The Misery Machine

 Knee Deep in the Craic 2 AM on a Thursday night in 1993. Mr. Bad Cop and Mr. A Bit Naughty Cop were emptying the contents of the Misery Machine onto a road just outside Felinheli, North Wales. This was an ongoing occurrence, every week, sometimes twice a week. I had gotten to the point where all my documents were under the sun visor, ready to go, as I was becoming on first-name terms with the station staff every time I got a producer to go show my details. I couldn't work out why we were of such great interest to them—a bright orange Transit van with two multi-haired, scruffy guys driving around late at night. A bit obvious if we were criminals, maybe it was a double bluff, maybe we were peacocking drug dealers. So on this occasion, they were pulling up the stained carpets, throwing everything out, going through the dash, and they spotted a pack of Rizlas with the corner ripped out. "Ah-ha," they thought, "we've got you, you reefer madness hippy." They aske...

Record Companies and Other Dubious Bastards In the early days of being in a band, securing a record deal was the dream. We pictured studios kitted out like the deck of the star ship Enterprise, gigs with a dressing room, roadies, food, and a working tour van. To secure said record deal, we'd need a demo – a proper demo. Up to this point, in late 1992, we had recorded about ten tapes on a shonky Tascam four-track, which was held together with hope and beer residue. The last tape we did, a compilation of the previous demos entitled 'Why Bother Firing,' had reached a spot in the NME top ten of Avant-Garde Industrial releases. This was thanks to a friend of ours, but still, "bragging rights, innit?" The decision was made: we had to go into a studio. We'd been recommended one in Blaenau Ffestiniog called 'Pharmacy Studios' which, as you can guess, was in an old pharmacy. Phone calls, dates, and the selling of kidneys were sorted to pay for this two-day extr...

 A Drive by Shooting in Weymouth We were on the A354 on the way to Weymouth when the fear of no windscreen wipers took hold.  It was 1993 and we had embarked on a short tour as we often did, spreading the word in our untrustworthy Ford Transit, the original 'Misery Machine'. We had been in London the previous night playing a gig at the Kentish Town Bull and Gate, which had gone ok even though we were the first band on and failed to drag in many bodies, but this is how shows went, some good, some bad. As long as they were never indifferent. We also had a brief second meeting with a potential record company which I'll cover in another story. So fresh faced and full of hope, we set off for Weymouth.  (A few things I should point out about The Misery Machine; it was bright orange, a proper workhorse, but riddled with problems.  It had no heater and wouldn't go faster than 50mph, even downhill. It was not comfortable; the back was kitted out with a second hand carpet we h...