MUSIC | Teenage Fanclub
P H O T O :
D O N A L D M L N E
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TEENAGE KICKS
As Teenage Fanclub get ready to revist their Creation Records years across three very special gigs, Henry Northmore catches up with founding member Norman Blake to reminisce
T eenage Fanclub’s mix of jangling guitars and fuzz rock helped dei ne Scottish indie and forge links with the American grunge scene. The band are getting ready to play a special three-night stand at the Barrowlands to celebrate those formative years and to mark the re-release of their most beloved albums from their Creation Records days. And with bassist and co-founder Gerard Love recently announcing his departure from the band, this could be your last chance to catch the original lineup together. Each gig will see them revisit a specii c time period, playing two full albums from start to i nish. Night one is songs from 1991–93 (Bandwagonesque and Thirteen), the second shows covers 1994–97 (Grand Prix and Songs From Northern Britain), rounding off with 1998–2000 (Howdy and a special b-sides and rarities set). Vocalist and guitarist Norman Blake takes us on a trip back through time as he recalls the highs and lows of the Creation years.
1991–1993
How did you i rst hook up with Creation Records? I’d always known Alan McGee through Bobby Gillespie [from Primal Scream]. He wanted to know what we were up to, we said ‘we want to make another record’. So we headed down to Amazon studio in Liverpool and he started paying for the recording session. We had no contact at all, in theory we could have made that record and said ‘thanks for paying Alan’ and shopped it around. That was the kind of label Creation was. Creation had [Primal Scream’s] Screamdelica and Loveless by My Bloody Valentine and Bandwagonesque 74 THE LIST 1 Sep–31 Oct 2018
all being made at the same time. Alan and Dick Green [Creation co-founder] had to remortgage their house to pay for it all, you can’t imagine a record label doing that now. Fortunately for everyone, the records were successful and the company went from strength to strength from that point.
Did it feel like you’d stepped up a new level when Bandwagonesque came out? You i nd yourself on Saturday Night Live and think ‘how did that happen?’ It’s amazing how quickly it happened, six months later and we’re playing shows with Nirvana on their Nevermind tour. We just took it all for granted, we just enjoyed it, we had no expectations, we had ambitions to make great records but no ambition to be famous.
How was the Nirvana tour? They’re all nice people. Kurt [Cobain] was such a nice guy, he had his problems, but he was a decent guy and it’s tragic what happened. They were great live, an amazing band, we had a lot of fun on that tour. It was amazing to witness that phenomenon the way that it went from nothing to this massive thing and I don’t think Kurt enjoyed that aspect of it, he couldn’t handle it. Bandwagonesque had amazing reviews but how did it feel when the critics laid into follow up Thirteen? I think a big part of that was myself and Gerry [Love] did an interview just before that album came out talking about how it hadn’t been a very good experience making the record. I think we just went down the rabbit hole recording it. We should have taken a break after touring
Bandwagonesque but we went straight in, so it was just a torturous experience. I think what we were unhappy with was the experience, not the music, but we learned a lot from it. 1994–1997
Do you remember playing the i rst T in the Park in 1994? I remember it being about three miles from my mother’s house so that was nice. I went back to my mum’s for a cup of tea. I remember it quite well, Katrina [Mitchell] from the Pastels played keyboards with us for the i rst and only time. If I’m not mistaken, Crowded House played that night. I met Neil Finn, he was a nice fella.
How did you feel going back into the studio after the critical mauling of Thirteen? After what had happened with Thirteen, we had a plan, we knew the songs we wanted to record. We had about 16 songs and that’s all we recorded. We brought in a guy called David Bianco, who sadly passed away a few months ago, who we’d met through Frank Black [Pixies] and he came in as producer, he was really enthusiastic and did a great job on [Grand Prix]. We recorded at the Manor Studios in Oxford, it’s where I met my wife. Krista was the housekeeper there, so that was a very pleasant experience for me. Did that momentum roll into Songs From Northern Britain? I think both those records go together in a way, it was a continuum, there’s a similarity in style, it felt like a very smooth transition from one into the other.