|
 It’s
been an exciting twelve months for pop-punk pranksters Testosterone.
Support slots with Kerrang Award nominated The Ga*Ga*s, record deal
offers, and now they’re debut album is due out anytime. However, with
success has come the inevitable arguments and tensions that haunt most
bands at some point in their career. A few hours before their
much-anticipated Co-headline slot with Wigan’s angriest girls Hatemale at
the Wigan Music Collective, The LINC’s Chris Skoyles sat down with the
foolish foursome. Singer/guitarist Dave Costello, rhythm guitarist and
egomaniac Ian, Kev, the drummer with a Déjà vu problem, and cake-loving
bassist Mat were all too happy to talk about their hectic year.
So you’ve just finished recording your debut album, what should people
expect from it?
IAN: Catchy little songs
DAVE: It’s all about Ian’s love life basically
IAN: Or lack of one, rather!
MATT: I just hope people aren’t too offended by it.
Why would they be?
MATT: Erm, the lyrical content, we’re just a bunch of idiots really!
During the recording, you were having problems coming up with, or at
least agreeing on a title, have you sorted that out yet?
DAVE: We have, it’s gonna be called ‘Let’s Grab A Sock, It’s Time To
Rock!’
OK…Where did you come up with that one?
DAVE: It’s actually a line from a song by a band called Zebrahead called
‘Playmate of the Year’
IAN: We just thought it was funny, ‘cos we like rockin’… and we like
socks!
[Dave lets rip with an impromptu version of Zebrahead’s ‘Playmate Of
The Year’]
So you basically stole your album title?
IAN: Well, you say stole, you really mean ‘borrowed without telling them’.
It’s like, you know when you had the kid next door and you used to nick
his bike without telling him?
Erm, not really….
IAN: Oh right…I’m probably the kid who used to nick your bike.
You never lived next door to me!
KEV: That’s what you think!
[A brief period of silence elapses whilst your humble reporter looks
around, his face awash with fear and paranoia.]
Anyway, how does the song writing work in Testosterone? Is there a set
formula that goes on, or does it just happen randomly?
KEV: You’ll have to ask Ian about that!
IAN: Erm…
DAVE: I’ll give you the low-down. Basically, Ian goes for a night out, has
a drink, meets a good lookin’ girl who dumps him the next day. So then he
writes a song about it, brings it to me, then I do the music, record it
and send it back to him for him to tell me whether he likes it or not.
That’s pretty much how it works.
KEV: And then six months later, Matt and me get told about it!
IAN: [Laughing] yeah, that’s it!
MATT: Yeah, like at band practice a week before we’re supposed to be
playing it!
DAVE: Yeah, Matt, we wrote a new one today.
MATT: OK…
IAN: Yeah. We’re playing it tonight!
MATT: [Laughing nervously] Really?
KEV: You’re gonna have to do it acoustically.
Kev, I’ve heard a rumour about drummers. Is it true that they
experience a lot of DeJa Vu?
KEV: You’ve asked me that before!
Thought I had. Right, one thing that’s always noticeable at your shows
is the little tiffs between Ian and Dave taking the mick out of each
other….
IAN: It’s all real! I hate this guy, seriously!
DAVE: Yeah, and I hate you, you *****!
IAN: The only reason we’re in a band together is because we need each
other.
DAVE: Pretty much.
Seriously?
DAVE: Nah, we do get annoyed with each other, but I think that’s natural,
because in terms of the band, we’re quite close and we write the songs so
sometimes there’s a battle between us to get what we want in terms of the
songs, but on stage we do exaggerate it a bit. Like at The Ga Star Ga
Stars gig, we did milk it a lot. Except [To Ian] you never told me about
The T-shirt!
[At the now infamous Ga*Ga*s gig, Ian produced a T-shirt with an insult
aimed at Dave printed on it, handing out to one lucky fan]
IAN: Dave, you were with me when I bought it!
DAVE: Yeah, but you never told me you were gonna give it away!
Another thing that I’ve picked up at your gigs is that it depends
heavily on the crowd. If the crowd are up for it, you’re whole show works
better, if they’re not, then it seems like you don’t perform as good…
DAVE: That’s pretty much how we see it.
IAN: I wanna hear what Matt thinks about this.
MATT: What? Er…Er…Don’t put that Dictaphone in my mouth!! Erm, er…I like
cake. Seriously, I think it’s just that you get more relaxed when there’s
more people there, especially if it’s people who you know. You just kind
of get into the swing of things easier.
IAN: As well, it’s like, when you’re playing a song, if people aren’t
reacting to it, you just think ‘Why the hell are you here? Are we doing
this right?’
Have you got many people coming down for your gig with Hatemale
tonight?
DAVE: I hope so, if there’s good looking girls there, then even better!
IAN: Matt’s got to wear a skirt as well tonight.
MATT: I’ve got to wear a what!?!
DAVE: A kilt
MATT: Oh, I’ve got a kilt.
OK, you tell people that you play ‘Spunk Rock’. What on earth is Spunk
Rock?
DAVE: It’s rock… but spunked up, that’s pretty much it.
IAN: It’s like the next level of rock. A lot of bands will go ‘Oh, I like
a girl, I want to hold her hand’ we just take the lyrics a bit further.
DAVE: And talking about getting caught in your girlfriend’s underwear!
IAN: Oh yeah, that’s another issue! I think when we get famous, that’s
when I’m gonna reveal that it was Dave who got caught wearing his
girlfriend’s underwear.
DAVE: Shut up! That was you, in your head! It didn’t even happen; you
imagined it!
IAN: So you say… I’ve got the video evidence.
DAVE: I’d like to see this…
I bet you would. Kev, I’ve heard a rumour about drummers. Is it true
that they experience a lot of Deja Vu?
KEV: You’ve asked me that before.
Thought I had. Right then, each of you, your favourite song.
DAVE: Favourite song?
By Testosterone.
MATT: I suppose mine’s, ‘The Thing About Love’, it was the first song I
learned to play with the band.
DAVE: Yeah, probably mine as well. It’s just class; I love doing the
little solo in the middle!
IAN: Ask Kev, you’ll have to come back to me on this one.
KEV: I’d probably say ‘High School’, because that’s one of the first ones
that I learned with them and, well, I just like it.
IAN: Ask my brother, I’m still thinking.
IAN’S BROTHER, ROY: The Lesbian Song!
IAN: Ok, mine’s either ‘Hot College Girl’ or ‘High School’.
DAVE: Hi, I’m Ian, my favourite songs are the ones about me.
IAN: Yeah! Any song about me has gotta be good! Nah, seriously, I like
‘Hot College Girl’ because it’s got a really cool riff in it, and when it
kicks in I just feel really good. And ‘High School’ because I finally got
to tell everyone I hated at school what I thought of them.
OK, so Matt’s just joined the band (Replacing Nick Cunliffe), and you
had another drummer before Kev (Some guy called Jack), is this the final
line up, and is everybody happy?
IAN: Yeah, I think so, this is it.
DAVE: Ian has been talking of leaving to form his own band called ‘Ian’
IAN: Yeah! No seriously, things seem pretty good now. We’ve got a solid
line up.
Is there any sort of hostility between you and the ex band members?
IAN: I don’t think so.
DAVE: We all parted on good terms. I think they’re both coming down to the
gig tonight.
IAN: We wrote a song for Jack when he left, and we’re gonna write one for
Nick too. Called Nick-er-less.
The simplest way to describe your music is ‘pop-punk’; the pioneers of
which were Blink 182 and Green Day. Green Day have grown up and Blink 182
have split up. Is ‘pop-punk’ a dying genre?
IAN: I don’t think so, I think it just needs another band out there that
can do that.
DAVE: I don’t think pop punk will ever die out because when you here it
you’ll like it, it’s just fun.
MATT: There are a lot of bands out there though who play this sort of
music. It’s not just Blink 182, the only reason people liken us to them is
because they were the big mainstream band. There’s loads of pop-punk bands
out there, they just stay a bit more out of the mainstream.
KEV: I think people are always gonna like it too, because there’s loads of
bands out there who jump on the bandwagon going ‘Ooh, we’re all miserable,
let’s go and write some really depressing songs’, our music is just fun
and upbeat, and I think people will always want that.
IAN: I think the closest thing around now is Bowling For Soup. Their last
album was amazing.
A lot of your songs, like you said earlier, are about failed
relationships and girl troubles, how come you can take all that and make
it sound really fun, rather than, as Kev said, being all miserable about
it.
MATT: We don’t wanna be ‘emo’, that’s why! We hate emo!!
IAN: DOWN WITH EMO!!
MATT: It’s just rubbish.
IAN: Ian-mo isn’t though. Ian-mo is the way forward. Nah, to be honest,
when I’m writing, I just don’t wanna be too depressed about it. There’s
gonna be other people going through the same thing, and I think if they
can here one of our songs, then maybe they’ll think ‘Oh, it’s not that
bad, let’s dance!’
DAVE: If we arrange the songs differently though, with acoustics and
stuff, they do come out depressing, but the music behind it, that’s what
really makes ‘em happy.
Kev, I’ve heard a rumour about drummers. Is it true that they
experience a lot of Deja Vu?
KEV: You’ve asked me that before.
Thought I had. What’s been the highlight for you guys so far?
MATT: For me, it’s just been joining the band, them letting me be in it. I
think Kenfest (Free summer outdoor gig in Wigan) as well. That was pretty
cool.
DAVE: The Ga Star Ga Stars gig was cool, all the kids going ‘Wooo!
Testosterone!’
What was so good about that gig?
DAVE: Well, I’ve been in a few different bands for a few years, but I’ve
never really played on a big stage, with people dancing to our music in
front of us and then cheering for each one of us when I introduced the
band. Then they didn’t even really enjoy the other two bands that they’d
come to see, and didn’t seem to bother. That was ace.
IAN: There’s a few for me. We played a gig with The Gods Of Rock at
Christmas at The Topspot, which was cool; everyone was up for that. The
same when we played The Presidential in Ashton, everyone was dancing and
it as just really cool. But yeah, I think The Ga*Ga*s definitely was a big
thing for us, it was just amazing.
I do remember that, after you’d finished playing, and lots of girls
went surrounding Ian. I’m stood there thinking ‘Hang on, it’s only Ian!’
IAN: Exactly, it is only Ian. Ian is pretty good though. Ian for
president!!
KEV: I think the highlight so far was the last gig we did at The
Presidential in Ashton. IT was packed, and everybody got really into it.
All you could see was people dancing, which was awesome. It was really hot
though, and the DJ was rubbish!!
Speaking of The Presidential, you’re set to play at a big charity gig
there on September 25th with nine other bands. Do you think it’s important
for bands to get involved with charities?
DAVE: I think so definitely. You have all these bands that go out and make
loads of money for themselves, surely they can take one night off to play
for charity and help out.
IAN: I think bands are important for charity, because they can help to
raise awareness, but I don’t like these bands that dedicate themselves to
one charity and shove it down people’s throats. If you do that people just
stop listening.
KEV: Like U2?
IAN: Yeah, Bono’s an idiot.
What kind of fans do you attract?
DAVE: Teenagers… and immature adults.
MATT: Guys and girls who basically just don’t want to grow up, so people
like us!
DAVE: I think the main core of our fans are really the people who ‘get’
our sense of humour and aren’t offended by what we say!
IAN: I think we really speak out to Hatemale as well, they’re probably our
biggest fans!
You’re playing with them at The Tavern in Wigan tonight. A band called
Testosterone with songs about girls and a band called Hatemale, it’s a bit
of a battle of the sexes isn’t it? You looking forward to it?
IAN: Yeah! I can’t wait for it!
It’s got to have been deliberately booked that way.
DAVE: Yeah, I think it’s a good idea.
IAN: I’m playing a pink guitar tonight though, so that just makes
everything a bit confusing!
Kev, I’ve heard a rumour about drummers, is it true that they
experience a lot of DeJa Vu?
KEV: How many times are we gonna do this?
Do what? A lot of bands from the Wigan area tend to venture out and try
their luck on the Manchester and Liverpool scenes, yet you’ve stayed
pretty close to home so far, why is that?
DAVE: I think we’re going to get ourselves a name round here, and then try
and take it a bit further.
IAN: We’ve only been together for a year really, some bands are together
for a whole year before they even gig, but I think we’ve done pretty well
for ourselves so far, supporting a signed band…
DAVE: Getting offered a deal, which Ian turned down.
Why did you do that?
IAN: I just didn’t think it would do for us what we wanted it do. We got
offered a deal to get our cds in shops, and possibly work with Warner
Bros. on soundtracks, but they didn’t seem to know what they were gonna do
with our music, how to market it. They were gonna take a way our creative
freedom, and I didn’t want to sign a deal just for the sake of saying that
we had one.
Do you think that’s what a lot of bands do?
IAN: There are a lot of bands out there who just want a deal and want to
be famous rather than play music, we’re not like that. We’re gonna hold on
till we get something that’s right for us. I mean, I hear they’re looking
for a new Busted, we could do that.
Do you think you’ll get what you want?
DAVE: I hope so, I don’t want to teach for the rest of my life!
[Dave is training to be a teacher]
What’s the most rock ‘n’ roll thing you’ve ever done?
KEV: It depends how you define rock ‘n’ roll. I went for a pee in the
corner of a pub because I was drunk. They threw me out, and I got banned
from my Student Union at Uni.
MATT: I was involved in a satanic ritual drinking something vulgar and
worshipping vegetables.
DAVE: I was there too, I killed the vegetable.
IAN: The most rock ‘n’ roll thing I’ve ever done was standing on Matt’s
amp at the last gig!
KEV: That’s rubbish!
IAN: And then there was the three pretty girls I went home with…
Erm, you walked home with me and Slater that night!
IAN: Oh yeah… but then I came back to Ashton later, it’s true you know, I
did!
Right, where do you see yourselves in five years time?
MATT: Smouldering on the ashes of history.
DAVE: Still rocking out. We’ll probably still be trying to make it and
cursing Ian for turning that deal down!
IAN: I see these guys backing me up in my new band, Ian & The Banshees.
KEV: Rehab.
And finally, any message to your fans?
MATT: Erm, thanks.
DAVE: Basically, to everyone who’s supported us, we just want them to know
that we are very, very grateful to all of them, they show up to pretty
much every gig, they put up with Ian’s ego, and I hope that they’ll keep
doing it and don’t get bored of us. Thanks guys keep on rocking!
IAN: And look out for new material soon. Chris, can I ask you a question?
Go for it…
IAN: What makes Testosterone so special?
CHRIS: Oh you can’t ask me that! No, I can only speak for myself, but what
I think it is, is that, I’m not really a fan of the type of music you
play, or rather it’s not the sort of stuff I would normally listen to. Yet
I can sit and listen to your songs and I do genuinely enjoy them, and it’s
not just because I know you. At least, I don’t think it is. You just play
good, fun music, and I think that’s cool.
IAN: A lot of bands in Wigan play either play a more heavier sound, or
play more traditional rock. Us being different, is that good?
CHRIS: Yes.
IAN: Fair enough. Has anybody else got any questions for Chris?
MATT: Yeah, where’s the cake?
Sadly, there was no cake to hand, but that didn’t stop Matt joining the
rest of the band later that evening for a top performance at The Tavern.
Sure bands, just like any group of friends, have their differences, but as
Ian and Dave proved that night, when it comes down to it, it’s all about
the music.
During a cover of the Foo Fighters classic, ‘Learn To Fly’, the
quarrelsome twosome looked at each other with huge, and more importantly
genuine smiles. As long as there’s music, Ian & Dave, no matter what they
say, will be friends, and along with Matt and Kev, will soon be letting
the whole world know about the pop-punk rollercoaster that is
Testosterone.
Testosterone are set to play ‘The Gig’ an all-day charity gig at The
Presidential on Sunday September 25th. Featuring other top local bands
including The Randoms, Former Babies and Riff Raff, ‘The Gig’ starts at
12:30pm. Entry is just £3 with all proceeds going to male cancer charity,
Everyman.
For more info on Testosterone, visit
www.myspace.com/testosterone
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