Please note the items you are about to read consist largely of scurrilous gossip, vicious back-stabbing and idle speculation. As Jon Stewart might say, its stories are not fact checked. Its informants are not journalists. And its opinions are not fully thought through.
THE GONADS! CHARLTON! SOUTH LONDON! STREET ROCK N ROLL! COCKNEY CULTURE! COCKNEY ROCK! OI-TONE! SKA! BEER! CURRY! WORKERS’ RIGHTS! FLAG-GIRLS! ENGLAND! OI OI OI! THIS IS WHO WE ARE!
May 31. This blog will have a more sombre and serious tone when it returns next month, according to band insiders. On the instructions of newly appointed assistant manager Martin Sporrell (aggressive gooner), there will be no more coverage of “the pathetic fantasies of Fat Col or the secretive doings of the Jolly Pranksters”, and “no more bad jokes, ironic sexism or gossip about Terence Hayes DM (Divine Master)”. Instead Sporrell will oversee a return to the band’s pure-punk, street-socialist, south east London roots. A spokesman for the blog writers’ union, the Blog United Monkeys, condemned these developments saying, “Bad jokes and cheap gossip are the very heart of this blog, if we strip away Col’s fantasies what are we left with? Martin Sporrell is turning us into the Gang Of Four. We say no to Sporrell and up the B.U.M.” Dark days indeed.
Evening all. Major changes are afoot, so we’re closing this blog for a while. If we’re not back within a fortnight, listen out for our cracking new single THREE CHORDS & THE TRUTH which is released on 4th June. The links will be posted on Facebook etc.
May 22. Welcome to the third edition of our regular monthly feature: Gonad On The Spot. This month’s questions for Gal are: 1) Have you got any unfulfilled ambitions? Yes, but I’m not sure Beki Bondage feels the same way… Yeah, of course I have. I’d like us to play Mexico, South America, Canada, Jamaica, Japan, Austria… in fact anywhere people want to see us and especially places we haven’t managed to get to yet. I’d also really like to see The Face film finally get financed, and I’d like to make those ‘Evening With’ shows – that should have started in 2019 – happen next year. There are so many things I’d love to do… There’s a possibility of something exciting happening in Vegas, but loose lips sink ships.
2) Why are there so many Gonads splinter groups and side projects? Gonads fans seem to want us to stay punk. They don’t mind the comical songs and the odd Ska number, but on the whole they’d rather we kept the set streetpunk. And we understand that; so when we want to rock out we do it as DMG (Dirty Metal Gonads – Ed) and when we record Ska songs we do it as the SkaNads. When we write something lighter it’s been credited to GBX for a while. But I only formed GBX to tie in with the Evening With events, so that spin-off is now on hold until the live shows happen.
3) Are you really doing the 18 Stone Of Dynamite album? We are really writing a brick-wall punk album which will get back to our roots in terms of the music, attitude and subject matter, but this won’t tally entirely with Fat Col’s peculiar perverted vision. We have got record company interest and a lot of it is written or part-written.
May 21. Happy boifday, Paul SkaNad. Next week, the Pub Crawl! May 20. Big news! The most illustrious Lord Waistrel (OBE, KGB, TFI Friday, Baron of Charlton, Earl Of Chelsfield, First Lord of The Admiralty {pub}, Life Chairman of the Over 80s Nude Hang-gliding Club {Eastbourne branch}, Acting Chairman of Feudal Reactionaries Against Any Change Whatsoever, Defender of the Silver Cross {pub}, last known survivor of the siege of Mafeking etc etc) has agreed to let us record the 18 Stone Of Dynamite album. (If we pay for it). Hurrah! It’s not all good news for Fat Col though because his Lordship insists that the album “must include” fiery numbers like Revolution Now, Pentonville Five and Wake Up England “to truly reflect the band’s radical roots and to keep the bally plebs happy”. Sipping his seventh pint of Hennessy Paradis Imperial, the good Lord then added mysteriously, “The road of excess leads to the palace of punk.” Here, here…we think.
May 19. Our new single Three Chords & The Truth b/w So Glad To Be Alive is released on 4th June. You can hear a tasty snatch of the songs on
iTunes, Amazon, and 7digital.
May 18. A furious Lord Waistrel has taken legal action against this blog to overturn what he calls “the fake Top Ten of Gonads fan favourites” that we published yesterday. Waistrel’s lawyer (the Beast – Ed) said that he could provide “copper-bottomed evidence” that the list was “entirely fraudulent” after a mail-bag full of uncounted votes was discovered in Maricopa Country, Arkansas. Effete El’s protest – that voting was conducted by email only – was dismissed at an emergency court hearing overseen by the Honourable Justice Frank Crack (a boyhood friend of his Lordship). Scrotum, Waistrel’s wrinkled retainer, told a hushed press conference that “a very large number of votes” had gone to Oi, Mate – ensuring its “immediate” return to the top of the chart – and also to Reg & Ron (a song written and performed by Lord Waistrel & The Cosh Boys). Scrotum also claimed that “many more” uncounted votes had been found in the Gonads unchecked spam file and in unread messages on our deserted MySpace account. “The final tally will be far more haccurate,” he said. Our own legal team tell us that Crack’s verdict can’t be challenged “because his father was a Cabinet Minister and his mother won the Derby”. More news when we have it.
May 17. Your votes for our all-time best songs have been pouring in all week. And what a result! The count reveals that you’ve put the punk rock cat among the pigeons. For the first time ever Oi Mate did not make the Top 5! Alconaut plummeted out of the Top Ten! And Franken-Skin failed to dent the Dirty Thirty. Instead, you voted for 1) FEDERALES 2) JOBS NOT JAILS 3) BRITISH STEEL 4) VALHALLABALLOO 5) TUCKER’S RUCKERS AIN’T NO SUCKERS 6) UNKY BUNK 7) BACKSTREET ARMY 8) ENGLAND’S GLORY 9) I LOST MY LOVE TO A UK SUB 10. (RISE UP) LONDON BOYS. The next five were OI MATE, ALCONAUT, TNT, PUNK ROCK WILL NEVER DIE and ATTACK OF THE ZOMBIE SKINHEADS. GETTING PISSED scraped in at 16. An ashen-faced Effete El tells us the results were “a knee in the nuts for Gal and Clyde – no one would have predicted Backstreet Army beating Oi Mate, it’s come from nowhere. This is like Labour losing Hartlepool. The oi oi equivalent of the ‘Red Wall’ has fallen.” El added that Badly Done had received just three votes, while country numbers such as EMILY and BARNET BETRAYED “had failed to even reach the Top 50”. Fat Col immediately responded by claiming the vote was “a complete vindication” of his vision for the Gonads. “I was right, people don’t want pop reggae or rock-a-fuckin-billy or so-called meaningful rock from the Gonads, they want pure punk for row people,” he said. “You need to stop fannying about with songs like Shona & The Alien and give the people what they want, that is, ‘18 Stone Of Dynamite, Half Inch Fuse’ – a proper raucous racket.” Has he got a point? We have had no official response from Fit Bird, but Lord Waistrel was heard to mutter “fake news” and has ordered a recount.
May 16. There’s been some interesting voting in our poll to establish your three all-time favourite Gonads tracks. Surprises so far have been a wave of unexpected love for Unky Bunk and a poor showing of support for Oi Mate. Mistress Material has produced a noticeable swelling – as you’d expect – while Jobs Not Jails and Federales are neck and neck battling for the top slot, with British Steel riding hard on their tails. There is still time to send us your votes by emailing waistrel@the-gonads.co.uk. The cut-off point is midnight tonight. Check back tomorrow for the results!
We’ve been ticked off by Lord Waistrel for our “inadequate coverage” of the new GBX song Shona & The Alien. It seems the single is only a teaser for a much bigger number because, “It’s a three-part epic, innit thickoes,” sniffs Fit Bird. So the pop-reggae part that’s already out should actually be titled Shona & The Alien Part One. The album version will have a much punkier part two and an “indefinable” part three, “reflecting the knee-trembling passion of their cosmic coupling”. Blimey. It might’ve helped if they’d told us that in the first place.
May 15. Anyone missing the wit and wisdom of Gal Gonad should cop an earful of his appearance on the Behind The Scenes podcast with Colin Edmonds. The mega-chat takes in much of Gal’s life including escapades with Ozzy Osbourne, Freddie Starr, The Selecter, The Blood, the Cockney Rejects and of course us. Edmonds, author of the Steam, Smoke & Mirrors steampunk books is best known as Bob Monkhouse’s joke-writer but he proves a dab hand at interviewing, and tells us he only had to censor two of Gal’s gags and one story (involving Ivy Tilsley star Lynn Perrie, which apparently was too risky even for Spotify; so we guess you’ll have to wait for the Audience with Garry Bushell live shows next year to learn about all the dirty details). You can hear their chat here.
May 14. Bad news 1! Gal is suffering from a “arthritic thumb”. Let’s have no unsavoury speculation about what the cause might be. The off-shoot is he can’t currently play the guitar. A sad state of affairs, to be sure. Although those closest to him might count it as a blessing…
Bad news 2! Fat Col has been rejected for the new ITV2 dating show Secret Crush on the entirely reasonable grounds that a) he has never tried to keep his crush secret and b) his “lurve” is completely unrequited…
Record noos: Our Welsh mates Foreign Legion are re-releasing two albums worth of their earliest songs. These are their first proper album, 1990’s Welcome To Fort Zinderneuf, and The Early Years which is a compilation of their 1980s singles and EPs. Both are on vinyl…New York’s the 45 Adapters are also re-releasing their early tracks as a 2x10inch vinyl set which includes digital download. The band are veterans of the NYC Oi scene who got together at soul and reggae DJ nights. Think Oi meets Mod with a twist of oi-tone.
Mag Noos: coming next week, the latest Vive Le Rock featuring THE CLASH, BOB MARLEY, RUTS DC, THE SLITS, DON LETTS, THE MEMBERS & MORE in a pukka punky reggae party.
May 13. Happy birthday, Gal! Gal Gonad turns 66 today. As he says himself, the third six is silent…
May 12. The phone rings at Nads HQ. It’s a reverse-charges call from Los Angeles. A gruff-speaking gent introduces himself as leading Hollywood filmmaker Rufus T. Firestein. He loves Shona & The Alien, he says and sees it as “a multi-million dollar blockbuster movie!” Strewth, gasps Fit Bird. “It’s got everything,” he adds, “aliens, sci-fi, romance, sexual chemistry, moral choices, a whole new meaning to ‘Deep Space Nine’… It’s a big screen epic waiting to happens.” Blinding, says our girl. Rufus goes on, “I want to call the film, Brief Encounters Of The Third Kind – you see what I’ve done there? And all you need to do is get Gal and Clyde to sign a contract with my production partners.” Who are they? asks Fit Bird breathlessly. Firestein pauses for a moment too long before half whispering, “Beachdancer Films”. Fit Bird slams down the phone, and quite rightly. We’re too old to fall for that one twice.
May 11. It’s that time again folks! Please vote for your Top Three Gonads songs by email to waistrel@the-gonads.co.uk. One lucky winner, chosen at random, will win one of Fat Col’s coveted no-prizes – to wit, free entry to our Welling Beer Festival headline show in July.
May 10. Lord Waistrel has waded in to what he calls “the Arkwright Curiosity”, and has issued a statement – hand-written on goatskin – which backs Miss Management “to the hilt” saying that “There is absolutely no chance of the songs the band did not play at the intimate concert that never happened appearing on any future live album release, be it on 78rpm vinyl or a new-fangled compact disc”. To the hilt of what, we ask. But no clarification is forthcoming.
May 9. Noo music update… the Raging Nathans have banged out a video for new song Waste My Heart… the Riverboat Gamblers have released new 7-inch single called Ramotorhead, featuring covers of the Ramones’ Bonzo Goes To Bitburg and Motorhead’s No Voices In The Sky… and Suck, from Germany, release new single Copkiller b/w with Hell and Heaven next month
May 8. Today Miss Management took the unprecedented step of issuing an official denial that we had played a secret gig at Arkwright’s last night, adding, “and the band certainly did not play a set including Badly Done, What’s Happening Now?, Shona & The Alien and Reinfected”. Suspicious Rainham Recorder reporter Suzie Tacini tells us: “Reports that something hasn’t happened always interest us. We know there are known knowns and known unknowns, but there are also unknown unknowns – things we don’t know we don’t know. And if one looks throughout the history of punk and Oi, and of the Gonads in particular, it is the unknown unknowns that tend to be the most significant.” Hmm. The DM agrees saying “Why deny something that no one thought had happened? There is a bigger picture here that we cannot yet wossname.” What can it mean?
May 7. Although Rebellion has blamed the festival’s cancellation on Covid uncertainty and insurance difficulties, we can’t help wondering if Fat Col is to blame. On Friday, acting in an unauthorised capacity, Gannon submitted a series of outrageous rider demands including roast oxen, a landing pad for Wattsie’s alien(s) and extra security to keep members of the UK Subs away from our wives, mistresses and girlfriends. Festival insiders believe this pushed the organisers over the edge. Our absence from Blackpool this year means the fortune tellers on the piers will take a major hit, however. Col is addicted to them ever since Gypsy Rose Lee informed him that “the tealeaves revealed” his unrequited love for Wattsie, his counterfeiting activities and his time in Belmarsh. With voice trembling, Ms Lee told him “The one you love despises you, her heart is lost to another… from far far away… you are destined for great sadness…” Col left her booth in tears after handing over a wad of twenties. When we asked all-seeing Rose how she knew all this, she replied: “I read it on the blog, didn’t I? But don’t tell Fatty.”
May 6. STOP PRESS. This year’s Rebellion Festival has been cancelled. Their email reads: We are absolutely gutted to have to announce that it’s not possible for this year’s Rebellion to go ahead. We genuinely thought that a year on, with the vaccine programme and all the promises of a normal summer we’d be in a position to return. But as of today, we still have no confirmation on what needs to be put in place regarding entry to a large event. The government have been trialling events with Covid Testing but that won’t work for an event that runs for 4 days with re-entry. But crucially we can’t get insurance for this year and we’re not prepared to gamble the future of the festival if there’s no guarantee we can stage it safely. We have released a statement explaining our position and you can read it in full on our website or our Facebook page. We thank you for being part of our plans for this year and regret that we were not able to pull it off. Cancelling 2 years in a row is hard but we will overcome. However, we are going to have to approach 2022 as a new festival rather than carry over all bookings so unfortunately no slots are guaranteed. We will do our best to re-book as many bands as we can subject to availability, budget and our plans for 2022. Please don’t be offended if your band isn’t re-booked immediately. This is a long process. No decisions have been made yet on the line up and you could get that call / message at any time in the next year. For now, we’re having to deal with the very messy fall-out of cancelling a festival, so please bear with us. Your support is going to be really important in helping us get through this, so we thank you in advance. More importantly, we hope you and your loved ones are all safe and well and we all look forward to seeing you when things can finally return to normal. Best wishes, TEAM REBELLION
May 6. Suzi Moon’s new single, I’m Not A Man, is released tomorrow, ahead of her debut ep Call The Shots (released Friday week). Her first single Special Place In Hell can be seen here.
Please snap up her records, the poor woman clearly can’t afford to buy many clothes.
May 5. The backlash against the May 3rd backlash has begun! First Skippy, ship’s captain at Pirates Press, has praised our new protest song Promised Land dubbing it his second favourite of our four new numbers behind Federales. “I really like the message and the fact that the lyrics are pretty discernible throughout the song,” he says. Second, the first review of Shona & The Alien on Amazon awards the GBX single five stars describing the ditty as a “surprisingly tuneful outing from the guys behind the Gonads” and adding “which of us hasn't fallen for a passing alien?” (Quite true. Even Fat Col admits to spending hours standing around on Plumstead Common late at night just hoping to be sucked off by something alluring and other-worldly…). Effete El tells us: “This reaction really puts Col back in his box. He doesn’t speak for Club 77. Our loyal members generally prefer your punkier songs but we like the way Gonadary flourishes in other forms too.”
May 4.The Dropkick Murphys’ UK & Ireland tour dates have just dropped. They are, Feb 2022: 15 Manchester O2 Victoria Warehouse, 16 Newcastle O2 City Hall 18, Dublin 3Arena 19, Belfast Telegraph Building 22, Glasgow The Hydro 23, Cardiff Motorpoint Arena 24, Brighton Centre 25, Birmingham O2 Academy, 26 London Wembley Arena. Support band are the mighty Interrupters. Disappointingly there’s no sign of Awkright’s Bar in Rainham. Fat Col sniffs: “They’re big, but they ain’t Arkwright’s big yet”. Nuff said.
May 3. The backlash against Shona & The Alien has begun. First a furious Wattsie Watts condemned the single’s cover design saying: “The alien is completely wrong. My spaceman looked like David Bowie in The Man Who Fell To Earth! He didn’t have fingers like bananas neither! And why has Shona got brown hair? She’s a woman in her twenties – she doesn’t look like a teenager at all!” Backing Wattsie all the way is Fat Col who lambasts the song “as lightweight pop”. We tell him that GBX are a separate band from the Gonads and aren’t supposed to sound punky. But Col insists the spin-off band “must be disbanded”, adding “this is the Gonads’ ‘Dylan at Newport’ moment and you need to stop it and do what you do best – that is, record 18 Stone Of Dynamite in all its mewling and puking punk rock glory”. Our alien expert, Professor Eric T. Mork dismisses Wattsie’s complaints however saying “Ze creature on ze cover is quite clearly a Changeling from ze Gamma Quadrant of the Milky Way who could morph into whatever physical shape Shona desires, be it David Bowie, Fat Col or a man-sized gluten-free bagel”. He adds that the Changeling’s natural state is “a viscous liquid” that “she could swallow whole without feeling ze need to spit it out”. He goes on, “Changelings have been secretly breeding with earth women for decades – which explains ze existence of Boris Johnson.”
May 1. Happy Mayday. We can confirm that good sense has triumphed over controversy and, as Miss Management decreed, we will release our new split single THREE CHORDS & THE TRUTH by The Gonads b/w SO GLAD TO BE ALIVE by The SkaNads in about five weeks’ time. Promised Land is being “held back until the time is right”, Dave Long style-ee. Fat Col, one of the hardcore who objected to the song, tells us, “This is the right decision. We have to make the Gonads punk again. Anyone who liked Federales will fuckin’ LOVE Three Chords.”
