Avrocar (November 1997)

"There are a lot of left field bands in Birmingham", Perry tells me. "It seems to be in waves with a trickledown effect. Broadcast and Pram were the spearhead, then there's Plone and Novak, and then there's Jameson, Rocket Science (now Magnetophone) and Avrocar. It's a small musical community. Comparing it to the 'Madchester' scene Pram and Broadcast would be the Roses and the Happy Mondays. Things like the Charlatans follow but there's also Northside and the Paris Angels. We don't want to be Birmingham's answer to the Paris Angels!"

Perry is full of enthusiasm when I meet up with the band. Perry is always full of enthusiasm and it's often difficult for Steve and Vickie to get a word in! Steve and Perry have been in band together before, Vicki joined in March 96 and Claire, the percussionist, was discovered outside a music shop late last year. Perry explains, "She was outside Fairdale Music. I had never seen her before but I had this idea that she was a drummer so I went straight up to her and asked her. It was perfect and she came along. She lives down in London at the moment but we send her all the tapes and we get together to practice. We had a stand-in drummer for a while. We kept on saying let's get together for a rehearsal but it never happened. It ended up that we were playing with Novak and just had to get together on the night. He was spot on; he just heard it and played it!"

"We're growing up in public here in Birmingham. We do things even if we're not 100% ready. We're getting used to using the drum machine; I love the drum machine, so clear, so sparse. You can distort it as well. We were going to use effect pedals on the drum kit but it would have been a nightmare live. The music is in transition, the new stuff is going to be more electronic, less guitar-influenced, less about a dynamic. Chords are still the centre of the current stuff. When we play live we start with a short instrumental. I think that's more indicative of where we are going, using the drum machine, keyboards, effects. We're working with a drone, the same drone starting and finishing the set. We might work with it between songs."

"I have an aversion to Rock, I tend to lose interest. I want music to be a linear thing with different layers. It's difficult to say where we might fit in. You've got your noisier bands like Urusei Yatsura and then the futurist-retro bands like Pram, Broadcast and Stereolab. We probably would fit in with the latter (though they did go down well when they recently supported Urusei Yatsura in Birmingham). I'd like to play with Quickspace and Snowpony again but second rather than third on the bill."

"There seems to be a lot of like-minded bands, they give us feedback, they seem to understand us."

The band are obviously excited about current developments in Birmingham both with the bands and the emerging audience. At the end of 1997 they put on a night with Jameson and Rocket Science (now Magnetophone). Vickie describes the event: "We advertised the night as "We brought our friends" thinking that we would just bring our friends. But there were so many people there who we did not know. We'd got so used to playing to Jameson and Rocket Science and a few others as the audience. It was amazing to see how many people were there, that shocked me!"

It was in fact that very night that inspired me to start work on what you are reading now. There was a feeling that something was crawling out of the woodwork of pub-rock infested venues and that people were sitting up and taking notice.

Perry remains humble: "I can see us staying an underground band, Pram have remained an underground band but they are very influential in America. I don't mind if other bands get better deals that us. I'm pleased that the single came out. There were 1000 copies released by Earworm (almost all sold out even as I typed then). We really wanted to release a single on Earworm, I suspect that Novak put a good word in for us. We would have put the single out ourselves but it's a question of money. We've been selling them at gigs as well as getting them distributed, I've always wanted to sell our records at gigs!"

The single has gone down very well and they can count John Peel as one of their fans. It also got reviewed in the Melody Maker, a major triumph for Dominic at Earworm. A follow-up also on Earworm follows shortly.

"There are very few venues in Birmingham," explains Perry. "The Jug of Ale. The Flapper and Firkin and the Hare and Hounds are the main ones. There's a lack of big venues these days. Some bands find it difficult to play at all. It's difficult when we've been third on the bill, we're sometimes told to do sound levels as we play. We've played gigs with no sound men."

"We've played gigs with no PA!" adds Steve.

"At the moment it's only really London and Birmingham to worry about," says Perry. The band have supported Novak at the Garage in London and also supported Pram on their recent tour. The band are still furious about their treatment at the hands of a less than competent soundman in Wolverhampton.

"Hopefully the single has been advantageous" continues Perry, "we were a band in search of members to complete the vision, we were a band in search of an audience as well."

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