Winston's Zen

WINSTON'S ZEN TALKS TO THE RIFLES JOEL STOKER

No Love Lost the 2006 debut from The Rifles may not have made them a household name as such, peaking as it did at number twenty-six in the UK albums chart. But in the intervening years a strong work ethic, a down-to-earth attitude and a plethora of ska-ed up indie rhythms have gone a long way to building the London four-piece a sizeable “cult” fanbase. With such a dedicated following did the recording of this years delayed follow up LP Great Escape cause the band sleepless nights?

Winston’s Zen caught up with lead singer Joel Stoker to find out;

[COMPETITON BELOW – YOUR CHANCE TO WIN A COPY OF GREAT ESCAPE!]

Hi Joel, it’s Winston’s Zen here.
Alright mate? Sorry I missed your call earlier, I was in the bath.

No problem. You’re obviously at home then, at you’ll least be sitting comfortably for the interview.
Yeah.

Excellent, right well.....
Hang on, nah I’m not in the bath now.

Err... you’re not in the bath now?
No! I was I getting out of the bath, my phone was in the front room. That would have felt a bit wrong that, sitting in the bath, doing an interview.

[Laughs] Tell me you’ve got some clothes on mate, please?
Yeah, I got clothes on.

Great, then why don’t you start by telling my readers a little about Great Escape, the new album?
Yeah, OK. Well I think it’s a bit of a move on for us, from the first album. I think it’s a lot stronger, musically it’s a lot stronger, lyrically it’s a lot stronger and we went about writing the actual songs a bit differently for this album. We kinda made all the music, before I went and put lyrics onto it. So whereas the first album was quite acoustic based in the way it was written - we’d write it acoustic and then put a band around it - this time round we tried to make an interesting piece of music first and then fit the lyrics into the music and I think it shows.

You’ve been quoted as saying that the recording of No Love Lost was a long winded broken up affair, did experience make the follow up more fluid?
Well, the thing with first albums, is that they’re usually a bunch of songs that you’ve been playing for three or four years, do you know what I mean? And then it blows up and you just go in and record them. Whereas this time, yeah I suppose we’ve had more time touring, more experience writing but it’s still pretty drawn out. We’d have a couple of weeks in the studio, but then we’d break off of it. We did a lot of touring as well, so it was still hard. We didn’t just go in and get it done. But I think it’s good sometimes to take songs away on tour with you and listen to them.

Were you conscious of the “tricky second album” cliché at all?
No, not really. Not for us. We’ve never really been hyped. We were never really pushed, press-wise or radio-wise. So the record label was pretty cool with us, well, basically just being happy with it, you know what I mean? We weren’t rushed into doing it. And so we did a lot of live stuff, because that’s important to us. That’s our way of getting out to people.

You mentioned earlier that you thought the new record sounds stronger. I would have described it as a fuller and more expansive sound as well.
Yeah, definitely.

Was that something you had to work at, or does that fall into place naturally when you follow-up a debut?
We can go in the practice room and we can naturally just jam for hours, you know? So I wouldn’t say we had to work at it to create the actual music. That comes naturally. But turning that into songs, that was quite a new thing for me, to actually put lyrics to music that was already there, rather than coming up with chords and a vocal melody together.

So which style do you prefer?
I think we’ll use a bit of both really, whatever works for the song. I could find a certain guarantee that we should do it one way, then I’d be a lucky man.

Let’s talk about a couple of tracks from Great Escape. The opener, Science In Violence seems to lyrically bemoan yob culture. Did you ever attempt to reprimand a hoodie on a bus?
Ha ha. No, I don’t really get the bus that much, but if I did get it more often, I’m sure the chance would arise. But, yeah that’s exactly what’s it about, this sort of lack of respect for anyone, really. The only way you’ll probably get through to them is to give ‘em a taste of that, do you know what I mean?

A clip round the earhole?
Yeah, which was kinda the done thing wasn’t it? For me, growing up, we’d be naughty or whatever and have a laugh and stuff. But if someone older, I mean even just a year or two older, stepped in, then you’d have some respect for that, but all that’s just gone completely out the window.

Writing a song about Mike Tyson seems a strange thing to do? So what inspired The General? Is he a big hero of yours?
Well, I don’t know if I’d call him a hero, with some of the stuff he’s done but growing up I was quite a big boxing fan. So growing up, he was the man. He was Mike Tyson, he was massive. We rewrote the whole verses of that song when we got in the studio, we changed the whole music to it and everything because three weeks prior to that I went to an evening with Mike Tyson, which was round our way. Basically you sit down and have a meal and he comes out afterwards and tells you about his life and that. I thought that’s the kind of thing that eighty year old men should be doing, you know? At the very end of their careers, it’s sad really to see someone like that.

An anti-hero then perhaps?
I don’t know about that either, he’s just... well... [pauses] He was unbelievable in his prime and then to see someone like that in a little hall in Debden, well it just seems a bit weird, so yeah that’s what it’s about.

Any plans to immortalise any British sports stars in song? Daley Thompson maybe?
Cor Daley Thompson, he was a bit of a legend wasn’t he?

Eddie The Eagle?
It’d have to be a blues song I guess.

Definitely. So, you’ve got a pretty expansive tour underway, promoting the album. Is the touring life something you look forward to as a band or something you dread?
I think we’re all different. I personally like being in the studio. Going on the road does my head in a little bit. It’s brilliant to play the actual gigs but it’s the other twenty three hours in the day that do my nut in. Living on a tour bus and not being able to come home and stuff, the other boys like it, but I prefer being in the studio making the music.....Then again, like I said, when you’re playing and you’ve got the crowd behind you, that makes all the other stuff worth it.

And you played to some pretty big crowds last year. You sold out venues like the Forum and Brixton Academy. I notice you start this tour with a number of instore shows and smaller venues. Do these intimate gigs mean more to you these days?
I really like the atmosphere in the small venues. The people are right on top of you and you can really get it a lot more. Obviously Brixton’s brilliant, for a different reason, but I like them both. The instores are fun, we’ve been doing them all week, they’ve been good and you get to meet everyone.

You talk a lot about meeting the fans and you’re often to be found outside after your own gigs signing autographs and chatting with the people, that contact is obviously important to you.
Well for us you see, the way we’ve built our fanbase is live and at the end of the day, if people didn’t come out and see us live, I’d be back on the building site. So yeah, we appreciate the people coming out. So it’s nice that we can go out and meet them. That’s why it’s nice at the smaller venues, you’ve got a lot more choice, it can be a bit of a nightmare at places like Brixton. But if you can go and have a chat with people it’s nice.

Any hairy moments with crazed fans?
No not really. Obviously people get over excited sometimes, but they’re only having a laugh. At the end of the day we’ve had... [pauses to think] .... [for a while] .... nah, no we haven’t.

Are Rifles fans a sane bunch of people then?
Phew, I don’t know if sane’s the right word. I mean, they get excited but they’re quite err..... [searches for right word] respectful?

Respectful? We’ll go with that one that one shall we? You’ve grown something of a cult following in the UK [without overly bothering the top ten]. Are you massive in any obscure countries? Any tours of Azerbaijan in the offing? Number one in Belarus?
No plans as yet, no! And I don’t know what the British music scene is like in Belarus to be honest. But it might be an angle, you never know.

You’ve played an awful lot of gigs last year and you’ve got a whole load more booked for this year. You must end up playing with hundreds of bands, do you actually get to see many of your support acts, and do any of them stand out?
Yeah, definitely. We always try and take people that we know with us if we can. People who haven’t got a record deal yet that we think are good and worthy of it. We’ll bring our mates in with, us so to speak. Speed Circus are a band who we’ve had on quite a lot with us, and well, I just think they’re a brilliant band. They’re fun to watch live. There’s about seven of them. They’re quite Coral-y, that sort of thing and they’re just a really good band to have with us.

Last year Johnny Marr became a fully fledged member of The Cribs, what are the chances of us seeing Paul Weller joining The Rifles full time?
I dunno. I think that’d just become Paul Weller, do you know what I mean?

It’d be his band?
Yeah, course it would. I ain’t telling Paul Weller what to do!

Weller’s the daddy! Any news on Lukes hat?
Luke’s hat? Nah, that’s long gone that is, he’s got new one.

Yeah? No ransom requests or anything then?
Nah, nothing. We put a little thing out, but it got no response, so he had to get himself out and buy a new one.

And just to wrap things up, one word answers only from now on please.
John or Paul?
Ooooh sheeesh. Errrrr... Paul!

Ike or Tina?
Tina.

Liam or Noel?
I’m gonna have to sit on the fence with that one, I think they’re both....yeah, on the fence I think.

One word answer, I gotta push you?
No!

Fair enough. That’s one word. What about the last one then? Robson or Jerome?
Robson or Jerome? ..... I don’t even know which one’s which!

I knew you’d say that! Jerome’s the blonde one.
[Pauses] ... That ain’t helping!

[Laughing] Pick a name then!
Alright – Robson

Great Escape it in stores and available to download now.

With full permission from the copyright holders, you can stream or download album opener
Science In Violence for free below.

MP3 – The Rifles – Science In Violence

---

COMPETITION [NOW CLOSED]

Lovely people that they are, The Rifles have given us not one, not two, but three (yes three!) copies of Great Escape to give away to fortuitous Zen readers. To be in with your chance of a copy send an email to comps@winstonszen.com telling us your favourite Rifles track.

[Winning entries will be selected at random and will be required to supply a mailing address upon request]

Back soon,
Winston

Links:
Homepage | MySpace | Last.fm
Buy CDs | Buy MP3s