Interview with Mark Morriss and Adam Devlin:

(Gothenburg, 24th May, 1998)

[Q] A couple of days ago I got an e-mail from a Bluetones fan in the U.K. and she wrote this about you: "You will be amazed at how damn nice they are. They are absolutely damn gorgeous, you could package em' and sell them to old ladies cos' that's how sweet and polite they are". Are you really that nice and polite?!

[A] Mark: Fuck no!!! They must have met us on a good day, or should I say a good night when we have had a little too much to drink (laughs).

Adam: Nah, we're just human beings y'know. We're like everybody else... we always come alive at the night-time. It's weird, lot's of people think that just because your in a band you're rude and have a bad attitude... Y'see, we're not like that, we've never been that way and never will. We're just being ourselves.

[Q] So, why do y'think your fans are so devoted?

[A] Mark: Cos' we're making music that has never been made by anyone else before and our music will never be everybodys' cup of tea. So the ones who like our music likes it a little bit more. I think that a lot of our fans can identify themself with us. We're still like em' and we haven't changed that much really. We like to get close to our fans, it's nice to be a personal band with a lot of devoted fans.

[Q] Do y'have a lot of fans hanging outside your house, ringing your dorrbell and asking for autographs every day?

[A] Mark: Nah, not anymore actually. In '96 there were some but no, there aren't many today. Or maybe it has been cos' I haven't been home that much really. I mean, we've been away recording the album so I haven't been home for almost a year.

[Q] How would you describe your music for those who haven't heard The Bluetones yet?

[A] M: Well, it's relly hard for us to tell someone what we sound like but well... it's speed dungle with heavy beats... (laughs)

A: And a lot of Jazz and Blues. A little bit of everything really.

M: Yeah, it's really hard for us to tell since we have about 30-40 songs and they all sound different. The thing that links them together is our personal chemistry within the band and the way we play them together as a band.

[Q] What bands are you inspired by and what do you listen to when your at home?

M: Well, we're trying to sound like a mix of all our favourite bands but The Stone Roses has made a very big impression on us and has meant a lot to our way of making music and i think that our fans know that.

A: We like lots of different music, but at the moment we're playing music by The Beatles, Super Furry Animals, Daft Punk & Jeff Buckley.

[Q] Do you think that you've changed now when you've become famous?

[A] M: Yep, of course we've changed. You change from day to day and as your conditions change, you change automatically. Our goals have changed and money is not important anymore. Well, money have never been important to us... we don't do it for the money, y'know. But, we don't have to worry about the money now like we did before we got signed. We're doing it cos' we love it and cos' we want to have a good time and give our fans a great time as well, at least i hope we do...

A: It's a personal fulfilment for us and it's much better to be in a band than to have an ordinary job y'know...(laughs)

[Q] Has there been any time when you felt like giving up, and if so, what made you carry on making such great music?

[A] M: No, not seriously. Well, sometimes you just feel like you want to put the whole thing on ice for a while and give it a rest. But the adrenalin that we get from playing gets us through that. I could never live without music, everything in my life is connected to music and the guys in the group are my best friends and i could never live without em'.

A: We're just human beings y'know... some days you're just in a bad mood or feeling really pissed but we all do sometimes, don't we? And if we are that way sometimes it's probably because we're tired or something. We're not an arrogant band, we don't fight and we have no plans whatsoever to give up the things that we're doing now.

[Q] Is there any diffrence between touring back home in the U.K. compared to Europe?

[A] M: Yep, there are a lot of diffrences actually! First of all, the venues we play here are much much smaller than the ones we play at back home. Here we play for about 200-250 people and it's not even sold out!! Back home we play for about 2000-3000 people and it's usually sold out too... But, we love playing here, it's nice to get that close to the audience again, it's almost a little scary... (laughs) It gets so real to play at small venues and we really enjoy it cos' when you're playing at a big place you're so far from the audience and sometimes it doesn't feel real, it feels like you're playin' on TV or something... It takes some time to get used to have the audience right up in your face like we do here, but we love it. We've been to Sweden quite a lot cos' we really like it here. You're less violent than the fans back home...(laughs), you're all very nice and the Swedes are so beautiful. And a lot of blonds too...(smiles)

A: Yeah, here in Sweden people seem to dress up a little when they go to concerts, like if they we're on there way to a party or something.

[Q] You've been supporting bands like Oasis and Supergrass, but you've also toured with The Cardigans. Do y'know any other Swedish bands, any that you like?

[A] M: We've heard a lot about that Swedish group 'Kent' but we've never heard any music of theirs... we like to make fun of em' though, cos' we don't like their name 'Kent' What kind of a name is that? Back home in U.K. there's a part of England called Kent, and it's place that people think is very boring... and then there's the cigarette label called Kent too... but i'm sure their music is better than their name. There are a lot of great bands in Sweden, we like 'The Cardigans' and 'The Wannadies'. We actaually met The Cardigans last night when we played in Malm�, they we're on their way to Denmark to see a concert with Beck.

[Q] What inspired the entire look and feel of 'Return To The Last Chance Saloon'?

[A] M: Well, y'see... we've been living in a studio for almost a year, which is a very long time, and after a while you kind of get off the rails. Cos' during this time you're isolated from your friends and your family and you're very far from the city life cos' we usually go to pretty isolated places when we do it. We wrote the music in Surrey and recorded it in Wales. So after a while we started to get a little weird and you always drink way to much during that period off time (laughs). So, we're just sitting there watching loads of mexican films and westerns and we adopted the whole cowboy-mexican thing on ourselves.

[Q] Did you feel any pressure while you were recording it following up the sucess of 'Expecting To Fly'?

[A] A: Well, no... there was a little pressure when we first got together and before we started the writing. But we knew that we were good and that our songs were great once we finished it. We were really up for it y'know. We just wanted to do a better album than our last one.

M: Yeah, as long as we're doing our best we know that we can't do any better than that. The pressure we felt was within the group cos' we wanted to make great music.

[Q] What's the diffrence between 'Expecting To Fly' & 'Return To The Last Chance Saloon'?

[A] M: Hmm... well, the difference is about two pounds and two years...!(laughs) It's not a stylistic change really. But our sound has got bigger with the last album and we're a much tighter and better group now than we were two years ago. We've got more experience and we're more confident in the studio now. Now, we know how to get that sound we want. Being in a band has been a learning curve for us, it started down here and now we're up here (shows with his hands). That's the way it should be for all bands really cos' it's dangerous to get to big in the beginning cos' then you're usually just going down the curve instead of up.

[Q] There's one song on the album called UTA, what does it mean??

[A] M: We've been asked that a lot, both from our fans and from journalists, but we can't tell you cos' it's a secret. But, hey...i can tell you, but then i have to kill you! (smiles)

[Q] I've heard that you Mark once sang in front of thousounds of school children?! Tell us about it!

[A] M: Oh, no! I'm trying so hard to forget that incident! How did you know about that?! Well, my mother works as a teacher at a school in Cornwall and it was at a birthday party when i have had a little too much to drink so my mother goes 'Now, when you're home Mark, can't you do something for the school, like sing a couple of your hits for the kids?" So, I said yes cos' i thought that she was going to forget about it but then she woke me up the next morning at 7 o' clock and i had a big hangover and she starts to tell me that i better get up and get dressed cos' she had spoke to the headmaster at school and told him that i was going to be there at 8am singing some of our songs to the kids!!! And at that moment it was too late to say no, i couldn't let my mother down y'know. So, yes it was a nightmare.... i sang Slight Return & Bluetonic and no, i didn't enjoy singing that morning in front of a thousounds of school children and the local press but i tell ya what: afterwards i spoke to the kids and i really enjoyed that! But, i'm really trying to forget the whole thing cos' it was so embarrasing (laughs).

[Q] I've also heard that you love reading Oasis & Black Grape interviews, how come?

[A] M: Cos' they're always so funny, don't you think? Our interview's pretty boring, right? Nah, i just like reading em' cos' i'm amazed of where they get it all from. But, we know Oasis pretty well and we like em'. I saw Liam in the end of November and he was doing alright. Everybody is so busy all the time so it's hard to get a chance to see em'. There's not a lot of time to get to hang out with the famous people y'know...

[Q] Do you want to become more famous, get more comercial success and play in front of 20 000 people instead of 2000?

[A] A: We don't want to become as big as Oasis if that's what ya' mean. I can't think of nothing worse that that.

M: Nah, that's not important for us. I think that it would effect my writing if we lived in a bubble cos' it would be hard for me to relate to real life. And as you become that big your music tends to stay in the background cos' suddenly the press are more interested in who you're sleeping with, if you're drunk and who with, and so on...

A: We're already living in a bubble, but it's big enough. Our manager lives in the same area as Liam does, and there's journalists and fans outide his door all the time. I would never like to live that way, Liam & Patsy don't got a personal life. That's not our thing y'know...

M: We like it the way it is, but it's really out of our hands, right?

[Q] What do you guys do when you're not touring with The Bluetones?

[Q] M: When you're on tour you always eat too little and drink too much. You stay up late almost every night and the thing that keeps us going is the adrenalin that we get from playing. But when you get home it all catches up with you and you just want to sit on your sofa for 5 days doing nothing more that watching telly and eating crisps. So, that's what we do when we get home from touring, i don't even get dressed during those 5 days's.... (laughs).

A: We all live pretty close to each other, like within 5 miles from each other in West London. I share a flat with Scott, Eds lives with his girlfriend and Mark lives on his own in his one room flat.

M: Yeah, Eds our drummer is getting married when we're coming home. He's growning up (laughs).

[Q] So what are your plans for the summer?

[A] A+M: Football!!!

M: We're having three weeks off so that we can watch all the games, yeah... really looking forward to that!! (smiles) And Jennifer... Sweden didn't make it this year... too bad huh?! (laughs) Pretty strange since you came third the last time and played 4-0 against Bulgaria in the bronze medal game...

[Q] Lot's of people say that you're part of the whole britpop-thing that started a couple of years ago, do you consider youself as a band within that category?

[A] A: There's nothing called Britpop anymore, it was just a buzzword for a period of time and at that time they said that almost all music that was made in the U.K. was Britpop, like everything from Radiohead, Portishead and The Orb and we were supposed to be in the middle of that...

M: It's all about timing really. People like to call it something cos' it's easier really.

[Q] So, what can we expect from The Bluetones tonight?

[A] M: Well you never know, do ya'?! But we'll start with a volcano and then build it up to a climax, how does that sound Jennifer?!

Jennifer: It sounds pretty good. Good luck tonight guys!

M: Talk to ya' more later Jen after the show cos' you'll be around won't ya'?

J: I sure will.

A: Gotta do the soundcheck now, see ya'!