A little something to fill the void of the holidays. Yesterday a friend sent me a copy of an Interview I conducted for Virtual Festivals.Com in May 1999 back at the butt-end of Britpop. It’s with Radio 1 DJ Steve Lamacq who was the man about town back then as far as the British music scene. I remember him looking on the verge of death when I met him in the pub near BBC Centre. Had a good chat and a few pints... anyway the reason I’m posting it here is because of its relevance to my dissertation topic. Lamaqc was a close friend of Blur and we spoke quite a bit about them during the interview. He was also there at the very beginning of Britpop ... back in the day... Anyway, here’s the edited version 12 years on....
Interview with Steve Lamacq
It has just turned 12 O’clock and we are sitting in a pub, not too far from the studios of Radio One. We are waiting for radio legend, Steve Lamacq, DJ, compare and champion of alternative music. Lamacq is late. We ponder over the question, “How do you interview the man who has interviewed everyone from The Stone Roses (from under a desk), to Nirvana (in a one roomed hovel near Earls Court). Finally he arrives, looking almost dead. Hard night then? For want of a better place to start, we start at the beginning.
Do you still remember your first interview?
“I remember the first one I did for the NME. It was a band called The ‘God Fathers’ and I used to write a fanzine and I spent 6 months trying to get 'The God Fathers' to do an interview and then I got a job at the NME and it took six hours. It was just like that. Some of the early interviews ones at Radio One – Evan Dando most of the stuff around about that point, around 93 –94 was the emerging Brit pop. We did quite a big interview with Blur. It was one of the first ones I was really chuffed with on the radio. It was quite an in-depth one with Blur around the time of Parklife. I think, not maliciously but they can be a little tricky, a little difficult Blur can sometimes because I’m almost the worst person to interview them anyway cause I’ve vaguely known them on and off for years - Ever since when the first single came out. I saw Blur when they were called Seymour in a pub in South London. They were playing in front of about forty people and it was a lot punkier. They were all just bouncing around and falling into each other and it was a bit of shambles.”
Ah. The Blur connection. Lamacq even part owns a greyhound with Blur's lead singer, Damon Albarn.
“We all got into a phase where we all got interested with Greyhound racing for all different sorts of reasons. His was sort of cultural, reading books about that sort of culture and also Andy Ross, who runs food records, used to be a bookies runner so basically he’s terrific at gambling and knows loads about horses and greyhound racing and we all just sort of fell into it really. So we bought a dog. The first one was called ‘Honest Guv’ and the second ones called ‘Honest Injun’ which is an old school phrase we used to use but the second one is rubbish. The first one was very good actually it was amongst the top twenty long distance dogs in the country about three years ago but the second one is rubbish. I mean he could run a race tonight and he would still be running on Tuesday. It’s that hopeless - poor thing.”
Considering the close friendship with Blur, it must be difficult to interview people like Justine Frischman (Elastica) Brett Anderson (Suede) and Oasis, (all of whom have well publicised, rocky relationships with the band.) Is this the case?
"No. It’s strange actually; you sort of separate it out. I think if they had more of a problem with it I’d probably have more of a problem with it but they don’t seem to at all. It’s more difficult with maybe Blur and Oasis. And that was mainly from the Oasis side. Oasis knew that I’m from Colchester. I’m an Essex boy. I'm bound to side with the noncey Southerners in any argument and apart from a couple of singles along the way I’ve always been quite a fan of Blur. I’ve always written about them right from the start. That was more difficult interviewing Oasis. It’s like ‘You are the enemy’. But having said that Noel is a really pleasant fellow apart from when you get onto football."
"The worst thing is trying to interview the person you’re friends with. You can sometimes know too much. You think Oh yeah I better ask them this and they just look at you like this is what we talked about on the phone and your like, “Well…no. I’ve got to ask you professionally.”
Pushing the issue further we ask his opinion on the Mogwai V Blur fracas at T in the Park. Surely this must have been doubly difficult with Mogwai playing the stage for which Lamacq was compare. With the impartiality of a true journalist Lamacq, again, disagrees.
"You see again the thing that salvages it really is that Mogwai are just very strong in their beliefs about stuff but they’re not taste Nazis where they would fall out with you if you liked a band that they didn’t like. I think they enjoy having the argument. So if you can sit down and argue why you like something and they argue why they don’t then that’s almost what they’re trying to achieve. Mogwai are really good because they create some debate, they’ve thought about the music whereas some people treat pop-music in a sort of glib manner. They add a little sense of analysis to it, which just makes people think more. Even with our audience it gets a bit too lead-along sometimes by whatever’s in trend at the moment or just peer pressure. People say they like things without thinking why they do. I know pop music should be spontaneous but at the same time it’s interesting to find out more about why you like something. I’ve always been very concerned with trying to put music in to context - work out why things really are good."
Comparing at festivals, writing about festivals, you would think that Steve Lamacq was seasoned a festival lover. Wrong again!
"I didn’t go to festivals for years. I only had two rules of life when I first joined the NME 1. Never go to gigs South of the river. 2. Never go to outdoor festivals. Live your life by these rules you’ll never go wrong. And then I messed this up completely by A. Moving South of the river and B. Getting a job where I had to go to festivals. I didn’t go to a festival until... I don’t know what year it was. It was probably about 1990. Quite late and it was awful. It was terrible. I can’t remember that much about who played but the New Model Army were on and there was hoards of their fans in clogs. I just thought it was messy, bad, the sound was rubbish and I never wanted to go back but then the NME had to keep going back after that and then I got the job comparing. With Radio One last year I went Reading, Glastonbury V99. After swearing I’d never go to a festival I found myself going to like five in year. You just get dried off and then it’s time to go to another one."
The conversation inevitably turns to the mother of all festivals, Glastonbury and even more inevitably, the weather at Glasto ’98.
“The problem was you just couldn’t sit down. The whole thing about Glastonbury is sort of lolling around. Maybe listen to a bit of music and the other thing is you had two years of Glastonbury that were really wet and nasty and when I go to festivals, if I do go to festivals, I really like going out and seeing bands not necessarily on the big stages but in the new band tents and you just can’t walk around. It’d take you forty minutes to walk from one end of the site to the other end and you would just get to one tent. By the time you get there you might have missed the band that you wanted to see and then you’d have to slog all the way back.”
What about the line-ups this year?
"I think it’s all right. The thing is someone will always be good at a festival. Usually the people who do well at festivals are the ones that are a surprise. Look at all the big hits at Glastonbury over the years and it’s always the ones that people had no expectations of. The year that no one really thought that Oasis were much, Oasis were brilliant. The year when Oasis headlined and everyone thought it was going to be the best thing in the world, Orbital were the best, over in the other tent. Oasis went on stage and did all these new songs which no one had heard before off the new album and it was a bit of a let down. So people build up their expectations so high sometimes bands can’t pull it off.
One year I saw ‘The Reverend Haughton Heath’. I'd never really taken any notice of them. Wasn’t really into them at all and they came on the main stage at Reading and were fantastic. Really good entertainment. Really good festival group. Good tunes good spirit and that was one of the highlights of the weekend. It’s all about the things that are surprising. Glastonbury this year for me was the dance tent. I can’t dance to save my life. No sense of rhythm what so ever but when you understand that Drum ‘n’ Bass and Jungle music is effectively Reggae speeded up andIF you don’t dance to the drum you dance to the base then it works. But I saw loads of things. I went to see Fabio and Grooverider DJ-ing. Break Beat Era I had never seen before. Never taken any notice of them but they were superb. Really really good. So there’s always stuff going.
You have to realise for some bands it’s a really big thing. Even the most confident ones are surely gonna have a little devil on their shoulder saying ‘You might fuck up. You might get it wrong. You might fall on your arse on front of 50,000 people.’ Surely? I mean I get it when I’m comparing at Reading. My major fear is that when I’m introducing the band I’ll forget who it is or I’ll end up introducing the wrong one. Please welcome on stage Fountains of Wayne and there's Bis standing there looking at me. Touch wood it’s never happened but there was one year where I had in fact forgotten. Fortunately I wear a laminate that’s got all the bands names on but I got to the stage where I was like ‘Please welcome …er...a band… a band that really need no introduction whatsoever. But we’ll make some noise anyway for…’ It’s really nerve racking.
The thing is, I’d like to go to a festival where I wasn’t working I could just go and like most of the punters do and actually get pissed. But you can’t really go and get drunk. I have to do an end of night announcement so you’ve still got to be able to talk reasonably sensibly at whatever time, half past eleven, just to say 'take it easy on the way out of the site. 'If you wanna go down the Rivermead there’s a club open. See you back down here at eleven o'clock tomorrow. Take Care. So you can’t get pissed. Otherwise you’d be like ‘Sleep in the Rivermead, go to a club in your tent, be back here in two days at eleven tomorrow at night in the morning…’
Are you disappointed that you’re not going to get to see the bands on the up and coming Carling stage.
Yeah. It’s always the problem but the way we got over this last year is there's a guy at The Mean Fiddler called Neil Pengelly - he’s a really great bloke and last year we managed to commandeer a little moped type of thing and he used to buzz around the site on the back of that around the outside of the perimeter fence So it’s like ‘what time is it? Bentleys are on.’ Jump on the back of the bike. Mad dash around, see two songs and then where are we going next? So, that’s how we did it last year. It gets better as the day goes on because obviously all the sets get longer so if the band are on stage for an hour you’ve got an hour to run around and see as much as you can.
I have to play records and shout a bit. That’s what compairing is. It’s not exactly rocket science y’know. But it always happens on a Sunday just when you’re thinking two days down only one to go they put all the rock bands on. The loudest, noisiest all on the one day and last year it was Page and Plant. I mean what do you play before Page and Plant go on?
What’s your opinion on Page and Plant?
They are very scary. I’m all for people who are past their sell by date to be put into a different league. They have to go and do something else. Like footballers have over thirty fives leagues. I think like old people have to reapply for their driving licence the oldest rock people should have to reapply for a kind of music licence. If they can’t hack it their music licence should be revoked and they won’t be allowed to release records anymore.
Someone puts the Rolling Stones on the jukebox. I ask whether their licences should be taken away.
Yeah in about 1980. I suppose the Stones are better than some though. I’m actually more appalled by people like Sting. They should be held over the Thames on the end of a crane and made to re-consider what they are doing.
What’s the most memorable moment at a festival?
Underworld at Reading. It was in the new bands tent which was the NME tent back then and it’s not that big Born Slippy had just been released and it was a huge hit. I managed to get off to around the site to go and see some things and I arrived just as they were going into Born Slippy and looking out from the back of the stage I could just see the crowd going absolutely mental and it was just chaos in there. That was brilliant. And the Foo Fighters in that tent one year and they hadn’t really done anything over here yet and there were so many people trying to get into the tent and there was loads of talk about whether they should move to the main stage. In the end it was a really exciting set and the sense of anticipation before they came on. Just watching people’s faces at gigs, especially at festivals - This is what they’ve come for this is their moment. It’s the bands moment and it’s their moment. There a real sense of camaraderie and it’s really hard to capture that. The Verve, at T in the Park, before they split up, I was comparing at T in the Park again on the NME stage and they were absolutely mesmeric and Richard Ashcroft was in a world of his own. He was walking around early backstage in his bare feet in his own little world. People say that bands came on and played like their life depended on it but that was like a life and death gig. It was like life or death for the band. ‘Will the band carry on or is this the end? We’ll take it as far as we possibly can.’ It was brilliant.
Your worst moment?
My worst moment at a festival was the year that the Stone Roses played at Reading and I organised an interview for Radio 1 cause we had a back stage porta-studio. I’d had a heavy night and halfway through the Sunday afternoon I think, before I was supposed to interview them I’d just introduced a band on stage and went to have a quick lie down. I woke up an hour later being prodded by a producer saying ‘Steve there's some people here who say you’re supposed to be interviewing them.’ And so as I climbed up from under the desk there was The Stone Roses. Not the way to start an interview them seeing you lying on the floor having never met them before. ‘I’m supposed to be interviewing you? Who are you? What time is it?’
How did you take over from John Peel?
It’s because the Mean Fiddler had to festivals at the time. They were gonna get Peel to do Phoenix and me to do Reading. People said after he stopped doing it he actually had more fun cause he could wander around and see more groups cause you are actually tied to the stage a bit. You don’t get to see your mates much. You’ve got a band on stage for half an hour. You can run to the bar say Hi to someone, run back sort your records out, play them, introduce another band then run back to the bar and it goes on like that for three days. The other thing about festivals is that people always imagine backstage as really glamorous and really exciting. Me and some mates of mine have nick named it ‘The Nest Of Vipers’ cause what it is is a load of people who just come down and lig. It’s not really that exciting and there are so many people there doing it it’s more rammed back there than it is out the front. It isn’t glamorous. I think people expect marbled toilets and fantasise about all the luxuries that you get back stage and it’s just as much of a pigpen as it is out front really.
Do you think that twin festivals stop all the fun for the bands?
I think bands sometimes bands think that it does but when you think about it they get two chances of meeting all these different people. I think that they secretly enjoy it. They just moan about having to travel and not being able to stay over night and not getting to sit down get pissed and shill out at the end of it. But surely there are other nights where you can do that. I think it’s good. Anything which encourages devolution of musical power away from the south. The South used to have all the festivals and none of the talent. I’m so pleased about T in the Park. Because the audience is terrific and it’s slightly less ‘cool’. Scottish people don’t care whether you’re fashionable or not. They just care about whether you’re any good. They’ll give you a chance whoever you are and if you’re good they’ll really like you and if you’re bad they really really really dislike you bad that’s the chance you take. SO it’s good that you can get the festivals further north now. I can’t believe there's never anything around the Manchester area. Leeds is a really good idea and it’ll do for now. It’s ridiculous really that the music industry is all down here when all the bands come from Glasgow or Manchester and places like that.
The best gig?
Certainly not Blondie. Blondie were the worst. I was a bit let down by all the old punk-rockers and the new-wavers at Glastonbury. That was a little depressing. Probably Faithless and the Fun Lovin’ Criminals at Tin the Park. I thought they were going off the boil for a while and even given the fact they’ve introduced these noodly jazz guitar bits and heavy guitar solos, I thought they were brilliant. Mogwai on the Evening Session stage at T in the Park and a band called Doves from Manchester. There have been quite a few good things along the way.
You’ve championed Idlewild along the way.
I think song wise there’s loads more to come from Idlewild. There’s a sort of similarity between Idlewild and Blur in that Blur, even when they were just fooling around being kind of a punky noisy creation; they could obviously really play. They really understood how to play. Quite talented people really and I think the same about Idlewild. The thing that Idlewild have to do is forget about trends and making records for radio and stuff. But I think also the next stage in the development of Idlewild is actually in their characters and talking to them cause they’re actually really interesting people. There’s a lot going on in their heads. I think they could end up sounding like REM but like a spiky REM. Which is like Nirvana. Kurt Cobain used to say that one of his big, driving influences was REM cause he wanted the tunes of REM mixed with the punk noise of the late seventies and I think there’s a touch of that about Idlewild in that you can try and marry the two things together. REM now, bring an instant yawn around my house but some of the stuff they did was very clever and good at the time.
What new bands to you rate at the moment?
It’s been a bit strange really. I think that Muse are going to do quite well. We had them on the Evening Session tour. But the thing I’ve found is that bands develop at different rates. Bands that you sometimes tip early on take will take longer to get there. Doves make some really interesting music but whether it’s right for the time and whether they’ll sell loads of records, I kind of don’t think they will but that doesn’t stop them being a fantastic band. Muse are probably more likely to happen just on the basis that’s it’s kind of the sound that’s more right for the time. I think in the run up to Christmas I can see a sort of second wave of MTV punk rock – 'Lining Ends' and 'Blink 182'. Blink 182 I think are going to do really well. It’s gonna be American bands and Australian bands. Bands with long shorts. That’s where everything’s shifting slightly. There’s nothing come through post-Britpop. There are lots of bands re-inventing themselves but nothing that I think that’s going to sell loads of records. But then again I’m not very good at picking out bands. I seem to go for ‘I like this record’ and ‘I like that record’. The Angelica single, which is out at the moment, is the tops. They’re these four girls from Lancashire and I got this compilation album of new bands and they were on that. And then they did a single but had to go off and finish their exams. And then they came back again with this new record. They’re really really good. They’re the sort of band, on-stage, that’ll look like they’re gonna break if you look at them too hard.
But I genuinely think that everything’s turning around and everything’s going to start happening again. On the ten-year basis that the start of the 1990’s was the most exciting times in music that I’ve ever lived through. I was editing the ‘ON’ page at the NME at the time and in the first six months of 1990 we did The Charlatans, Lush, Blur, loads about Teenage Fanclub. All these bands suddenly emerged out of nowhere, without warning. The tips for the year at the start of the year had none of these bands in it. Then all of a sudden, each week, a record came out. I think it might happen again.
The other thing is that all the bigger companies are all looking at the age demographic and the number of teenagers in the country starts rising again in the first part of the year 2000. The number of teenagers has been going down and in tandem so has record sales and singles sales and interest in music and when it starts going up and that’ll be in about the middle of 2000, that’s when you expect the next pop revolution to happen.
What do you think about Internet sites covering music and festivals?
I think it’s great. Radio one had a little web-cam at Glastonbury. Which I thought was quite good. I wasn’t quite so pleased about the pictures of me and Jo Whiley looking like we’d been left out in the sun to dry. But I think it’s good. In a way it’s fulfilling the same job that Radio One tries to do in bringing a festival to people who can’t get there. Whether you can’t get there because you haven’t got the money or you’re too young or your parents won’t let you go or just happens to be that you can’t get there. And it’s great. The one thing that the Internet has got over everyone else is that you find it’s having quite a big impact on everyone outside of the UK. There are a lot of Anglophiles in the States and people who like British music around the world and for them it’s a unique opportunity to find out what’s going on. It’s the global nature of the Internet that has the most impact.
Are you going to go into TV like Jo Whiley?
No! (Holds a cigarette packet up to my face and tells me to ask that question again). Try to look at an inanimate object whist trying to say something funny and interesting doesn’t work. I’d quite like to do something if there was the right vehicle to do it. The problem with TV shows is that you have to compromise your music policy more than you have to on radio. I mean I wouldn’t go and do a daytime show for instance, because you’d have to play things that you didn’t really like or want to plat and most of the TV shows don’t give you the space or the opportunity to put on the bands that you’d really like to. We had this idea that we’d like to a programme called ‘Fantasy Record Industry’ and we’d role play the life of a band in a kind of ‘Who’s Line Is It Anyway?’ style. So you’d create a band…what happens next? The singer leaves. SO what are you going to do? Advertise in ‘LOOT’. Audience- What do you think of that…? And so on. Something like that would be really fun to do. We’d have a couple of bands on as well. If the right thing came along I’d do it but I’m not desperate to get into television.
What advice would you give someone who wants to be a DJ?
Don’t’ worry if you get turned down. Just keep doing stuff and do radio where ever you can. Famously, I even got turned down by my local hospital radio and hospital radio is obviously the lowest of the low but I got turned down by Colchester Hospital Radio. I started off by doing pirate radio, which is obviously against the law, it’s not to be encouraged… (Lamacq smiles slyly at this comment) I have to say all this as I work for the BBC otherwise they’d sack me! But it was a good experience. Then I went down and helped out at GLR. I knew somebody that knew somebody that knew Gary Crowley and I just said ‘I work for the NME. I can bring loads of records in.’ And then I learned how to edit tape and he let me do a gig guide. Just try and get as much experience as you can. We’ve got a couple of producers that virtually turned up on work experience and then kept coming back every so often. After about 18 months they went for a job and got it. That’s because they’d been there. They knew how Radio One worked. You get a break as long as you don’t give up. I’d wanted to be a DJ since I was a kid and I’d almost given up on it but sooner or later, if you’re really committed to doing something someone will give you a chance. If you then go and fuck it up it’s your own fault.
C.1999 Ali Pibworth
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