Skyclad - Do They Mean Us?

SKYCLAD. Once my favourite band. Then I saw them for the umpteenth time in Nottingham and believe me they sunk below the lowest of the low in my conscience, for reasons I’d better leave unmentioned. Suffice to say it was all to do with their ex-singer. The rest of the band members were superb. Anyhow, for a while the future of the band seemed uncertain, as their ex singer Martin Walkyier, left them, out of the blue, to go on and form his own pagan project and try to fund it from his favourite pastime, printing and selling metal and obscene T-shirts. (T-shirts Good!!!). So when I heard that they didn’t intend to stop, I was very, very happy. Now as September beckons SKYCLAD are just about to unleash their new opus commercially (since a few copies made it into the circulation earlier than the official release date), entitled “A Semblance of Normality”. Let’s see what their new singer Kevin Ridley (correct this if I m wrong – I haven’t got a booklet next to me) has got to say about it.

MI: Hi Kevin, how’s things in the SKYCLAD Camp? Would you care to explain to the readers a bit about the “NEW” CLAD as opposed to the “AULD”?
KR: Hi there Dimitrios, I remember the Nottingham gig – well sort of, I got very drunk (naturally) – and it was great fun for me. Well, to be honest, after Martin (and Jay) left things were very calm and we all looked forward to the challenge of doing something new. I think there was a lot of tension between some of the band members before, but at this point I wasn’t in the actual band partnership so I wasn’t involved with the money side of things or the running of the band, which is where, I think, most of the problems came from. Also, after ten years, things change, so maybe it was time for people to move on. Now things are definitely more laid back and we tend to do things at a more leisurely pace these days. One good thing is that now everyone lives and works in Newcastle, so it’s easier to meet up for rehearsals and social events.

MI: Tell us about the new members in the band.
KR: Well there’s only really one ‘new member’, Aaron Walton (the drummer) who’s actually been with the band three years now. We were extremely lucky to find such a good (young) drummer locally. Aaron’s a very quite guy (doesn’t drink – very rare for a drummer lol), listens to a wide variety of music and enjoys the theatre etc. He’s a bit of a new-age hippy (does Ti- Chi etc), just joking. We really need to get some photos and info about him on our site. He used to play with some good local bands doing hard rock etc at bike rallies etc and he still plays with other bands and gives drum lessons etc.

MI: In this album you have elected to work with an orchestra, how did that came about?
KR: It was really a long-standing ambition of Steve’s to hear his songs done with real strings. Obviously, Georgina (our violin player) helped with the arranging and so on and the record company had contact with someone from the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) – and they don’t come better than that. So it was simply a matter of arranging the time and place. It certainly added a new dimension to the album.

MI: Also we can see that you and Steve wrote most of the album. Did the other members contribute? And why the D-tuning? (sounds weird – although I like it)
KR: Yes, Steve and myself wrote this one, though George helped (as mentioned) with some of the dots, Aaron did a great job introducing some percussion etc and Bean (bass player) made the coffee (lol). We also decided to record this album differently (i.e. digitally) and part of that was to de-tune everything to help make it ‘heavier’. I don’t know how much it helps but I know it made some songs more difficult to sing. But that’s the way of things, sometimes in trying to solve one problem you create others.

MI: What were your lyrical inspirations this time around? You have managed to create lyrics, not a thousand miles away from those of your previous lyricist, but managed to keep the focus mostly on world events as opposed to personal struggles or fictional stories. Discuss? (Even do a little track-by-track analysis if you don’t mind).
KR: The lyrics on this album mostly deal with ‘roots’ (i.e. the North-East, where do we come from) and the notion of ‘Englishness’ – as opposed to ‘Britishness’. Though it’s not a concept album, as such. Some of the songs deal with politics (but not in a heavy way) others with more personal issues (i.e. the ‘love songs’) and life in general. I wanted to keep the ‘feel’ of past Skyclad albums but to try and add some of my own style to the proceedings. After producing twelve albums with the band I felt I was particularly well versed in the ways of the band.
I wrote a bit about each track previously so, if I may, I’ll include it here:
PIPES INTRO:  Well the idea for this intro was to introduce Clad fans to the Northumbrian small pipes – yes we do have our own pipes. They are similar to Irish pipes but are ‘chromatic’ over two octaves. Anyway, I just asked Andy May (the session pipes and whistle player) to improvise on the theme from ‘Lightening the Load’ and bend a few of the notes etc and we were all knocked out by the results.
DO THEY MEAN US: A stomping track that looks at the notion that the English are an eccentric lot. There was a T.V. programme called this and I was intrigued by such event as flying bird men, rolling cheeses and nettle eating competitions. It’s about trying to be English in multi-cultural Britain in the 21^st century.
A GOOD DAY TO BURY BAD NEWS: Obvious references here to 9/11 but I was more interested in the idea that everyday is a good day to bury bad news. It’s about the way the media prioritize stories, especially here in the UK, with its cult of celebrity.
ANOTHERDRINKINGSONG: A great song to do live. It kind of tries to capture the feel of the ‘Irish Pub’ tours we did. Again there is a lot of reference to the idea of the English Pub as an institution, fascinating stuff to research (Queens Head, Kings Arms etc).
A SURVIVAL CAMPAIGN: This was actually an old lyric I had that Steve really liked and wrote music for. It’s based on a board game from the 70’s; well sort of. I had to update it, of course, to include computer games – very Matrix. It’s about the struggle to succeed – ‘in the City’ – hence the reference to ‘Mr Polly’
THE SONG OF NO-INVOLVEMENT: Again, this is an old idea, though I never got round to finishing it until I started writing for this album. It’s funny how things can lie around for years and then just seem right. Basically, it’s saying that I’m a lazy sod and can easily spend hours achieving nothing much.
THE PARLIAMENT OF FOOLS: A very ‘Skyclad’ song. I always liked the idea of Chaucer’s ‘Parliament of Fowls – with the wordplay on Fowls, Foul and Fools, of course. It’s also a potted history of my political life (i.e. from Thatcher to Blair). I studied Politics at college briefly and learned something about the philosophies of each of the major UK parties, then gave it up as a bad job. It kind of pokes fun at everyone.
TEN LITTLE KINGDOMS: Obviously then, this song follows on from  ‘Parliament’ (which is why it’s on the album at the expense of other ‘bonus’ tracks). I have to state here (and this is a very political statement from me – not the rest of the band) that as well as being pro- European; I am also strongly in favour of a regional assembly for the North East of England (and have been since the shake up of 1974). This is now a hot political issue – well fairly hot (tepid really) and about time too. It will be interesting to see what happens over the next few years.  I mention this because, of course, it completely contradicts the sentiments expressed in the song, which is, if you like, ‘the other side of the coin’. I am, obviously, lampooning this argument (how many of you spotted it?) by the way in which the song is delivered (i.e. it’s not serious).
LIKE… A BALLAD FOR THE DISENCHANTED: A big nod of respect goes to Alex Harvey here for his version of Next (I know it’s not his song). It also builds on the idea that Geordies (people from the North-East) say ‘like’ at the end of sentences etc for no apparent reason, like. It’s quite a personal song this and so difficult to discuss. But I’ll bet you can guess that there’s a woman (at least one anyway) behind all this.
NTRWB: This is the second part of ‘The Roman Wall Blues’ the first part of which – in true Skyclad fashion – will appear after the second part (on a single???). Anyway, it’s sort of my answer to Auden’s ‘Roman Wall Blues’ (incidentally, also covered by Alex Harvey), which doesn’t present a very good picture of the North-East (at least in terms of the weather – but I’ll give him that). While it might not have been the best posting in the Empire, recent evidence suggests that (for the Romans at least) it wasn’t all bad.
LIGHTENING THE LOAD: another song with a bit of politics in it. I read about the English love of moaning or complaining. Apparently it is worse for middle-aged people who have been let down by the State (pension etc) and have lost all the benefits of youth (i.e. ‘cool Britannia’). It is my attempt to put such ideas across in a folk style and while it may be an odd song I really like it.
HYBRID BLUES: Well now, another personal song (bloody women again). Though really I should say that this is my attempt at a ‘white man singing the Blues’. Steve (Ramsey) reckons Skyclad have always had Blues influences (he’s clearly mad, of course) but I did firstly to humour him but then sort of got carried away with the sheer emotion of it all. Very much in the style of ‘woke up this morning and my woman had left me’ (again); but such is life. Oh, and I forgot to mention the references to 1930’s art in Europe (Marcel Duchamp etc) as by way of contrast.
OUTRO – THE DISSOLUTION OF PARLIAMENT: All I can say about the Outro (apart from the fact that I love it) is that it is based (obviously) on ‘Parliament of Fools’ but this version brings out the original 7/8 – 8/8 feel to the music Steve wrote much better. I am also proud of Arron for doing the percussion (triple tracked Bodhran indeed) and Georgie for some lovely fiddle work.

[qst] What are Skyclad’s future plans after the new album has been released?
KR: Just the obvious ones at this point, namely to do more live work, try to do some DVDs and then start to write the next album.

Sounds simple but, believe me, it certainly isn’t straightforward. It’s important, at this point, that people get to hear the album and get

used to the new material before we can plan more tours etc. It’s been a time of uncertainty and hopefully that’s coming to an end now

(with a positive conclusion). 

MI: Although not necessarily a 100% linked with your lyrics, are you worried about the politics in today’s society? The wars going around, the humiliation of the individual, by taking one after the other away all his rights to privacy, etc with shroud or non-existent evidence and with wild hypothesizing about possible terrorist activities? Has the word terrorist become what the word communist was all those years ago? Do you think that this systematic oppression will stop, or that it may continue leading us to a bleak, uncertain future?
KR: Wow, that’s some question! Of course I’m worried about the state of things and the politics of it all (especially after watching ‘Fahrenheit 911’). The sad thing is that this has all been going on for years – one way or another – and you may be right about terrorism replacing communism as the global threat; but, no, I don’t see an end to all this stuff. We’ve had thousands of years of it, so why should it end now? It would be nice if it did, but that’s wishful thinking I’m afraid. It appears that people will always have something to fight about – race, skin colour, religion, politics etc. But I do try not to get too down about it, you’ve got to live your life the best you can. I mean you can’t solve all the world’s problems (or even some of them) and you wouldn’t be able to function if you worried about such things all the time.

MI: You seem to be on a new label, and to be going “steady” with them. I’m also under the impression that the company is now merging with a few more and you also seem to be trying to do something similar with what MARILLION did as far as financing and selling your albums directly to the fans. Give us some more info on those topics.
KR: Well I don’t think we’re quite on the scale of Marillion yet and that’s not really our intention; we just wanted to set up things for ourselves so that people have an alternative to High St shops etc that only sell top 40 CDs etc. We were also keen to set up our own little community for information and gossip. This has worked well and there is a webring for those interested. It would be nice to get more people online. As to the ‘new label’, this is Demolition which was set up by an old manager of ours and we were able to get a ‘good deal’ which gave us more control (to do things like the Internet etc) and things have been good so far. It all works by licensing agreements, which is a better way to work if you have the contacts etc.

MI: Are there gonna be any singles to promote the album? It is well known that there are a few leftover, tracks (how many really? 3-4?), will they be included there or be made available for download?
KR: It certainly was the intention to do some singles/video’s/DVD’s or whatever they are these days, though it seems to be taking forever to sort it out. But you’re right we did keep some tracks back for such releases. I think there are three songs still to be released but I’m sure we’ll get them out at some point – you’ll just have to kept your eyes peeled (again the our website is a good place to check)

MI: Is there going to be a video clip and if so, which song do you want to visualize?
KR: As above, we certainly plan to a video/single release and it will probably be for ‘Do They Mean Us’. We have got half an idea what we’re doing (lol) though when we’ll get it finished?

MI: The thorny-horny-porny- 1 million dollar / 826.000 euro/ ~640.000 GBP question. When is Martin coming back (since all this is a cleverly devised commercial/advertising plot) for the Reunion tour and for the quadruple pagan metal opera that will eradicate all the other bands from the face of the planet, with its brilliant lyrical content, it’s apocalyptical/cathartic concept, barking vocal delivery and all? Or to put it more straightforwardly although you might have answered to this a million times before. How do you view your ex-vocalist, what do you make of the accusations that he has made against CLAD and just hypothetically, would you ever consider working with him again both on a personal and a collective/band level, either in CLAD, producing his album or doing something else musically?
KR: Ha! Very good. I think the likelihood of any sort of reunion is remote, to say the least. It’s just not going to happen. All I can say is, that after four years, I don’t really care about what’s been said etc (it’s old news now) and I hope Martin does well with his new project.

MI: Have you received any proper vocal training? Because your voice sounds quite nice.
KR: My voice sounds ‘quite nice’ thank you, but no I’ve never had any ‘formal’ musical training (just a few guitar lessons as a kid). Funnily enough, I’ve never considered myself as having ‘a voice’ (i.e. like Paul Rogers or someone), neither am I a very good guitarist (lol), I just kind of bash things out in my own merry way and hope someone likes it.

MI: How did songs like “Ten little kingdoms” came about? Are you using some kind of new drugs??? (jokingly) How can a fan sing-a-long that at a gig? Do we need to oil our tongues or something? Will you be actually singing it live, or just pretending to be singing it?
KR: No drugs involved I’m afraid (except coffee), it’s al done to practice and hard work. Boring, but there you go. Yes, we do intend to play it live. Why not? It would be great fun seeing if everyone can keep up (it’s the same with ‘Anotherdrinkingsong’). Ten Little Kingdoms is actually from an old poem that addresses the fears of breaking up the (not very) United Kingdom and was written about 100 years ago (although I totally disagree with it’s sentiments – hence the silly delivery – the song’s supposed to be ironic) it shows that not much has changed with the horrible UKIP party etc.

MI: Do you have a favourite CLAD album? Any favourite songs from “ASON”?
KR: Well obviously I’m biased towards the new one, having wrote the songs etc. So that one aside, I think my favourite is ‘Wayward Sons’ (because that was the start of it all), closely followed by ‘The Answer Machine’ (very ambitious) and Irrational Anthems.
Again there are a few tracks that I’m particularly proud of on the new album, including DTMU, Parliament of Fools, Song of No-involvement and Anotherdrinkingsong. While Hybrid Blues isn’t one of my favourites (too personal) some people have commented on the vocal performance on that track, which is a nice compliment.

MI: By the way what’s the meaning of the albums title? “A semblance of normality”?
KR: It is supposed to be a comment on the fact that the band is getting back to some stability after the last few years. It’s a line from ‘Parliament of Fools’, basically, but I like the idea of anything to do with Skyclad being ‘normal’ (that’s a joke). The usual saying is ‘some semblance of normality’.

MI: Tell us a bit about the artwork. Who did it? What does it depict? (to be honest I did not like it that much-not that it was bad or something-I just thought it was a bit generic and abstract) Why didn’t you commission a Duncan Storr piece, as you usually do?
KR: Ah, yes the artwork! I stated above that after ten years it was maybe time to change things and we started from the ground up – the way we write, record, the equipment we use and so on – and the artwork was another area we looked at. We all think Duncan did a great job for us (that’s why we asked him to do ‘No Daylights…’) but we also felt that Skyclad was getting a bit predictable in some ways (people said they could write the reviews before hearing the album etc). What we wanted to do was to make people sit-up and take notice (hence the running order of the album). So when I saw some of Marie’s artwork I thought it was perfect because it linked the past (i.e. Northumbria in the Anglo-Saxon era) to the present using more abstract designs etc. The cover is based on some grounds works (i.e. burial site or something) as seen from above. Steve also thought that having got some nice artwork it was wrong to stick a great big ‘80’s’ type logo all over it. So we used a hand written logo because that is how Marie (Wright) signs and titles her work (she actually wrote some stuff out for us). She intends to have a website up and running soon so, if interested, you can see more images there.

MI: Tell us a bit about the production of the album. Where and who did it along with you?
KR: Well, I was in charge of the overall production of the album (as always – or is that left to get on with it?). The band trust me enough by now, I hope. Anyway, when it came to mixing we went to Italy to work with Dario Mollo (another record company contact); and I really can’t thank Dario enough, he did a tremendous just (just being able to understand me lol). This is the first album we’ve done completely digitally and it’s a slightly different way of working, so it was great to work with someone who understands all this technology. I really think that this album is technically far superior to anything the band has done in the past, In can’t stress that enough and a lot of the credit for this has to go to the record company and Dario Mollo who were very patient, helpful and supportive.

MI: Favourite Artists/Bands? Records? Movies?
KR: There’s a lot of this stuff on our website (forget what I put there now - lol). I’m always dubious about putting down ‘favourite’ things because I think it might give people preconceptions as to what you’re like. I really do (like most people) enjoy a wide range of music and movies etc. I’ve been listening to music for over thirty years now, so ‘favourites’ I had during the 70s are very different from now, I mean I have all the albums by Steely Dan, Talking Heads, Faith No More, U2 and Bjork, But I don’t know what that tells you. I grew up listening to ‘classic rock’ (Free, Deep Purple, Wishbone Ash etc) but went through a prog period (Camel, Yes, Genesis) a ‘New Wave’ phase (still like XTC, for example), a ‘Goth’ period (Mission, Cure) before starting to work on a load of 80s ‘Thrash’ albums (I saw Trash as metal’s answer to punk – very ‘Street’) and I even have a soft spot for ‘old school’ hip-hop; though I mostly spend my time listening to New-Age/ambient and folk stuff now. The only music I can’t get away with (which is a shame as it’s probably the future) is ‘dance’ music (whatever that is), I think this is because I can’t /don’t/wont dance and I’ve never taken any drugs (okay, aprt from oceans of beer, red wine and caffeine) so (to paraphrase a friend of mine) I’m afraid that the whole dance culture thing just passed me by. He last five albums I’ve bought are ‘Valentine’ (Roy Harper), ‘Steal This Album’ (System Of A Down), ‘Sunder ohne Zugel’ (In Extremo), ‘Narrenkonig’ (Schandmaul – after listening to MP3s) and, lately, ‘Medulla’ (Bjork). So I hope this helps.
The same applies to movies (and books). I take my kids to watch Spiderman and Shrek 2 (great fun) but also go to the ‘arthouse’ to see films such as ‘Before Sunset’ (because I’m a romantic) and Fahrenheit 911. There’s hundreds so I don’t really have a ‘favourite’.

MI: Do you think that CLAD have managed to become bigger over the years? Or are you just a band that has a cult status and a more or less steady nucleus of fans? Do you think that you can appeal to more people?
KR: I’m sad to say that I think (up to now) Skycald is a band with a ‘cult status’ and some ‘loyal fans’. It’s worth pointing out that Martin didn’t leave the band because things were going swimmingly. As I said at the start, after ten years of effort maybe it was time for things to change, as the band weren’t getting any bigger etc. As to the future, who knows? With a different singer and different material (that is maybe more accessible or even more – the dreaded word- commercial) maybe more people will give the band a chance. Though, I have to point out that we don’t write things to be ‘radio friendly’ or anything like that.

MI: How hard was it to make this record? Was there any pressure to live up to the fans expectations? Are there any funny incidents from the recording sessions? What are your expectations for it? Are there plans already for the next one?
KR: To be honest, it wasn’t really hard to make this album, in fact it was quite relaxing and good fun. We just took our time and got things right. There wasn’t even any thing particularly funny to report (I spent quite a lot of time on my own or with just one of the band actually). I did, as suggested above, enjoy the mixing sessions in Italy and recording the orchestra in London (makes us sound very cosmopolitan). As to what we expect the album to do, well, most importantly, we want everyone to be aware of the band again, to know that we are going to continue and that the new material is good and we’re looking forward to do lots more shows live now. Hopefully, we can build on the good points of this album (and it has given us some ideas as to what works etc) and we think the next album might well be even more heavy and more insane (lol).

MI: Is there gonna be a tour? Is Greece in the cards? It’s been ages since you last played here. Or are you going to play anywhere north of the border? (UK) or south of it…
KR: As the album’s not even out yet (officially) we haven’t got any concrete plans for touring as we’re still waiting for reviews etc (though we have started to book some festival dates for next year already). Having played Greece before with Skyclad (and having had a wonderful time), I can say that Greece is certainly ‘on the cards’. As to when…watch the web.

MI: Do you have any plans to release a DVD? Would it be older material? New material? A mix of both perhaps?
KR: I mentioned videos/DVDs earlier and yes there are plans to put some stuff out, both old and new I think. I know that some of the shows we’ve played recently were filmed, so we’ll see what we have there. Maybe some stuff wil go on the singles, maybe some stuff on the website; we’ll see.

MI: Ehm, what do you think about the Internet in general, your website/fansites and the MP3/filesharing issue? (I like the little text on the front page of your site – telling people to copy stuff freely- that’s what the internet is all about :P)
KR: I mentioned that we were keen to get our site up and running because we feel that it can be a real benefit for bands like us. Fortunately for us, most of our fans want to buy the album even if they’ve heard the MP3s etc (I think it works quite well for metal or small, underground music as opposed to pop stuff). So we have given a lot of our fans the chance to hear the new material months before it was released etc and they certainly responded by spreading the word. Viral marketing, it’s the best way.

MI: Ehm, is there anything else you ‘d like to add? Out of curiosity did you come to Greece for the Olympics?
KR: No, like most people I watched a bit of the Olympics on TV – but only bits, I’m not a big sports fan.

MI: Salute our readers and end this as you like.
KR: All that I would like to add is that we know it’s taken us over two years to complete this work and we are really grateful to people for their support and patience during what has been a time of major change. However, now that it is done I hope people listen the new album with ‘open ears’ and enjoy this new chapter in the story of Skyclad. Cheers and beers, as we say!

Dimitrios “Rockavlon” Fatouros