Valley Of The Dolls

NME 12th December 1987

Scene One: "Frailty, thy name is woman". 

God, that psychosomatic, manically depressed Dane could speak more than a few words of truth when he chose. There I was, an hour before the interview, grasping my features editor and begging to be forgiven for my actions: a headache? Queasy tummy? Rushed off my feet with work? Last desperate tactic, women's problems ? "NO! NO! NO!" 

I couldn't believe it. The situation was horrific. There was no possible escape in sight and I'd been caught red-tonsilled singing (no, not humming with contempt - SINGING) "Gorgeous", the new Gene Loves Jezebel single by a senior member of staff in the middle of NME Towers. 

It was scandalous, unheard of, the sort of inexcusable actions that career promotions aren't made of. It was, I insisted, PMT Let me at them, I'd spit in their gloriously made up faces and laugh when their mascara smudges. PAH!

With just 45 minutes to go I was left desperately wrestling with my subconscious rather than my prejudices. Of course I didn't like the single, I'd just heard it so many times that it had stuck. You know the way these slick A(dult) O(rientated) R(aunchy) pop songs sometimes do. - No? Oh shit! 

Well lets try another tack: how did you feel when you saw them live? The way they slowly peeled off layer after layer of silk, revealing lithe, voluptuous bodies? Horrific, wasn't it? The way they teased all those poor, stupid women by dangling their toes into the audience - just far enough away so they couldn't touch. They could feel the excitement. They generated it. But all they'd do was tease.....BASTARDS 

Good, we're on the way: what did you think when you interviewed Mike before?... well, he rang an hour late - keeping me waiting all that time... and ... he was short, a bit obnoxious I thought (though he'd only just woken up)... 

You're starting to make excuses for him... well urrrm... Didn't he say he never wanted to speak to NME because of the way GLJ had been ignored/scorned in the past.. yeah but he only wanted me to be gentle.... I give up. Submit. You're already nine tenths of the way there... 

Scene Two: "'His' Appartment"

Well, here goes; shoulders back, chest out. I'm just outside Sloane Square tube contemplating the ten floors of apartment block that stand between me and the Aston twins; the core of Gene Loves Jezebel. Steps taken, I've never been made to feel more welcome: coat, cosy chair, coffee and chat follow in quick homely succession.

With "Gorgeous" moving up the charts, their fourth album "House of Dolls" on the racks, a successful world-wide tour accomplished and a new profile to flautnt, I was expecting the hard-sell, lets talk about our new marketing ploy treatment. Anything but. In fact the only requestion was that after spending the whole weekend cleaning up their flat I didn't brand it "messy". Some people are easily pleased... 

Surprisingly enough, Michael and J Aston seem peculiarly content with their lot. They're not striving to be media stars; they have no unfulfilled dreams or fantasies; they don't want to change the world or even have "chart" singles; they just wannabe accepted as professionals.

"We'd like to make it into the charts just so we could stick our fingers up at all the people who wanted us to do all those crummy little TV shows. For us, that would be complete vengeance" 

Michael, the blonde twin, is sitting with one leg folded under the other on the adjacent couch airing his views without a chance of contradiction while his brother is still making his way across town. 

You've always been easy in media terms to drop into the Gothbag, though the latest material sees a real Americana transition 

"The whole Goth thing has never really bothered me, it was just the bands they chucked us in with, bands I detested like Specimen and Bauhaus. I always thought we came from a much more emotional backdrop, we didn't belong in the Goth field. We've never been a youth movement like your Cults or Bunnymen, there will never be parkas or leather jackets: Gene Loves Jezebel stood outside that on purpose. We just see ourselves as a performance based band - it's very showy what we do; very Hollywood, I dunno, Broadway"

How did the tour with Echo and the Bunnymen and New Order go in the States, is the audience there more shared? 

"To an extent, but I was surprised by The Buymen's and New Order, they all seem to wear sports gear, an almost yuppish audience. They were really intimidated by our audience. For one thing they were much younger and prettier, and two they hang our in lobbies and theirs don't do that.

We'd arrive at hotels, there would be crowds and they'd be able to walk straight through. That hurt them a lot. They just got a few old women occasionally, or they might have been their wives, I don't know"

OUCH! 

They come across with their usual crass Englishness and superiority which I find nauseating - it alienates me. They're so condescending I don't know why their audience don't just bottle them off stage. And they're completely unprofessional, you know, when people are paying a lot to see they shows they should be in a position to do shows, you know. These guys were..er.. indulging themselves too often."

And you're clean on that score? 

"You have to be. Well, J and I are."

How about on other scores? You tease and flirt so much when you're performing, doesn't your brand of never-ending strip poker ever get you into trouble?

"It beats Samantha Fox, doesn't it? Girls should have something to look at too. In America we often get into fairly scarey situations, they try to drag you off stage and tear you apart. It was funny with the Bunnymen and New Order beccause they could WALK through the audience and we were going "Alright, got a light mate!" Ha ha..."

But that whole flirtatio that's they whole joy of doing it, not knowing where its... We do a lot of silly things - not wise things. Sometimes you might, you know, consider letting that tease go a bit further, but generally you don't, you can't. Though it's a wonderful feeling having a beautiful woman chasing you...."

"Very flattering!" J walks in on a self-made cue. Like his brother he is so much more attractive devoid of pounds of heavy make-up. Both look somuch the glam pop-starlet dream and coupled with the easy, friendly manner and chirpy personalities it's difficult to see how they avoid it.

"The last thing we want to do is go out to pubs and soak up that stupid pop atmosphere."

You seem to despise the whole pop machine 

Michael: "You're so conscious of the whole novelty value of British pop. The machine will spit you out and leave you for dead..."

J: "Even the music papers are turning into the same gossip columns as the tabloids and we're frightened of success on those terms. In America and Japan you don't have those problems." 

So why bother pursuing success in this country?

"We've never worked that hard at getting success in this country. England is a relatively small market anyway and we don't need it financially. We haven't been here for 18 months, we've done a short tour and put out records for Beggars Banquet because they want succes, they deserve success."

J: "Everyone wants success in their own country, so their mum can say "Well done son", that's part of it, that's the reality of the situation. But there's something to say about being successful elsewhere and not in this country. It's a very nice feeling when you see CBS or Chrysalis' latest massive signing not doing a thing and then blowing themselves out, but we're still around - without being too grandiose about it."

Michael: "But that said, if "Gorgeous" charts, we'll be in exactly the same frame..."
 

An extra edge to these reluctant pop stars' appeal are their subtle Welsh accents, which tend to become stranger and highlighted the more relaxed they feel. Exported from the same coastal town as Dylan Thomas and John Cale they have six strapping elder brothers in Porthcawl, they're all unemployed, victims of the Maggie regime. 

J: "We always try to write on a positive note, to escape the greyness of other bands..." 

Michael: "but we don't just write about love - we've writtenn about everything from cosmetic surgery to the miners' strike..."

J: "Bread from Heaven" is about the miners and what happened to our part of the world"

Michael: "I left Wales because I couldn't breath there. It was so suffocating we found it utterly depressing and loathesome. I don't look back on my days in Wales with any affection, I just... I'm glad I escaped that hell."

J: "I enjoyed it to the extent of being a big fish in a very small pool It was very easy to be a star in Wales." 

Michael: "If you've got a job you were a star in Wales."

All the album seems to be based around a love/lust/loss theme, are you falling in and out of love all the time?"

J: We are very optimistic about what love does and we do fall in love a lot. Mike does anyway (silence/laugh). All the tragedy ones are mine..."

Michael: "J's very unlucky with women..."

J: "Michael has all the flirtations, all the excitement of the romance. I'm the lonely guy" (emphasises last line with genuine feeling)

Michael: "Arrrrhh!"

J: "No, I always attract the completely wrong kind of girl, the real neurotic, paranoiac... perhaps it's something to do with my theatrical performances, my awkwardness on stage, I don't know."

Michael: "There's half an audience totally fixated by his presence who won't even look at me and the other half are the opposite. It's bizarre, isn't it J? (a brotherly attempt at cheering his other half up). It's like having two bands on stage at the same time; two singers, different sets of songs. You have to believe in what you're singing when you go out there." 

J: "But you have to be careful, it can have the reverse effect: Bono doesn't make me want to be religious and Morrisey doesn't make we want to become a vegetarian. I want to go and buy a burger when I hear a Smiths song." 

Does that mean all thse girlies listening to GLJ's lustful songs want to be celibate? Cue mass laughter.

Michael: "No, they want to open themselves up. I hope we're slightly more promiscuous than that. Sorry, that's the wrong word - adventurous. Maybe women find us attractive because we kick against the grain of masculinity with our make-up and curious elegance, instead of having designer stubble and dirty Y-fronts."

Don't you ever feel tempted to pump yourselves full of steroids for that more masculine shape? 

Michael: "No, lean men always make better lovers, you know that Helen - everyone knows that." 

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