|
text: Tyler Jacobson | photos: Jim Narcy
I was 17 when I saw Kingmaker play for the
first time in 1992. Their incredible stage presence, pop sense
and tight sound hooked me immediately. The next day, I went
and bought a copy of Kingmaker's debut, Eat Yourself Whole.
The next week I bought a copy of NME featuring Kingmaker as
their cover story. There were some great bands around at the
time and Kingmaker could hold there own around their peers,
but as these other bands began to gain international fame,
Kingmaker quietly disappeared off of the radar.
In 1993 the release of Kingmaker's sophomore
LP, Sleepwalking, was released. A solid album with 3 incredible
singles, "Armchair Anarchist", "Ten Years Asleep" and "Queen
Jane." This was the last album released in the US. Unless
you'd been reading the British weeklies, it would have easy
to miss their third and final album, In The Best Possible
Taste. As quickly as the press and hype and buzz came, it
went away for Kingmaker.
In 1998, I was surfing the internet when
a Kingmaker song got stuck in my head. Chances are, I was
the only person in the world at that moment with a Kingmaker
song rattling around in their head. Despite being hailed as
the band of the year of the week by English music magazines,
Kingmaker never quite had the notoriety of a Suede or an Oasis.
"My experience with the press was the pits," says Loz, "Mainly
because of the weight of shit published about the band and
me personally. It became a kind of challenge where journalists
would try and outdo each other in a who-can-write-the-nastiest-thing
kinda MO." Despite creating some of the best music of their
time, the never received the same adoration or following that
a band like the Verve or The Stone Roses received. So, as
I went online looking for the lyrics to this song, I found
that there was nothing to be found. The next logical step
was to create my own Kingmaker site.
By 1999, I had been in touch with many Kingmaker
fans around the world. I've found that most of us hold Kingmaker
close to our hearts as they are one of the bands that weren't
taken away from us by A&R reps, big dollar publicity campaigns,
guest spots on Loveline or, most feared, a public with no
taste. Sure, Kingmaker was playing rock and roll, but they
couldn't be neatly placed in that category. The same goes
for Brit-pop, alternative, prog rock, indie rock... these
labels have always been just a little too small for what Kingmaker
did. Mildly pretentious, presumptuous and forgiving guitar
pop, the easiest description that can accurately place who
Kingmaker was.
"I think we were a lot more straightforward
than we may have come across. I think I started off with really
Dylan, Hendrix and a lot of folk/blues in my repertoire and
updated it with bands like the Pixies, Eat, the Wonder Stuff
and early Ants. We were equated with the Stiffies and Ned's,
etc., but we basically just wanted to be a rock band. I think
our second album was our most confused and in then different
directions at once which did no favours but it was a battle,
we knew where we were heading and the record company,in their
tunnel vision, just wanted ten other Scrape the Skies. Same
old same old...Ho-hum."
1999 was also the year that iCrunch.com
began the release of 4 MP3 only Kingmaker albums. While these
albums are mainly catered to die-hards, it offers them a presence
on the internet beyond a one-off fan site. Meanwhile, a buzz
began about Loz's involvement on the new Elastica album and
in April 2000, Q magazine printed a "Where Are They Now?"
half pager on Kingmaker. Not a bad question when you think
about it. They were in the minds of music fans and then just
disappeared. Suddenly, we're seeing traces of how important
the band was to its fans. "Where are they now?" is a secondary
question, what happened to Kingmaker?
"The 'what happened to Kingmaker' has two
main sides to it," explains Loz, "One is professional the
other personal. Professionally I trace it back to the nightmare
experience we had with the second album. The first album was
on the whole peachy and left us feeling confident and ready
to take on the oyster of a world. We recorded album no. 2
and had it all finished and were pretty pleased with it and
it felt good releasing Armchair Anarchist (the first single
from the second album), bitchin' single with two bitchin'
b-sides. Record co were a bit reticent but couldn't say anything
coz we hadn't put a foot, nay, a toe wrong up until this point.
Then week of release it got to number 49 or 47 or around there
and they called an emergency meeting and informed us they
were unwilling to release the album without a top forty single
preceding it so they insisted we recorded some new songs.
They became fuckheads over night and took the opportunity
to do some things they had wanted to do from the start, let
me explain, from the start we had independent radio promoters
and press and they hated it coz it cost them money and they
had pluggers and press in house but they were shit so we kept
ours on until that incident. It was at times like that we
discovered what unmitigated wankers the suits could be and
also how they will make your life hell in an instant coz they
got the dough. The fragile egos that run these institutions
have to be experienced to be believed and their scheming makes
Machiavelli look like the Milky Bar kid.
"Anyway, I digress, so we recorded some
new songs and decided on Ten Years sleep as the new single
when they announced they were gonna format all singles. I
dunno if you have that over state-side but it basically means
there would be different b-sides on the 12 inch (2), cassette
(1), CD 1 and CD 2 (3 on each). So if the album has say 13
songs on it and with three singles that means you
gonna need 40 songs. 40 fucking songs! So
the workload is near impossible and plus the fans get ripped
left, right and centre to boot. What was also happening was
that you did songs for the album and then b-sides but really
fucking excellent songs were ending up tucked away third song
on CD 2 and no-one heard them. By the time we got to our last
album we decided that we wanted to all 40 songs up front and
pick the best for the album but this meant we needed to take
a long time out to write and record. A year and a half it
took us. In that time Brit pop really happened and blew us
out of the water.
"By the time we got to releasing In The
Best Possible Taste we knew we were well past our sell-by
date and I didn't want to keep playing and playing scaling
down to smaller and smaller clubs, I found it a depressing
notion."
"On a personal level, for the three months
leading up to the Best Possible album tour I had elected to
co-manage the band as one of our managers had legged it this
meant going to all those friggin' meetings and dealing with
the suited scum face to face. What was I thinking? It was
getting to the point where it was getting to me and I woke
up day after day deeply depressed. It didn't go away and in
the end I said to myself that if I really was that unhappy
then I shouldn't just stick for the money coz we weren't particularly
rolling in it and this shit is really needs 110%. So the day
after the last tour date I went in and announced to the MD
and a few others that I wasn't willing to go on.
"They wanted to keep me on as a solo but
I said, 'no, you are hard of hearing, I said I never want
to work with you lot ever again, you have systematically killed
my deepest love of music that I have been nurturing since
the age of six and I hate you for it.' They said, 'ahhhh,
you're tired, we'll ring you next week and you can maybe do
some demos....' I left the building and relief I experienced
was so powerful and emotional I was ready to fly, I tells
ya', the thought of never having to deal with those brains-not-fit-for-dog-food
was deeply liberating I felt like a space shuttle pilot who'd
just passed his driving test.
"For a year after that I went into hiding.
I had two grand in my pocket so I hightailed it down to London
and just hid until my recording contract had officially expired.
I didn't particularly know it but I was having a breakdownus
nervosus, deeply depressed and never wanting to touch the
guitar again. It took a fair while but then music started
to take hold of my life once again. I started hearing music
differently and was making low key soundtrack stuff and slowly
began building up a sound. It was then Justine offered me
a place to live and I moved in and we started writing together
and I was doing my own stuff as well. Some music I've found
a home for on pornographic film soundtracks under the marvelous
name 'Strappadictomy' and other stuff I have kept back for
myself and am putting shit together as we speak. I joined
a Samba band and have not decided the full shape of things
to come but I'll keep it low key for the time being and just
try and avoid all the wank that killed it for me before. Wish
me luck."
This is Loz Hardy. A 30-year-old man who
quit the game in order to keep playing it. At some point,
while Loz was depressed, emancipated and then breaking down,
I was on the other side of the ocean, listening to his music.
His recorded word, mood and sentiment never changed. As a
fan, he was the same person he was when he was writing songs
about burning down buildings, whereas he may very well have
been planning to do just that at the exact same moment. "The
break up was hard and it wasn't. Thing is, when you're in
a band you just think you're gonna be like the Stones and
be going until fifty but the record company and press were
being such major fuckers that the fact my boyhood dream was
being shot down in flames paled in comparison. Once I was
used to that the decision was easy because I'd had three months
of bleak mornings and sleepless nights that it became untenable.
I know we made some big mistakes but have no regrets and am
proud of what I did.
"At nineteen I had signed a record deal
and just wanted to make my life exciting and get out of the
dreamy little village I lived in and see some things and miss
the 9-5 life and institutional life of education and I did
that when all around were telling me to keep it real and forget
this crazy rainbow chasing. So fuck them."
Fuck them is right. And to the naysayers,
fuck them he did. As easy as it would've been to slip away
into the "has-been" booth at Spago's, Loz managed to keep
his head above water. It wasn't even his choice really. Call
it divine intervention, or call it Justine Frischman, Elastica's
lead singer and possibly the world's most famous ex-girlfriend,
Loz's ass was saved. "Justine and I have been mates since
1992 and when I was wandering about the streets of London,
living in shit holes, she took mercy on me and said to move
in. She's been an angel. I mean, when the band broke up everybody
told me, 'Ah, you'll land on your feet, you're just one of
those types' and then promptly the platitudes were flowing
freely but she was the only one to actually respond by helping
me and not fobbing me off. We ain't dating and never have
been, we sister and bro. We both went through some shit, her
breaking up with Damon (Albarn, of Blur) and me getting over
the band and we helped each other through. And let me tell
you, this biz is as fickle as they say, the phone quickly
stops ringing." As Loz's girlfriend puts it, "She saved him
first, then I saved him.". Loz and Justine's relationship
went beyond that of two flatmates. Loz and Justine began writing
songs. Loz composed the music to a few new Elastica songs
that appear on their new album, "The Menace".
"On the Elastica album I did the music for
'My Sex' and 'Miami Nice' and on the 'Mad Dog' single I did
'Suicide' and 'Bush Baby'. We have also written a few they
are playing at the moment, chief amongst them being 'Bitch
Don't Work'. I got involved because the band were in turmoil,
not speaking to each other and in the midst of a break up
and me and Justine started to do some tunes which kinda caught
the mood at the time. It was good for me because I wasn't
releasing anything; I wasn't ready for that, so it was a good
confidence builder and I generally liked the experienced and
think the songs are dope...in my humble but correct opinion."
With some renewed interest in Kingmaker,
a 4 album release of outtakes and Loz's writing credits on
"The Menace", one starts speculating on what the next move
may be for Loz and possibly Kingmaker. Many fans have posted
in the Guestbook area of my Kingmaker site and held discussion
on Richard Harker's Kingmaker mailing list about how great
it would be if the band reformed. With Kingmaker's close kin,
The Wonder Stuff, reuniting for gigs in December, the notion
doesn't seem that unrealistic. From the sounds of it, though,
Loz is content to simply do his own thing. "Even though I've
not been signed or any fixed musical abode I haven't stopped
writing. Some of it went Elastica's way, some of it became
porn, but that still leaves a mountain of music waiting for
homes. I can't tell you where it's heading because I'm not
sure myself, yet.
"I am certainly satisfying a need to write
music. I been thinking bout this and y'know everybody absorbs
roughly the same kind of experiences and sees the same news
and for some reason I siphon this into making sounds and music,
that's what I do. I fought against it for a while because
I was negative but I've since given in to it because it's
deeply embedded in me somewhere and it makes me feel like
I'm fulfilling my role in life. It used to be that I was as
much interested in being famous as I was in making music but
now it's a much simpler and emotive drive to make the music
I wanna make. I feel like the music is mine again, like I
used to when I was fifteen before I signed it away to a bunch
of cloth-eared second-rate businessmen."
I'm really trying to close things here without
a "Velvet Goldmine" or "Behind The Music" feel. Is Loz Hardy
on a comeback? Who knows? Is he my hero? He's done his bit
of influencing me. This man wrote better songs for an album
than most people get out in a lifetime. I used to think the
score was even, he gave us some great records and we gave
him a few years of being a pop star. When I first got this
interview back and read it, I wasn't so sure. It kind of seemed
like the fans got the better end of the deal. Still, for all
the bullshit that it cost the guys in Kingmaker, you can't
put a value on what that band meant to it's fans or the memories
that flood back whenever we throw on a Kingmaker album. It
doesn't seem like any price would be too high to pay for that
kind of a return, but then again, I'm not the one who had
to pay it.
— Tyler Jacobson
Talk Back
post
in the webboard
e-mail the chief
Like this article?
e-mail it to a friend!
|
