“Fight Or Die, F**K Or Fly!”
It’s a balmy Saturday evening, Waterside festival may be calming down but over at the Tombstone Bullet camp things are looking quite edgy with the band meeting a rather bi-polar fan. After the strange hassle has ended we walk down canal-side and take-five at an overused rock garden. We first seen the band at the Pitz in a Band Blitz heat last year, they didn’t make it through but they left quite an impression, in short, we loved them. It’s about a year down the line and we managed to have a word and discover more about the band as they discuss their upcoming album, black mages and the “Gay Nazi” look…
I have to admit, though we knew the Tombstone Bullets played classic rock and what we seen of them live, the band were still a bit of a mystery to me. “The Tombstone Bullets formed about three years ago…” begins frontman Alex, “I dunno, we like rock music” he continues with the introduction as he and the others laugh at a rather straight-cut intro to a brash rock band, the guys get into a bit of a natter murmuring names like Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple. “We love to play rock n’ roll” finishes Josh, the man behind the band’s lead lines, keeping it rather simple.
But beginnings weren’t exactly just as simple as their self introduction, or maybe they were depending on which way you look at it. When asked how the band came to be Alec smartly remarks “Drunkenly!” before Josh gives me the basic low-down of the rather bluesy beginnings of the band that I’m talking to now, “Alec and I started doing a blues jam and then we just thought “Let’s start a band!””.
“We were originally a blues band” continues the frontman “Tombstone Bullets” is actually a lyric from a Muddy Waters track. We jammed and then we discovered this mutual appreciation for seventies rock and some more contemporary stuff like Radiohead and Pearljam, we just rolled from there really…”
And from there developed a band that would become a little larger than life and enjoyed playing gigs as much as possible. As Alec says himself, he sees “so many bands that are not enjoying themselves, with a bit of a “laissez faire” attitude and I think what that’s about. You get up there and you love it, that’s why you do it. If you don’t love it then stop doing it, it’s as simple as that.”
“If you don’t look like a total, utter prat then you’re obviously not working hard enough.” notes bassist Rich with a stern voice before the band trails into laughter again at the whole straightness of the situation. When we gather ourselves it’s time to get a little more serious, the band noted an upcoming album during their set so naturally we had to sate our curiosity with what it’s all about.
“We’re really looking into kicking it off in the summer with a whole host of shows” begins Alec, again “And we’ll be doing some more recording and we’re hoping to get the first batch of songs down proper. I’ve kind of described the whole thing as a concept piece, I don’t know if it would be fair to call it that exactly, but they’re all at least lyrically themed and feel very much as a collective.” muses the boot-wearing frontman.
“But we’re hoping to really get that all together and then go onwards and upwards with a batch of new material. We want to get more stuff out there, we want to get out as much as we can so we’re hot on the writing at the moment.”
“It’s not so much a concept in the sense of a story-telling album but it’s eight songs linked thematically” describes Alec after I chance him for a little more detail. “It’s about displacement within twenty-first century culture I think, if that sounds really pretentious, but sod it, as Richard said, we’re a bunch of prats. But we do want it to make some kind of statement with our first record.”
The guys break down once again at the reference to Rich’s analogy for the band. But in all seriousness, Alec may have a point. “You see so many bands with limp first offerings, we’re not going to play it safe, it’s fight-or die, f**k-or-fly on this one to be honest.”
Almost unsurprisingly, Josh is doubled over and almost in tears which causes the rest of the band to follow suit, prompting the frontman to remark “Josh liked that one!” with a huge grin.
With the band out of their serious shoes again, it seemed fitting to ask questions of a more geeky nature, namely the Final Fantasy orientated. Alec once mentioned about a certain incident and being into that kind of stuff myself, I had to find out more as he explains.
“(At a Christmas do) The band thought it fair to offer up a cover of “Those Who Fight Further” (The FFVII boss music) by the Black Mages and it was truly something else!”
For the next moments we’re all blasting the theme out of our lungs a’la Never Mind The Buzzcocks with pure enthusiasm. Unfortunately the guys note that they were asked to turn the volume down at that particular gig, also as unfortunate, no-one came rushing into the front with an oversized sword.
“We’re not nerds!” laughs Josh, though Alec begs to differ, going into a bit of philosophy “What hard rock band wasn’t nerdy to be honest? That’s why you start playing guitar, because you’re not a jock, it’s a way of expressing yourself. We all feel a bit of that inside I think, we’re not going to be extreme and whiny about it but there is that displacement… but playing Final Fantasy music is f**king fun to be honest, what can you say?!”
The answer to that is “not much”, but one final question has to be asked, though, as you can see by the photos, frontman Alec’s dress code raised a lot of my curiosity throughout the interview and their previous gig.
“I’m a gay Nazi, what can I say” says Alec jocularly, “But in all seriousness, again, so many bands get up there in jeans and t-shirts, we wanted to make a conscious effort to really stand out, we probably look like tossers; do we care? No. Are we having a good time doing it? Yes!”
“It’s a real gripe of mine, I get a lot of grief for it. Are people really that self conscious that they need to comment on the way others dress? But we enjoy doing it, we’re going to keep doing it, if people like us then great, if they don’t then sod them.”
After all of laughter, tears and deeper conversation I’m invited down the pub for a drink with the guys as the evening winds into the night. One of the things I’ve noticed about the band is that they aren’t exactly at either end of the seriousness spectrum, they may dress in boots have a laugh and have the strangest of analogies, but lyrically and musically they’re still quite serious, it’s just that they enjoy themselves, I guess that’s what being in a band is about underneath it all.
Craig \m/
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