Tagliatelle Tubbies

By Simon Williams, NME

*Fist of fun*

Like tabloid hypocrisy, stroppy bus conductors and careless estate agents, certain aspects of reality will never, ever let you down. And the music business -'alternative' or not - is no exception.

Take Prolapse, for example: a haphazard collective of half-a-dozen studey types seemingly drawn together by a penchant for shouting and Sonic Youth B-sides and armed with a name about as hospital radio-friendly as FrankieWank & The F----ers, surely few acts could compete with them on a thoroughly low-rent scale of Transit van-trundling, bedsit-bundling indie schmindie on-the-road nightmares.

Sure enough, ruddy-faced ranting vocalist Scotch Mick is fondly recalling some of the more glamorous moments of Prolapse's career. Like that time in Germany when they arrived in a huge squat in Hanover after spending light years on the sodding autobahn to find they were playing with the Gay City Rollers - oh yes - the majority of whom appeared to be getting intimate in the boys' toilets.

Anyway, it was really bloody cold and Prolapse were all shaking'n'quaking from a high-octane blend of on-tour psychosis and the DTs, and the larger-than-life singer of the Gay City Rollers - a chap called Elvis, natch - well, he reappeared from the bogs and he had blood, like, under his armpit. By the time Scotch Mick had seen the wall of a nearby bar burst into flames, the actual gig itself had become something of an irrelevance. Suffice it to say the show was rubbish.

'It was,' growls Mick with masterful understatement, 'f---ing horrible.'

Spending a weekend in Rome with Prolapse should therefore fill the more sophisticated among us with the sort of dread normally associated with cold concrete floors, stinking syringe-littered toilet venues and cockroach-infested lunacy. But that's enough about Camden.

And, in a very real sense, that's enough about the potential social perils of being in Prolapse, for this weekend is blissfully free from any touring traumas or tribulations - primarily because they aren't even playing any gigs! They're just here to chew the fat with NME over their new album 'The Italian Flag' - the rather piss-poor excuse for our current location -and to have the odd discreet conflab with their continental paymeisters at Warner Brothers. In fact, with the luvverly blue skies and visits to the Pantheon and the Vatican, these 48 hours could almost be described as classy.



Prolapse? Classy!???? Skankin' shrimp paste sandwiches, tomorrow Scotch Mick will be on a British Airways flight with Brian 'Queen' May. And Anita 'EastEnders' Dobson! And not only that, but he's also been pissed in Los Angeles! With Drew Barrymore!

'I pulled her ear!' he beams, ruddily. Yeah! Really! 'Yeah, I said "Cheers, Big Ears" and she went, "What? Cheers, Big Ass?" so I said, "No, ears!" and pulled one of hers to show her what I meant.'

Even better, we find Scotch Mick and co-conspirator/co-vocalist Linda Steelyard in a local backstreet restaurant, guffawing heartily at the Inglese menu and its poorly translated promises of Spaghetti on Angler's Way, A Little Walnuts by Vernaccia and, of course, the soon-to-be legendary starter, The Salmon Fill With a Smoke, because the menu reads like a Prolapse set list.

Yes indeed, 'Slash/Oblique', 'I Hate the Clicking Man', 'Return of Shoes'... you'll find all these and more stumpily-titled delights on 'The Italian Flag', the 'Lapses fine forthcoming (third) album. More Prolapse facts? The other two-thirds of the band consist of The Other Mick (Harrison, bass), Dave Jeffreys (guitar), Pat Marsden (guitar), Tim Pattison (drums) and Donal Ross-Skinner (keyboards). They all sound like they should be modelling donkey jackets in a Vic&Bob sketch, and they are all currently back in Leicester or London or wherever else it is that Prolapse have been accused of 'coming from', maaaaan.

To the average discerning punkoid punter, Prolapse have been around for blatheringly ages, whipping out such a stompingly comprehensive string of sniggles'n'sniggers for such a baffling variety of record companies that Mick and Linda struggle to remember, a) the song titles, b) the label names and c) what the hecksie becksie they're going on about.

In reality, the sextet fell into (mis)shape about three years ago in between studies in Leicester, and Mick was so shy he wore a balaclava onstage for the first, ooooh, 20 gigs. They have subsequently played a sweltering welter of maniac live shows with Pulp, Sonic Youth and Stereolab, the majority of which have dwelt upon the deranged antics of Linda and Mick. Crucially, every year Prolapse bung out a fantastic single like 'Pull Thru Barker' or 'TCR' and everyone goes 'BRILLIANT!' but nobody buys it so they slide back into saggy old oblivion; and this week Prolapse's BRILLIANT new single is called 'Autocade', which is so poptastically fantastic that Mick hates it.

Ummmmm.

'I choose not to be on it,' he says dismissively. 'I just don't like the song - it's not my cup of tea. But that's OK, we're in a band where it's not gonna cause any fuss. I just don't like our new single, that's all. It's too pop. That's the way the cookie crumbles.'

'It should be pointed out here that we didn't set out to write a pop song,' defends Linda. 'We don't want people thinking that. It just happened!'

'I still think it's crap,' mutters Mick.

'I could have shouted all over it ad then it wouldn't be a pop song,' insists Linda. 'It could've easily been someone boiling a kettle over the music or whatever. I mean, the next single could be ten minutes of Hoover noise!'

It probably will be, as well, which is precisely why Prolapse are hardly ranked alongside Fairy Liquid and Uncle Berkov's Ratcatcher Delight in the household name stakes. 'I can't write words that are about anything other than murder,' sighs Linda. 'And death. Oh, and relationships splitting up. I'm probably the nastiest person in the band, really.'

True, she has just spooned an entire mouthful of - wait for it - Parmesan cheese into her mouth, which is pretty damn nasty.

'We're somewhere between Throbbing Gristle and The Razorcuts,' leers Mick. 'Some of our album is unlistenable! A lot of it sounds on first listen like there's no structure to it. It's just the rantings of a madman and a madwoman!'

Brilliant! Of course, on the second and third and tenth listens you're convulsing along to the delirious rushes of sonic mayhem and Stereolab-in-a-madhouse grooves and understanding exactly what Linda means when she says that, 'There are a lot of people who are really fanatical about our music - they really do love us!'

Yip! Especially in America! But we digress. Anyhow, some Prolapse songs 'depress the shit' out of Linda, and that's brilliant as well, because, she says, 'I'd like people to get off on the words and I don't mean that people should go out and murder people but I'd like them to relate to it like a Smiths song: I'd like them to say, 'Oh, it's really miserable, but I know what she's going on about.'

What about the somewhat haphazard take on your career plan?

'We're not one of those bands that are really intense and go, 'Where shall we take it now?', sniffs Linda. 'Maybe that's where we're going wrong. We're quite take-us-or-leave-us, really. We're not into licking arses or anything like that.'

'If we'd put our minds to it, we could be as big as Symposium,' beams Mick. 'Or Morbid Angel.'

Great!

'I don't know what I'm doing in a band, actually. I don't really care about it. I'd be quite happy if 80,000 people bought the album - I'd be like, f---in' hell, people do appreciate us! But I'm not a wee crappy indie kid, I really don't care.'

He doesn't either - he prefers his job as an archaeologist back in Leicester to being a pop singer. But, of course, he does as well, because beneath his charmingly cantankerous Crass-rousing melody-loathing anarchist-with-a-small 'a' hollerings, one heartily suspects that Scotch Mick is as enamoured of his band's furious pop noise as the rest of the radiator-lugging Linda-hugging Prolapse fanatics are.

'I had to list my three current favourite bands the other day,'reveals Linda, blushing with the social importance of it all. Excellent! And, pray, which particular globally-renowned publication was canvassing your opinions on the likes of Tiny Too, Spraydog, and (possibly) Frankie Wank & The F---ers?

'It was for the Prolapse newsletter.' More blushing. 'Heeheehee!'

'Hurhurhurmph!' gurgles Mick.'And we wonder why we've never been big?'

Still class in a pint glass, though.

Fob.Com

"Uh-oh! Feeding frenzy! I type this atop the tallest filing cabinet in the office whilst witnessing scenes of stomach-turningly sickening crocodilian carnage as the cold-blooded monsters (See Ash for singles review 'concept' ­ Ed) ­ whipped into flesh-crazed frenzy by the the first five demented seconds of the Prolapse single ­ tear the rest of Team NME to screaming shreds. Read quickly, dear punter, for these may be the last words I ever write...

The medical definition of 'prolapse' is "like where you literally fart your own guts out". This is incredibly apt because Prolapse truly are the sound of rock farting its own guts out.

"I could smell skid marks, OK?... There's some inexplicable reason why legs turn orange... I've seen a huge figure with a red face, it floated towards the window... I wouldn't lie to you about a thing like that, would I?... Are you listening to me? It makes children detonate explosives... that's why flies carry communications from outer space" rants a conspiracy theory-crazed and rather peeved Home Counties female whilst a presumably Tennants Extra-slaughtered tramp rants Scottishly over the top about fucknosewotbollocks. Prolapse revel in a frenziedly nervous pop music which assaults the brain on 418 levels at once, bombarding the poor bastard listener with paranoid whispers and caustic little side-sniggers that'll probably prod the more sensitive of you over the edge into suicidal depression.

Everybody hates you, the government have bugged your dental fillings and all of Madonna's lyrics are aimed at you personally (especially where she sings, "Go get an axe and kill Bis and I'll shag you/Honest I will" on 'Material Girl'). Prolapse are the sound of your 19th nervous breakdown happening simultaneously with numbers one to 18. Have you ever wondered what the 'voices' that Mark Chapman allegedly heard before he went and de-Beatled The Dakota building sounded like? They sounded like Prolapse. Imagine the Trainspotting 'choose' monologue crossed with the deranged purple-ink diary scribblings of a public schoolgirl psycho-killer done but days before she liberates the Bren from the school armoury and turns the fifth-form gymkhana into the beach at Gallipoli. I wonder if you can.

If all the poxy little dimwit indie bands that clutter up this planet (wasting our diminishing supplies of oxygen, fresh water and fossil fuel) were but one-tenth as radical, perverse, demented, witty, sassy or sexy as Prolapse then we ­ the indie community ­ would have every right to look down our pert but blackhead-riddled little noses at the coke-crazed and corporate hosepipe sucking clown-whores of Proper Pop. But they're not, are they? Bands as whacked to fuck as Prolapse are as rare as wings on dogs. Give them all your money and drugs and attempt to emulate the spirit of their genius, you SCUM! This is an order. Over and out."

- Stevie Chick, NME


"A welcome return for one of Britain's more demented musical set-ups. Sounds like Stereolab playing mini-golf with Arab Strap. Probably. Drew Barrymore's favourite group. Apparently.

- "really strange and really appealing. The soft, hazy female vocals against the really strong 'trainspotting'-style voice, it's got a lot going for it; it sounds like real old style indie music. It'll be nice to separate the vocals so you can hear what they are both saying. But it works, it's your classic John Peel, it's a goer. Prolapse, great name, too."

- Comments by Graeme Le Saux, Melody Maker

'TFI Feisty' NME, 6 September 1997

Prolapse live at Edinburgh, Cas Rock Café by Ben Willmott

The name, of course, does not inspire confidence. The image is not a pretty one; at best it suggest Concorde-speed metal executed by brickies from Walsall, at worst a brand of 'challenging' post-rock to chisel A-roads in your forehead.

And, although our seemingly ever-multiplying friends (up to seven members and showing no sign of slowing) from Leicester have never dealt in anything other than pure, if severely skewed, pop, their most unsettling of tags always was eminently appropriate. Because Prolapse used to be a mess. A splendidly compelling street scrap, fuelled by animosity and the ever-present threat of inter-band physical violence, but a mess all the same.

But something strange has happened to their wilfully indie bedsit since the major label cleaners descended for a serious scrub earlier this year. For starters, they've learnt to play their instruments without sounding like the Grange Hill school band being conducted by Mark E Smith. Smart move.

Secondly, they've relaxed to the point where actually performing has become a distinct priority - as opposed to simply demolishing the rider, giving each other death stares and indulging in unseemly scuffles. Wonders never cease.

A few moments into tonight's opener, 'Visa', its evident their once wiry mesh of mangled power pop and Krautrock as molested by the Happy Mondays has been helping itself to steroids of late. Even without Julian Cope's right-hand man, Donald Ross Skinner, dispensing the kind of high-frequency Mooging that's been syringing the ears of Beck's audiences recently, they sound way bigger, sharper and ultimately more mischievously evil than ever.

Don't get us wrong, the playground squabbles and tantrums are still all present and correct - without them the band would be rendered all but impotent. A baby doll is produced from nowhere, promptly dismembered by tiny vocalist Linda Steelyard and then slung with ferocious force at the face of her lanky, oafish counterpart, Scotch Mick. Between verses of 'Day at Death' the pair mutter private obscenities to each other and kick the other's beers over, but tonight such acts feel like flashpoints for the whole band's collective raging instead of mere incidental distractions.

It's probably halfway through 'Killing the Bland' - imagine the Primitives on a diet of psychopathic drugs and razorblade milkshakes - that we realise precisely what damn fine pop stars they'd make. Visualise Linda, the 60s B-movie heroine with a meat cleaver in her handbag, systematically demolishing Chris Evans' ego on TFI Friday with a handful of well-chosen insults. Or Mick emptying his stomach behind a breakfast TV sofa.

A year ago, such a scenario would've seemed about as likely as Noel Gallagher having a drink with a Labour Prime Minister at Number 10. Or Chumbawamba shifting 100,000 singles and gatecrashing the Top Five. Stranger things have indeed happened - and often to bands displaying a fraction of Prolapse's bruising class.

The Inside ov a Butcher's Shop

Banking On Death (Carnage)

"THANK GOD PEOPLE STILL have the time, energy and resources to make records like this in the 1990s. And thank God we hardly ever have to hear them.

The Inside Ov A Butcher's Shop is Mick the shouty Scotsman out of Prolapse, and apparently three other grown men who have to do this to avoid getting their dole stopped.

To think they probably listened to this over and over while recording it, chills the blood. "Carnage, carnage, every fucking day of my life", they chant, for a full 31-and-a-half minutes. Then again for another five minutes on the other track on the CD.

If there is a message, aside from hilariously in-jokey Dadaist mischief, it appears to be on the sleeve, where they claim they 'utilised their now famous cardboard tube as a phallic symbol to humiliate the butchers', who, they also claim, are mostly impotent. Laugh? I nearly listened to it the whole way through.

While I admire their persistence, familiarity breeds contempt. You can imagine this being played to torture Third World dictators from their homes. Alas, most of us pampered Westerners will lack the same mental fortitude. And they say meat is murderous..."

- Johnny Cigarettes, NME

Reviews - Pull Thru Barker

NME review

"Maddening attempt at disrupting passing traffic by Leicester/Scottish outfit with crazed double act vocals and an innate, intelligent overview of the more absurd things in life. The song titles on their LP have to be seen to be believed."