Hot Press, September 21, 1984: Difference between revisions
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Me and this geezer, we used to go down to Cabaret Futura. It was alright for a posers' club but it was still a posers' club. We used to go down there and ponce drinks. And we thought "fuck this" so we went up to Richard Strange and said we wanted to do a set of Irish rebel songs and he said" ... here the speaker switches from his normal nasal London accent to affect a | Me and this geezer, we used to go down to Cabaret Futura. It was alright for a posers' club but it was still a posers' club. We used to go down there and ponce drinks. And we thought "fuck this" so we went up to Richard Strange and said we wanted to do a set of Irish rebel songs and he said" ... here the speaker switches from his normal nasal London accent to affect a B.B.C. hip mode ...: 'Oh wonderful darling, that sounds really avant-garde' " | ||
"And half the point of it was to shock these ponces out of this smug little synthesized heaven and when we got on, they didn't know what the fuck was going on. But of course with our luck, there happened to be about 20 British Army squaddies there and they didn't like it. The manager went apestrit and we got pelted with chips. Luckily they had plastic glasses and the plugs were pulled on us." | "And half the point of it was to shock these ponces out of this smug little synthesized heaven and when we got on, they didn't know what the fuck was going on. But of course with our luck, there happened to be about 20 British Army squaddies there and they didn't like it. The manager went apestrit and we got pelted with chips. Luckily they had plastic glasses and the plugs were pulled on us." | ||
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"But we caused a real reaction and then I thought I enjoyed this a hundred times more than the Nips. So then we started and made it a going concern." | "But we caused a real reaction and then I thought I enjoyed this a hundred times more than the Nips. So then we started and made it a going concern." | ||
Shane McGowan speaking and possibly with mild exaggeration but no matter. So often, the best bands are | Shane McGowan speaking and possibly with mild exaggeration but no matter. So often, the best bands are born in madness and badness. | ||
The | The Pogues seem an impossible notion. Irish and country music have been fused before, but the Pogues add an outraging element — punk velocity and couldn't-care-less-ness. They will never be accused of being an academic exercise. | ||
Naturally, the | Naturally, the Pogues can cause suspicion at first sight and hearing. At worst, they might seem yet another calculated London fashion scam, the latest ethnic disorder to be foisted on the pop public, or else, they could be more charitably viewed as a well-intentioned but ultimately futile attempt to kidnap the tradition and take it through the punk safety limit. Yet another unavailing scheme to graft Irish music onto rock roots. | ||
Initially I condescended to take the second view but now I'm not so sure. Without any cultural or commercial masterplan, the | Initially I condescended to take the second view but now I'm not so sure. Without any cultural or commercial masterplan, the Pogues are on a rocky road to Stiff knows where. But they are a natural brew. It would be most unwise to think them contrived. | ||
A history lesson shouldn't be required. Most Irish families have at least one relative who | A history lesson shouldn't be required. Most Irish families have at least one relative who emigrated to Britain in the first dismal 15 years after the War, But we forget their children. They haven't all been assimilated so completely as to blot out their parents' culture. | ||
A coincidence of punk was how that | A coincidence of punk was how that generation also arrived with the '76 mob. Claiming the likes of Lydon for auld Ireland can be spurious yet he and others came from the same crop, the children of the mid and late 50s born after Carlow building workers had set up homes with Mayo nurses. | ||
Those emigrants had exported their culture with them and it was never rubbed out. | Those emigrants had exported their culture with them and it was never rubbed out. Particularly in London. That a madcap eintation like the Pogucs should happen there is neither surprising nor objectionable. | ||
But certain purists may object to the area of Irish music that the Pogues redevelop. Shane doesn't rescue rural ballads from the era of the Penal Laws. Instead he's definitely a 20th century man, concentrating on the urban and often unashamedly commercial ballad tradition, the music of the | But certain purists may object to the area of Irish music that the Pogues redevelop. Shane doesn't rescue rural ballads from the era of the Penal Laws. Instead he's definitely a 20th century man, concentrating on the urban and often unashamedly commercial ballad tradition, the music of the Fureys, the Dubliners and the man who straddles all traditions, Christy Moore. | ||
Our | Our encounter turns out to be the Pogue's first press conference rather than a conventional interview. Ranged around the table in a pub close to the Hammersmith Clarendon where the Pogues will play that Saturday night are myself, Shane, the band's bassist and foremost Frankie Goes To Hollywood fan, Cait O'Riordan and Romford Ron of "Everything Counts" fanzine, a London mag devoted to a healthily non-cultist view of music. | ||
For me, it's fascinating hearing Shane and Cait explain themselves simultaneously to both Dublin and London and watching Ron grapple with the idea of the Pogues. He's | For me, it's fascinating hearing Shane and Cait explain themselves simultaneously to both Dublin and London and watching Ron grapple with the idea of the Pogues. He's | ||
Revision as of 16:04, 6 July 2014
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