SCARED TO DANCE winter 2010/11 fanzine The Vaselines £2.00 Plus: Edwyn Collins Ballboy Where It’s At Is Where You Are Big Pink Cake Wekender Review WeePOP! Onward Chariots Northern Portrait MJ Hibbett & the Validators Including a FREE Christmastime, Approximately CD from WIAIWYA! Winter Fanzine cover 2.indd 1 1/4/11 12:59:29 AM introduction Welcome to the Winter fanzine! I hope you’re full of all the festive cheer that this time of year brings. We’ve got lots of presents for you in this edition, from interviews with the legendary Vaselines and Edwyn Collins to a bumper review of the Big Pink Cake Weekender. On top of that we catch up with Ballboy and Northern Portrait, and Ben Clancy tells us what makes those sleigh bells ring- ting-ting-a-ling. So enjoy Christmastime, Approximately lovingly put together by John Jervis at Where It’s At Is Where You Are. It’s a stunning compilation from many of our friends here in London. We’ve introduced membership at the club, so if you’d like your free card please get in touch at [email protected]. We’ve got a big year ahead of us in 2011 so keep checking the website to see what we’ve got up our sleeves. Happy holidays! Paul Richards contents 1 The Vaselines 17 Big Pink Cake Weekender 4 Edwyn Collins 21 How Does It Feel To Be Loved? 7 Ballboy 23 WeePOP! 9 Northern Portrait 24 dirtyconverse DISCO 11 MJ Hibbett & the Validators 25 It’s Grim up North... Content: Paul Richards ~ Design: Bree Wright 13 Onward Chariots 15 Where It’s At Is Where 26 Testing the Bells in Loughborough www.scaredtodance.co.uk You Are 16 Christmastime, Approximately 27 Sleigh Bells Ring-Ting- Facebook: facebook.com/scaredtoddance Ting-A-Ling Twitter: twitter.com/scaredtodance myspace.com/scaredtodanceclub Winter Fanzine cover 2.indd 2-3 1/4/11 12:59:30 AM I was in the Famous Monsters and rankle with your inner punk? Frances was in the Pretty Flowers. We The Vaselines realised we weren’t getting to do what The Scala show was amazing, one of we wanted to do so we got together and our favourite of that tour. It’s the kind started writing some songs. of reaction you want from an audi- ence and it make us excited and helps There’s a lot of teasing banter on us raise our game to deliver the best gig stage. Is it hard to do it with an possible. ex? What were you doing when you It’s easier to banter on stage with heard Kurt Cobain was covering Frances. We’ve known each other for your stuff? over twenty years and we’re very re- laxed around one another and that I was working in a bar on Duke Street in comes across on stage and we use it to Glasgow. I’d finished college, Frances get back at one another for any griev- and I had split, the band had broken up ances we have with each other. There’s and I was feeling pretty down so to hear a lot of history that we’re still working our music was being taken up be a band through. in America was pretty amazing news. Graeme Swanson talks to Eugene Over the last twenty years Glasgow has Kelly. developed as a city for musicians to When I saw you at the Scala in Lon- work in that others in Scotland haven’t. don I was struck by the affection Are all the best songs written You’ve just completed a thorough There are a lot of rehearsal spaces and in the crowd for you. Does that with only three chords? tour of North America including venues. It has had a few bars that have Mexico. How did it go? I see at one been constants that give musicians a point you had en suite Jacuzzis. place to hang out and it helps create a buzz that is lacking elsewhere. The tour went well. It was the longest tour we’ve done as The Vaselines so it With your double and single was great to travel all around America, entendres and sometimes rocka- Canada and Mexico. Yes, Frances and I billy rhythms, The Cramps spring had a Jacuzzi in our rooms in Mexico. I to mind. Were they one of the few don’t know how that happened and it’s good things for you about the never likely to happen again. 1980s? You were playing with Teenage I loved The Cramps music. It’s all about Fanclub and Belle and Sebastian. making rock ‘n’ roll fun and sexy like it What is it about Glasgow? How was when it first started. different would you sound if you grew up thousands of miles west What bands were you playing with of the M8? in the beginning? 1 2 Winter Fanzine cover 2.indd 4-5 1/4/11 12:59:34 AM Three chords work for us on most songs. We like to keep it simple and repetitive, catchy and fun. Not every song has to have three chords only but if you want to write short, snappy, punk, garage edwyn collins songs then it helps. I sent Frances some tunes I’d written, she sent me some and we decided what ones would work. We got together to write the lyrics and we would send new versions with new ideas back and forward to each other as MP3s and we would add our ideas and send it back. The lyric writing was the most fun part. How were your 1990s? The 1990s were fun for a while. I had an exciting time in Captain America/ Eugenius releasing records on Fire Records then Atlantic Records. I got We grew up in the era of comedy on TV to travel the world and play music. It were entendre was King (and Queen). was all going great but after Kurt killed Carry On movies, Dick Emery, Are You himself the music industry changed and Being Served? and Frankie Howard. It On your new album Losing Sleep, you collaborated with The Cribs’ bands signed on the back of the grunge must’ve rubbed off on us. We also love Ryan Jarman and Johnny Marr, Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos and scene were swiftly dropped. We were Viz and Finbar Saunders. Nick McCarthy, The Drums and Aztec Camera’s Roddy Frame. How about to sign to Nirvana’s management did that come about? You’ve recently played with the company but that was cancelled by them Dum Dum Girls, how aware are Ryan is in my studio all the time, he’s like family. He did the very first col- the week after Kurt died. The second you of your influence on younger laboration. The Franz Ferdinand lads, I know them and bumped into them half of the 90s were pretty miserable bands? at a festival and we arranged to get together. Roddy is my oldest friend, from for Eugenius and we struggled on for a Postcard days. Romeo and I know each other. We’re on Heavenly together and few years until we split. I started writing We weren’t aware that there were any The Drums became friends with my son, Will first. They like early Orange my solo album and then I found a new bands out there that were fans of ours Juice and we decided to do a song together. And Johnny was the last thing. direction and inspiration. until we started playing gigs again. It’s He had a song idea up his sleeve and also the title, “Come Tomorrow, Come a great feeling to think that anybody is Today”. Can we start the rumours about a listening to your album, but knowing third album yet? that musicians are listening and want- You won an Ivor Novello award last year for your song writing. ing to write songs because of your tunes How did it feel to be recognised in that way? No talk of album three as yet. We’ve no is a very good feeling. tunes. I loved it. What a day, what an honour. It’s special because it’s for songwriting www.thevaselines.co.uk and comes from other songwriters. I’m proud of my songs. Where does all the filthy talk come from? 3 4 Winter Fanzine cover 2.indd 6-7 1/4/11 12:59:44 AM The Byrds, Chic, Motown and The Velvet Underground were all mentioned as influences on Orange Juice. Who are the influences your song writing these days? It’s all from my head, from my experience, no particular influences are needed. There is so much music in my brain. Tell us about the seven-disc Orange Juice box-set Coals to Newcastle. Was it something that you helped put together with the rest of the band? Mostly it was done by Kris Gillespie of Domino in the US. A labour of love, he had to track down all the masters, piece it all together. We own the recordings, so that makes it easier. Domino are also re-releasing the Orange Juice back catalogue in 2011. Will the albums be put out in an expanded version? Not sure, but Domino always do things in a gorgeous way, extra things that people want, all of that. Do you look back at the bands time on Postcard Records fondly? What was it like alongside Josef K, Aztec Camera and The Go-Betweens? I do, but it was a long time ago.