WE INTERVIEW – 9 O’CLOCK NASTY

Honestly, we’ve been blown away by the creativity and versatility of Leicester (UK) band, 9 o’clock Nasty. Their press releases never fail to make us chuckle, and their music never fails to make our toes tap. We’re just in awe of every aspect of this band, so we decided to ping them a few questions to get to know them a little better.

Who’s the crazy one?

That isn’t how 9 o’clock Nasty works. We’re all crazy in our own way, and that collective madness is one of the things that drives the band forward. Crazy can be whimsical, destructive and obsessive. We do all three. We have all at different times been described as having absolutely no impulse control whatsoever, which can mean we’re hard work but also creative and generous.

But also, the answer is Ted. Absolute nutter.

Who are your biggest influences?

We ingest music all day, every day. We listen, and we deconstruct. We’re music geeks. So there absolutely isn’t an influence you could say “oh yes, they are inspired by XXX.”

We get compared to the Beastie Boys a lot which is incredibly flattering, but we work in totally different genres. That said, there is something free and unhinged about Paul’s Boutique as a body of work that would be a pin in our musical map. People we hugely admire and probably feel steering us? Zappa for sure. Betty Davis. The Birthday Party. Sydd is big into prog rock, and Pete loves a show tune.

We listen to a lot of garage rock and psychedelia, a fair bit of hip hop and trip hop, and we grew up on a diet of post-punk and bad pop music. But in reality, every song draws water from a different well. You just have to let the song find its own shape.

Tell us something about each of you that we wouldn’t believe!

Pete was a child star. He was taken from his family and made to tour the clubs in a covers band. Sometimes he glazes over and starts playing cool 60s guitar parts as he relives those memories.

Sydd is qualified to handle the most dangerous chemicals known to humankind. In his day job, if he made a mistake, he would leave Leicestershire as a greasy, smoking ruin. We have mixed feelings about that.

Ted spent 6 months penniless in Prague with only his bass, Ampeg and a 4 x 10 cab on a 7th-floor apartment on the edge of the city. When he finally got an offer to work his way back to the UK, he had to leave all three behind. We kind of hope the cab is still there, it would be very hard to get back down to street level again.

If you could pick anything to be backstage after the show, what would it be?

People we love to help us calm down and return to earth. Live shows are an emotional rollercoaster. You have to get into a pretty deep trance state to do the shit we do in front of a room full of people and what we need after are people that care about us and don’t stand for any nonsense. That and enough legal stimulants to lead a major military operation sideways.

What can the fans expect from you in the next 12 months?

Surprises. That is of course a total cliche, but it’s the truth. We aren’t doing this for the “likes and plays,” 9 o’clock Nasty really is an Art project. We make what we need to. We spent 2022 on a journey to try and refine a 2-minute “banger.” We wanted to write tunes that grabbed you, smeared you with sweat and lipstick and then headed off into the night. In 2023 we want to paint from a broader palette. Expect some musical violence of course. We have some pretty hardcore blistering punk on the way. We also have some orchestral songs that have acres of open space, and a true glam rock masterpiece. There will certainly be 16 songs in an album this summer that reflect a year’s work. It will be much more varied than “By All Means Necessary.” Right now, we feel at the top of our game. We had to overcome some difficult problems as a band last year, with our studio closing and some difficult people messing us about. We beat that and now we’re stronger.

What’s the best gig experience you’ve had?

We’ve only played live as a band once. Well, twice but the first gig turned into a fight, so we don’t count that one. This will probably sound very shallow, but the night before our gig in Brighton we went out with the Qwarks who were headlining with us, and we realised that we had sold the venue out on advance tickets. We actually had to message some people to warn them they probably wouldn’t get it. That sounds like a humble brag, and obviously, it is, but knowing that enough people, from all over the UK were excited to see us play was confirmation that this whole “online social media” modern music thing can translate into a very real, packed, sweaty cellar bar full of people willing to scream for release.

The gig was monstrous. The Qwarks are amazing. We did a couple of cover versions with them as an encore which was probably the most joyful thing we’ve done as a band.

As individuals, we’ve played 100s of gigs with various bands over the years. The focus of 9 o’clock Nasty is writing songs. Rehearsing a live show takes up a lot of the time we could spend recording, so gigs will be rare events.

What’s the worst gig?

Well, we’ve only played one proper one. Before we released any music at all, a friend who runs a venue in Germany persuaded us to play a headline slot there. It was a sketchy idea, we only had three songs, so we decided to play them 3 times each. The room was full of very drunk people wanting to see a “British Punk Band” and we were a mess. At one point Pete’s amp was about to fall over and a guy got on stage to try and stop that happening. Pete just saw someone enter into his space and flipped. It turned into a full-on battle and we had to make an escape. It did mean though that we only played the three songs once.

Aside from music, what are you passionate about?

Very little else matters. Obviously, people can disagree with that, but they’re wrong. We’re passionate about politics and we’re passionate about the people we care about and who care about us. We’ve got a great idea for a TV series if anyone wants us to pitch it. Ted has written some detective novels, so he is probably passionate about that. Hard to tell.

What is the best advice you’ve been given?

Don’t waste people’s time giving them advice. If they have any sense or direction to what they do, they will do the right thing and ignore it and do what they believe is right. If they don’t have any sense or a direction, then your advice is wasted.

What’s the worst advice you’ve been given?

When we were forming the band, we talked ideas over with a friend who dabbled with music journalism for a number of years. He was mortally offended that anyone would try and form a band with two bass players and a drummer. When we explained that we could play other instruments and playing bass was a pleasure, not a life sentence, he tried to get us to bring in a couple of other musicians, people we like and would have enjoyed working with. Fortunately, we were in the COVID lockdown and couldn’t meet anyone else, so it never happened, and by the time it could, we were a unit and there was no way we could have coped with anyone else joining.

Thank you 9 o’clock Nasty for chatting with us today. We look forward to hearing plenty more ‘musical violence’ and excellent musicianship.

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