Melody Maker
17th May 1986
By Carol Clerk

BITING THE BULLET
Kicking against complacency, The Screaming Blue Messiahs have won acclaim the hard way. Carol Clerk applauds their conviction. Jon Blackmore snaps.

It's sad but true that the pubs and clubs of this country are dying on their feet – with their slippers on. The complacency, the politeness, the awful sanity with which musicians entertain their audience and with which their audience respond has turned a traditionally bustling breeding ground into a nursing home for the terminally unimaginative.

Things have never looked so hopeless. Once, and it wasn't so long ago, you were spoilt for choice, you could hop around the small venues every night of the week and quite reasonably expect to stumble across the future of rock 'n' roll. Now you're more likely to to find it alongside the chicken in the eternal basket than you are in Dingwalls.

Which is why The Screaming Blue Messiahs are so important. They are inviting us to get excited again about a night in The Marquee, stomping mercilessly all over the nice-boy bands, and revelling furiously in the recklessness of their own instinct, impulse and emotion.

We want this, and we need it. It's obvious. Complimentary reviews of the the Messiah's new album, 'Gun-Shy', have been coming from the most unlikely quarters and, all the time, the group's live following has been growing bigger and more devoted. At The Marquee a couple of Saturdays ago, attendance reached a stifling capacity, although the guest list, significantly, was minimal. Unusual as it may be, the whole place was packed with paying punters who'd arrived not to lig at the bar but to feel the power of this three man band, to be part of its drama, to thrill to its intensity, to belong to its urgent rhythm, to answer its challenge and finally, spontaneously, to invade the stage because this really was one of those occasions where the group and its audience connected and stayed connected until the moment that the lights blazed in and the spell was broken.

The Screaming Blue Messiahs are out and about in a world of their own. Comparisons won't do because there are no comparisons. , This is an uninhibited, untamed, almost primitive outpouring of individuality, a 60-minite utterance from the heart, soul and mind of a man who may have his influence but won't be messed around by them.

Bill Carter, vocalist, guitarist and writer, doesn't listen to charts, doesn't own a record player, doesn't have a TV either. What he gives to the Messiahs, and what they in turn give to us is something he can feel but not explain, and I think the key word is danger – the kind of danger that has always turned good bands into great ones, the kind of danger that you sense when you realise that the music you're listening to is bigger, much bigger, than the guitar, drums and bass that are making it.

"Our music is totally emotional and it's to do with some sort of power, psychological power," agrees carter, a two-day shadow bristling over shaven head as he sinks another vodka and orange in the Frog and Firkin and hopes, in vain, to drown his flu.

"It's a bit like a drug – or what I've heard about drugs. I can't dwell on it too much because it's dangerous, psychologically dangerous. It used to affect me badly because I found it hard to recover from the effect the gigs used to have on me. I would end up not knowing where I was really. In a way that's why I try not to talk about it too much. I try to keep it at a distance. It is a powerful thing that we do, and it can become too important in your life. I want to keep it on one side so i don't have to live it.

"We're not trying to be heavy or anything like that, but the shear force of the band, plus the kind of vibe of it, sometimes does get a bit, maybe not dangerous, but very, very exciting. You just could not live like that. It wouldn't be a balanced way of living."

He may not want to talk about it, may not want to think about it, but Bill Carter, at the same time, recognises that this X factor, whatever it is, is the spark that illuminates the Messiahs, sets them apart and ultimately drives him forward in a business that he actively dislikes.

"I think we've got a bit of magic, which is what real bands used to have," he muses. "I can't say what it is, but it's special and it's priceless. If it was just music we were doing, I wouldn't be interested."

It seems, however, that the things which are special and priceless to the band and their fans are the very things which are most perplexing to the record company. The Messiahs' very singularity, their eccentricity, their refusal to conform to any convenient music style, makes them difficult to gift-wrap and sell to the public.

"I get the feeling that WEA think of us as their token 'rock' act, and don't really have a grasp of the band's potential," says Bill, removing his shades for the first time. "I could be wrong, but I'm usually right and I've yet to be convinced that they have the capabilities or the commitment to do this band justice.

"It's almost like they have to see things in writing before they believe them. Record sales would convince them, or a very good write-up would cheer them up. I wish they had the same enthusiasm that we have. I don't think they quite understand what we're doing.

"But having said that, I don't want to do a hatchet job on WEA. We know how it's gonna go. We're not The jesus and Mary Chain. This band is building a slow but genuine following, and it's a long job. Keeping the excitement all the time, keeping things moving is part of it. I like the conviction of our band. The fact that it knows what it's doing.

"I also like the fact that it's probably an unlikely looking band. We go to places and they think we're the roadies or the managers or something, and afterwards they have to change their minds."

It's true. The Screaming Blue Messiahs couldn't look anything less like a band on the road, and yet this works to their advantage. Bill Carter, blustering around the stage, apparently in the grip of some uncontrollable mania, offers outrageously spectacular viewing. But performance – like every other personal aspect of his career in the band – is something he's reluctant to analyse too closely.

"I try not to think about what I do onstage," he insists. "I don't want to be a performing clown. We're not a travelling circus.

"People say it's like an ugly, anti-pop type of thing we do, but I don't think of it like that. I think it's a charismatic band. I think it's quite glamorous. When the Stones and The Who came out, people said they were horribly ugly. It was only when they were successful that everyone said how glamorously ugly they were. It's just people. There's different kinds of glamour.

"It doesn't have to be glamour with glitter and stuff and camping around. There are all kinds of glamour in the world. Cars can be glamorous, politics can be glamorous and politicians can be glamorous without wearing spikey hairstyles. Maybe glamour is the wrong word, but it's just I find something untouchable there which is what charisma is all about and, to me, that's worth all the fancy clothes and hairstyles and nice-looking people in the world."

The Screaming Blue Messiahs are asking us only for an honest hearing. Honesty's a strong point with this bunch. Ask Bill, for instance, about money and he'll tell you bluntly; "I need money. I'm miserable if i haven't got any money. I can spend more money than anybody I know if I've got it, and it's all on petrol. That's what I need it for. I don't buy anything else. The only thing I buy with money is freedom/"

At the same time, the Messiahs will say there are some things more important than money, and you believe them. Bill; "I suppose, ideally, I'd like to see us getting somewhere where we can really do what we want without worrying. I don't want to see three frustrated people at the end of five years. I'd just like us to fulfill ourselves. If everybody in this band achieves their maximum potential, we all should lead pretty exciting lives. That's all I want really."