MiM The Dublin Castle interview ended with you guys about to go to London to record an EP and promote the band, so what happened, how did the recording go?
Jimi It went really well, the actual week recording was class we had a mint time. We stayed in a hostel and were sort of like drinking all night and recording all day.
Martin And the Chinese girl ….
Jimi Yeah, there was a Chinese girl.
MiM Really? Tell me more.
Jimi … we won’t say too much about that.
Sam Stuart .. ask Stuart about a tin of red paint.
Jimi There was an Irish girl, an Australian girl as well, an’ Sam felt the ……
Sam I felt the tremors of the Irish girl, first hand, ha ha!
Jimi It was a class week but unfortunately as far as the recording went with the people that we did it with, nothing came of it.
MiM But the recording was OK?
Jimi Yeah the recording was good we thought it was really good, I mean the recording was class, at the end of the day we had a mint week we did a really good recording.
MiM In what way didn’t it go well, what were you hoping to get out of it?
Ben We thought we might get a bit more out of it than what we did.
Martin Well they promised us basically that they’d do something, pass it round a few contacts they had in the industry and when it came to it they just said you’re not ready for that.
Sam We needed some kind of idiom, apparently!
MiM A what?
Sam An idiom!
Jimi A manifesto.
Ben We ended up with a demo … alright a very good quality one but we could’ve ended up with a demo in Manchester.
Jimi We spoke to him at the end and he was gonna like sort it out and pass it round and then I spoke to him like a week later on the phone and he said right I’ve got some ideas just hit me with any ideas that you have, but then he said basically that we need to have some sort of manifesto. I think he was talking about like a theme.
Martin Like us all the same in black hats.
Jimi Like The Levellers and The Pogues.
Sam Basically some shit that we were never, ever gonna do …. bloody disgrace.
Jimi They were Finnish though weren’t they?
Martin Yeah they were Finnish.
Sam It was quite a Scandinavian thing this whole week we spent in London.
Jimi This while year’s been like it.
Ben Except there was Australia, China, Ireland ….
MiM ……. worldwide then.
Martin Oh all sorts of stuff going on!
MiM That didn’t materialise as you’d hoped but something happened in London and after you got back you were on a high, so what happened while you were there?
Sam Is this about the Irish girl?
MiM Ha ha, no .. no nothing about the Irish girl!
Sam Basically the hostel we were staying in had a roof terrace with a Jacuzzi on, really nice little place … erm our kid liked that Jacuzzi. So one night me and Martin were a bit pissed about half three, four …. pretty late on, and we got chatting to this kid on the roof terrace who was Swedish. We got talking cos he was bang into Manchester and we must’ve given him a CD or something like that cos a few weeks later he mailed us asking us if we’d go over to Sweden to play a couple of gigs, and that was Anders. So…. it was pretty good.
Jimi Top lad aint he …
Sam Yeah he’s a bloody king!
Jimi Yeah he is a bloody king …. a Swedish king. What’s their King called?
Sam King Carl Gustaf.
Well, didn’t think anything of that, we were wasted.
Martin We didn’t think anything of it we were drunk at the time it was like 4 o’clock in the morning.
Jimi We didn’t even know that he was operating or involved in music and stuff.
Martin He was just someone we met.
MiM He didn’t tell you that he was in the business?
Sam Well he could’ve have but me and Martin were shit faced.
MiM Ha ha, you wouldn’t have remembered then?
Sam We remember meeting him,
Jimi It was more like we met a couple of foreigners and we were having a chat and that was it.
Sam Then we got an email first saying that he’d listened to our tunes and really liked them and then about another month later we got another mail saying that him and his partner, whoever he was working with at the time, really liked them and wanted us to come to Sweden to play. And then we thought, that’s fucking great!
Jimi We never thought it’d come off to be fair.
Sam Well you know you take it with a pinch of salt don’t yer..… “Oh we we’re gonna pay for your flights you don’t need any money for beer ……”
Martin “You don’t need any money to stay anywhere just get yourselves to Stansted and we’ll do the rest”. Which is actually what happened!
Jimi And they even offered to pay for us to get to Stansted didn’t they..?
Sam Yeah they did.
MiM You came all the way to Stansted and you didn’t pop in for a brew?!!
Sam Yeah well it was about midnight to like 3 o’clock.
MiM I’d have been having a sandwich that time of night!
Sam Well we could’ve come in for a bloody bite to eat!
MiM Yeah you could’ve done.
Ben Lets face it if someone turns round and says right come over to Sweden to play a few gigs, we’ll pay for it, we’ll do everything, you don’t need to put your hand in your pocket, you’re not exactly gonna say no …..
MiM OK, so you got on the plane, landed in Sweden, how did it go?
Martin It was great, it was fantastic. It was unbelievable, we played a gig and they treated us like we were The Beatles or something like that, like signing autographs for an hour afterwards. It was just madness, like we were chauffeured around the whole weekend and everything was done for us.
Sam To be fair, the one bad thing…. the women could’ve been a bit better looking to be honest in Sweden.
ATKM Yeah ….. right, ha ha!!
Sam There’s no room for improvement there.
MiM That’s rough innit!
Martin Yeah there were lots of attractive females weren’t there!
Sam Yeah it was a fantastic place to visit and play. Really good.
MiM What about your accommodation and everything else?
Ben Yeah it was all done for us.
Sam And as we stayed with Anders we were living like kings weren’t we?
Martin We were living like kings, it was fantastic!
MiM When we spoke earlier you were telling me about the free beer?
Ben Ahhhhh ….. well you need that don’t yer, over there it was about £20,000 a time.
Sam It was fantastic, I mean there was a fridge, an upright fridge like you get in the newsagents over here, in the back room with a shit load of beer in it that had written on the front of it All The Kings Men. It was just our beer, and then I thought, shit we’re getting to the end of it and then I came back in for another one thinking I’ll nail one of the last ones, and they’d replenished it all!
Ben Dodgy bastard to the end ain’t he …
Martin They’d filled it all up again!
Jimi We were taking three bottles at a time as well.
Sam Anders actually put a bottle of beer in front of our amps for us before we went on stage and then half way through the gig he came and put more out for us.
MiM So how did you actually manage to play?
Sam Oh well … can’t remember …
Martin What we played did we? I thought it was a holiday!
Sam Friday night the gig we did in Sala, I was an absolute disgrace!
Jimi Sam couldn’t see his bass.
Sam I couldn’t see my guitar, I stopped half way through Bootle Street Nick, just stopped.
Jimi I was pretty bad on the second night.
Sam Yeah you were worse on the second night weren’t you.
Ben I was fine for both, cos I’m a legend.
Martin But they both went well though, nobody noticed.
Sam Even when we played in Preston the other week and we were shit faced, I thought we were terrible, everything went wrong that could, but the people that were there just loved it.
MiM That’s something that I get from seeing your performance, you just have so much fun that it doesn’t really matter how you are, I mean ……
Sam What you trying to say Kim?
Graham (MiM photographer) There’s a compliment there somewhere!
MiM Ha ha, what I’m saying is that what comes from the stage .. the way you perform and involve the audience, you have so much fun that you don’t actually notice till you listen back to a recording that maybe it wasn’t perfect.
Martin Do you know what Anders said to me? What he said to me the other week at The Hope and Anchor was that you play with your hearts not with your brains.
Ben That’s a good job really cos I’d be fucked wouldn’t I?
MiM That comes back to the honesty in the way you play that you talked about in the Dublin Castle interview.
Sam We’re in it because we’re close friends, we love playing guitars and getting pissed.
Jimi The thing is we know that if we didn’t drink anything we could do an absolutely perfect spot on set …..
MiM You might as well get the CD out!
Sam Yeah exactly.
Jimi But we wanna enjoy it as much as we can and we put in as best performance as we can but I mean, we think fuck it if we miss a couple of notes.
Ben We’ve all got a drink problem so ….
Jimi Yeah you’re right! We get to a gig and anyway ….
Sam We’re never gonna not drink.
Jimi We can’t stop ourselves, just can’t help it.
Sam It’s always worse when United and Chelsea play!
MiM You did the gigs …
Ben Oh, can I just say that Martin learned to say in Swedish, “I love you all”.
MiM Yeah? Can you demonstrate?
Ben I don’t think he knows it now…
Martin No I learnt, “we love you” ….. which is vi älska er
Ben He was frantically sat there all Friday night trying to learn it
MiM So, you did your gigs and when you got on the plane to come home what was going through your minds?
Jimi We were still drunk on the Sunday weren’t we?
Sam We were still shit faced at the airport.
MiM Well did anything happen while you were there with Anders … crumbs that sounds a bit erm …… I’ll rephrase that!
Sam He crept into my room one night .. oh he’s a dirty little man. That Anders Bjurenvall, dirty little man, ha ha….!
MiM What happened after the gigs? That’s a better question.
Martin How d’ya mean .. what on the night?
Sam I thought this was family magazine Kim.
MiM Ha ha …. alright, you got taken over there by Anders, he loved your music, you did your gigs so what was the follow on from that?
Jimi Nothing really. When we actually left Sweden nothing, we knew we’d got on really, really well and knew it was gonna be something we were gonna be doing again. We knew he was gonna get us back and he contacted us afterwards sometime on Myspace. We knew he was gonna start a label up and The Unconditionals that supported us in Sala, they were gonna be his first band and they were …
Sam They were arguing among themselves
Jimi Arguing on stage, they hated each other. They were a decent enough band, but
Sam The guitarist was looking at the front man on stage like …
Jimi It was hate, sheer hate. I’ve never seen anything like it.
He wanted to jump across the stage and beat him to death, he really did, and it was obvious though. So they were going to be the first band that he signed and when he saw us and like obviously with them being argumentative fuckers, he got on the blower to us afterwards and said that we’d really like it if you were the first band that we represent, and we were like… he’s a great, great fella
Sam He’s a grafter aint he…
Jimi And the way he sorted everything out for us, like everything just went into line. Y’know we got over there and the beer was sorted out, the food was sorted out, the beer was sorted out, everything was just there.
Sam The beer was sorted out I’ll tell you one thing though, and I’m sure Anders won’t mind us saying this….. he’s got a very, very hot shower.
Jimi Yeah he has got a hot shower.
Sam There’s no need for that, I told him that myself
Jimi Was steamy as well when he got in with me … steamed right up, ha ha….
Sam Sponging you off…. arghhhh.
Jimi This is James Williams saying goodbye.
(Jimi had to leave us …)
MiM So to the signing. You were approached by Anders to sign up to his label, what label is it?
ATKM Changes Music
MiM And how did that take place, when did it happen? And how did it happen?
Martin Well basically it was …..
Sam We knew it was on, we knew we were doing it, it’s just the physical signing you want to know I think innit?
MiM Yeah ….
Martin I was gonna say if you keep interrupting me when I’m about to speak ….
Sam Well I’m sorry Martin.
Ben You can’t stop him talking! It’s the beer, the beer it controls what he’s saying. That beer just takes over his words.
Martin We’d just like to say Sam stormed out of the interview ..ha ha!
MiM Elvis has left the building... haha
Martin Exactly! Well basically…. it was all done over the internet cos obviously we don’t live in Sweden, we have to do everything over the internet on MSN, and Anders decided he wanted to come over to London to watch us at the Hope & Anchor and do the signing there, like get the record contract ready and do it like a public sort of thing. So basically, yeah we ended up going to London cos we had a gig there in the Hope & Anchor, Islington and they came over…. three of them for the gig.
Ben Two co-owners and the other guy, Joel. I think Joel is the one putting some of the money in.
MiM I’m hoping to talk to Anders at some point to get his side of it.
Ben I don’t fully know, but I know that Anders and Frida are the co-owners and I’m pretty sure that Joel is the sort of money man isn’t he?
Martin I presume so… I think that’s what it is.
MiM So you signed this very interesting looking contract?
Ben Very Factory-esque it was, very Factory-esque.
Martin It looked like Tony Wilson had written it himself. Basically it ends with “The band has the right to fuck off whenever they want”, which is basically the same as what happened with the Factory label.
Ben Which is good cos that’s exactly what we want.
Martin Which is great, great for us.
MiM How much control has the label got over you then?
Ben None!
Martin To be honest with you none. That’s the thing, we’re happy to work with them, we like working with them, it’s great. They’ve given us a great opportunity. They decided this Factory Records style is going to be the best thing.
(Sam and Jimi returned)
Ben I think it’s all because of the film 24 Hour Party People.
Martin They really are big fans of 24 Hour Party People.
Sam Joseph, Joseph .. make sure Joseph gets in there, he loves it.
Ben He’s gonna be like our engineer when we do our album in Sweden.
Graham (MiM photographer) So you’re gonna do your album in Sweden?
Martin Yeah hopefully
Graham (MiM photographer) Are you gonna re-do all your tracks then?
Martin Erm .. we don’t know what we’re gonna record yet and what it’s gonna be.
Ben We’re releasing Peterloo next month.
MiM Is that the same EP that I’ve got?
Sam It’s the same EP.
Martin It’s gonna be re-packaged and everything not re-recorded.
MiM The next thing then is your EP launch, and that’s at MAPS Festival in Manchester, when is that?
Sam 24th May, yeah! *
MiM Good, and what formats is it coming out in?
Sam CD, it’s gonna be on a 7” vinyl and gonna be download as well.
MiM After the EP launch, what’s next?
Ben Off to Sweden again, we’ve got a couple of gigs over there.
Martin We’ve got two gigs booked over there, one in Sala and one in Stockholm again.
Ben Two confirmed at the minute.
Martin Two confirmed at the beginning of June so we’ll do that. If we can get to Malmo and Gothenburg as well, get those gigs booked for the same thing then that’ll be good, but I’m thinking we might be going back maybe later in the year to do something, I’m not sure. It depends what Anders has got planned.
Sam Anders is the man with the plan at the minute, we’re just gonna keep playing good gigs including the one tonight in Manchester, big gigs that should be really good, obviously we’re all looking forward to them, and getting back to Sweden. And we need to book a few more in London soon too.
MiM Yes! Yes you do.
Martin We’re trying to at the moment.
MiM So is there anything we’ve missed out?
Sam Only that our kid is a complete dickhead.
Ben That’s a bit strong innit….
MiM Well I don’t need to know your favourite pudding or anything like that. We’ve done that before.
Martin Yeah babies head innit!
MiM I think that’s about it then, thanks guys!
Sam That’s it, lets go and get pissed then? Thanks Kim good, come on everyone …….
And so All the Kings Men left the room cheering, clapping and whooping all the way to the bar.
Interview with All The Kings Men @ The Club Academy, Manchester 26.04.08: Kim Etheridge
Photography © Graham Etheridge
