Longball To No-One interview
February 2nd 2005
posted February 2nd 2005

This is my first live interview! It's 2:30 am local time...gotta love that 13 hour time difference between here and Japan! But I am a night owl after all. I'm having an MSN chat with Longball To No-One's drummer Graeme Gilmour - formerly of other great bands like Broccoli and Shonben. "I'm ready for you sir. I'm a bit slow with the typing though. I have hooves instead of fingers! Be gentle!" haha...neither of us are great typists! Graeme only had 30 minutes before he had to pick up his kids on the first part. We went on for about an hour in the second half. The interruption was noted. And I left in some of the typos just because his comments about them were funny! So let's get on with it...

John: What made you decide to move back to the UK? I'd imagine you're not going back to Dundee...

Graeme: We wanna put the kids through the UK education system. It's flawed but at least it's free! Plus, me and the wife are setting up our own business! We're gonna clean up mate! It's called Pretty Green! After the Jam song. Gonna sell ridiculously expensive kids clothes to people with more money than sense in the UK. It'll be on-line and fucking cool.

John: haha...interesting. You don't want to be in a band anymore?

Graeme: Well, we'll see what happens. I've been playing in bands constantly for 20 years. As you can imagine, I'm a bit worn out. I'll probably get something going. Watch this space.

John: Will you miss all those crazy Japanese tv shows much? Or moreso playing drums for the same band you've been in for nearly five years now. Quite a feat these days!

Graeme: I most certainly won't miss the tv over here. It's all variety shows and right wing news programmes. They all seem to involve cooking stuff and then panel members eat and say things like...mmmmmmmm! Tasty! Even when they're eating baby suid eyes in vinegar. That's on the news shows too. Utter tosh! Yeah I'll miss the band but I7ve got me family to think of. It was a bit of a wrench but, you know.. That'll be squid and I've by the way!!!! Told you I couldn't type for shit!

John: I had the benefit of typing most of my questions out before hand! For instance...any chance you'll record the next Longball To No-One album before moving away?

Graeme: I don't think that's gonna happen. It's been a hard slog trying to write and rehearse new material. We all work and have other stuff on the go. At the moment we only have about 7 new songs ready to go. They're already looking for a new drummer, so I'm sure that stuff will see the light of day before long. We're going to record Razor Blades And Aspirin next week for the Snuffy comp and I think that will be the last recorded work I'll do. Yea, a bit sad...

John: Is it good to be on Snuffy Smile? They opened up the whole Japanese scene to me. Fucking great label in my opinion!

Graeme: I think the only link we have with the label is that Yoichi is an old friend from back in the day. We don't really fit in with the current roster and when we play gigs with other Snuffy bands we get a pretty subdued reaction. I think we're too hard for the Snuffy crowd and too soft for the full on hardcore screamo crowd. We could never seem to find ourselves a niche, you know. But yeah, a lot of great stuff came out of Snuffy.

John: That's real interesting. Longball sounds like the perfect mix of hardcore and pop to me. But as I understand it the Japan scene is very different from everywhere else.

Graeme: It's a little fragmented and cliquey. I think we got better feed back from the UK and the states actually. They don't like it over here when you start mixing your bleedin' genres!!!

John: hahaha...go figure! Are you looking forward to the Leatherface tour in April? There's some badasss bands as support!

Graeme: Um...we're only doing the first gig. Should be fun. I'll be comparing baby photos with Frankie I reckon. Haven't seen him for about 6 years. I think the one with Jawaharal will be the most interesting. In fact I think they're the band in Japan who we feel most empathy with approach wise. Ho-wey the lads!

John: Who do you think are the best bands in Japan right now? Funny you just mentioned 1000 Travels Of Jawaharlal cos they're one of my favorites.

Graeme: Well, I don't get out much. Being a dad kinda knocks that malarky on the head a bit. Yeah, Jahwaharal rock my arse. As do Envy and a band called Deep Slauter. Strange Over The Sun from Kyushu. DipLeg from Okayama. Emomushi label is very rodking. Oh yeah! Or even rocking!!!!

John: I had a feeling you'd have Strange Over The Sun in there. Liam (drummer of The Happening until recently) told me they're fucking incredible live...I can believe it! How about your all time favorites?

Graeme: What? In Japan?

John: From anywhere.

Graeme: Jawbreaker, Husker Du, Scream, Govt Issue, Sleepytime Trio, Drive Like Jehu, Beatles, Who, Fugazi, Motorhead, Ramones, Fuck on the Beach!!! Ha! Loads! Squirrelbait. I even like Death Cab for Cutie and stuff like that. Slint! Anything with a bit of crunch!

This is where Graeme had to go and pick up his kids. We picked back up at 8pm after he dropped his kids off at daycare. That's local time of course!

John: Oh yeah! You gotta have Jawbreaker and the Du in there. But I hope you mean old Fugazi. They're such a shit college/art band now...

Graeme: Nah! The last album was cool. They're the nicest people I've ever met. Guy and Ian came round for a cup of tea when I lived in London. They wanted to borrow my drums. They were doing that twin drum attack thing. Wash your mouth out young man and take the fudge out of your ears!!!!! They've always had that arty thing going on though. It keeps things interesting. I think that's why they've lasted so long.

John: For me they went downhill with Red Medicine. I didn't listen to End Hits more than once. That's the last time I put them on.

Graeme: It takes a few listens. It's a grower and you can't fault them lyrically. Go on listen again. The argument was their last one. Go get it. Back on form.

John: Almost everyone puts out a bad album so maybe you're right. Tell us a little about your family. How old are the kids now?

Graeme: My son Sora is 4 and my daughter Hana is almost 3. They're a bit of a handfull I can tell you. They dig the Who. The Kids are Alright dvd is on repeat play!

John: haha...the dvd player! Saviour of tired parents the world over. Awesome names too.

Graeme: Cheers. We don't let them watch any old crud though. The Who, Michigan fest, Superchunk, old grey whistle test with the Police and Talking Heads. Got sort them out young. I think they're the only kids at their day care centre who sing Ramones songs as they go about their daily business. The Jam are another fave! Teach them the basics first and they'll never go wrong. Brainwashing!

John: hahaha...yeah you don't want them to grow up liking Britney Spears or some pre-fab boy band.

Graeme: It'll prbably happen sooner or later. All kids want to rebel against their parents. Gotta try though. It seems to be working at the moment.

John: Do you enjoy the teaching job? (he's an English teacher)

Graeme: It pays the bills but it's a bit of a drag. I've been doing it for 5 years and it burns you out. It's not like real teaching, you know? It's all a bit of a corporate con really. Bullshit! Nah, time for a change.

John: With the big stink government, big business, and yes...even Indie Lables are making over file sharing lately, how do you feel about it?

Graeme: I don't indulge in such tomfoolery! You know, bands really want people to hear their stuff, but for little diy bands every penny counts. It's a real struggle to keep a band functioning and you really count on what little money comes in. I think it probably harms the smaller bads more than it does the Jimmy Eat Worlds. Hmmm, ambivalant. Ambivalent even.

John: I'm not much into downloading in print stuff personally. I lean towards the rareties and video types. Like you said...diy bands need the support.

Graeme: It depends what you're doing I suppose. If the bands are cool with, then.....

John: I have to mention Benni Esposito since you were in Broccoli together and obviously good friends. Did it hit you hard when he passed away last month?

Graeme: Yeah. I hadn't seen the little monkey for about 5 years and it was totally out of the blue. I've lost my mum and my uncle too since coming over here and I couldn't go to any of the funerals. He was a talented, flawed, funny individual and he'll be sadly missed. It's difficult to find the right words really without sounding shallow and empty. Gotta keep going. He would have had some withering words if he could hear his friends grieving though. Have you seen his painting?

John: I only learned he was an artist just before he died. We traded a couple of emails and he sent me the link to an interview he did recently. Seemed like a really nice guy too.

Graeme: It's funny. Being in a band with someone gives you a really warped view of them. He was a difficult guy to get on with sometimes but then I think we all were. It's a strain devoting so much time to a struggling indie band and living in each others pockets for so long. It was bad sometimes but we all got over it and made up. He was an artist first and foremost and I think he tired of the band really quickly. That grated a bit at the time but it was all such a long time ago and it seems petty now. Man, Broccoli was in need of some therapy right from the start. I talked with Grant about that just after Benni died and we had a laugh about it. Youth is wasted on the young!! Love him to bits, where ever he is.

John: To lighten it up a little...you played with some real greats when Broccoli was still around. Hooton 3 Car, Leatherface, Jawbreaker, loads of Japanese bands...any good tour stories for us? That is if you can remember them!

Graeme: Fuck! Where to begin! I remember leaving Benni in a carpark after a gig in Harlow with China Drum. We just forgot him. Foggy memories of Hooton 3 Car swallowing worming tablets for dogs, washing them down with port and proceeding to play semi naked football in this guys back garden in the pouring rain at 3am. This is a whole other interview!!!!

John: hahaha...please continue!

Graeme: Sean Forbes shitting himself live in Gottingen, Germany! Some of the good stuff is up already in the brocc history page. We played with gvsb in Manchester and the audience sat down for our entire set. Students! A lot of the stories are Benni/Grant/booze related.....there's more. Much more! We were being courted by the management of Placebo at one point and they tried to soften us up by getting us free tickets to go and see lesbo shock rock outfit Rock Bitch. We took h3c with us and they were travelling in an unmarked white transit van, this was at the time when the IRA were still active and they were driving in a restricted area near parliament. Terrorist cops pulled therm over and got very arsey with them!

John: Oh wow. That sounds like something you'll never forget!

Graeme: It was a memorable time. An old fart remembers!

John: I suppose I should ask for some Longball tour stories while we're on the topic. Have they even toured outside of Japan yet?

Graeme: Nah. Never had the time really. That full on touring stuff is for the young uns. Work, family, other life guff. We would have liked to. Maybe they will with the new drummer. I hope so. I'm not really up for sitting in the back of a van and sleeping on some punk kids floor anymore. My old bones couldn' take it! We're way more grown up now. Pretty tame really. Plenty of drunkeness but that's about it really.

John: I think that covers it on my end. Is there anything else you would like to add?

Graeme: Thanks for listening to the ramblings of an old fool.

John: I had fun! Thanks for the chat.

Graeme: Any time John.