Dave and Helen talk to Ed and Rob.

What kind of reaction did you get to your last E.P. 'Another Love Song'?
R: We thought it was going to sell about a thousand, and so far it's sold five thousand and it's selling 300 a week at the moment, which is nothing really. We just wanted to treat it as the end of that era, treat it as the end of the first year in the public eye of S*M*A*S*H basically, it is probably the first introduction to the band for most people, it's done alright for us, it's getting played on MTV occassionally. When we were in Europe the other week with The Cramps, a few people there mentioned that they had seen it on 120 minutes or something.

Did you get a good reaction from people abroad?
R: Yes, really good, in Germany and that, they have a different attitude, because things aren't as fashion lead as they are in the UK, they look and listen to music in a different light. Over there we went out with Corrosion of Conformity, who are pretty much metal, we stood up with their crowd and they sort of dug it as well.

Someone said that if you took the two support bands tonight and put them together you would end up with PWEI.
R: That's one way of looking at it, because Loop Guru rely really, really heavily on DAT, they just tinker about over the top of it, but they really rely very heavily on DAT.
E: We haven't even got a DAT.
R: I suppose that if you put us together you might come up with PWEI, you would probably end up with a big fight more likely.

What do you think of them?
R: I love the Poppies, I just think they are tops really, top attitude, brilliant use of sampling and stuff, and good use of guitars and shit as well. Loop Guru, same as I say rely so heavily on DAT, to me they don't really mean anything, and as a live thing they are pretty kind of not very pleasing at all.
E: DAT is like a record, live is supposed to be... live, you know what I mean?
R: Still they look good, three percussionists...
E: I don't think they look good.

What music are you listening to at the moment? What sort of bands do you like?
E: Royal Trux - I've just got their 'Thankyou' album, which is pretty cool.
R: On the last tour I was listening to Elvis '56, we had some Soul compilation like Motown and James Brown and stuff, and then we had a tape of Led Zepplin and Stone Roses and stuff like that.
E: Yeah, we've had the Stone Roses album...
R: We we're in the Garage the other day and we bought 'The Best Punk Album in the World Ever' which was quite funny...
E: It was quite funny, they might as well have printed that instead of Elastica's new album.
R: But yes, all sorts, like we always have really, like Afghan Whigs and the Manics and stuff as well...
R: I like rare groove stuff and that...

What do you think to Sleeper's 'Lady, Love Your Countryside'?
R: Very funny, very funny indeed. I don't know... They're boring, aren't they?

What do you think of this new girl fronted indie band thing?
R: It's not new is it?....Well, they've got a millionth of the talent of Polly Harvey.

Have you heard her new album?
E: Yes, it's fuckin' monster.
R: I haven't heard that new album yet actually, but I really want to hear it, but yes, she's quite funny.

You are often seen as being in competition with These Animal Men. Is there any truth to that?
R: Someone probably thinks we are...
E: We're never in the same place, so how can we ever be doing the same competition?
R: It just stemmed from some early things when we did those gigs with them, before anything really kicked off, and like where there wasn't any pressure on either band to do anything commercially, do you know what I mean? And then as sson as things started happening there were a few words said but that was more on the management side of things, it wasn't really between the two bands...
E: I haven't seen them for so long...
R: We haven't seen them for ages, bump into them very occasionally, but Julian... sorry, Hooligan is DJing at our gig at the Garage in London.
E: Got a phone call of them the other day, they left a message saying thanks a lot.

Is it true you might be working with TAM in the future?
E: That was something we discovered in Europe, we went with like a metal band - Corrosion of Conformity, well rock metal, and The Cramps, and a load of S*M*A*S*H fans would turn up, but it wouldn't be a whole night for them, you know what I mean. And we're out there thinking, like, if we was out there with These Animal Men, or Shed Seven or something... these are bands that have been, like, front covers of the NME and that sort of shit, so...
R: We rock better than the Annies though. They want to be as rock 'n roll as us, but they have to do it by drinking beer instead of playing live.

What do you think of These Animal Men?
R: I like 'em, they're funny.
E: You liked the new album, didn't you?
R: That one that got really slated...
E: Taxi for These Animal Men.
R: It's got some good bits on it. They have worked hard on it, and... I actually think [John] Mulvey was being a bit unfair in the way he treated them in that. They can look desperate at times, with the speed stuff and the eyeliner, and that was where the differences were between us anyway. That kind of pop icon bullshit, or just being a good rock n roll band, which is probably more what we're interested in.

How do you see the future, now the New Wave Of New Wave thing has died down?
R: Quite nice for us.
E: It's all the new mod of new mod, and Gene and Sleeper, and Menswear innit?
R: The people who'll break through I suppose will be the people who've got the best marketing... there's a lot to be said for drinking in the right pubs and stuff, but it's not us. We're just crap at that sort of thing, you know? We can all drink, but we don't have to do it down the Good Mixer in Camden.
E: We've been a year in the life of the media now, and we've admired the Poppies and wanted to support them and now we are, y'know, this is the future. We want to support Therapy? at some point as well, and we've got a reputation that that's possible for us to do. We want to support a more like band.
R: Spend a bit more time in the studio as well, get to grips with that, y'know? Last year we didn't have enough time, we did too much touring, too much farting about really.

You did the big U.S. tour... Did you get a good response for that?
E: Fuckin' yeah.
R: Thing was, like, we was doin' gigs and at some places getting really bad attendances and some places really good attendances, but there was no one reporting it, you know what I mean, and the only one that got reported was one that we did in CBGB's where there was only a hundred people there, but the geezer gave it a blindin' review 'cause it was a blindin' gig, do you know what I mean, there could have been five people there and you would have got the same show. It's kind of just the way people want to play the game with us really. We did reviews all over America, everyone wanted to talk to us, The New York Post put us in one of their pages saying we were playing tonight at this CB's thing. They were all really interested in us, you know. When did we go out, in October or something?
E: I can't remember. November?
R: ...November, and then like all this press filtered through in sort of February/March this year so we're hoping to go back at some point and capitalise on it.

Are there any differences between the audiences in America and here?
R & E: They wear ear plugs!
R: They've never got rigs big enough to warrant that... so imagine what happens when they come over here, or Germany. In Germany every PA is really loud, no matter where you go. It could be a little hole in the ground, but it'll have a massive PA in it. But in the States, they're really weedy. And they still wear earplugs. I suppose they're a bit scared...
E: 'Cos there's all these warning signs.

Which do you prefer, little gigs or bigger places?
E: We just adapt to any. We did one in Berlin and it was this enormous room. It was a two thousand capacity place and there was only a thousand in there and that was probably one of the best gigs we've done for a long, long time, really. We just had to adapt to the room and the audience. Either, really. Any.
R: Even if there's five people standing around the edges, we're still going to fuck the place up.
E: Either. The whole good vibe of the gig is, like, getting there, sussing it out, and then doing the job accordingly.
R: The Poppies have got a drum riser and we don't like drum risers, we like to be on the floor, all three of us.

You're alternating with Loop Guru. Does it bother you being third on the bill tonight?
E: It just depends whether you get a soundcheck and stuff, just the finicky bits, you know?
R: Because the thing is, without a soundcheck, you know your first song is going to be ropey, no matter how well you play it. It's quite a good line up when we go on second, but we've not seen it the other way around, so tell you later.
E: Could be a downer, couldn't it?
R: I think it'd be more interesting with Loop Guru, then us, but every other night, it's good.
E: It still works out that we play in the middle five times.

You've got this alter ego called S*H*I*T*E that you play under sometimes. What's the difference?
E: Nothing. It's all the same songs, same attitude. It was sort of one of our pre-emptive strikes. We billed ourselves at the Subterrania as S*H*I*T*E, when we were still flavour of the three months with the newspapers, so we had called ourselves shite before anyone else did. And they did, pretty soon after.
R: I don't know...we do get portrayed as complete arseholes who are totally fucking stupid, just because we're honest and open and talk how we talk, and don't just quote lines out of books we think no-one's read and stuff. It's basically, 'Yeah, I know, journo-geezer, that you're going to turn S*M*A*S*H into S*H*I*T*E, because I know that's where you're at.' So it's no great shakes, is it?
E: And anybody, apart from a journalist, can see the funny side of it.

I got a badge in Hull. It's small and brown and it says S*H*I*T*E on it. And why not?
R: It's small and brown and it says S*H*I*T*E on it. Haha.
E: We did the shirts as well, a nice brown with yellow bits to signify sweetcorn. We know the score.
R: It's just fucking... rock.
E: We've got to save the world yet... Oh no, we did, didn't we?
R: We saved it last year. We don't have to worry about that anymore then.

So what's next?
E: I'd like to do a gig on election day and just play 'Kill Somebody' thirty times.
R: We've got plenty to do. We want to do some recording. We really want to get into the studio, but for ourselves, not to make something in particular, just to make a racket.
E: Just to learn what all the buttons do. And then next time we get stitched by a producer, we can just punch the fuck out of him and do it ourselves. Because the worst thing about being in the studio with a producer, is you're going 'No, it doesn't sound right' and he's, like, 'look, I know what I'm doing'. And if you know what the buttons do, you can just go, 'look, turn that one'.
R: The worst thing about doing the album was that we got stitched, in a way.
E: But it's only our first album, you know? It's, like, learn, learn, learn, which is what we intend to do. It's a fucking brilliant album, but we'll make another one. And that one will get looked back on and I think it takes a bit of investigatin', that album. You have to listen to it a few times, think about this and that, a few different moods might help.
R: He still fucked up the production, though.
E: He did. He buried the vocals, he buried the drums and, like, if you're keen, you can dig them out.

Are you going to do it yourselves next time?
E: Well, co-produce. Well, not even that. It's just finding the right balance with a producer. Someone who wants to hear every opinion, push every button and twiddle every knob.

You had remixes on 'Kill Somebody' - is that something you're going to get more into, or is it a one-off?
R: It's not a one-off.
E: Have some more of that, definitely. Get Depth Charge to do some, that'd be cool.

How about Loop Guru?
E: No.
R: We've asked Andy Weatherall to do one. He's not free 'til about August time, but we might have something out about then anyway.
E: I wouldn't mind Gunshot doing another one. Even getting someone to do some loops and stuff and then us do the rest on them. Anything really. It's just the time. And we're picking a bit more gear up now, so we're going to get, like, drum machines and samplers and sequencers, just to fart about with.

Do you reckon you'll be on Top Of The Pops again?
R: If we make a record that hasn't got a rude word in the title, or swearing in it, or...
E: ...that sells. We would've got a chart position with 'Another Love', if it had come out at the same time all over the country. But it didn't even come out in our town until, like, four days later.
R: It's such a nightmare putting out a record. There are so many points at which things go wrong. it's not just making the record, it's just trying to get it in the fucking shops.
E: We had the Radcliffe session the week before, the big this, that and the other and then the fucking distributor leaves them in the back of his car!

What was it like doing the Mark Radcliffe session?
E: Wicked. Really, really enjoyed it. We met him briefly and changed his mind about us. He really enjoyed the session and people who listened to that session have never heard him, like... apparently, when some bands finish a song, he's like, 'Yeah', but with us he was 'I like S*M*A*S*H' or whatever.
R: It's just funny that people in the BBC actually think we're going to go in there and start smashing the place up. It's an unbelievable attitude. They really do think that. That's why we've had trouble getting sessions and stuff.
E: The only thing I've ever smashed up is my car.

Maybe you ought to try 'The Word'...
R: 'The Word' is fucking...
E: I still wouldn't go on 'The Word', man.
R: The Word is an anal passage full of faeces, isn't it?
E: It's still not clever. They have some good bands on it like, but I still can't watch a whole show. It's the way that the programme is saying 'Ha ha, you lot are a load of cunts for watching this'. It's so obvious that that is what it's saying. Like having Craig Charles on it, he's just been cleared of rape and it's like, 'slap on the back, Craig, nice one pal'. It glorifies anything that's even vaguely seedy.

Is there anything you want to ask yourselves?
R: What do you think of the New Wave Of New Wave?
E: Shut the fuck up! That's not what he'd ask himself, honest.
R: If it's all true. Is it all true, Ed?
E: Is what all true? Good question that.

We'll make music journalists yet.
E: Try not to.

S*M*A*S*H were talking to Dave and Helen, in April 1995.