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Batttttty gets to grips with
Gal Gonad
(aka Garry Bushell) |
Well, what can I say about Garry Bushell that hasn't already been
said - and usually by Garry himself....
Let's just say that when the human race evolves to the point where
only a mouth and a brain are necessary for survival, Garry and
Batttttty will be hailed as the new Adam and Eve .... 'Old Gal
and the Old Gal', yes indeed. Anyway, until that day dawns, here
is something to keep you going.
For those of you who don't know, Gal is a journalist, author,
Charlton Athletic supporter, Sun non-supporter, pioneer of Oi,
campaigner for True British Values, and living proof that being
ugly doesn't stop you gettin a job on the telly.
Anyway, for the purposes of this interview, he is .... above all
else... UFO's most demented fan - oops, I mean most devoted fan.
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OK Gal, first of all... your passion for UFO - what was the first
UFO gig you ever saw, and what was it about UFO that made you
go all oooohhhhhhhhh'y? This
is going to sound flash but I'm pretty sure the first time I saw
UFO live it was in New York in either 1979 or 1980. I was pretty
jet-lagged so Pete Way's beautiful girlfriend at the time, an
English model called Katy, was spoon-feeding me cocaine from a
small glass vial. This didn't influence my critical faculties
(although if Pete had spoon-fed me Katy it might have done). I
knew the band's records of course, largely because the Cockney
Rejects were such big fans, and the wretched oaf Ross Halfin (aka
Gross Halfwit, a wart-encrusted photographer/hob-goblin) was pals
with the band and was instrumental in setting up the feature.
First and foremost I have to say you couldn't judge UFO from the
albums, the classic songs were great of course, but live they
hit another dimension. In his hey-day Pete Way was the most exciting
bass player I have ever seen.
UFO
are a different kind of outfit to bands such as Cockney Rejects
and the Upstarts and suchlike, so what was it you saw in UFO that
was (a) similar and (b) different to bands such as those. They're
all guitar based rock bands but that was where the similarity
ends. The Rejects were a raw primal street punk band with a feral,
bawling singer in Stinky Turner. UFO were an arena-playing hard
rock band, musically and melodically light years ahead of them.
The Rejects aspired to be UFO and even recorded a UFO influenced
album called The Wild Ones (much to the disappointment of their
fans who loved them for their rawness). However UFO were fascinated
by the Rejects too, every time I speak to Pete he asks after them.
The Rejects inspired Moggy to write Profession Of Violence. |
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Danny Peyronel has recently re-formed the Heavy Metal Kids, and
come back with an absolute monster of an album. Danny is now doing
lead vocals, but the vibe is reminiscent of the excitement of
the old live gigs with Gary Holton. What was your impression of
HMK first time around? Any fond memories? Loved
Holton, loved Heavy Metal Kids. Good luck with the new line-up,
sounds hot to me. It IS hot. And seeing
as this is my website, I reserve the right to put a photo of their
new album here, even though it's got nothing whatsover to do with
this interview. OK, done it.
On
which side of the Schenker/Chapman fence do you sit, musically?
(And I bet you're very musical whilst straddling a fence, aint
ya. I know I would be!) One of our SITN crowd wants to know whether
you think 'Michael Schenker is a misunderstood genius, or just
a twat'. Give reasons to support your answer, as they say in all
the best exam-papers. I
think he is half-twat, half-genius. Tonka was more fun.
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Talking
of mad buggers, remember I told you Waysted is getting back together?
Tell us your fond memories of Waysted, assuming you can remember
anything at all? I can imagine that liggin at a Waysted gig was
just a smoky haze of oblivion, yeh? But try hard and remember
some Fin-tales for us. Urh,
sorry, you're right and oblivion is unforgive-ion. Memory has
failed me totally here. The very name was both a tribute to their
brilliance and the reason for their demise.
You've
ligged at hundreds of UFO gigs throughout the years - tell us
some road-stories, such as the one about Ross Halfin, Phil Mogg
and the whistle... Well
the consequences of having toured so much with UFO in those golden
years of the early eighties is that I have zero memory of any
of it - and neither has Pete cos I rang him up specifically to
kick-start my chemically mutated brain cells. However some stories
like the whistle were so appalling my conscious mind probably
suppressed them in a doomed attempt to keep me sane. You see Halfin
was pissed, and Phil got him to blow a whistle without revealing
where the instrument had been just moments before...you don't
really need me to spell it out for you do ya? As
long as you don't whistle it, I'm happy. |
OK,
now tell us some more road-stories. (Give the punters what they
want, darlin - don't hold back). Oh
gawd... all I remember is Tonka Chapman snorting the biggest lines
of Charlie I have ever seen in my life. I don't suppose its news
to you that they partied every night after every gig, often over-sleeping,
missing the bus and having to charter a private jet to fly to
their next gig consequently blowing every penny they ever made
on drink, drugs and jets. Indeed at the end of one tour their
coke supplier wouldn't let them leave the country until they paid
up a £30K bill.
I seemed to spend weeks in the USA with UFO on the flimsiest of
pretexts. We were up on the eastern seaboard somewhere snowed
in and trapped in a Ramadan Inn for about a week just as the British
fleet was sailing to the Falklands; another time we seemed to
spend a week just sunbathing in Houston, Texas. How I got away
with it on my expenses is beyond me (Pete reckons I once phoned
him up and asked him to describe a gig I hadn't been to just so
I could review it and claim expenses for going but that doesn't
sound like me, now does it?). Absolutely
not.
When he wasn't porking beautiful American women, Phil Mogg enjoyed
watching terrible day-time US soaps, and tormenting other members
of the group. Drummer Andy 'No Neck' Parker was a frequent target;
they once persuaded a hotel to flash up Welcome No Neck Parker
on their giant exterior message board. And of course Michael Schenker
got plenty of stick too, are you understanding vot I am saying?
Ja? Ja indeed.
Phil
Mogg has one of the most distinctive voices in the business, and
as a lyricist he has a way of putting into words things that you
didn't even know you were thinking until you heard him sing them
- and then you realise that he must have hacked into your brain
while you were asleep and stolen your subconscious. Do you feel
that too, or do you see him more as just another ginger-haired
prima-donna? |
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Garry's
hobby is preventing top-heavy women from falling over.
Ooops, there goes another one! |
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You
put it so well Batttttty, it almost seems a shame to add any nonsense
of my own. My band the Gonads called him a big-nosed clown in
our Very Metal song TNT, but this was just affectionate jibing.
He did turn out some fair old lyrics and UFO produced so many
solid stadium rockin' stompers (Doctor Doctor, Lights Out et al)
that you wonder why they only had one hit over here and petered
out in the States. Partly they were the victims of their own excesses
of course, but you do have to question management decisions and
record company commitment too.
I haven't asked you any direct questions about Pete, but that's
cos I want you to ramble on in your own words about him. Do it
here. Try to keep it to less than 10,000 words, but if you have
to go over, that's fine by me. Pete
Way IS rock n roll to me. He walked it, he talked it and if it
moved he snorted it. He is first class, both as a musician and
a human being. However all my Pete Way stories are under lock
and key, along with my Debbie Harry story, awaiting my autobiography.
Oh yeah, baby. I've waited months for your
Pete Way anecdotes.... oh well, no doubt I'll get a free copy
of the book when it happens.... Hopeless.
Well anyway, did you catch any of the $ign of 4 gigs last November?
No! Have you heard the album, and
if so, how do you rate it - (a) compared to UFO, and (b) as a
stand-alone product? No,
not heard it. Typical - nobody sent you a freebie I spose?
True! But I will see UFO when they re-re-re-reform.
You certainly will, even if I have to goose-step you up to the
ticket-desk and ferret the money out of your trouser pocket myself! |
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OK, now on a completely different subject (completely different!)
tell us about your Gonads. Could they have been bigger? Why weren't
they? Did you feel they were crushed by Heavy Metal?
On one level the Gonads
are the greatest Oi band in the world, and on another level we are
quite obviously a load of old bollocks. We get together, we crank
up the guitars and I shout nonsense about 1) Barmaids 2) Charlton
or 3) barmaids in Charlton. My Gonads were always quite modestly
sized but highly productive - it wasn't uncommon for me to knock
out one large dollop of hot and salty song lyrics after another.
I once managed six in a day before my wrist got tired. From all
that writing. The Gonads weren't crushed by heavy metal, we were
in fact the first pioneers of the punk metal cross-over (see TNT
for details). We are still going strong. One day our greatness will
be appreciated and we will of course sell out immediately. |
In
your career (hah!) as a journalist, who is the biggest celebrity
arsehole you've ever met, and why? Good
heavens Batttttty - do you really think given my reputation that
I would be so indiscreet as to finger Lady Victoria Harvey in
public? PS. Magnus Magnusson was a miserable bastard. That's
cos he always wanted the posh chair and nobody would let him sit
in it. OK then, who is the most ridiculous/preposterous rock star
you've ever interviewed? |
Ho
boy... of course pop stars are generally more preposterous than
rock stars and I never met that knob from Whitesnake who used
to work in a shoe shop but gave interviews saying “I only
drink champagne” (prompting an outraged Ozzy to sneer “I
only drink horse piss”). However I would say almost certainly
Rob Halford. Incidently I was at the Lyceum once and all these
German rock fans were coming up asking for autographs which was
unusual at the time (now blonde women undress before me everywhere).
I obliged and noticed them studying my signature and getting very
confused. I looked over to see Mogg giggling in a corner –
he had sent the poor Krauts over telling them that I was Halford!
And no doubt that I would live with them after midnight and rock
with them till the dawn. And since
you didn’t ask, my favourite rock interviewees aside from
UFO, were always Ozzy, Phil Lynott, Dee Snider (is he still alive?),
Billy Gibbons and the lads from Maiden and Leppard. Quo were good
value. I did interview Motorhead several times but can remember
eff-all about any of it. |
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One
of our SITN fellas says..."I remember an article Garry did
for SOUNDS. It was a Butlin's 50s weekend with Lonnie Donegan,
Clodagh Rogers and Chas McDevitt. It was the funniest review I
have ever read in my life. I actually cut it out and kept it.
In my younger days when I aspired to become a rock star, I used
to say 'If I'm ever going to get slagged off in the press, I hope
It's Garry Bushell who does it, coz at least he'd do it with style'.
I have always been able to laugh at myself and would welcome,
even now, a good Bushell-ing!" Blimey. Which articles or
reviews that you've written that stand out for you as 'the best'
, and which are you most proud of? Are they available in book-format
and would you like to plug that book here with a link to purchase
it? As if......! I
remember that! It got me banned from Butlins for ten years!!!!
I dunno, I write so much it’s hard to remember what I wrote
yesterday, but I seem to recall that Ozzy in New York and Hanoi
Rocks in India were popular. I wrote a piece about eating the
world’s hottest curry once which went down well (certainly
better than the curry; I’m still plagued by the Patsies to
this day). The best of Bushell On The Box is out in handy book
form. It’s modestly entitled King Of Telly and is available
at a snip for £10 orff Amazon. I’ve been approached
to do a kind of rock n roll diary which would be fun, regurgitating
all the great old stories. And of course my crime novel The Face
(John Blake Publishing) is superb value at £5 packed with
filth. I’ve just finished the follow-up: Two-Faced.
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Now,
on to one of my favourite subjects. Carry On fillums. In an ideal
world, who would be on your casting couch for Carry On London.
On
my casting couch would be Denise Van Outen, Kelly Brook and Ruth
England. But none of them would get any part (except mine). I
would use people who are intrinsically funny like Joe Pasquale,
Paul O’Grady, Jack Dee, Fleur Golding, Francine Lewis, Bradley
Walsh and Big Mo out of EastEnders cos she’s scarey. You’d
get a part too, Batttttts. Is it true that older birds take a
lot more stuffing?
No idea darlin - I thought YOU were the expert on all things old.
Anyway,
going back to UFO, what do you see as the future for UFO? Who,
again in an ideal world, would you like to see in the line-up?
I’d
just like to see them live again. Yehhhhhhhh....
soon, hopefully.
What
do you think of the current state of the music business, from
(a) an insider's point of view, and (b) from the future-of-the-world-as-we-know-it
angle? Is there anything on the horizon that is gonna turn the
world upside down, much as the Beatles did, and Elvis did, and
the Gonads nearly did? The
Gonads time will come of course. We have a fan in New York. And
a relative in New Malden. I really don’t like the whole plastic-pop
side of the charts now, we seem to have gone back to the bad old
days of Tin Pan Alley, the pre-rock dark ages. What a wonderful
brave new world we have created – singers who can’t
sing (hello Victoria), actors who can’t act (see EastEnders)
and comics who aren’t funny. (Hudson and Pepperdine? Bring
back the ****ing ducking stool!).
That said, there are a lot of younger bands out there who mean
it man. In recent years I’ve been very taken (in the musical
sense) by Rancid and The Libertines. The Lars Fredericksen and
The Bastards album sounds like Oi meets the New York Dolls in
The Clash's back garden and gives Simon Cowell a kicking.
You're right! It DOES! Not sure about The Darkness though,
they are the ugliest band since the Angelic Upstarts. The great
thing about rock is that every generation re-invents it. What
we need to challenge is the complacency of the music business
and the hearing of the A&R men. Too
bloody right we do! |
In your life, how important is thinking/writing/talking/communicating?
That sounds a daft question, but really it isn't. If you couldn't
be a journalist for any reason, how devastated would you be and
how would it change your life? Furrrrinstance.... in my case (I
aint a journalist, but...) I get a thought in my brain, and I
feel it tingling down through my neck, into my shoulders, along
my arms, into my hands, where it spreads into my fingers and it's
out through my fingertips, onto the keyboard, crash bang wallop,
it's showing up on screens 10,000 miles away in a matter of milliseconds.
Stuff that was in my head is all over the world in less than the
time it takes to actually think it. This cerebral orgasm kinda
thing is what keeps me young and skinny. How is it for you? 'Ere
stop talking crap, Batttttty. There are people starving in the
world and there’s you waffling on about stuff and nonsense.
We oughta be talking about the big issues…like how did Aquaman
survive the pressure on the ocean floor and could Superman ever
have bedded Lois Lane? I mean, he’d have super-sperm –
they’d rip through her soft human flesh, right? And what
girl wants a guy with super-speed anyway??? I
knew I shouldn't have started this interview....
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All
the photos on this page are © of the places I nicked them
from. Thangyouverrymutch |
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©Batttttty
September 2003 |
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