Please give a brief history of the band, including current line up.
Started out in 1978 with the name Vermin, changed that to
Chaos and then The Skeptix when we signed to zenon records in 1981 we recorded
3 singles e.ps for Zenon and an album for Rock'o'Rama asplit single from
the album was released with German punks OHL and we also released a split
single with The Insane on White Rose Records, troubles within the band caused
internal disharmonies resulting, in the end, in Fish, the guitarist, leaving
to join Discharge in 1985> The present day line up is Snotty Vocals, Ush
Bass, Chig drums and Fish guitar. The same line up from the early days
Discography.
Routine Machine/ Curfew
Peace Force/ Born to Lose/ Scarred for life e.p.
Vendetta/ Berlin Wall Insane split
Return To Hell/ War drum/ Another Day e.p.
Violent Streets/ OHL split
So The Youth album
Why reform after all this time?
cos we hadnt seen Fish for nearly 20 years, then the sod
turned up as if he'd never been away and demanded that we finish business!
sort of went like that when Captain Oi released our Pure Punk Rock cd we
got back in touch and decided it would be good to record the remaining tracks
from The Skeptix legacy. It was done and dusted then. Unknown to us we had
developed, quite a fan base in The States, Which was down to a few dedicated
individuals..(cheers John G, Deck,Jim...theres loads of them and my fingers
are getting sore!!!!) and The Casualties for mentioning us in interviews
and stuff...After we started to practice, we all realised that The Skeptix
had matured but not in a bad way, basically the old songs sounded much better
and the new oldies sounded great, we decided to give it a shot, been practicing
hard now since December 2001we're all looking forward to gigging again.
What is the highlight and what is the lowest point in the
bands history?
The highlight was the release of our first single routine
machine, and playing at the Stollwerk in Cologne at a big festival (ask us
this again after the HITS festivals and our US dates)The low point was realising
that we wern't going to do the European dates and Fish leaving.
Do you still go and see other punk/oi bands when they play
in your area? If so, what was the last band you saw and were they any good?
Went to see the Subs in Newcastle recently, they were still
good.
What is the favourite song (and what band is it by) of each
member of the band?
California uber alles Dead Kennedys....Ush
Complete control The Clash....Chig
New Rose The Damned....Snotty
Plan 9 Channel 7 The Damned....Fish
Tell the readers five facts about the band / band members
they will not know
Ush shaves his bollix....its true, he just had em out!
Chig has a punk rock son who is older than him!!
Fish rides a suzuki gsx750 at tremendous speeds and once ended up with it and
him wrapped around a lamppost
Snotty once shared his snuff with GBH's Col at a gig in Brmingham
We all went to school with Baz the original drummer from Broken Bones and Nobby,
the original singer, in fact Fish sat next to Nobby in English lesson. Chig
once got beaten up by above English teacher because he and Fish were disrupting
the class, he he it was Fish's fault.
Fish and Chig who are (again) the best of friends, had 2 skirmishes around
the time of recording SO THE YOUTH.The first one happened whilst Fish and Ush
were waiting in the cold. Chig and Snotty had the keys to the practice room...in
December it was freezing, in fact it was the last practice before they went
off to Cologne ro record the album....they turned up with a bag of chips each....sods
had been getting food whilst Ush And Fish froze, well let me tell you, tempers
did indeed fray on that occasion, and the two unlikely buddies ended up in
a small ruckass....Well, not one to let sleeping dogs lie, whilst recording
the album in Colognes Studio Am Dom, Fish and Chig were sent out to fetch lunch...whilst
in the Giros fast food take out, the person behind the counter asked, quite
innocently, does this one want onions? pointing to Shep, the producers food,
Yes said Fish, No Said Chig......and so on.... until the brawl that had started
outside the dull practice room in duller Longton, in the snow, reared its ugly
head once more, and erupted all over the food store, to the disbelief, of the
now extremely, agitated and a bit vexed Greek counter person....well it all
got sorted in the end. And Chig and Fish are still buddies.
Describe punk at the beginning of the 21st century.
Punk has and should continue to keep growing, its really
great that there are so many fanzines and people who are willing to put time
and money into punk again. The HITS promotors, Mark Brennan, at capt oi,
yourselves, its great, its giving the older bands a chance to play again,
it also is giving the newer bands a chance too. Hope that it doesn't become
just a fashion though because it never was (not for us anyway) back then.
Plans, gigs and releases planned for 2002.
We have been invited to do the HITS in Blackpool and New
Jersey, we have some gigs in around the New Jersey gig in September..CBGB'S
New York Sept 9th. R1 Providence on Sept 5th, we hope to get on the Berlin
and Balkans HITS, we then may get a package of bands maybe Threats and one
or two others and do some UK shows.
As far as releases go, we are at the moment concentrating on our 2nd New/old
album working title is Unfinished Business, we then would like to do a live
album and then re-record the tracks from SO THE YOUTH that didn't get used
on the live album...maybe even add them to the new cd if there's room....And
then we've decided to write a new Skeptix album 2002 all new tracks, what we
feel important is though is not to wander off from where our roots are ie it
will be a kicking punk cd not a metal or whatever else album.
Any final comments?
hanks for the interview, thanks to everyone who's interest
has helped put The Skeptix back together.
DON'T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU SEE AND HEAR
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