Planet Rock - USA (2020-04)

PLANET ROCK 63

question I got asked at school was “Are you

Catholic or Protestant?” I was like, “Fuck’s

sake, really?” If you’re going to move out of

Northern Ireland to get away from religious

bigotry, the west of Scotland maybe isn’t the

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was never bullied. Strathaven was a great wee

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Did music become a real escape for you?

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straight away, at 1 5 years old. We rehearsed

in our living room one week, and

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it down. I remember his dad had

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What were the bands that united

the three of you?

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we listened to everything from the

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loved ’DC, that was the core that united us.

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geometry teacher, and he gave us a room to

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cos. So then you’d be walking through the

school with a guitar and it’d be, ‘Oh, look,

here’s fucking Joe Strummer.’ ī/DXJKVĬ

Did you like the attention of fronting

a band?

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had a gig booked at the school and I said,

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“Why is that girl who’d never talk to me before

suddenly talking to me now? I kinda like this,

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So Impact transformed into your next band,

Rough Charm?

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Charm we used another drummer from Coatĥ

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asked him back. I remember once, when we

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ty funny. Rough Charm were a bit more New

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management, and then their manager Nigel

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And then you ended up joining New Model

Army...

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world tour, and need somebody, would you

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and I knew it was the chance of a lifetime, so

I couldn’t say, “1R ́7KHJX\VZHUHSLVVHGRɱ

of course they were, but they understood. I

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world with my favourite band at that moment.

Was staying in the band not an option?

Well, when it came to writing and recording, it

was going to be the nucleus of the three guys,

which of course I totally understood. Justin

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I said I’d rather just leave and get back to

“YOU HAVE A GUITAR IN

SCHOOL AND IT WAS LIKE,

‘OH LOOK,IT’S FUCKING

JOE STRUMMER.’”

God squad: The
Almighty (from
left) Floyd London,
Ricky Warwick, Pete
Friesen, Stumpy
Monroe), 1993; Ricky
Warwick in 1996.