10 Reasons to Love Prolapse

Sound of Confusion: 10 Reasons to Love Prolapse

by Everett True, Melody Maker



1. They're funny

That's misleading for starters.
Frightening, moving, scary, hypnotic, totally f***ing exhilarating...yes. Funny...well, OK, but only cos singer Mick has such a laconic, self-deprecating humour on stage.

2. Live, they've got the potential to be absolutely crap

"Live would be alright," argues Tim (drums) "except there's always this big Scottish bloke jumping around at the front."
"That's the best bit," says big Scottish Mick (voice), affronted.
"It's shit," shoots back the drummer.
"We have the potential for complete disaster," mediates Dave (guitar), "cos there's no organised rhyme or reason to it. It's complete chaos, but complete chaos that everyone's totally dedicated about."
"I'd like to see us live on telly," says Pat (keyboards), "if I wasn't in the band. It'd be different - or abysmal - but at least it wouldn't be as dismal as something like Echobelly or Menswear."
"We aim to be as good as the Cranberries," sneers Mick (bass).

3. They sound like all the bands you missed out on first time round

Maybe I should explain. The reasons given here are the band's, not mine.
One Prolapse trait is to be self-deprecating. (Another is to have vans break down two miles outside the venue on the side of a motorway, get drunk on subsidised beer and end up spending the night in a creche. As happened at Brighton Uni recently.)
The first time I met Scottish Mick, he insisted on singing half my back catalogue to me (songs even I had forgotten existed) and claimed that Prolapse are "the C86 band it's OK to like." Ugh! Damned by faint praise. The second time (in a venue on Brighton seafront), he and fellow singer Linda had a truly scary argument on stage, which ended up with punches being thrown. Theatre? Possibly.
The sixth time (at Reading Festival), he made a point of buying me back an owed drink - "cos no one ever buys me drinks" - and seemed very nonplussed when Eric from Hole informed him he'd just told Danish radio Prolapse were his favourite UK band (wouldn't you be?)
Anyway, I seem to be straying off the point.
Prolapse reckon the main reason people like 'em is cos they sound like all the other bands those people like. What a refreshing, wryly honest, viewpoint...to a degree. So, try Nurse With Wound, Savage Republic, Huggy Bear, The Legend! [sic], Prolapse, Prolapse... oh this is silly.
The reason I love Prolapse is for the way Linda screams at Mick "what's your excuse?" and asks "do you blame me?" so quite and scared. The reason I love Prolapse is for the way the guitars fade away on Every Night I'm Mentally Crucified (7000 Times) from the new album so sonorously; the way the guitars collide and collide again on the truly righteous Strain Contortion of Bag; the pounding of the drums. The reason I love Prolapse is...
"Do you want us to sing a C86 song for you?" asks Mick the bass. "Go on, name a band."

4. They're like a 'care in the community' band

"We're always willing to extend a helping hand to outcasts," explains Mick the voice. "We have nutters come up to us in Torquay, people who say we're the first band they've liked since the Sugarcubes, and then keep writing us strange letters. We take 16-year-olds to the pub and get them pissed. Well, alright, we didn't buy that boy any drinks, but we were nice to him, and we sang New Order songs to him as well, and he looked really scared."
"While all our fans will be soaring the heights with their fanzines and maagazines," he continues, "we'll be down in the gutter, drinking... piss."

5. They own cats

Yesterday, a friend lent me her copy of the video to Breakfast at Tiffany's, purchased only a few days before. Small gestures, which mean so much. Even though the ending's all wrong, and George Peppard doesn't deserve to be in the same frame as Audrey, it's till... look, you can't go to New York City and not visit Macy's, Tiffany's, run through several stop signs, fall in love with the first apartment cat you meet, and spend at least one dawn watching the sun come up over the Chrysler building.
Prolapse, you know, are people who understand this. They own cats. Prolapse, you know, are the kind of people who - if they lived in New York - would wear cut-price feather boas and get into arguments about David Gedge's parentage in bars between 7th and 8th streets.
When I was in Texas recently, I played a tape of Flex, the hypnotic lengthy opening track of Prolapse's new LP, Backsaturday, to King Coffey, drummer from Butthole Surfers. "A violent Stereolab," we all cried, delighted. It was perfect driving music for the humidity. Only problem was: the volume refused to go beyond a certain point. F*** it. We sang bawdily along anyhow.
Last night, I slipped Backsaturday into my CD-Rom player and blanked out. It felt like the world was ringing, falling through my ears. Prolapse understand the terror of solitude.

6. They're nice people

"We're a very nice, approachable, easy to work with band," says Tim. "We are."
"Ay, we are," agrees Mick the voice. "We sing nice songs, and if someone buys us a drink we're even friendlier. And our records are shite."

7. They read books

Unfortunately, I forgot to ask which ones.

8. They're romos

Oh f*** off, Mick. You're not.
Prolapse are just about the most un-stylish band I can think of. With the exception of Mick's black jumpers and Linda's boots, they have a dress sense which makes Mark E Smith look like the Fourth Earl of Argyll. Dressing down? Down and out. That's not to say they don't have their own style, however... but they're far darker than today's crop of young hedonists.
"A lot of us just like the darker side to things, musically," explains Mick the voice. "We went to Ian Curtis' grave. Tim's got mud rubbings of the inscription on a pink bit of paper, which he carries with him everywhere he goes. It was four days before the anniversary and the grave was completely boggin'. In the same graveyard is one for Edward Woodward... "
"Even though he's not dead," interrupts Mick the bass.

9. They play every last song like it's their last

"Maybe next week we won't be here," muses Dave. "Then we can sit around in a pub pissed, feeling really cynical and twisted, saying, 'I used to be in a band, you know.'"
"It's the best way to record," states Pat, "thinking that you're gonna split up afterwards."
"Every gig could be our last," says Linda.
"Every gig sounds like it's our first," Tim corrects her.

10. They argue constantly

"We're a low rent Gallagher brothers for people who can't afford the real thing," states Mick the voice, finally.

Methinks thou dost protest too much.

Planet of Sound - fanzine interview

Planet of Sound #7, interview by Duncan Illing

Two characters are sat across a table from me in the corner of a pub somewhere in North London. A bloke, a woman. I'm listening to their conversation.
'Prolapse is a medical term,' the bloke says. 'When in pregnancy you get prolapse placentas, the placenta comes away at the wrong time and causes complications.'
'Not really,' replies the woman. 'It's when your intestines fall out of your bottom. In fact I had a kitten who had one, he had little pink lumps sticking out of his... and it went back in again.'
Meet Prolapse. In fact, meet Prolapse the London contingent, Dave and Linda, because it is something of a feat to get all of Prolapse in the same place at the same time. Based in Leicester, Newcastle and London, rehearsals have been known to be only a monthly affair.
As Dave explains 'You gotta get six people from different parts of the country together. It's a bit of a crap hobby really.'

'If we'd practiced every week, by the time we get to play it live we'd be sick to death of it and we wouldn't want to do it,' remarks Linda.
This is a band who started out in Leicester playing live sets that featured a single strobe light and a vocalist who wore a snorkel parka.
'It was awful,' comments Dave. So much so that he joined on guitar, followed closely by co-vocalist Linda to complement Mick.

Prolapse are a live spectacle. Mick started dismantling the stage with a screwdriver at a recent gig. In the past they have brought props on stage and beat the shit out of them. Gigs were not only musical performance but theatre too. Eccentric theatre at that.
'Mick used to smash up tellies and throw things at the audience,' Linda explains. 'Then the press started saying those Prolapse smash up tellies. It's just that we don't like standing still on stage and we have a lot of energy. The smashing has stopped (well, it's under control).'
Watching Prolapse's Linda and Mick on stage, you will notice the way they are so intensely within their own bizarre little worlds. Unconscious of their surroundings until they are bumped into, back to reality. Dazed and confused with a bubbly energy originating from their own unique madness it would seem. Linda rubbing both eyes with her hands clenched in fists while in verse, Mick taking screws out of the stage. Not a typical vocalist's stance.
'Sometimes I totally, totally forget that Mick's there,' remarks Linda. 'He'll do the same with me. He doesn't have his voice in the monitors, so I can't hear what he's saying, so that makes it easier to forget he's there. We'll bump into each other and maybe if the mood's right we'll have a scrap of a hug or whatever. It's difficult to explain cos it happens so subconsciously, it's not like Oh I know I'll go over there and put Mick's jumper on.'

Linda is prone to reading the odd book over the fizziness of Prolapse's performance. Mid-song, out comes a book. Most recently High Fidelity by Nick Hornby.
'It changes, cos if I'm reading a book at the time it'll probably be that,' says Linda. 'But I usually take a small selection of books. One is a mini encyclopedia and another called Sex Manners for the Single Girl and it's from the late sixties and is about what you should or shouldn't do. Once, we were supporting Pulp at Essex University and of course the audience was there for Pulp and I think we were even more disjointed than we are now! This was about two years ago and I got this big text book and was ripping stuff out of it and throwing it at the audience and people were (eyes bulge), put off by it. I think from then, my pile of books shrunk.'

Prolapse are also prone to the impulsiveness of live experimentation ie. avoiding the expected and not playing what the audience has come to hear.
'When the band first started, every song was made up during the set,' says Linda. 'Of course, the years go by and you record stuff, but we try and stick to this thing about making things up. So we take advantage of sessions.'

Prolapse made up last year's twin A side, Unroadkill, live on a radio station in Portland, USA.
'It's different every time, the vocals are different. We make things up at gigs,' enthuses Linda.
Do you take into account what the audience wants to hear? This make up stuff on the spot approach may lead to inconsistencies - a 15-minute art wank experiment may not satisfy the majority of an audience.
'I think there is a certain amount of pressure for us to be a band now,' responds Dave. 'If it was an audience that had seen us a few times, we'd make stuff up. But if it's playing to a new audience in a new city, then we'd stick to stuff that's written,' Linda comments.

Prolapse have had some truly mad live experiences. As Dave comments, the emphasis is directed at the audience. 'The thing about a Prolapse gig is to get a load of energy going. Once you get that you just want to keep playing. I think it's also important for us to keep a level of tension. If everything's buzzing, you just want to keep that going. One night I always refer to is a gig in Paris that ended in carnage, a huge mound of bodies on stage. We'd never been to Paris before and we thought everybody would be sat around writing philosophy.'
'They were diving on stage and lying on it and Dave jumped on,' says Linda.
'Yeah, I was about halfway down the pile. I didn't think they would carry on.'
'It's like, your music has made people do that... that's what's good about it.'
'I've been to a lot of gigs where I've though, I love this band, but it's boring and my legs are hurting,' explains Dave. 'That's one thing I'd like people to remember us by, that you didn't feel like you were standing there and your legs are hurting and you'd want to sit down.'
So Prolapse have an ambition in that sense.
'I'm only motivated to be in a band by really negative things. I really hate so much music that's around at the moment, that's what makes we want to make music.'
'I can't write about anything positive,' adds Linda. 'I don't know why.' (Dave chuckles.) 'I can't! I just feel too tedious on stage singing about positive nice things. Anything that is negative, about death, or about relationships ending, anything like that or about people going mad. Anything along those lines.'
Dave talks of Joy Division, the Velvet Underground, Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, and the fact that Marion are definitely not the new Joy Division.

So what about life for Prolapse beyond the cliquey indie underground? 'I'm not afraid of pissing off that sort of scene cos I don't actually feel part of it,' swipes Dave. Prolapse want to head in the opposite direction to everyone's expectation, away from both the cliqueness of the underground and the potential of the mainstream. Oddballs in the middle. '
'We've got to be interested in it, that's how we are,' says Dave. 'Maybe at one point we'll get swept up by the music biz and do all these things we don't want to do. I don't think we're capable of that actually. If we all get fed up we won't want to do it.'
So where does that leave you?
'We want to be accepted to an extent, but as an interesting entity,' replies Dave. 'A creative event instead of being great musicians, as to writing great pop songs. I'm not slagging off great pop songs, it's quite hard work really.'
'Maybe we should write some pop songs and get some money,' responds Linda.
'We have,' mentions Dave, 'we've written pop songs, but by accident,'
Corking bubbly power pop, like the live fave they don't play very often, TCR.
'We don't like our pop songs though,' says Linda.

So what of the scenario of Prolapse having a hit pop song on their hands? They recently appeared on the Chart Show. 'The thought of having an accidental hit,' says Linda, 'the pressure is on - not from out point of view - but from lots of other people's point of view, for us to write a song that was at least as big a hit as the previous one. You lose a lot of respect if you have just one hit. If it's an accident you've shot it really cos you're not writing hits. Maybe we do under perform, cos we know we could be number one in the charts.'
'The fluke hit single is a possibility, but the follow on is just not possible.' Dave states.
'A flukey one hit wonder band, that's a horrible phrase,' snorts Linda.

Prolapse have a spanking new album in their sights. In their hands they have the extremes of both potential hit pop tunes up against experimental workouts that will take their own little adventures. Whatever way they go from here, that is left to fate.
'You can get really bogged down thinking about it all,' remarks Linda, who would rather remain flippant. While Dave would rather forget stardom and settle down to his PhD and bring up his two kids.
Prolapse have experienced a long hard slog to this stage of recognition. So perhaps I should mention their polar opposite, Kula bloody Shaker. Perhaps now after the slog, Prolapse really wouldn't mind a quick splash into that pond called fame.
'I have no respect for situations like that,' spits Linda at my mention of that band. 'It really irritates me! We slogged our way around the shitest clubs, when there has been no one there. We have dragged ourselves up by our bootstraps.No one has given us money to help us. We got where we are today - not very far - by playing hard, going out and playing gigs and kipping on people's floors. The thought that someone can come along from nowhere with a famous mum and get a number one really irritates me so much. It realy does,'
'It's what the people want,' remarks Dave. 'What my gripe is, these bands don't sound very good. They're not trying very hard. There are lots of bands which do and who are never going to be very big. Most of the bands we respect could only dream of being on Top of the Pops.'
That's life. But Prolapse plod on up that path to fame. Perhaps those pop songs they make mention of will carry them at greater pace. Or perhaps they'll take their eccentric experimental jamboree into history, to be discovered after they've split up. Who knows?
'That's what it probably is really. Prolapse is a crap hobby,' remarks Dave.
'We've got to enjoy it to do it,' points our Linda. Crap hobbies indeed, enjoyment is the key and Prolapse still do it.

VOLUME 14, Reading 95 Special

Article from the 36-track Volume 14 CD and booklet (which included Move to Limit Slabs)

Those crazy Prolapse people have just completed a storming tour with Wales' finest Gorky's Zygotic Mynci. The band are currently between labels, as they say, but will release a mini-LP this October on the Lissy's imprint. A split single is also due (shared with Gorky's) on the Love Train label. [Sadly, it never happened.]

Volume: Do you ever think you're going mad?

Geordie Mick: Only when watching freeze-framed weasels.

Does God exist? If so, what does he look like?

Dave: Sixty foot weasel with wings.

Are you a good friend?

Pat: Not to people I don't like.

Do you drink red wine with fish?

Linda: I don't know any fish.

Can money buy you love?

Geordie Mick: Yes, also stoats, bags and shoes.

Do you know a good cure for hiccups?

Dave: Try breathing backwards.

Have you been or could you ever be corrupted?

Dave: No, but arrange a time and a place and I'll meet you.

Are you lonesome tonight?

Linda: What me? Don't you know who I am?

Whose language do you speak?

Geordie Mick: The Queen's English with a hint of Frog.

Do you think you'd recognise an alien if you saw one?

Dave: Yes they're noisy little metal things with four wheels.

Where are you now (at home, on tour, in a new band, a plumber?)

Pat: At home, on tour, in a new band at a plumber's house.

Did the West really win the Cold War?

Pat: Obviously, the former Eastern Bloc now has organised crime, McDonalds and ethnic cleansing.

Would you fight for your country?

Linda: No.

Is it better to smoke it or bong it?

Linda: I like the sound of a bong, it makes me think of dinner time.

Are jokers more interesting than winners?

Geordie Mick: Brian Conley is.

Do you believe in putting subliminals in your music?

Dave: We try to put subliminal messages in to attract completely, mad fans, and it normally works.

Do you believe in life after death?

Linda: I believe in death during life.

What is the happiest event you have ever witnessed?

Pat: 1995 FA Cup Final - Everton triumphant.

If your life could be something fictional, what would it be?

Geordie Mick: Withnail and I.

Pat: Are You Being Served (feature film).

Dave: Billy Liar.

How does it feel to be back in Memphis?

Geordie Mick: Like rubbing crab juice on Reg Varney.

Quality Time fanzine article

Quality Time fanzine - "a tour de collage of photos, interviews and some other stuff we stole. features the renovated rejuvenated cornershop imploding fall out prolapse flaming lips flying saucer attack. it's about leicester. john peel recommended."

Get all paranormal with Scottish Mick...

Q. Have you ever had a paranormal experience?

A. Ah flew out ma bed one night in the Gorbals (this woke me up). Ah looked behind me and there were ma stereo speakers 6 1/2 feet up but now level with ma recumbent heid.

Q. Is the truth really out there (ie. life in space?)

A. Aye somewhere round the corner ae some star at the 3rd universe oan the left.

Q. What's your star sign/ belief in astrology?

A. Pisces - ah only believe in the Scottish Daily Record stars, they're so ridiculous they always come true.

Q. Do you ever play the lottery?

A. Once - it was crap.

Q. Which country will win the European Championships?

A. Germany after a titanic struggle with the Czech Rep who'll score 1st with a penalty. I predict Germany to win 8-7 with a golden goal.


Prolapse faves


Scottish Mick
Object d'art: Art deco pottery hats
Drug of choice: Cans of Breaker or Royal Dutch
TV soap character: Soap is shite
Medical condition: Drunk
Sport: Football: Celtic FC, Partick Thistle
Pop kid u-like: Tim Vass (Razorcuts)
Obscure English band: Die Electric Eels/ Bark Psychosis
Leicester hotspot: Attik nightspot/ St Margarets' baths
Reading material: Boris Vian, Kurt Vonnegut, Billy Childish, Charles Bukowski
Phrase, expression: Burr dingy


Geordie Mick
Object d'art: Eric Bristow
Drug of choice: Napalm
TV soap character: Betty Turpin
Medical condition: Rust
Sport: Cank
Pop kid u-like: David Shop Assistant, Rob 14 Iced Bear
Obscure English band: Rusty Grifter, the Fluffy Slippers
Leicester hotspot: Aldi
Reading material: Stan Barstow, John Noakes, John Braine, Iain Banks, Splunk Cranker
Phrase, expression: Am irritated shiteless

Dave
Object d'art: Cy Twombly paintings
Drug of choice: Mushrooms (fried)
TV soap character: Derek Wilton
Medical condition: Pregnancy
Sport: Driving cars
Pop kid u-like: Mick and Linda (oor band)
Obscure English band: -
Leicester hotspot: The Magazine
Reading material: Melody Maker end of year reviews (on toilet)
Phrase, expression: Not me 'ouse, me 'ouse! (Linda)

Pat
Object d'art: Lewis's in Leicester
Drug of choice: Tea
TV soap character: Raquel (Coronation Street)
Medical condition: Prolapse
Sport: Trainspotting
Pop kid u-like: Neil from Bungalow Bill
Obscure English band: They don't exist yet
Leicester hotspot: Attik/ Fish market
Reading material: Tent and drugs
Phrase, expression: I'm really depressed/ Actually I don't like teeth

Tim
Object d'art: Ratcliffe on Soar
Drug of choice: McEwan's Best Scotch
TV soap character: Beth Jordache
Medical condition: Twisted testicles
Sport: Skiing
Pop kid u-like: Simon Voon
Obscure English band: Yes
Leicester hotspot: No
Reading material: oor Wullie
Phrase, expression: Do you reckon...

Linda
Object d'art: Tim
Drug of choice: Love
TV soap character: Brad Willis
Medical condition: Mania
Sport: Gymnastics
Pop kid u-like:Robert Sea Urchin
Obscure English band: Strawberry Story
Leicester hotspot: the cemetery near the Uni
Reading material: Kingsley Amis
Phrase, expression: Mardy spam cobs/ Bugger off

Interviews - Oscar smokes the leftovers

from Oscar smokes the leftovers issue 3 by Andrew Friendly

I got the chance to talk to Prolapse while at this year's Camden Crawl, and I was lucky to catch them as it seemed there were another half dozen zines as well as MTV (!) wanting a chat. I spoke to guitarist Dave, drummer Tim and Linda, their vocalist. Their other guitarist, Pat, was totally ill and didn't play,while vocalist Mick was hitchhiking, yes hitchhiking, down to the gig after some trouble with the van. Don't ask. I didn't...

They'd been in the US, so I asked them how that had gone.

Linda: We've been to America three times this year, so we've been trying to keep things going. We're between deals just now and we haven't got any money and we're wanting to record, we're just wanting to decide what to do next and it's taking longer than we thought. We had a good time in America though. We played with the Wedding Present, we went to California with Stereolab. It was really good.

Tim: We played in Boston and there were loads of people shouting out for songs from the first album, which hasn't been released out there which was wonderful. There were more people turning up there than there usually is in Leicester, which is where we're from. That was surprising.

You put a lot of effort into your live shows, is it important you engage the audience like that?

Linda: From a frontperson's point of view it's very difficult to play a gig when nobody's paying attention. But saying that we don't play gigs where we're getting ignored, probably because it's so loud.

Tim: I like the physicalness of doing a gig. It's like fighting with the drumkit.

I saw something recently about a Spanish dancer who lost three pounds of weight every time he performed. Do you lose any weight playing?

Tim: Oh God, it all goes back on again afterwards with kebabs and stuff, really crap food.

Dave: Our first gig in New York was really hot. We played this gallery and it wasn't very well ventilated. There was only one big fan and everyone kept on walking out. It was ridiculous. They came in to see what was going on, but a lot of people said Sorry, we just couldn't stay, it was too hot.

Does the 'New Pop Underground' frighten you as much as it frightens me?

Dave: It's a frightening name.

Tim: I mean, for me, I'm getting on a bit now...

Linda: He's got two kids, he's a proper grown-up.

Dave: I honestly think we're not like most of the other bands that's part of 'it'. We'd done so much before we formed the band so it's a bit difficult for us to go Yeah! We're a part of the pop underground!

Linda: Pop's not a word we can associate with really, but people have some funny interpretations of the music you know, like one person's pop is another person's er... er...

Dave: Sore funk.

Linda: I was thinking more like someone else's Brillo Pad rubbing on a table, you know?

Dave: I remember once Mick our vocalist was heckling Bis from the crowd and they said Don't mind him, he's our Dad.

I saw your video for Doorstop Rhythmic Bloc the other day and I thought it was really smart. How do you feel about doing videos?

Dave: Well we've just done one in New York, and it fucked me off completely. So depressing.

Tim: I came around to it by the end but at the start... I mean, it was the full production things, dollies set up and all that. I just remember sitting on the back of this truck thing, zooming around all these skyscrapers and I couldn't believe how depressed I was.

Dave: There's this really funny bit that I couldn't believe they used. It's this bit where I'm just miming along going (sighs through his lips, making a sort of propeller sound) and they used it! And that's what I felt like, like This is supid. Always thought it was something I would never do and now, two years later...
Tim: We had a stylist.

Linda: Called Raffey.

Tim: And he came up to our flat, and it was one of the most worrying moments of my life because he was checking out to see if we had any stylist clothes to wear, and I was just sitting there, dreading it. It was like being back at school again... like Oh no, there's a stylist going through my wardrobe.

Linda: You can look back on it now and laugh but at the time it was a nightmare.

And then they say they're not a pop band. I don't know. Prolapse, the band that want their cake and eat it too.