Interview taken from HermAphrodite #10
‘ “That music.” It moaned in his head in the hot electric night, it was the nearest he knew to sorrow, just as a faint secret sensual pleasure he felt, touching the bottle of vitriol with his fingers, was his nearest approach to passion.’
-
‘Brighton Rock’, Graham Greene
Most bands have to choose
between college and music, between exams and the lure of Top Of The Pops. Most
bands never get their first demo played on Radio1 days after presenting it to a
DJ. And most bands don’t get signed after they’ve only played seven gigs. But
yeah. My Vitriol are not like other bands. (Well, beyond their playing guitars,
delighting in rocking out, liking their booze, loving Nirvana and consciously
trying NOT to turn into ‘Spinal Tap’, that is…) Som and Ravi met in Halls, made
a demo as a music-project favour to a producer friend in ‘98, and presented one
to Steve Lamacq when he was spotted at a gig. He played it, tracks from it were
featured on various compilation albums, they got a full band together (nicking
Seth & Carolyn from other outfits), and somehow My Vitriol ended up with a
Mainstage slot at this year’s Reading. (Where they ‘rocked like little
tinkers’.) Well, I say ‘somehow’. It probably had quite a lot to do with the
fact that they are very very good at their jobs. Talent ‘n’ passion ‘n’ youth
being on their side, and all that. Oh yeah, and there’s that their music burns
like sulphuric acid. (And you thought you were gonna survive an introduction
with no band-name puns. Ha.)
Lost in my own Union (I didn’t know we had a swimming pool), and
unable to find my way onto the 1st Floor and into the Anson Rooms, when
I’m finally escorted up the barricaded stairs for the evening’s interview, most
all of the band have taken the opportunity to disappear off to have a shower.
Their bassist, however, is far more rock ‘n’ roll than that. Cheerfully
declaring herself ‘stinky’, I’m introduced to Carolyn. We seek refuge from
Mansun’s somewhat-ceaseless drum sound-check in a little side-room filled
mostly with chairs, and get down to business. Cos I really wanna know is – did
she used to play a tennis-racket when she was 
little…?
Carolyn – “Yeah. I used to
stand facing the stereo with my guitar, you know?”
Cos to her, that was the
way it was done. Even at an early age…
Carolyn – “I’ve played for
quite a long time. And you always start off with the cheapest shittest
equipment. I got my first electric guitar when I was eleven. My dad went into
the shop, asked for the cheapest guitar they’d got.”
And it was always the
guitar. No one-man-band stylings for this young lady. Unlike Som, who played
everything on the demo, but for the drums (and that only because Ravi was
there). I suggest him as a loveable chimney sweep Dick Van Dyke type.
Carolyn – “He could be,
yeah. He plays a bit of piano as well.”
Me – “Though that’s quite
hard to carry around…”
Carolyn – “Yeah. Just
wandering about with a Grand strapped to your back, like a snail or something.
Well, a snail with a piano on it.”
And Bert’s good at art too.
(You can tell from those pavement chalkings.) Maybe there’s something in this
spooky similarity…
No Poppins-seque characters
for the rest of the band, mind. They tend to stick to their instruments.
Carolyn – “Seth’s main
instrument is the guitar. Which is a good thing, if you only focus on the
guitar, you’re able to develop your own style.”
Me – “So he wouldn’t want
to bring in any clarinet…?”
Carolyn – “Actually, he’s a
clarinet player Grade 8, you’ve just reminded me.”
Wow.
Carolyn – “And I’m not
kidding. Did you know that?”
No.
Carolyn – “Shit! That’s
weird!”
I try and encourage her to
encourage him to utilise his skills.
Me – “There aren’t enough
clarinets in rock.”
Carolyn – “There’s
definitely an opening, yeah.”
And for wobble-boards.
Though on that she remains unconvinced. But if music’s in their blood, as it
seems to be for all of them…
Carolyn – “Yeah. Everybody.
Though Seth was a bit of a late starter, he only got his first band when he was
about twenty – which isn’t that late or anything.”
It was always this that she
wanted to do.
Carolyn – “Yeah, I think we
all did.”
(Though Ravi later admits
to a burning desire to be a pilot, fuelled not by ‘Top Gun’ but by childhood
model-making.)
And at least two of their
company were stirred on at an early age by a certain young man in very white
socks.
Carolyn – “Personally, I
think Som was also a Michael Jackson fanatic.”
Neither of them look the
sort. I voice this.
Carolyn – “Ah, when I was
little! He was a star, his dancing was shit-hot…”
Not that they’re ones for
moon-walking onstage. The Jackson influence doesn’t seep that far.
Me – “And from the Jacksons
there’s good matching trouser potential…”
Not that they wanna go down
that path either. Or any other Jackson-esque promotional routes. Like the
cartoon series option. For example. I get giggles and then a firm ‘no’ at the
suggestion.
Carolyn
– “I don’t see My Vitriol doing that.”
But you could be a Manga
character, they’re cool.
Carolyn – “That would be
the best way of doing it. If we were going to do it.”
Though she’s loath to run
around starting wars and fighting. Not that all Manga characters do.
Me – “You could just play
guitars.”
Carolyn – “In a Manga
style.”
She poses, cartoon like, as
though under strobe-light. It could definitely work.
And then the interview
gains another interviewee. In the shape of Ravi. Too restless to sit down, he
wanders about the room, admiring the BRIGHT pink/orange 60’s style-curtains and
picking at his nail varnish. I ask him about his sauce-pan past. And no, he
never went in that direction with a childhood drumming enthusiasm. However…
Ravi – “I had tubs of
cream.”
Course he did.
Ravi – “I took some of it
out, just to get the pitch right.”
Me – “So it was never
milk-bottles and different levels of water for you then?”
Carolyn – “He couldn’t
afford them.”
He happily ignores this,
lost to a childhood reverie.
Ravi – “And I used my
money-box as the high-hat. So you get the little ch-ch-ch.”
But never along to CTV
theme tunes. Oh no.
Ravi – “To lots of heavy
metal.”
Me – “You were a rockin’
child?”
Ravi – “I was The Rocker.”
Okay then.
And moving onwards a decade
or so in the band’s history…
Me – “D’you reckon it’s Fate that you were in Halls with Som? Else
you wouldn’t be here now…”
Ravi – “It’s weird, isn’t it?”
Like It’s Supposed To Be.
Me – “So would you have started a band with someone else on your
corridor?”
Ravi – “There was no-one else that could play on our corridor.”
So Som’s special. A sentiment he’ll
probably appreciate.
The others, as has already been covered, were not roped in this
early. Ravi didn’t know Carolyn while he was at college, though they went to
the same one.
Carolyn – “I started in ’98. Was that your last year there?”
Ravi – “Yeah.”
Me – “So you’re all qualified then?”
Ravi – “I’ve got a BSE (grins) in BioChemistry.”
And yet he’s doing this.
Ravi – “Weird, isn’t it?”
And Som’s got a degree in Genetics.
Me – “So you could set up your own mutant farm?”
Ravi (grins) – “Yeah!”
Carolyn meanwhile was doing Ancient World Studies (Greeks &
Romans & togas oh my) when the call of the band became too strong to
ignore. That, and the incessant demands on her time; My Vitriol got off the
ground comparatively quickly when they all got together, and they haven’t had
much peace since.
Carolyn – “I think maybe it’s more fun and less stressful for
bands if it takes longer, in a way.”
Ravi – “It’s been SOOO intense, this year.”
Carolyn – “At the moment we’re trying to finish an album off, mix
it, while we’re on tour.”
Ravi – “And now there’s no such thing as a personal life…”
Me – “You don’t have a little recording studio on the bus?”
No. They’re only small. At the moment.
Ravi – “We’ll want to sort something out like that next year. Cos
we just won’t have time to write songs and record them otherwise. Ooh, we could
have a convoy of tour-buses. One each.”
In the future, that. (A bus each for the Stadium Tour of 2012, I
think.) Best not to get too much too soon. (Look what happened to Chesney
Hawkes.) You don’t want to make too many people jealous of your success…
>>> Part 2
Last revised: 26/07/01