BYKERS LOST IN SPACE....
APOLLO 440 AND INDUSTRIAL LEGEND MARY MARY SPILL THE BEANS ON THE D & B THING....
With their explosive blend of metal riffs and searing drum and bass grooves, Apollo
440's rise to fame has been as meteoric as the name suggests. The funky,
jazz-inspired "Krupa" and chart-busting "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Dub" (from Van Halen's
"Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love") have set a blueprint for their fast-developing sound.
Finding an increased audience with the "Lost In Space" theme, @440's star is in the
ascendant. Incredibly, their trademark ragga-style vocals come courtesy of none
other than industrial legend Mary Mary.
"I suppose the rumours are true," Mary grins, as he reveals all about his days as vocalist for
psychedelic punkers Gaye Bykers On Acid. He reveals that the speculation of huge,
acid-fuelled frenzies stems from when a certain alternative celebrity handed out 250 tabs of
acid to the band. "We were handing it out to the crowd, and we did take quite a lot of it
ourselves. It's something you get over, though," he smiles, accounting for his current sober
appearance.
Born Ian Garfield Hoxley, Mary hails from Leicester, but has spent years in various bands in
Liverpool, Camden and Chicago. Mary has an extraordinary reputation. Not only as a
versatile and talented vocalist, but as of The World's Nicest Bloke. Former bandmates,
roadies, producers and friends all chorus their affection for the tiny, affable, gregarious Kurt
Cobain lookalike. In fact, so widespread was his acclaim that we simply had to find out what
all the fuss was about. We weren't disappointed.
After endless telephone calls to the Epic Press office [thanks guys!], I am finally led to a tiny
room at Subterrania, where my favourite singer and one of the hottest bands on the planet are
playing tonight. A man in an Afghan coat introduces himself as Simon. He in turn introduces
me to the band. I promise to Mary that I am not going to neglect Apollo 440 [and miss this
one?] and decide to start at the beginning.
"After GBOA, one night we went to see Henry Rollins play in Highbury, when Paul Raven from
Killing Joke came up to me and handed me £200. Cash. He said, "I really want you to be on
the team. Get a plane and come to Chicago." So I spent it. A couple of days later, he called
and said, "I was serious about you coming out here. Get the next flight out." I told him that I'd
spent it, but a royalty cheque came through, so I ended up in Chicago. Martin Atkins [Killing
Joke / Ministry] was like "Yeah, yeah, come on over", so suddenly I'm surrounded by people
like Andrew Weiss from Rollins Band, En Esch from KMFDM and it's like, great, I'm in a band
with loads of complete nutters.
Touring America with Pigface - the craziest "supergroup" in history - was no piece of cake.
"There were kids coming up to us with syringes, wanting to do heroin with us, and offering
effigies of Ogre. Ogre [from Skinny Puppy] was such a huge star. In America, that
whole scene is like their indie, and no-one cared who I was, just "Where's
Ogre!" Fucked up American kids - all they want to do is get fucked up with
their heroes singing about desolation and despair. I found Ogre to be an
uplifting sort of guy. He used to play ice hockey so we'd talk about sport, which is totally
alien to what you'd think. I got on better with him than anyone else, because everyone else
was like, "Oooh, Ogre, Oooooh...." But it was a good tour and I had a good time.
"It's a shame, because Martin Atkins is very difficult to work for, but he's very enthusiastic and
it's great that he gets all that shit together. I saw En Esch in New York and I saw Lesley
Rankine [from Ruby] at Camden tube station, heading off to Los Angeles, and I really like
those people, but in Pigface it wasn't the same any more. If you mention Pigface, those are
the people I remember."
For Mary, Pigface is a half remembered haze of "heinous amounts of drugs", every night
tanked up to the eyeballs on LSD. Atkins remained sober, so it ended up with half the rhythm
section drug free and the other half [including a virtually unconscious Ogre] staggering about,
trying to play and - somehow - succeeding. At the peak of its decadence, the industrial scene
populated by Martin Atkins, Al Jourgensen and half a dozen of their side projects was a
laughable, intriguing mess. Finally, a chain of tragic events took place, culminating in the
deaths of some of the most talented musicians on the network - not least drummer Jeff Ward
and Skinny Puppy's Dwayne Goettel. A kind of shocked silence seemed to befall the entire
scene. People stopped what they were doing. Took stock of their lives. Grew up.
Meanwhile, back in Liverpool, Apollo 440 had been knocking around for a fair bit. Mary
returned from the States with nowhere to live, and @440 were more than happy to oblige
["They kept me locked in the gimp box!"]. He was in Hyperhead for a while, but then @440
needed a vocalist, and Mary just happened to be around...
"I met Mary through Karl," explains @440's Noko. "Mary was in a band with Karl and he was
playing the viola, and my mate said, "Hey, you gotta meet this guy - he's insane"... I produced
the Hyperhead album and that was it. I asked Mary to be our singer about two years earlier,
but it didn't happen until "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Dub". Mary's like a box - he's got these buttons
marked "rap" and you push them and he makes up a rhyme and we stick a tune behind it.
You put him in front of an audience, and he makes them more excited than they would have
been before..."
"That's my function in life," quips Mary. "Noko came back from Tribal Gathering and he'd
written this tune with that Van Halen riff in it. Drum and bass. Never heard anything like it.
"Sing on this," he said, so I was like, okay. They got me really stoned, and that was just the
character that came out. The "grrrrr" thing. Rrrrrraw Power. Rrrrrapid Racer. That's how it
got born. I just did it jamming. Noko came back and said "That's the single." What's the
single? I hadn't finished!"
"We just cut it up and stuck it together in a different order," explains Noko.
Mary is quick to respond to accusations of trying to attempt a gruff ragamuffin vocal style. "I
wasn't trying to sound black. I mean, Elvis Presley sounded black. I was just so stoned that
that was the way it came out. Reggae has been part of black and white culture for twenty
years. It belongs to everybody. I never sang like that in Gaye Bykers on Acid, though I now I
wish I had... Still - I invented grunge! But now I'm more Michael Caine than
Kurt Cobain."
One of the most fascinating facets of Apollo 440's electrifying live shows is the fact that they
use live drums. Cliff plays the Digital D drum kit, which he played on "Krupa". Second
drummer Paul Kodish is a jazz fan, whose love of drum and bass allows him to mimic the
complicated syncopation of breakbeats whilst playing live. Noko describes the live shows as
"Great fun. We played seventy gigs in a year. We supported U2 in Israel to 70 000 people.
That was incredible. Did you know that we sell more records in Poland than Oasis or The
Prodigy? We are huge in Germany. Record company people keep giving us loads of vodka!
That was bloody nice!"
Apollo 400 isn't the only thing that keeps these boys off the streets. Side projects include
Maximum Roach, a jungle rockabilly Dick Dale-style offshoot. The band also harbour
ambitions to have a residency at somewhere like The Blue Note [ultra-cool London
night-spot], but still intend to release further Apollo 440 singles. The "Lost In Space"
soundtrack was a dream come true for the boys who have benefited from the increased
exposure, and cool factor, of working on such a high profile project. It is something they
started pitching for months in advance, and the end result is a sophisticated and frivolous
piece of work. All that listening to John Barry appears to have paid off.
So, a closing sentence from Mary?
"We are the soundtrack band of the Nineties."
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