MONKEY WAH WAH
interviewed by Keiji Jansch

RF, Russell Freeman - DT, Des Torpey - NV, Neil Vines

Do you think there exists a Swindon scene and are you part of it?

RF: Yeah, I think there is a possibility of a Swindon scene, there are a lot of bands playing around, a lot of them not very good. But, there are some good bands coming out who’ve got similar ethics, similar ideas. I don’t think its linked by sound, like Seattle, grunge or whatever, I think now there’s a lot of people interested in making music for themselves, and making music that challenges people, that challenges audiences, and actually does something new, rather than, keep together some form of boring old rock ‘n’ roll type hedonism.

DT: There’s always scenes around, but, you need something extra to make it become full fledged.

NV: I think the night our bands [the eidola records roster] have been playing on, I think there’s a definite scene been forming, same faces. And I think eventually other people watching might be inspired to do something themselves, make their own music, so it should increase.

RF: Exactly ‘cause the way we... it's not about having the really expensive equipment, or being professional, or in any way having any ideas of stardom. So someone hopefully in the audience seeing it will see that it’s a grass roots thing, people making their own records, and having control over your product, and yeah, hopefully those people might be inspired to do something themselves.

DT: Even if this supposed scene doesn’t take off, if it inspires one or two bands then...

RF: Its worth doing.

DT: Yeah.

The ‘scene’ seems very male dominated, how do you feel about that?

DT: I don’t think sex has anything to do with it, I think it's just who can be bothered, who has the right kind of influences to set something up, and make it work, I don’t think it's got anything to do with gender, it's who can be bothered.

NV: The audience is split as well, where there are probably about fifty fifty.

RF: I don’t know, I think the only way it would be good if you had women do music would be if they did dance routines, and stuff and they were really attractive, I think otherwise I think we should just keep it.

NV: The fact that they’re going to watch shows they’re part of the scene, so I wouldn’t say it was male dominated.

RF: In all honesty it would be cool, [if more women we’re part of the performance side] I guess we have Lindsay [Monkey Wah-Wah violinist], but its not like we’re flaunting our masculinity.

DT: It couldn’t be anything more different really, I don’t really think gender's an issue to be honest.

RF: Not with what we’re doing, the nights we have are literally open to all different types of music and all different types of people. Regardless of race, sex, whatever, I think it would be good to see more variation, hopefully that will spread.

What would you say influences you?

RF: In music, I’d say lyrically by the beat generation, the free prose, the lyrics I write don’t really have rhyming couplets or set choruses or anything, I want it to be more free, representing what I see around me really.

Do you think people listen to your lyrics?

RF: I’d like to think they do but, from having seen bands, unless you hear the same song over and over again or unless the lyrics are really blatant, its very difficult to take it all in.

You change your songs quite often as well…

RF: I think a lot of the eidola bands have an ethic, of constant change and innovation, and if people are bothering to come and see you, you should at least play a few new numbers.

DT: I don’t think there’s any point in slogging the same set around for six months.

RF: Or even worse mainstream bands who play ten of twelve songs for two years, I’d be bored shitless doing that.

DT: People buy albums for that, you give them something different when you play live.

RF: It’s also the way you interpret the songs, a lot of the songs we had for the summer (2000) to the Christmas, the songs through playing them more actually changed, got more aggressive, you’ve got a fly in your eye [referring to Neil]

[conversation about insects, monkeys and Stevie Wonder and his audience takes place]

Is there a Monkey Wah-Wah philosophy?

RF: At the moment the idea of post-punk, the idea that punk's something that’s not spiky hair and leather jackets but it's like the Fugazi idea that you should be there to challenge yourself and your abilities.

NV: Try out new ideas.

RF: And innovating, what we’re moving towards is a sound with energy, that’s got something to say, without slipping into all the clichés.

DT: Our basic ideology is just to play with passion, whatever comes out comes out, as long as you're putting as much as you can into it then it’ll invariably turn out well. If you're not there’s not a lot of point in doing it really.

RF: About passion, and about not feeling lazy, about the privilege to play, you should play every gig like its your last.

DT: All or nothing basically.

NV: That another reason why our set changes all the time, because we’re always coming up with new songs.

DT: You can’t just let things lie so keep striving to change.

The Monkey Wah-Wah line-up keeps growing, I don’t think you’ve played live with the current line-up…

RF: As yet we’ve not played at all together, it is the official line-up, but we’ve practised separately but not all together.

Any idea of when the first gig with the new line-up will be?

RF: Possibly the Impending Suicides Night, which is July 22nd [at the Vic] if not it’ll be late July early August, we’re trying to find somewhere else other than the Vic, as well.

Is Swindon better for the Vic, having taken over the role of live local bands from Level 3?

DT: You're never better for having less places to play.

RF: I think at the same time the Vic doesn’t seem to have a problem with different types of people, like Level 3 are really selective on the door, and the Vic is often all ages as well, where as Level 3 is eighteen, I’ve been stopped there before, and also the bands that used to play there were either the odd band passing through that were crap or really crap local grunge bands that were just not innovating at all.

That seems to have died out a little.

RF: Yeah, but it’s just been replaced with punk which is popular right now, which is why they’ve got audiences in, which is why they’re making money, so it appears healthy, but you watch it’ll shoot itself in the foot, within two years.

It seems that the eidola bands are doing something that didn’t seem to be happening three years ago, is that anything to do with the Vic or is it a more general shift in consciousness?

DT: The Vic has been a massive help, it helped us.

RF: ‘Cause nowhere else would have given us a gig.

DT: It's just a shame that is the only place, apart from maybe the Atrium.

RF: But it definitely gave us a chance because all these people who have been playing around have been making music in their bedrooms or wherever for the last three or four years now have been wanting to do stuff, and it’s taken us a while to get the confidence to really go out and do it, and the Vic’s given us the chance to do that, it's also now holding us back, so I think we need to take more of an active role in advertising gigs, finding new venues, put a bit more effort in really.

NV: Maybe venues outside of Swindon, branching out a little bit.

There was some talk of a Monkey Wah-Wah summer tour, is that in…

RF: The gutter? Yeah, now it is.

NV: It's not financially viable.

RF: For now, but perhaps next year or the year after, start with out of town gigs though, it's like a stepping stone, like eidola records, everything is one step at a time, so we don’t slip, because there’s no point just trying to do something straight away and it falling on it's face, that’s how grassroots things work, one step at a time.

DT: I don’t think we should rely on outside help, really, you have to do these things yourself.

There seems to be a great community spirit embroiled in the eidola bands…

RF: That’s something I think is cool with eidola, is that all the bands play together, we had Jejune Oil and James (Vacuity Basement guitarist), joining us on things, and all these different people, that’s the community aspect, lending amps, equipment, help for everyone getting to the places, its that idea that all working together is better than slogging along on your own, we’ve found it strange when we’ve played with other bands who want to use all their own equipment and don’t want to talk between sets or in sound check and stuff, not mentioning names, but it’s just a really strange uncomfortable atmosphere having done the eidola gigs, where everyone is there to share ideas.

The eidola gigs seem to have found their own place now, with the first two gigs there seemed to be the consensus that you needed a more populist band to bring in the crowds…

RF: Partly because it was about securing the venue and keeping Kev [Vic landlord] happy, getting to the point now, with good advertising and playing good gigs, we can pull in enough people to make it work now, whereas before there was the worry that we wouldn’t, and I think we’re more confident now that we can.

So you’re more comfortable playing in front of people now?

RF: I am, I don’t know…

NV: Yeah, although I was comfortable when we first played really.

DT: I’m still not completely comfortable playing live, I’m still really nervous, but I’ve only played three gigs, so…

NV: I think when you've got all the wires and things down, there is so many things you can collide into. It makes you a little nervous that you’re going to knock the mic stand over or something, that’s the only thing that un-nerves me.

DT: It's the exposure thing that worries me.

RF: In what way?

DT: You shouldn’t worry about what people think, but once you're up there it’s a different matter.

RF: I think it's something you get to, it's definitely something I’ve got to.

DT: I have yet to get there.

RF: I don’t know, that last gig we played [at the Atrium] to me it felt, musically the same as practise.

DT: I still can’t get over the feeling that if you play badly people are going to think bad of you, I kind of have to get over that before…maybe I’ll never get over it.

RF: Like the last z+ gig I really stopped giving a shit basically.

DT: I don’t know about you two but I don’t wannabe anarchistic action, I don’t care about what people think, otherwise you’re just dismissing your audience, who you’re making your music for.

RF: We’d rather be giving than alienating, but that’s an easy thing to say, and it's different when you get to somewhere and you don’t feel the audience is responsive.

DT: You make music for other people you know, you make it for yourself as well.

RF: You make it at a creative level, when you’re recording or writing, but if you don’t want to share it then why are you playing live?

DT: You may as well sit in your bedroom.

NV: At a gig the audience is equally as important to the gig as you are.

DT: The audience make the gig you know.

RF: Which is one reason why you want to play with real passion.

DT: You can’t take the audience for granted, they came along, they made the effort to see you so you’ve got to give them something back, or there’s no point really.

RF: That’s also the thing about putting on our own gigs and wanting to promote them better and get more people involved, because if you’re in a situation where you’re in a big mainstream band then everything’s booked for you, you don’t ever see your audience, all you do is turn up and play, it's just like, well you know, there’s a load of people out there and you’re just playing, it doesn’t really matter especially if you’ve been in the street and said come along to my gig, you feel an obligation to be good, not an obligation to please them but an obligation to do what you’re doing with the utmost conviction.

DT: Once you lose communication with your audience you may as well give up, rather than become some blotted rock band that has no concept of the ordinary world.

RF: So the last message is come and see us when we play and we promise to play with our utmost effort.

Information on Monkey Wah Wah at www.eidolarecords.co.uk and http://uk.geocities.com/monkeywahwah

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