DARKLIFE: Just a quick routine question to get into the matter, which band or artsist inspired you to get on stage and especially compose?

Christian Wicky: That would definitely be SPRINGSTEN, my first (and only) hero, Born To Run was one of the very first records album I bought, basically on the fact that he looked so cool on the cover. Of course, 7 minutes epic songs were a little out of reach so we aimed at first to copy our favorite bands of the moment, which were THE DAMNED , THE CLASH and NEW MODEL ARMY. Seems like that kind of stuff stays with you for ever, everything I've written since (or every pose you take, willingly or subconsciously on stage) comes from those days.

DL: Your best memory in a recording studio and with which producer?

CW: We were fortunate to only have good memories, the two recordings we did in NY wit John Agnello were very fun and the americans generally have an unbeatable work ethic. The last record we did in Switzerland with Greg Wales from Australia was also extremely fun, but I guess the best memories were with Santi Garcia in Barcelona, just because he was a very laid back punk rocker and would chill out a lot, gave us time to sit on terraces and beaches, all the while still making the band rock out quite intensily when the time came for rocking. I guess the only unpleasant studio experience we had was when we did recordings on our own, it's always nice to have an input from a guy you trust and like.

DL: For years Lausanne was a dull place with nowhere to party, and now it's the place to be, where things happen in the French speaking part of Switzerland. It has even become the Swiss Rock & Electro mecca, how do explain that?

CW: It seems like every scene hangs on a very very VERY small number of people. In Lausanne, for years, the scene was dead just because the leaders were fuck ups and morons. As soon as a very motivated crew of people took over, did Le Romandie and fought for the right to party, everything went well, other kids were inspired to do it themselves. I must say a lot of the credit goes to Renaud, the guy from KRUGER, who's an amazingly nice guy, hard worker and who's focused enough to actually get things done and still have fun doing them.

DL: What madness got into you and your partners in crime Renaud (KRUGER) and David to create the label & distribution IRASCIBLE and how do you forsee the near future of the record industry?

CW: Renaud had the insane idea of starting this, and at the time I told him it would never work. Of course, he's good at what he does and as soon as it started taking off, he recruited David (who used to work at L'Usine in Geneva) and me (I worked at the indie record shop Disc A Brac). We were not only fortunate enough to take advantage of the bad state of the record industry by getting great labels whose Swiss distributions had collapsed, but we also diversified right away, doing more and more booking and promotion. Renaud, who is the boss, has a very democratic way of seeing the company, is always open to our ideas and together I think we brought IRASCIBLE to a very nice place in the Swiss music scene.

DL: Being Swiss touring abroad can be a real challenge, what are your impressions of the clubs, life on tour, hard times?

CW: Yep, the worst being of course the UK and the USA, where everything is a struggle. Touring Europe has gotten to be quite comfortable for us, even though we payed our dues and slept on our share of stinky kitchens floors. The worst experience was probably when someone said that we could sleep in their living room after a show in Houston. We got to the house, it was quite dark and we were pretty happy to see that there was a nice rug on the floor. Of course, when he turned on the light, we realised it was actually dog hair that covered the whole appartement... But in any case, except for a few times, we always enjoyed the solidarity you get from the people who come and see you, and, to get back to your question, being Swiss always gave us the exotic advantage of not being the hundredth band from Cleveland Ohio, criticizing George Bush and saying that everything is "awesome". I guess you don't realise that what you have to offer, the way you play music and your stage talk is actually influenced from where you come. Even though we play pretty straightforward rock music that some would consider banal, after a show abroad, there would always be someone who'd come and tell us how unique we were. And one last cool thing about being Swiss is that it lowers expectations, nobody takes you that seriously and they sort of suppose you're not going to be any good, so yeah, just play ok, have decent songs and don't look too much like a twerp on stage and you've got them thinking "wow, I was expecting these guys to suck, they're pretty good"...

DL: If not already done,  who would like to do a "versus" album with?

CW: We're really not very good at collaborating, we've been playing for 20 years now and seems like the band has it's own communication skills that are hard to share with anybody else, but I really wouldn't mind doing a split/cover album with a nice hardcore band, say CHAMPION or HOT WATER MUSIC (even though i'm guessing neither of them exist anymore) and make their songs sweeter while they rough up ours.

DL: Is there an artist's attitude that particularly pisses you off?

CW: Yeah, I hate the niceness in the scene, that "we're all a big family of musicians" type of thing. Bands shouldn't be scared to slag people off, to be a bit meaner and more arrogant, it makes things so much more fun, more frank, more interesting. Of course, especially in Switzerland, people are often shocked by people who actually have an opinion, seems like it's some unclean way of thinking. We've always tried to be arrogant assholes and, if i dare say so myself, have often succeeded in said venture.

DL: What's the latest album that really kicked your ass?

CW: It's not that new, but The Boxer by THE NATIONAL is an amazing piece of music, the singer grumbles like a pissed off old man, the band is really understated when they play, lyrics are simple but brilliant, I really love that record. Apart from that, I love the Hold Steady, more or less for the same reasons (minus the understatment of the playing).

DL: What are your projects at the moment and in the near future?

CW: I'm recording a new album for my solo project THE SAD RIDERS in October, i've got a double-bass player, a jazz drummer, the piano player from FAVEZ and two rock guitarists (one fo them being my brother Greg from CHEWY/PENDLETON), it's songs I've been writing for the last 5 years, so it's nice to see the evolution there has been, not in the songwriting but in my personal life, it's a nice document for me and hopefully some people will like it. Apart from that we're working on a 20th birthday project with FAVEZ, we're planning on doing a festival tour with films and stuff, and then it's off for a new FAVEZ album, probably to be released in October 2010. We've changed our way of writing songs, we were getting nowhere with our usual "get in the room, make some noise and see what comes out" technique, so we now have two songwriting teams, the piano player and i write songs together at my place and the four other guys in the band get in the room, makes some noise and see what comes out. It's quite fun to see what the others come up with, you can give your input without having your nose in it. It's the first time that we write without the impact of the noise behind us at all times, so it might be quite different and who knows, maybe it'll suck, but in any case it's very exciting and when you've been in a band for twenty years, excitement is a nice feeling...

DL: And now, the Darklife question by one of our friendly reader let's call him ' Bob' : 'If you could change three things in Switzerland, what would they be?'

CW: -I'd like the French speaking part to be more interested in the German speaking part's culture, instead of constantly looking down on it and making fun of it. -I'd love people to be more intersted in the songs that a band has, seems like everybody is fascinated with sound and attitude, but there is something to be said about classy songwriting, and that goes for any style of music. -I'd also like people to do a bit more for the scene, work in a club, do stuff for free, just give a hand from time to time. So many people seem to think they're exploited if they work for free. If you love something and it exists only if people who love it as much as you do make it exist, you shouldn't think it's not valid because no one is making money from it.

DL: What's your top 20 of swiss club venues?

CW: Here goes, in no particular order: Le Romandie (Lausanne) Le Bourg (Lausanne) Bad Bonn (Düdingen) ISC (Bern) Gaswerk (Winterthur) Salzhaus (Winterthur) Grabenhalle (St Gallen) Palace (St Gallen) Kiff (Aarau) Ox (Zofingen) Mariaberg (Rorschach) Schüür (Luzern) Treibhaus (Luzern) Börömpömöm (Oberentelden) Frison (Fribourg) Nouveau Monde (Fribourg) La Coupole (Bienne) Sommercasino (Basel) and two in the R.I.P. section: Werkhof (Luzern) Haffenbuffet (Rorschach)

DL: And your last word is?

CW: I probably forgot a club, I feel really bad!

chris@irascible.ch
www.irascible.ch

(Photos © Christian Wicky)