DrunkenProphet 
Sailed away on the Albion
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Nachricht senden |  Erstellt am 04.01.2007 - 20:17 |      |
Teil 4
IN THE BEGINNING
„Carl just reaches this point where there's no talking to him at all. It took media hyperbole and fans' adoration to drill into him that, yes, you can play guitar. Yes, what we're doing is good.“
PETE (2004)
„It was bit like finding a manhole cover and lifting it up and then going under. We came out of the manhole the day we signed to Rough Trade.”
PETE (2003)
“We had this early song `You're My Waterloo', he [John Hassall] played bass along to it right away. You've got to remember I wasn't from a musical background. Jamming? I'd twitch if someone used that word.“
PETE (2005)
„Money didn't really figure that much. As long as we had enough for a packet of Benson and Hedges, a couple of drinkies and to take a bird to the pictures.“
PETE (2003)
“The plan was to get a load of money but it was frustrating when, in reality, it didn't materialise.”
PETE (2005)
“It was the Strokes, I suppose, who pissed us off in the first place really by coming to our country, wearing our clothes, having our audience with our women and our excitement!”
CARL (2005)
„I got into every fad possible, buying the most absurd things -Iike one of those ridiculous metal guitars, for no reason, and never playing it. Pete would buy all manner of junk and call it `comfort shopping’.”
CARL (2005)
“Our old drummer used to have a friend who worked in an old peoples' home and he asked if we could go and play for them. So we did all the old musical numbers. It was really amazing. A woman died during the show actually. These were old, old people and we played a few of our own songs and that's when she copped it. They loved it. Some woman kept shouting out [Pete imitates Barbara Windsor] ‘I saw you at the Palladium in 1949. You haven't aged at all'.“
PETE (2002)
„Anyone who could play in time and in tune to a song I'd written just blew me away.”
PETE (2005)
“Before we got signed to Rough Trade, times were pretty desperate. We were both homeless and Carl owed the County Court £23o. That doesn't seem like that much now, but back then it was like 'Where the fuck are we going to get that from?' We signed a special agreement with Banny [former Libertines manager] who said: 'I'll pay you £230 if you sign this contract.' We didn't think about it; we just did it, because she said she was gonna get us signed to Rough Trade eventually.”
PETE (2002)
“It was just a case of let's get the best looking people and be as much like the Strokes as possible. That was the idea at the time.“
PETE (2002)
“What you have with us is some people who can write some songs and, in the process, create another land. We have a romantic vision. We have a dream and, much to my surprise, it seems to be coming true." PETE (2002)
„When I was 16, 17, I started drifting away from everything else and picking up a guitar, and it was like, 'What are you doing? You can't sing and you can't play a guitar,' right up to the day we got signed by Rough Trade. And then it was like, 'Go on play us a song,' whereas before it was, 'Shut up, fucking racket'.”
PETE (2005)
„What kept us going was strong ideas and passion. We were angry at this stage as well. Sick of it. Carl was really down on his luck, kipping on sofas, split up from his missus. Fucked off. Lads
coming over in American bands and sweeping up.”
PETE (2005)
„We spent the summer [of 1999] in Odessa Studios in Hackney with Gwyn, this Welsh fella who used to keep this eyes open with matchsticks - a proper old school engineer.”
PETE (2005)
„We didn't have a drummer. So this Welsh fella says 'I know this old geezer who'll play the drums for you for 5o quid,' and half an hour later Mr Razzcocks walked in the door. We did our first demo, a song called `Pay The Lady'.“
PETE (2005)
„Our proper gig was at the Hope & Anchor on Upper Street [Islington] on 11 September 1999. We were like the Bootleg Beatles with a 70-year-old drummer and a fucking weird cellist.”
PETE (2005)
Signing to Rough Trade:
„It wasn't the most money but we were under the impression we were going to have artistic freedom and they'd [Rough Trade] appreciate us as artists.”
PETE (2005)
"We're not in a band. That's why we're called The Libertines - there's no states, there's no barriers and borders. There are no limits. We've had about 60 people in this band over the years, from Stoke Newington squats to fields in the middle of Dublin. And we're nostalgic for a time that didn't exist and we love it. About three years ago he [Carl] wanted to form a suicide pact. He was well up for it. 'Let's throw ourselves off a tall building. Let's shoot each other at the same time.' This is the same thing. Signing to Rough Shade - it's the same as shooting each other."
PETE (2002)
"We had some fucking good times after we got signed. We used to iron out £50 notes and put them in the fridge so when friends came around, you could nip to the fridge and give them a cool 50. That didn't last very long. The money ran out pretty quickly. “
CARL (2004)
"We were in a studio and there were people you could ask to go and bring you stuff and they would. I was asking for about nine coffees that I didn't need and all that rubbish."
CARL
“We went in and demoed 17 songs over two weeks, it was incredible - looping drums, and even Carl playing a bit of drums. Gary came in and did a few bits and bobs.”
PETE (2005)
„James Endeacott [of Rough Trade Records] said he was going to take out a full-page advert in NME with just the lyrics to 'What A Waster'. I thought it was the greatest idea I'd ever heard.“
PETE (2005)
On the choice of producer:
„All I can say, really, honestly and with clarity is Mick Jones is a Libertine and Bernard Butler isn't. Mick makes you want to go in to the studio and record your songs. The other fella made me want to sit in a cupboard and smoke crack. I threatened to knock him out a few times.“
PETE (2005)
"We got around to The Albion Rooms to take the first press shots at about 11.30 for a midday start. We had a key for some reason, me and Tony, to let ourselves in. They turned up about three hours late to their own house for their own photo-shoot!"
ROGER SARGENT
"I was completely wrapped up in the songs and particularly the words, how people were going to interpret the words, and how important it was to get it right.»
PETE (2005)
[Dieser Beitrag wurde am 04.01.2007 - 20:31 von DrunkenProphet aktualisiert]
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DrunkenProphet
Sailed away on the Albion
Status: Offline
Registriert seit: 26.07.2006
Beiträge: 10129
Nachricht senden | | Erstellt am 04.01.2007 - 20:43 | |
So letzter Teil für heute... morgen geht's weiter
Teil 5
LIBERTINES
on how the band got its name:
"The story of The Libertines starts for me when it was me, Carl Barât and Steve Bedlow sat on the side of a canal, throwing stones at a bottle and we had a game where whoever hit the bottle first with the stone got to choose the name of the band - I can't even remember who it was that hit the bottle but, yeah, from that night onwards we became The Libertines. We ended up throwing ourselves into eternity, as we called it at the time."
PETE
"I approached Johnny Borrell and asked him to play, told him I was putting down the guitar. He was a friend but I don't think he had a great deal of respect for our friendship. He was arrogant, and that's not me bitching.“
PETE (2005)
„At the end of the album recording Carl turned up absolutely fucked. He'd been on skag and bone all night. He cracked his head on a mike and fell asleep - halfway through a song.”
PETE (2002)
„They [Pete and Carl] were alive, alive to a degree that you just don't see. They were hilarious, entertaining, jumpy, songs coming out of their ears.”
GEOFF TRAVIS (2004)
„As of right now, our lives are much like before, except that now we live them in front of other people. But we don't yet know what kind of effect all of this will have one us. Maybe, it will consume us, and it will be the beginning of the end.“
PETE (2002)
„Obviously he [Liam Gallagher] pretends he can't spell but I made him read a dictionary and explained to him that a 'libertine' is actually a man who, rather than going by anyone else's idea of what liberty is, does so within himself as an individual.”
PETE (2005)
“I just got the royalties through from the second Libertines album - the other three got ninety-five grand and I got eight hundred quid! Not sure where it went ...”
PETE (2005)
„Apart from the Sex Pistols, the Libertines were probably the most manufactured band ever. Me and Carl signed to Rough Trade as songwriters and then pieced together a band from the miscellaneous. I mean, John had left the band the year before we signed because we were getting nowhere, but we swallowed our pride and asked him back.”
PETE (2005)
„I sometimes get a feeling when I play with the Libertines that we are playing beautiful songs that feel just perfect, and then I feel like I have got it. Success is when, despite all the hurdles, we can make something beautiful together.“
PETE (2004)
„Sandra The Wood Nymph used to play with us quite a bit. She was a French dancer, who used to crawl out of a plastic egg with fire around her. Was it any good? Well, it was a woman dancing out of a plastic egg, so it was OK, I suppose.”
PETE (2002)
“I think it's going to turn sour and then we'll get back together. But you know as well as I do that we disagree on some major issues.”
PETE (2002)
“I think [the cover of The Libertines] is absolutely horrendous, it scares me. It looks like, 'Oh look, it's Carl and his junkie mate'.”
PETE (2004)
“Mick Jones had a baby around the time of Up The Bracket and he had another little girl around the time of The Libertines. That's two Libertines babies. So I'm saying this to the world: you want another Libertines album? Then get Mick Jones' missus to eat some fucking oysters or something!"
PETE (2004)
"The Ha-Ha Wall' dates back to the very first night Carl and I, having met and having seen through maybe a year of animosity and standing-off, the first night we actually sat down as friends with guitars in about 1998 in Mortlake [West London] above a furniture shop.”
PETE (2005)
"He [Carl] was really proud of his Union Jack tea towel and this old guitar he had, and the first song we wrote together became 'The Ha Ha Wall'.”
PETE (2005)
„Primarily, we're about establishing the Arcadian dream. That statement might make people laugh, but that's the bare bones of it; that's what we're all about. For three minutes inside a song I can live in Arcadia.“
PETE (2002)
“Our first manager, Banny, introduced us to different press teams, and different photographers. The infrastructure that stands today as being at the Libertines' roots since entering the industry is the one that Banny brought together - it's her legacy.“
PETE (2005)
„We're not part of this punk revival; all the best punk bands were pop bands anyway. The Ramones, the Sex Pistols - all pop.“
PETE(2002)
“There's been a lot of violence directed at us. In Wolverhampton a bloke head butted me for no other reason than I was wearing nail varnish, which I thought was a bit harsh, but understandable. This fellow tapped me on the shoulder and I thought he was gonna shake my hand and say 'Nice gig'... but he butted me in the face."
PETE (2002)
“We're being chucked in with the Strokes and the Vines by people that we don't give a shit about. If we worried about stuff like that we'd go mad. You've got to remember that it's the way we've always been doing things.”
PETE (2002)
„Me and Carl got done actually by one of their [Strokes] security guards - got a bit of a clip round the ear for trying to nick their guitar pedals.”
PETE (2005)
“I remember telling Carl that I wanted him to sing `What Katie Did', and he thought I was winding him up. I said, ' I don't want to end up out the band again, with you going round the country and on TV doing these songs and I can't play them,' and he said, ' No, we are in it together - you've got to believe.' So I did, and it was great and I threw myself into it. We had our fallouts, but we made the record. I feel a little bit duped because I want to do those songs. They're not anti-Libertines songs, but they were never written for the Libertines to sing because the words, the things we're singing about, they were feelings that had been stifled by the Libertines, and those songs were a way out.!
PETE (2004)
!After the signing everyone went to see British Sea Power, I think, at the Water Rats [London bar], but we lost each other. But at about three in the morning Carl and I both happened to be at the same place - Percy Circus - at the same time. So, we'd both come from different directions and bumped into each other, and then we saw this tramp on a bench. We hadn't said anything to him, but he just came up to us and he went, ' It's the worst thing that could happen to you.' It really freaked me out.»
PETE (2002)
"We started playing to fair-sized audiences all the time and me and Carl entered into this strange world of paranoia, feelings of paranoia and over-analysis.”
PETE (2005)
„Mick is very direct. He comes from another decade, a less absurd one, while Bernard Butler came from a more recent decade. It seems there are two ways to do things: to either follow something along the same direction or follow another path. If we get led along two different paths, tough - we get lost.”
PETE (2002)
"It's always been really important that support bands, and bands we go on tour with, are good people“
PETE (2005)
"The Libertines is an ever-changing, swirling unpredictable monster of a band, and line-ups change as often as I do brogues... not every week but 'don't ever get too comfortable if you're not Carlos or myself', basically, is the rule of things. The boys are not playing Libertines gigs; they're doing their best not to get Banny sued for breaching European gig contracts.”
PETE (2003)
"The Libertines is more than a four-piece band you read about in the NME. Just as Up The Bracket is more than a Rough Trade album. It is a now eight-year-old blueprint for life, and an uncustomised illegal/illicit manoeuvre in the Arcadian hinterland. We have been forced to operate in this manner in order to grab your children's attention, in order for the real show to start, in order for justice to be done. There is no such thing as a backstage pass or hospitality tent in Arcadia. Do not be conned. Music is free; come and get it. Roll up, roll up, donations welcome ...“
PETE (2003)
"My brother and I are not rivals. We are shipmates and best friends and the greatest songwriting partnership in the world.»
PETE (2004)
[Dieser Beitrag wurde am 04.01.2007 - 20:43 von DrunkenProphet aktualisiert]
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DrunkenProphet
Sailed away on the Albion
Status: Offline
Registriert seit: 26.07.2006
Beiträge: 10129
Nachricht senden | | Erstellt am 05.01.2007 - 16:59 | |
Teil 6
UPT THE BRACKET
Vertigo
It I like the line `Was it the liquor? Or was it my soul?' It's when you can't work it out whether it was genuine or whether you just got caught in a debauched outside influence. Is it a Hitchcock reference? Well, there's a hit and there's definitely a cock, but that's nothing to do with the film director.”
PETE (2002)
Death On The Stairs
"That song's a cry in the darkness. But not from us - it's when you're in the darkness and then you hear a cry.”
PETE (2002)
Horror Show
it I think heroin is mentioned on this and a few songs - heroes and heroin, soft drugs and hard drugs, days by the sea. But it's quite an upbeat song and if you've been down on the brown the last thing you want to do is thrash about. You'd much rather lie down somewhere or spew up. Dangerous territory, really. You'd think in this day and age it wouldn't be, but you've got to be careful.”
PETE (2002)
Boys In The Band
“Everyone's been singing along to it, they love it. I always find it a bit weird singing `They all get them out/For the boys in the band' and seeing all the girls singing along. But it doesn't matter - it is a bit of a singalong number. It's not actually saying `Get your bangers out for the boys!' It's more like 'Roll out the carpets! Get out the drinks!'”
PETE (2002)
Up the bracket
That's me screaming at the start. There was all this fucking about in the studio. It was frustration. I can still see Mick with his can in his hand going, 'Right lads, more fucking about!'»
PETE (2002)
The Boy Looked At Johnny
"Ah! That's one of my favourites. It's a blatant singalong. It's got this amazing riff on it - you're going to piss yourself with pleasure or laughter when you hear it. It's restored my faith.“
PETE (2002)
The good old days
„That's a call to arms really. It's not nostalgic at all. It's saying mere were no good old days, stop going on - these are the good old days, probably.“
PETE (2002)
[Dieser Beitrag wurde am 05.01.2007 - 17:01 von DrunkenProphet aktualisiert]
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DrunkenProphet
Sailed away on the Albion
Status: Offline
Registriert seit: 26.07.2006
Beiträge: 10129
Nachricht senden | | Erstellt am 05.01.2007 - 17:00 | |
Teil 7
RECORDING THE LIBERTINES
„That's not my album. I've been packaged by it and advertised by it and had strategies weaved around by it. It's nothing to do with me. The cover with me looking like a very handsome boy's junkie mate? Come on, man. It's not the Libertines."
PETE (2005)
„Are we making an album? Either way I'm gonna make some records this year, with or without [the Libertines ].”
PETE (2004)
„I don't know if the Libertines would want to carry on. I can't see why they'd want to prolong the agony. For them. For the British public."
PETE (2005)
Recording The Libertines
On why a bouncer was assigned to the recording studio.
„To get us there, to stop fighting, to stop drugs coming in, and to stop hard-hitting pipe posse turning up. To stop unpaid-drug-debt people turning up."
CARL (2004)
„When I think about it. I just feel like putting a bullet through my head.»
PETE (2004)
„It's turned into a soap opera. And besides, all the shit that people are romanticising and embellishing, it's all on the record"
CARL (2004)
„Things were as they'd never been before. I was making a big effort to be with him, to show my love for him. All right, I wasn't squeaky clean, but I had nothing but love for him and I was trying fucking hard.”
PETE (2005)
„I feel a bit disgusted and disturbed by the way someone, other than myself, has done the artwork, the inlay, and how my songs haven't been credited.”
PETE (2004)
“They should change their name and do their own songs. Carl's going around saying he wrote 'The Likely Lads'. He knows that's not true.“
PETE (2004)
“I knew I had a better album than Up The Bracket in me and I wanted to record it. But I was told we've got to keep touring, keep promoting. That was the first time I realised we were on a conveyor belt.“
PETE (2004)
“My nightmare is to be kicked out of a band, then have all your songs and artwork taken out of your hands. Oh no! That happened, didn't it? But what can you do but keep going, keep fighting?“
PETE (2005)
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