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| Oct 28. Out today, the 'Doctor Punk' tribute single to Doctor Who - heavier than a Cyberman with two Sontarans in a sack. An ace reporter writes: ‘Doctor Punk’ is a hard-edged hooligan tribute to Doctor Who. It is by DMG (the exciting new spin-off group from the Gonads) and radical New York electro-Oi band Maninblack. Released to mark fifty years of the much-loved British TV sci-fi series, the split single features ‘Doctor Who Theme (50th Anniversary Mix’) by Salvador Dalek featuring DMG and Maninblack’s ‘No Sleep Till Skaro.’ A vinyl version will be released next month on Randale Records of Southern Germany. Harder Than The Pest: here is a scary snap from the set of new crime movie Gatwick Gangsters featuring one of the hardest men in streetpunk (our Stief)... and the great Jeff Turner. Publicity-shy Gal has so far turned down the chance to appear in the flick. Says Fit Bird: “’E’s ’olding out until he gets a bedroom scene with Sarah ’arding. Unfortunately she ain’t in the film.” Out now: three cataclysmic Casualties albums on vinyl – ‘On The Front Line’, ‘Die Hards’ and ‘Under Attack’ – all on Side One Dummy, and all come with a download card... Oct 26. Wotcha dodgers. Just popping in to remind you that we play our home town Charlton next Saturday – 2nd November! We played our first gig in London SE7 an incredible 36 years ago. Back then, it was at the Lads Of The Village pub, now it’s the Charlton Liberal Club. Everything has changed... except Fat Col’s pants. Hope to see you all there... especially loose women with very low standards... Plans for the Cockney Rejects to play a similar 'back to the roots' gig in Canning Town next year have been put on ice after the BH2 had its licence revoked. The club is pressing to get that decision reversed. If it isn't, The Rejects will be forced to find an alternative East End venue. Meanwhile Jeff was spotted on the film set of Gatwick Gangster in Croydon earlier today. Insiders reveal that his acting style is "naturalistic, powerful and utterly convincing." Gal and Clyde have come up with another classic track for their Brothers Gonad collaboration. It’s called ‘Full English’ and confirms rumours that the project will be a collision between Ska and Ian Dury, very much a continuation of the Old Boots album. Our mates at Pirates Press have released a job-lot of quality seven inch singles including: ‘Dress Well, Drink Heavily’ by 45 Adaptors (Oi meets soul!), ‘Hoist A New Flag’ by The Ratchers, ‘Victory’ by the Downtown Struts, ‘Been Drinking Again’ by La Plebe and ‘Some Folks’ by FM359 - a rather fine anthem described as ‘a humanitarian, gospel, Americana, punk rock song’. Bad Religion have just released a Christmas Songs collection on Epitaph featuring punk versions of festive favourites including ‘White Christmas’ (Oi, we dun that 31 years ago! - Ed), ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’ and ‘Hark The Herald Angels Sing.’ Socialism in action? A little bird tells us the Upstarts have done the dirty on guitarist Dickie Hammond. Word is Dickie was told he’d be playing on their tour, and borrowed money on the strength of it, but on the day he was due to start no-one came to pick him up. Mensi replaced him without bothering to tell him. Not very angelic is it? Random chuff: Punk Rock Curry Club reconvenes on Bonfire Night - tasty. The Selecter are trying to get their Too Much Pressure album re-issued to coincide with their 35th Anniversary tour (where they will be playing that album in full) next year... expect Liberty Hayes’s brilliant new single next Easter... Sparrer and the Rejects are discussing playing a few gigs together next year, we’re told there’s a 60/40 chance of these dates coming off... There’s a strange Skinhead Exhibition on at what used to be the London College of Printing. We were going to tell all, but it turns out that The Bitch has written a very funny column about it in the next edition of Street Sounds (due out in about a fortnight) so it’s probably best to wait for that... Oh Paul Hallam tells us to expect a Street Sounds annual for Christmas... Finally, Twisted Sister the movie is coming. There’s a facebook page promoting it apparently. Hello – and goodbye. We’re shutting down for a bit. But first... here is Fat Col’s SkaMouth diary: 9am, Friday 18th October. Stief arrives to pick up Gal and Wattsie. It’s an hour early – he’s dead keen – which means Gal is upstairs enjoying a wet dream (he’s fallen akip in the bath) and Wattsie ain’t even there. (Gal’s a bit odd, he doesn’t play with boats in the bath whereas I’m never happy unless I can have a little tug in mine... ). At 10.15am we set off to Great Yarmouth, except Stief has promised to take his mate to Lowestoft on the way, so we detour back to Hackney to get her first. That’s okay though cos Stief drives like he’s auditioning for Death Race 2000 and regards speed limits as mere state-imposed red-tape, as binding as a politician’s promise. Confident we’ll make the camp in time, Gal and Wattsie rehearse painstakingly, with an emphasis on ‘pain’. Stief is itching to play us something, though, and at 12.30 he finally gets his chance. First up: King Kurt, lulling us into a false sense of security. Next, his own fine solo single (soon come) and then, to our abject horror, Stief slips on Steps. Yeah, that’s right. STEPS! Singing ‘Reach For The Stars’... or reach for the bleedin’ sick bucket, I forget which. Well, Wattsie is traumatized. The poor cow nearly chokes on her gluten-free muffin. Colour drains from her face. And Gal leaps into action like Jack Bauer, reaching over, pressing eject, grabbing the offending CD and slinging it straight out the window to perish under the wheels of a ten ton artic. Later he admits: “Yes it was an extreme reaction, but we had reason to believe that Stief was planning to follow through with Cher Lloyd... and Liza Minnelli. Evasive action had to be taken. This was a Gonads jaunt, and standards have to be enforced.” Hear, hear! 1.15pm: We finally reach the Vauxhall Holiday Park, Great Yarmouth, where Skamouth is happening. Incredibly the band is here ahead of us – even Mick Maverick. (South Coast turned up the day before!) The mighty Olas Boss is DJing in the V Lounge, and gladly plays our old intro music ‘Liquidator’ to cue “the magnificent Gonads”. The band hits the stage at 3pm. The sound on stage is pants, but in the venue it sounds the bollocks. The band plays: ‘Oi Mate’, ‘Getting Pissed’, “the very true story” that is ‘Badly Done’, ‘SE7 Dole Day’, ‘Lotto’ (only the second time live), ‘Grant Mitchell’, ‘Buy Me A Drink You Bastards’ (the third and last time they’ll play this live – a shame as I’m in the lyrics), ‘Skinhead Girl’, ‘Yeti’, ‘Infected’ (or as I like to call it ‘Return Of The Dildo’), ‘SkaMouth Boys’, ‘Sandra Bigg (Really Big)’, ‘Hey You’, and ‘I Lost My Love to A UK Sub’, serguing into the encores of ‘Oi Mate’ again, ‘FrankenSkin’, ‘Alconaut’... and maybe one more but I am outside having a pie by then. 4pm: Off-stage, into bar. Drinking commences. The crowd are friendly, the feedback is blinding, and everything is cool. Except for one thing... the Skamouth programme shows that Gal is doing a ‘Breakfast With Bushell’ session at 9am on Saturday morning – which is the first he’s heard about it. This means we all stay over in a seven-berth caravan and a night of festivities ensure, the highlights being: seeing Dave Barker live! Meeting Susan Cadagan and Trevor ‘ET’ Evans! Meeting old mates like Barrie the Mod, Paul Pettitt and the Big 7 girls! Watching Mick Mav get increasingly pissed until he reaches a plateau where he grabs hold of Wattsie, gets her in a bear hug and tells her she has been accepted into the band (Editor’s Note: Wattsie has been our backing singer for years before we even knew Mick). It’s a strange, uncomfortable incident, that re-occurs around 1am. By the end she looks like she’d rather have had Steps back. By midnight Jason has necked so much he has lost his Nacho and become Jäger Jase, South Coast is skanking, Stief is off hugging skinheads, Allyson Mav is opening her heart Oprah stylee, Billy Whizz is about and Gal retires to the van either because he is a) a party-pooper or b) because mindful of the encroaching 9am ‘Bushell Breakfast’ he thinks he should do the sensible thing and get some shut-eye. A fruitless ambition; the sweet sounds of Ska don’t stop until 3am and then just as we’re all finally dropping off some bastard attacks the caravan. Bang! Bang! Bang! they go, slowly, yet powerfully. It’s creepy, like something out of a Hammer House of Horror flick. Bang! Bang! Bang! And again. And again. It can only be someone scary or someone extremely drunk and very dim... or “that ****in’ ****” South Coast ****in’ Steve as he’s known to certain bad-tempered sleep-deprived band members... Some sleep is finally had before the Big Bushell Breakfast of Ska, fry-ups and Judge Dread stories (Next time guys, how about a more civilised Big Bushell Brunch?). Mick and SCS stay on, the rest of the band go on their merry way. Thank you Skamouth, especially thanks to Christine, Tom, the Vauxhall team, and the great crowd. The next Gonads gig is at Charlton Liberal Club on November 2 and Gal says everyone from Skamouth is welcome “on the guest-list.” This blog returns in November. One love! Up the Addicks!
Oct 19. Thank you SkaMouth! We had a blast. A full blog entry will follow... but not today, we’re too out of it. Random news while we’re here: the legendary Pretty Things are headlining this year’s Xmas Mod Ball, on 21st December at the 100 Club. It costs a score on the door but you do get free sausage rolls and mince pies... Out this week, the new album from The Creepshow – ‘Life After Death’ a gut-busting, fist-pumping, bits-bumping mix of punk, country, r’n’r and full-on psychobilly (Sailor’s Grave)... Booze & Glory ask us to spread the word about their new video, which is here. Oct 17th. Cheers to everyone who made the launch party for Gal’s new novel Face Down last night. The Golden Bee in Shoreditch was buzzing with guests, many of them familiar to readers of this blog. There were Charlton Tel, Chelsea Dom, Barnet Mark, Dirty Rob, Wattsie Watts, Stief, Crazy Zoe, poet/DJ Tim Wells, and of course the PM looking as dapper as a Savile Row shop window. Vicki Michelle from ’Allo ’Allo mingled with ravishing Rhoda Dakar from the Specials. There were Dave Cairns from Secret Affair, Nick Hodgson from the Kaiser Chiefs and Mark Wyeth from Symarip, plus Bradders from Monkish, Jen from the Crows, Mod ledge Dave Edwards, comedian Louise Fowler, Johnny Wah-Wah, Lorraine from Mudkiss, Radio Litopia founder Peter Cox, the Editor of the Daily Star Sunday and Bob Monkhouse’s gag-writer Colin Edmonds whose own steam punk crime novel Smoke & Mirrors comes out next year. Sadly the free bar closed at 6.30pm (You’ve tried that scam before – Ed), but the happening crowd were grooving to the Ska and Mod sounds supplied by DJs Rodger (Soul Partisan) and Paul ‘Train Rage’ Hallam who interviewed Gal about the book and its controversial predecessors. Apologies for absence were received from Barbara Windsor, Cass Pennant, Jennie Bellestar, Kiria, Hoxton Tom and John King. And our apologies to anyone we forgot to mention but we’ve got hangovers the size of Atlas balls. Incidental asides: Hallam nearly got nicked after an altercation at Waterloo station... Gal and Shona were outrageously papped in a borrowed Mercedes (have lawyer, will sue! – The Beast)...
Reviews for Face Down are already rolling in. Face Down is “Mickey Spillane with a dash of Micky Flanagan” – South County magazine. “An absolute triumph, even tougher and raunchier than the first two books” – Jeff Turner (The Cockney Rejects). “A pulp fiction classic” – punk poet Garry Johnson. ‘So filthy they should replace the fly-leaf with a box of tissues’ – comedy writer Brian Sykes. “Fifty Shades of Garry!” – Wattsie Watts. “Loved the first two, can’t wait to read the third” – Barbara Windsor. Face Down is hard-hitting, sexy pulp fiction that rattles along like a Japanese bullet train. When a vigilante starts assassinating criminals he believes have been treated too leniently by the courts, Kent police are stumped - until they spot a possible link to the shootings and an outspoken rightwing newspaper columnist. Jailed South London crime lord Johnny Baker, known as Johnny Too, agrees to be the bait to lure the killer into the open. There’s just one problem – he wants retired undercover detective Harry Tyler, the man who put him away, to be part of the plot. And Harry’s supposed to be dead... Face Down is the third part of Garry’s controversial Harry Tyler trilogy following the successful debut novel, The Face and it sequel, Two Faced, but can be read as a stand-alone novel. Gal says: “People kept asking me what Harry Tyler would do next; for all his flaws as a human being, they seem to really like the character. I didn’t want to leave Harry in limbo either. So I’m very happy to be finishing the trilogy. This new story reunites Harry with his smartest, toughest foe, and pits him against a deadly new adversary.” Oct 16. Gal’s lively encounter with Pauline Black is up and running now at Radio Litopia. It’s a good long session, as you’d expect. Oct 14. If you’re not at SkaMouth next weekend, you might fancy a mighty fine charity knees-up put on by the Paul Fox Social Club over in Ruislip instead, headlined by the magnificent Members. All together: “Love in a lift/Sweet tender love/Between the fourth and the fifth... ’ (We’re not sure who the ‘suprise’ guests are, but odds on they’re not Spelling Bee champions.) R.I.P. Foxy.
Oct 13. See you at SkaMouth on Friday! We'll drop back again when we can! Cheers and beers - The Gonads. Here is Cass Pennant mentoring Gal in advance of his book launch this Wednesday. Face Down, the third part of the Harry Tyler trilogy, is out next week and available for pre-order here. The Pogues have paid tribute to their guitarist Philip Chevron, who died on Tuesday morning. He was diagnosed with cancer in 2006. The Pogues say: "The news of Philip's death from complications brought about by throat cancer, has hurt us terribly. Philip was first diagnosed with the disease in 2006 and after a gruelling period of chemotherapy which he had fought with such dignity, strength and heroism, he was declared to be in remission. But in a tragic stroke last August he returned from visiting his oncologist with the harrowing news that his cancer had returned, and that this time it was inoperable. It has been no consolation that we have all had months to prepare for the worst; when the worst came yesterday morning, the preparations we had made turned out to be futile, and the impact has been felt very deeply. The hole that his death has left will be huge. He was a remarkable and fantastically talented colleague, but most of all a friend. Our thoughts go out to his fans, who loved him unanimously. But above all, our thoughts are now with his family, with those he held dear and who have held him dear. Philip will be missed terribly and will always be in our hearts." Chevron was a founder member of The Radiators From Space, one of the first Irish punk bands back in 1976. He joined The Pogues in 1985, and wrote their song 'Thousands Are Sailing' about 19th century Irish emigration to the USA. He was 56. In happier news, the East End Badoes are continuing to enjoy a golden age of song-writing. The latest new numbers from El Tel include 'The Cockney Way Is Essex' (about the decline of the Cockney dialect in the capital), 'The Ghost Of Ben Tillett' (about union leaders selling out the London dockers) and 'Gartree Bye-Bye' (about a certain bassist's reprehensible daredevil exploits). The Badoes are currently looking for a new bassist as Skully is unavailable for live shows. Argy Bargy will be taking a break from gigging for a few months due to personal health issues (Round-ophobia? - Ed). However Watford and Daryl will be using the time to write new material. When the band come back next year they'll be joined by a new bass player, their long term friend Nicky Baxter. In a statement, Argy say: "We'd like to thank Dalb for the last 10 years and wish him all the very best for the future." The Crows will be playing London with Paranoid Visions next June. They'll also be appearing at the BBA Taking Control fest in Ulster, as well as playing two sets at Rebellion next year (However did they wrangle that? - Mystified Ed). The acclaimed acoustic punk band are promising to release their long overdue debut album in 2014 too. You can catch them opening for TV Smith at the 12 Bar on 6th December, with the excellent Toy Dolls. Random News: The latest Maximumrocknroll, issue 366, is out now with features on Chaos Destroy, Permanent Ruin, Rosa Apatrida, No More Fiction and much more... TV Smith's latest album Coming In To Land is on sale via his website... the new Swingin' Utters album is released at the end of November on Fat Wreck Chords; out first: a three track taster 7inch ep called 'Stuck In A Circle'. Oct 6. Okay, the secret is out. The first release from our spin-off project DMG is just three weeks away. It’s a Doctor Who tribute single called Doctor Punk – and it’s a split between DMG (billed as Salvador Dalek featuring DMG) and New York City’s finest radical electro-synth punk herberts Maninblack. DMG have recorded a special 50th anniversary remix of the Doctor Who theme, Maninblack contribute brand new song ‘No Sleep Till Skaro’ from a Dalek’s point of view. If all goes to plan, Doctor Punk will be released as a download on 28th October via Soitainly Records, and on vinyl by Randale Records about a month later... watch this space for more DMG news early in 2014.
Incidentally this blog is still officially CLOSED. We’re just popping in whenever we can... Oct 5. Our pal Nell the Unobtainable bumped into Lars Ulrich of Metallica yesterday. His first words were: “Hey! How’s Gal? Is he still editor of The Sun?” (Newsflash: Gal was never editor of The Sun and actually stopped writing about TV for the tabloid twelve years ago, but hey, Oi The Sun is a nice idea). “I knew him up at Sounds, along with Alan Lewis and Geoff Barton,” Lars added. “A great bunch of guys.” Nellie who likes to bang her head a bit reports that the new Metallica film Through The Never is “kin’ awesome”. Mick Jones of The Clash this week revealed that he was writing new songs with Joe Strummer shortly before Joe’s death. Mick told BBC 6Music that the songs were written “a batch at a time” and were due to be recorded by by Strummer's band The Mescaleros. Mick also suggested that they might have recorded a new Clash album if Joe hadn’t sadly pegged it in 2002. Slash has turned movie producer and his first horror film, Nothing Left To Fear was released in the States yesterday. He also wrote the score. Slash told Rolling Stone mag: "Everything about doing this is exciting to me... I've had a passion for movies, and especially horror movies, for as long as I can remember. So to have the opportunity to be able to produce horror movies is great, and to be hands-on behind the scenes and getting to finally be involved where you can influence the outcome of what the picture is gonna be and what it's gonna look like is very exciting.” He went on: "I'm hunting down the next story" and added that he wants to work with director Sam Raimi on his next film. Could that be Curry On Up The Gonads? Industry insider Isaac Cox tells us: “Slash wants something truly terrifying but also sexy and rock ’n’ roll. The Gonads movie could very easily fit the bill... if between now and the start of filming every writer in Hollywood has a full frontal lobotomy.” Random news: Me First & The Gimme Gimmes tour Europe next February... the first two Bouncing Souls albums have been remastered and re-released on vinyl by Chunksaah Records... Our mates the Moonstompers play the Cricketers, Chessington on 9th November... Teenage Bottlerocket release new single ‘American Deutsch Bag’ next month... Here’s a pic of Dublin’s own Tracey Oi-Town and Gal with Oi The Candle at the Rebellion. We don’t know exactly what they were doing with it, but we’re definitely carrying a torch for her!
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