for us. There were some real Neanderthals around back then and they just didn’t like punk rockers being in the club. But, you know, the punks might have looked a bit different but most of them were just nice kids trying to have a good time.
After releasing your first single by yourselves, you then signed to Satril Records. Had you not thought about remaining independent ?
Tone : We’d talked about being independent, you know. We didn’t want other people telling us how to sound or how to dress, all that kinda stuff. But the problem with the first single was, in the end, we couldn’t sell enough of them just by ourselves. So when we got offered a deal with Satril, we thought it would just be an easier way to get our records distributed. It did seem like a bit of a let-down to be signing to an established record company, but we took some advise and decided at least they’d be able to sort out the distribution for us. Of course, in the end it ended-up that they didn’t do that at all and actually held us back when it came to releasing more singles and the album.
Martin : Satril found out about us through the gigs we were doing at The Raglan. They offered to take us to a studio in London, owned by EMI, to record an album…
Tone : But basically, they told us a load of bullshit. They were a subsidiary of Warners, so we thought they’d be quite professional. But almost straight after we signed to them, we found out that Warners were just about to get rid of them, so that was a big let down for us. Warners had decided that Satril were just a waste of time, but of course, we were the last to know that.
Martin : We hadn’t had anyone advising us properly, so we fell for it.
Tone : We were dealing with two pretty young blokes so we thought the label would have a quite modern approach to promotion and stuff. But when the album came out they told us, No, we believe in the old-style of doing things. We want you to go out on tour to promote it yourselves ! I mean, we’d already been doing that for our first single… They really were a bunch of wankers.
They also took quite a long time to actually
release your album… it didn’t come out until 1979, two years after your first
single…
Tone : Oh yeah, they were really slow. And there were other things, like, Toyah wanted us to go out on tour with her, but we’d have to put-up £1500 towards the PA rig. Satril wouldn’t even consider it. So straightaway, that was another good opportunity lost.
Martin : The President of the company, Henry Hadaway, just ran it like his own little fiefdom. He was happy because he got gold records from things like The Fonz and The Birdie Song… that was the record label we were signed-to ! He even came up with the suggestion that we should try to write a song for the Eurovision Song Contest ! Fortunately, that idea quickly evaporated when we told them we certainly weren’t going to do it, but that really was the sorta level that they worked on.
The one decent piece of promotion you did have around that time was an appearance on the TV show ‘Look Hear’…
Martin : Yeah, you can see that on Youtube… the show was presented by Toyah Wilcox, it must’ve been at the end of 1979 or the beginning of 1980… We were still with Satril so we got a big neon sign made with our logo on it to use when we played. It was this big plastic thing, maybe 8 or 10 feet long and the idea was to hang it above us. Now, this was in the days when the BBC still employed men in brown coats who’d come around to do the technical stuff. We told them how we wanted the sign suspended behind the drum-kit and this bloke came along with some stuff that I thought looked like fishing wire. I really wasn’t sure that it would be strong enough, but he assured us it would be fine. Of course, the inevitable happened… they got it about 15 feet up in the air, levelled it out, and then it fell straight to the floor ! The only good thing about it was that we got to charge the BBC for it and they sent the cheque to us instead of Satril, so we spent it on something else… And, in fact, I think Steve’s still got the broken sign somewhere in his house to this day.
Oddly, the track that you performed on that show, ‘Synchronisation’, was never actually released back at that time…
Martin : It wasn’t back then, but we’ve recently recorded it for our new EP. We never made a proper recording of it back then, so we thought we should finally get around to it. Actually, I think it was probably the last song we wrote together before we split-up…
Tone : I can’t remember but that might be right. I do remember the first time we played it live, which was at JB’s in Dudley, which was just a little Scout hut at the time…
Martin : It was certainly towards the end of the band. We’d really fallen-out with Satril by then and we’d decided that we weren’t going to record anything else for them, so ‘Synchronisation’ just ended-up sitting on the shelf.
Tone : Oh yeah, they were really slow. And there were other things, like, Toyah wanted us to go out on tour with her, but we’d have to put-up £1500 towards the PA rig. Satril wouldn’t even consider it. So straightaway, that was another good opportunity lost.
Martin : The President of the company, Henry Hadaway, just ran it like his own little fiefdom. He was happy because he got gold records from things like The Fonz and The Birdie Song… that was the record label we were signed-to ! He even came up with the suggestion that we should try to write a song for the Eurovision Song Contest ! Fortunately, that idea quickly evaporated when we told them we certainly weren’t going to do it, but that really was the sorta level that they worked on.
The one decent piece of promotion you did have around that time was an appearance on the TV show ‘Look Hear’…
Martin : Yeah, you can see that on Youtube… the show was presented by Toyah Wilcox, it must’ve been at the end of 1979 or the beginning of 1980… We were still with Satril so we got a big neon sign made with our logo on it to use when we played. It was this big plastic thing, maybe 8 or 10 feet long and the idea was to hang it above us. Now, this was in the days when the BBC still employed men in brown coats who’d come around to do the technical stuff. We told them how we wanted the sign suspended behind the drum-kit and this bloke came along with some stuff that I thought looked like fishing wire. I really wasn’t sure that it would be strong enough, but he assured us it would be fine. Of course, the inevitable happened… they got it about 15 feet up in the air, levelled it out, and then it fell straight to the floor ! The only good thing about it was that we got to charge the BBC for it and they sent the cheque to us instead of Satril, so we spent it on something else… And, in fact, I think Steve’s still got the broken sign somewhere in his house to this day.
Oddly, the track that you performed on that show, ‘Synchronisation’, was never actually released back at that time…
Martin : It wasn’t back then, but we’ve recently recorded it for our new EP. We never made a proper recording of it back then, so we thought we should finally get around to it. Actually, I think it was probably the last song we wrote together before we split-up…
Tone : I can’t remember but that might be right. I do remember the first time we played it live, which was at JB’s in Dudley, which was just a little Scout hut at the time…
Martin : It was certainly towards the end of the band. We’d really fallen-out with Satril by then and we’d decided that we weren’t going to record anything else for them, so ‘Synchronisation’ just ended-up sitting on the shelf.
Although the original line-up split, the band
did carry on with different members for a while ?
Martin : Yeah. I think I was the first one to leave and then Keith decided to go. We’d been playing loads of gigs but we just never managed to break-through in the way we had hoped-for. When we look back now, you can see there was so much more we could have done, but I guess we were just too young to realise that at the time. Anyway, Tone, Steve and Paul continued with a guy called Mark Fuller on drums, and Tone started playing guitar. That was the line-up that went on to record a John Peel Session and I have to say, I really liked that ! I thought that was a really good line-up and they continued to play more gigs…
Tone : But it had got to a point where everything was changing. Especially in the Midlands, it was the advent of Two Tone. We actually played a gig in Stafford with The Specials, at a club called the Top Of The World. We had to share a dressing room with them and they were such a miserable bunch of blokes… But then we went onstage and the whole audience seemed to be wearing sheepskin coats, porkpie hats and bovver boots ! I was looking at these skinheads thinking, I’m gonna get my head kicked-in ! And, of course, the only alternative to that type of audience were the New Romantics…
When the band finally ended, Tone continued with a new band called Silhouette Theatre. Was that intended to be a continuation of what you’d been doing with Neon Hearts ?
Tone : Yeah, I put a new band together and I think I was just trying to get something out of Satril. We released an EP and demoed some other stuff, but by then I’d finally had enough of Satril and told them to fuck off. The next thing I knew, the police came round to see me because I’d taken all the master tapes we’d made. That was around 1980 or ’81. Actually, we’ve started playing a few of those songs since we’ve got back together and re-recorded some of them with this line-up…
Martin : Keith and I were also in another band called Circles for a while…
And Tone also did the Vael Deary thing…
Tone : Bloody Hell – I’m surprised you’ve even heard about that ! I doubt if you can even find any of that stuff on the internet. But, yeah, that was something I was doing to try to avoid Satril records, because they were really being bastards. It was just a solo thing… I’d bought some digital equipment and I was going to record some demo’s just on my own. But eventually, I met up with these guys again and I just realised, we’ve got a great drummer, a fucking good guitarist and a great new bass player, so I knew this was going to be a better idea.
Martin : Yeah. I think I was the first one to leave and then Keith decided to go. We’d been playing loads of gigs but we just never managed to break-through in the way we had hoped-for. When we look back now, you can see there was so much more we could have done, but I guess we were just too young to realise that at the time. Anyway, Tone, Steve and Paul continued with a guy called Mark Fuller on drums, and Tone started playing guitar. That was the line-up that went on to record a John Peel Session and I have to say, I really liked that ! I thought that was a really good line-up and they continued to play more gigs…
Tone : But it had got to a point where everything was changing. Especially in the Midlands, it was the advent of Two Tone. We actually played a gig in Stafford with The Specials, at a club called the Top Of The World. We had to share a dressing room with them and they were such a miserable bunch of blokes… But then we went onstage and the whole audience seemed to be wearing sheepskin coats, porkpie hats and bovver boots ! I was looking at these skinheads thinking, I’m gonna get my head kicked-in ! And, of course, the only alternative to that type of audience were the New Romantics…
When the band finally ended, Tone continued with a new band called Silhouette Theatre. Was that intended to be a continuation of what you’d been doing with Neon Hearts ?
Tone : Yeah, I put a new band together and I think I was just trying to get something out of Satril. We released an EP and demoed some other stuff, but by then I’d finally had enough of Satril and told them to fuck off. The next thing I knew, the police came round to see me because I’d taken all the master tapes we’d made. That was around 1980 or ’81. Actually, we’ve started playing a few of those songs since we’ve got back together and re-recorded some of them with this line-up…
Martin : Keith and I were also in another band called Circles for a while…
And Tone also did the Vael Deary thing…
Tone : Bloody Hell – I’m surprised you’ve even heard about that ! I doubt if you can even find any of that stuff on the internet. But, yeah, that was something I was doing to try to avoid Satril records, because they were really being bastards. It was just a solo thing… I’d bought some digital equipment and I was going to record some demo’s just on my own. But eventually, I met up with these guys again and I just realised, we’ve got a great drummer, a fucking good guitarist and a great new bass player, so I knew this was going to be a better idea.
Interest in Neon Hearts began to build-up
again when Overground released the ‘Ball & Chain’ CD in 1997, featuring
rare and previously unreleased tracks…
Martin : Steve put that together, really. He dug into all our old demo tapes and outtakes and decided to put it all together. We hadn’t realised there was a demand for this kinda stuff until John at Overground got in touch. In fact, we still weren’t entirely convinced, but told him he could release it and, by now, I think it’s up to its’ fourth reprint. He does a really good job with his releases, so they always sell-out eventually. There was some weird stuff on that CD, things that I’d virtually forgotten about. But, yeah, you’re right, it was that CD that really helped to keep the interest going, so we were happy to go along with it.
It must be nice to know that your music is still appreciated over thirty years later…
Martin : Oh yeah ! It’s great… I mean, when we were doing it at the time, we were so immersed in it that we never thought about how long it was going to last. We were just teenagers doing it because we enjoyed it. The last thing on our minds was, I wonder what people are going to think about this in 35 years time ? A lot of people were saying that Punk would only last six months so we were thinking, let’s try and get it out there before it’s all over…
But even with the interest that ‘Ball & Chain’ and the subsequent CD reissue of ‘Popular Music’ created, there was no talk of an actual band reunion. So it was quite unexpected when you did briefly reunite for some new recordings in 2002…
Martin : Yeah, we did that. Actually, that was all of us apart from Steve… he was there with us at the time but didn’t play anything. This was on one of those odd occasions when Paul was back in Wolverhampton for a while. Obviously, he had his own career by then, what with Killing Joke, and he’d also played with Prong, Ministry and a whole load of other stuff. He’d become a real, professional musician and travelled the world doing that, so we didn’t get to see him all that often. But it turned out that he was in Wolverhampton at this time and by coincidence, it was our sorta 25th anniversary. He was staying just around the corner from my house, so he came around to see me and we ended up in the pub across the road. It was just a matter of a few phone calls and everyone else came down for a few drinks. Anyway, I’d set-up a small sorta home-studio in my basement, so after the pub closed we all went back there and ended up recording a couple of songs. Tone had said that he had these two new songs, ‘Heart of Darkness’ and ‘Horror Story’, so we worked on them. You know, we just had an acoustic guitar and an electronic drum kit, so it really was just a spur of the moment thing. We hadn’t rehearsed for it or anything. We just went through them and thought, these are pretty interesting, we like them. Actually, I think we also started trying to play ‘Retrograde’, which is on the new EP, and maybe one other, but we didn’t get to record them. But especially in light of what happened with Paul, those tracks are quite poignant. It’s funny, because there was no question of a reunion at that point, particularly because Paul was so busy with all of his stuff, and Steve was really busy with his work. The rest of us all have families, so it was just nice that we were all able to get back together again for that occasion.
Martin : Steve put that together, really. He dug into all our old demo tapes and outtakes and decided to put it all together. We hadn’t realised there was a demand for this kinda stuff until John at Overground got in touch. In fact, we still weren’t entirely convinced, but told him he could release it and, by now, I think it’s up to its’ fourth reprint. He does a really good job with his releases, so they always sell-out eventually. There was some weird stuff on that CD, things that I’d virtually forgotten about. But, yeah, you’re right, it was that CD that really helped to keep the interest going, so we were happy to go along with it.
It must be nice to know that your music is still appreciated over thirty years later…
Martin : Oh yeah ! It’s great… I mean, when we were doing it at the time, we were so immersed in it that we never thought about how long it was going to last. We were just teenagers doing it because we enjoyed it. The last thing on our minds was, I wonder what people are going to think about this in 35 years time ? A lot of people were saying that Punk would only last six months so we were thinking, let’s try and get it out there before it’s all over…
But even with the interest that ‘Ball & Chain’ and the subsequent CD reissue of ‘Popular Music’ created, there was no talk of an actual band reunion. So it was quite unexpected when you did briefly reunite for some new recordings in 2002…
Martin : Yeah, we did that. Actually, that was all of us apart from Steve… he was there with us at the time but didn’t play anything. This was on one of those odd occasions when Paul was back in Wolverhampton for a while. Obviously, he had his own career by then, what with Killing Joke, and he’d also played with Prong, Ministry and a whole load of other stuff. He’d become a real, professional musician and travelled the world doing that, so we didn’t get to see him all that often. But it turned out that he was in Wolverhampton at this time and by coincidence, it was our sorta 25th anniversary. He was staying just around the corner from my house, so he came around to see me and we ended up in the pub across the road. It was just a matter of a few phone calls and everyone else came down for a few drinks. Anyway, I’d set-up a small sorta home-studio in my basement, so after the pub closed we all went back there and ended up recording a couple of songs. Tone had said that he had these two new songs, ‘Heart of Darkness’ and ‘Horror Story’, so we worked on them. You know, we just had an acoustic guitar and an electronic drum kit, so it really was just a spur of the moment thing. We hadn’t rehearsed for it or anything. We just went through them and thought, these are pretty interesting, we like them. Actually, I think we also started trying to play ‘Retrograde’, which is on the new EP, and maybe one other, but we didn’t get to record them. But especially in light of what happened with Paul, those tracks are quite poignant. It’s funny, because there was no question of a reunion at that point, particularly because Paul was so busy with all of his stuff, and Steve was really busy with his work. The rest of us all have families, so it was just nice that we were all able to get back together again for that occasion.
Did you all keep in touch with Paul after he
moved away from Wolverhampton ?
Martin : Well, he didn’t get back there very often, but whenever he did, we’d always catch up and hang out. We sorta followed his career from afar and he was always so busy that there was never any question of us getting back together as an ongoing band. But, you know, when you’re in a band at the kinda age we were, you’re all mates and it’s sorta like a gang. You end up friends for life. When he died, the funeral was held in Geneva. The guys from Killing Joke were there, but it was also kinda weird because there were three ex-wives, two ex-girlfriends and six children… and I don’t think any of them had ever met each other before ! So it was an interesting but somehow fitting farewell. He truly was a larger than life character. I mean, some people in Wolverhampton used to think he was a bit of a bullshitter because he’d come back with all these stories, but then you’d be reading something like Dave Grohl’s biography and there’s a whole page about him working with Paul !
Are those tracks you recorded in 2002 ever likely to be released ?
Martin : We’re sorta planning to include them as bonus tracks when we release our new album, hopefully next year…
It wasn’t until 2011 that the band re-surfaced again, this time as part of the ‘Neon Japan’ project…
Keith : A bloke called Miles Wood got in touch with me on Facebook. He was living in Japan but had originally seen us years ago at The Raglan. He told us that there were quite a few people in Japan that loved our records and he was thinking about releasing a CD of all these Japanese bands covering our songs. He said he was going to arrange a launch event and asked if we’d like to go over there for it. In the end, only me and Martin we able to go, and we were also able to play a few of our songs with some of the bands at the end of their sets.
Martin : The thing is, the music scene is just so vibrant in Japan. There must be a hundred little clubs in the centre of Tokyo, putting on three or four bands every night, and they’re all playing original material. Miles had been going out to see a lot of bands and one night, he bumped into someone wearing a home-made Neon Hearts t-shirt ! Then, at another gig, one of the bands played a Neon Hearts song for their encore… well, for a guy from Wolverhampton, that was really weird. I mean, how obscure is that ? So things started to come together from there and he ended-up releasing a CD of nine Japanese bands playing covers of our songs. When it came out, he invited us to come over and play a few songs with some of the bands. It was brilliant, they were so respectful. And I guess that was really what sowed the seeds of the idea to actually put the band back together again.
Martin : Well, he didn’t get back there very often, but whenever he did, we’d always catch up and hang out. We sorta followed his career from afar and he was always so busy that there was never any question of us getting back together as an ongoing band. But, you know, when you’re in a band at the kinda age we were, you’re all mates and it’s sorta like a gang. You end up friends for life. When he died, the funeral was held in Geneva. The guys from Killing Joke were there, but it was also kinda weird because there were three ex-wives, two ex-girlfriends and six children… and I don’t think any of them had ever met each other before ! So it was an interesting but somehow fitting farewell. He truly was a larger than life character. I mean, some people in Wolverhampton used to think he was a bit of a bullshitter because he’d come back with all these stories, but then you’d be reading something like Dave Grohl’s biography and there’s a whole page about him working with Paul !
Are those tracks you recorded in 2002 ever likely to be released ?
Martin : We’re sorta planning to include them as bonus tracks when we release our new album, hopefully next year…
It wasn’t until 2011 that the band re-surfaced again, this time as part of the ‘Neon Japan’ project…
Keith : A bloke called Miles Wood got in touch with me on Facebook. He was living in Japan but had originally seen us years ago at The Raglan. He told us that there were quite a few people in Japan that loved our records and he was thinking about releasing a CD of all these Japanese bands covering our songs. He said he was going to arrange a launch event and asked if we’d like to go over there for it. In the end, only me and Martin we able to go, and we were also able to play a few of our songs with some of the bands at the end of their sets.
Martin : The thing is, the music scene is just so vibrant in Japan. There must be a hundred little clubs in the centre of Tokyo, putting on three or four bands every night, and they’re all playing original material. Miles had been going out to see a lot of bands and one night, he bumped into someone wearing a home-made Neon Hearts t-shirt ! Then, at another gig, one of the bands played a Neon Hearts song for their encore… well, for a guy from Wolverhampton, that was really weird. I mean, how obscure is that ? So things started to come together from there and he ended-up releasing a CD of nine Japanese bands playing covers of our songs. When it came out, he invited us to come over and play a few songs with some of the bands. It was brilliant, they were so respectful. And I guess that was really what sowed the seeds of the idea to actually put the band back together again.
I’m guessing it was the actual offer of a
tour in Japan
that really prompted the bands’ reunion in 2014 ?
Martin : Yeah, initially. We were offered some gigs in Japan and that was the main impetus. Obviously, Paul was no longer around, so we got Ed involved, and I think that brought something different to the sound. Also, Steve decided that he didn’t want to do it. He actually did start rehearsing with us to begin with, before we went to Japan, but when it ended up that we’d be going over there for two weeks rather than just one, it was something he couldn’t commit to, and we respect that. The thing is, he’s always very busy, especially at weekends, whereas for the rest of us, that’s when we’ve got spare time to do stuff. Anyway, we started rehearsing initially just to go to Japan and play the old songs again, but after a while Tone said he had some new songs and when we heard them, we realised we loved them and wanted to carry on playing with the new material. And that’s really why we’re still doing this, now.
Had you thought about getting a replacement sax player when Steve decided he couldn’t do it ?
Martin : Well, it ended up that we were rehearsing without a sax and it was working-out for us, so we just decided to leave it at that. Actually, the funny thing was, at several gigs in Japan, sax players turned up at the soundchecks, because they’d heard that Steve wasn’t playing, and asked if they could play with us. We were a bit sceptical at first, but we let them play with us at the soundchecks and it turned out that they were all pretty-much note-perfect !
So, bringing everything right up to date, you’re now playing live and recording new material. You’ve already released the ‘Dangerous Planet’ EP, what other plans have you got ?
Martin : We’re recording a whole new album, which I’d say was about 90% finished. Tone has written some great new songs and the nice thing is that people have been telling us that the new stuff stands-up really well next to the old material. I suppose you could look at it that what we did back in the Seventies was our apprenticeship, and now we’ve returned 35 years later, we’re a but older and greyer, but we’ve got more experience behind us to work on new songs.
Martin : Yeah, initially. We were offered some gigs in Japan and that was the main impetus. Obviously, Paul was no longer around, so we got Ed involved, and I think that brought something different to the sound. Also, Steve decided that he didn’t want to do it. He actually did start rehearsing with us to begin with, before we went to Japan, but when it ended up that we’d be going over there for two weeks rather than just one, it was something he couldn’t commit to, and we respect that. The thing is, he’s always very busy, especially at weekends, whereas for the rest of us, that’s when we’ve got spare time to do stuff. Anyway, we started rehearsing initially just to go to Japan and play the old songs again, but after a while Tone said he had some new songs and when we heard them, we realised we loved them and wanted to carry on playing with the new material. And that’s really why we’re still doing this, now.
Had you thought about getting a replacement sax player when Steve decided he couldn’t do it ?
Martin : Well, it ended up that we were rehearsing without a sax and it was working-out for us, so we just decided to leave it at that. Actually, the funny thing was, at several gigs in Japan, sax players turned up at the soundchecks, because they’d heard that Steve wasn’t playing, and asked if they could play with us. We were a bit sceptical at first, but we let them play with us at the soundchecks and it turned out that they were all pretty-much note-perfect !
So, bringing everything right up to date, you’re now playing live and recording new material. You’ve already released the ‘Dangerous Planet’ EP, what other plans have you got ?
Martin : We’re recording a whole new album, which I’d say was about 90% finished. Tone has written some great new songs and the nice thing is that people have been telling us that the new stuff stands-up really well next to the old material. I suppose you could look at it that what we did back in the Seventies was our apprenticeship, and now we’ve returned 35 years later, we’re a but older and greyer, but we’ve got more experience behind us to work on new songs.
You released the ‘Dangerous Planet’ EP
yourselves which was almost like going back to how you started with the first
single… is that what you intend to do with the new album ?
Martin : I think so…
Keith : Times are different now, so we’ve got the internet to help us out and get the information out there.
Martin : It has almost gone around in a circle and bands are doing stuff for themselves again. There are things like Spotify…. Everything is available on there for free, so bands aren’t going to make any money from it, but they can go out and maybe make some money from playing live and selling their own records direct to their audience.
Keith : For a long time, bands didn’t make any money from playing live and only really toured to promote the records. But now, with everything going straight on to the internet, that’s all changed.
Martin : Obviously, it’s nice to be rewarded for the records you put out, but at the end of the day we’re really doing this because we enjoy doing it and I’m sure if we weren’t enjoying it we wouldn’t carry on. Like tonight… we drove all the way down from Wolverhampton to a London pub… we’re certainly not doing this to make loads of money ! We’re doing it because we enjoy playing live and as long as there’s a few people who enjoy what we’re doing, then that makes it worthwhile. I think that’s what it’s always been about. Even when we were teenagers, we just enjoyed playing and whatever else came our way was a bonus. I guess the most challenging thing now is the ageist thing… you’re not supposed to carry on playing loud, fast music when you’re in your Fifties. But we’ve played with younger bands and they haven’t had a scratch on us. I think too many of them come from nice, good homes these days !
Martin : I think so…
Keith : Times are different now, so we’ve got the internet to help us out and get the information out there.
Martin : It has almost gone around in a circle and bands are doing stuff for themselves again. There are things like Spotify…. Everything is available on there for free, so bands aren’t going to make any money from it, but they can go out and maybe make some money from playing live and selling their own records direct to their audience.
Keith : For a long time, bands didn’t make any money from playing live and only really toured to promote the records. But now, with everything going straight on to the internet, that’s all changed.
Martin : Obviously, it’s nice to be rewarded for the records you put out, but at the end of the day we’re really doing this because we enjoy doing it and I’m sure if we weren’t enjoying it we wouldn’t carry on. Like tonight… we drove all the way down from Wolverhampton to a London pub… we’re certainly not doing this to make loads of money ! We’re doing it because we enjoy playing live and as long as there’s a few people who enjoy what we’re doing, then that makes it worthwhile. I think that’s what it’s always been about. Even when we were teenagers, we just enjoyed playing and whatever else came our way was a bonus. I guess the most challenging thing now is the ageist thing… you’re not supposed to carry on playing loud, fast music when you’re in your Fifties. But we’ve played with younger bands and they haven’t had a scratch on us. I think too many of them come from nice, good homes these days !
With time moving along, we end the interview
there, to catch some of the music back in the main room,. There’s already been
solo, acoustic sets from Sarah Pink and John Ellis, both of which sounded fine
from where we were although I was trying to concentrate on the interview…
Anyway, the next band are Rubber Legs, a sorta off-shoot of The Phobics, with
Tom on vocals, Moyni on bass and Paul on guitar. Similar sorta punk-rock’n’roll
style as well, which certainly ain’t a bad thing. They like to keep themselves
busy, these lads… First time I’ve seen them play in this format, and I’m
suitably impressed.
Next up are Neon Hearts and it’s great to be finally seeing them live. They have a few technical problems and the stage is a bit of a weird set-up, but overall, the gig is great. Starting with ‘Venus Eccentric’ from their first single, they then play ‘Synchronisation’ which really should have been a single back in the day. They mix several new songs, including ‘I Sleep With Your Enemy’ and ‘Dangerous Planet’ together with original singles ‘Popular Music’ and ‘Answers’, and just as they said in the interview, the new material really does mesh well with the older songs, taking it all forwards but maintaining the original style and attitude. Unfortunately, due to time restraints and the aforementioned technical problems, they soon come to the end of their set, but finish with a great version of the other track from their first single, ‘Regulations’. Due to the PA, this probably wasn’t one of their best sets to date, but I was still left feeling very impressed and certainly keen to see them again. With an album of new material also on the way, I think they’re going to be a very exciting prospect over the coming year.
Next up are Neon Hearts and it’s great to be finally seeing them live. They have a few technical problems and the stage is a bit of a weird set-up, but overall, the gig is great. Starting with ‘Venus Eccentric’ from their first single, they then play ‘Synchronisation’ which really should have been a single back in the day. They mix several new songs, including ‘I Sleep With Your Enemy’ and ‘Dangerous Planet’ together with original singles ‘Popular Music’ and ‘Answers’, and just as they said in the interview, the new material really does mesh well with the older songs, taking it all forwards but maintaining the original style and attitude. Unfortunately, due to time restraints and the aforementioned technical problems, they soon come to the end of their set, but finish with a great version of the other track from their first single, ‘Regulations’. Due to the PA, this probably wasn’t one of their best sets to date, but I was still left feeling very impressed and certainly keen to see them again. With an album of new material also on the way, I think they’re going to be a very exciting prospect over the coming year.
