Made in England
Apocalypse Babys
06/11/01 (interview with Asterix)
Please give a brief history of the band, including current line up.
Apocalypse Babys played their fist gig in 91, the original
line up was Asterix - vocals/bass, Mr Reed - guitar & Kelly - drums.
We gigged for about two years adding and taking away another couple
of guitarists Stu and KD. We recorded and released our 1st record. the
'Dance till you drop' e.p ourselves, which to our suprise got the thumbs
up in the N.M.E. Steven Wells rang us up asking what we planned to do
to change the world, we told him we'd think it over in the pub! they
thought we were some 'NWONW' thing, we used to get in all these Manic
St Preachers zines that were doing the rounds but we were fuck all to
do with that, it made us laugh though. Anyhow we relaunched the band
in 94 with the Hippy on guitar and Dutch on bass, this line up lasted
another couple of years, we recorded our first and 2nd albums for Smokin
Troll records and then Kelly quit in 96 to go to university, Daz 'Chelsea'
Clay joined for about a year and a half. He recorded the 'Local Heroes'
e.p with us before
he and Dutch quit. Kelly returned and we recorded our 3rd album 'WDYTOISF'.
In 1999 Asterix put together yet another line up of the band with John
'Heavy Metal' Slater on guitar and Rob 'Love the perm' Kershaw on drums,
this line up recorded the 'Full Metal Racket' e.p before John left to
join ex Iron Maiden frontman Blaze Bailey's new band! 2001 saw the return
of the Hippy and Dutch and new drummer Andy 'the kid' Tyler, the band
celebrated ten years at a home town gig in Mansfield, after which Andy
decided the snarl and spit world of punk rock was not for him (who did
he think he was joining, Steps for fuck sake?) and the Hippy announced
he was definitely retiring for good this time. at present the Apocalypse
babys are auditioning members, hopefully we can get back out here a.s.a.p.,
here's to another 10
years!
Discography.
Dance till you drop e.p 93
Shootin from the hip e.p 95
3 Chords to heaven album 95
Whoops Apocalypse Babys album 96
Local heroes e.p 97
I don't wanna be a nazi 7" 98
WDYTOISF album 98
Nuclear rain 7" 99
Viva le Rock 'n' Roll album 2001
Full Metal Racket e.p 2001
Describe your sound and the main themes to your lyrics.
What is the highlight and what is the lowest point in the bands history?
Unfortunately for this band there has been too many low
points, far out weighing the highlights! A catalogue of missed opportunity
like having to pull our trip to the US coz our twat of a guitarist wouldn't
pay for his own airfare! having to cancel a tour in Germany coz our
drummer decides to have a mental breakdown! although we did manage to
play France a few years back which was a real laugh, the audience in
Paris was really up for it. Releasing a new record is always a highlight
too, we're very proud of what we've put out and it's nice when people
say they like your album. Playing HITS for the first time this year
was also another highlight, it was nice to see so many check us out,
great weekend, punk rock, I love it!
If you could see any band play live, either of the past or present who
would it be?
Well Motorhead, Sex Pistols, Dead Kennedy's, Thin Lizzy
all come close but I'd have to say the Ramones. I saw em about 8-9 times
and it was always the most exiting time for me. They were like a fucking
machine, stood there, leather jacket, ripped jeans, guitars slung low,
blasting out these heavenly tunes, cool as fuck! Sad day when Joey died.
What is the Punk/Oi scene like in your area?
Well there are loads of kids with Offspring/Green Day
T shirts, but they've only heard the successful commercial bands, when
an old school Punk/Oi band plays locally at the Vic, Derby, it's usually
the same thirty something's in there, the younger 'Pop Punk' crowd aren't
interested coz they've never read about em! it's a shame. but you get
used to being the
underdog and ignored by the music press, fuck em! we played Mansfield
recently and all these kids started bouncing around and at the end they
said 'wow you're great, how come we've never read about you in Kerrang,
we just shrugged our shoulders and told em it's coz we're British!
What is the best sentence you have ever heard, that someone has managed
to get into a song's lyrics?
'Treat your women like toilets, they're happy when you're
abusing em, but toilets don't follow you round when you've finished
using em' -Beer & sex & chips 'n' gravy' -Macc Lads, there's
no real excuse for this, it's extremely degrading to woman, but sadly,
it makes me laugh, for me the Macc Lads were masters at making sexism
absurd.
What is punk?
To me it loosely describes a form of music, fast loud
Rock 'n' Roll. The fashion changes a little depending when you got into
it? punk came about to rid Rock 'n' Roll of the 'Boring old farts',
it did that for a while, its aims were achieved. Today punk rock stands
as another
alternative to the mainstream music world.
Plans, gigs and releases planned for 2001/2002.
We have already recorded a 5th album which should see
the light of day next year (2002) if we can somehow manage to keep a
stable line up then we'll play as many gigs as possible, anywhere we
can!
Any final comments?
Yeah a big fuck off to all who have ripped us off and
let us down over the last ten years, Apocalypse Babys are still here,
most of you are NOT!
Cheers Asterix!
