Interview from GADGIE ZINE issue 20
 
1) DESCRIBE SEE YOU IN HELL IN THREE WORDS
 
Short. Fast. Loud. I know that this is not most original, but probably suits us well... Also I don’t like to speak in slogans and banners.
 
2) WHAT IS THE PUNK SCENE LIKE IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC? IS IT EASY TO BOOK GIGS AND BE A PUNK? WHAT SORT OF VENUES DO THE CZECH PUNKS MAINLY USE? (SQUATS, CLUBS, YOUTH CENTRES? ETC) WHERE WOULD YOU RECOMMEND FOR A TRAVELLING PUNK ROCKER TO VISIT? ANY BANDS, LABELS, ZINES YOU THINK WE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT?
 
I think that the scene in Czech Republic is totally great right now. It has changed a lot from the early 90‘s (and ofcourse even more from the 80‘s Communist times), when it used to be definitely more chaotic and more idealistic and also way more fresh. Through the years it became more „professional“, people gained experiences in booking gigs or releasing records, today’s bands have better recordings etc. It has also became much more „americanized“ with any stupid US HC/punk trend having it’s own „mirror band“ here. Today I would say that our scene is not so much different from the rest of the so-called Western Europe, the difference lies maybe in fact, that people in Czech are not so spoiled yet by punk/hardcore and that we earn less money in general, so the gigs and some other things are a little cheaper over here (but for how much longer?).
I don’t think that it’s so difficult to be a punk over here, in bigger cities (esp. Prague – capital city) you can even find special shops, which will gladly sell you the right punk image (pretty expensive and stupid in my opinion) – trendy clothes, boots, hair-colours etc. On the other hand especially in some smaller towns it may be still a bit dangerous to walk around in punk as fuck image. And many of towns have it’s area infested by nazis/footbal hooligans hunting punx and beating them up, but I guess it’s the same everywhere.
About gig spaces – so far I saw this only in UK, but many gigs outside big cities are booked in pubs or city halls. Sometimes in rock clubs as well. Prague has the only currently running squat in Czech - Milada squat, where they do book gigs quite regularly. It’s small villa in the Northern suburb of Holesovice quarter. Other active gig spaces in Czech are 007 Club in Prague (on Strahov Hill), Paluba pub in Pisek, Cosa Nostra Club in Prelouc, Yacht Club and U Babicky pub in Brno, some other cities have different places where gigs are booked often (Hradec Kralove, Liberec, Teplice, Ostrava etc.). The best place in Czech Rep. for gigs is the autonomous club VRAH (= „murderer“) in Roznov pod Radhostem going strong since 2000. It’s pretty small place operated in d.i.y. punk as fuck way by collective of people around CO-CA and V.V.B. bands and Malarie Records label. It is also situated in beatiful area of Beskydy mountains. I saw some of the best gigs of my life there. Sadly we don’t have here the network of youth centres like they have f.e. in Germany, Sweden or Netherlands.
Usually we get lots of foreign bands touring Czech, in last 2-3 years I would even say WAY TOO MUCH. I personally would prefer if the bands would decide to release some records and tour their own country before attempting to tour the Europe, but sadly it doesn’t work like this. Czech Rep. seems to be one of the most prefered gig destinations, because it’s in the middle of Europe and, as I already wrote, prices are still little cheaper here and people are a bit more enthusiastic, so even totally crappy bands usually have better gigs here than in their homeland. On the other hand we have our dose of ass-kicking bands touring Czech, just during last 2 years our „United Crusties“ gig collective has booked bands like MIGRA VIOLENTA, SEVERED HEAD OF STATE, SICK TERROR, BORN DEAD ICONS, VIIMEINEN KOLONNA, TRAGEDY, MUNICIPAL WASTE etc. (+ dozens of killer Czech bands) and it was great!
Advices for travelling punks – if the time alows don’t visit just Prague, where you will most likely meet more Americans and English than anywhere else in the world! Prague has some pretty nice historical parts, but in general it’s pretty westernized and fucked up city with rip off prices (like every capital I saw so far). Be at least a bit adventurous for fucks sake and try some smaller places in the South (Southern Bohemia – Pisek, Cesky Krumlov), North East and South East (= Northern and Southern Moravia) – Roznov pod Radhostem, Brno, Boskovice, Znojmo etc. If you want to see some gigs check out www.czechcore.cz website for most current info.
Speaking about music I would definitely recommend bands like GRIDE (devastating extreme HC w/few vinyls out, kicking since mid 90’s, they just underwent some drastical line-up changes this month and have CD discography out), HOMO CONSUMENS (early Italian/Swedish HC worship, new split 7” w/AD CALENDAS GRAECAS out now), BALACLAVA (100% energical HC/youth crew stuff, split 7” w/CO-CA out in Jan 05), CO-CA (punk as fuck touched by WIRE/STOOGES influences just started playing again after some longer hiatus, 3 LPs out), FESTA DESPERATO (with new line-up sounding like some heavy Portland/Scandinavian crust as fuck, also the first band I know who play DISCLOSE cover), MASSGENOCIDE PROCESS (Scandi-crust tornado, two split EP’s out, split 7” w/SEE YOU IN HELL and split LP w/VISIONS OF WAR out soon), SICHERHATESYSTEM (raw punk, split 10” w/NESOUCASTS STROJE out soon), LAHAR (extreme HC ala HELLNATION, split 7” w/GRIDE in the works), INNOXIA CORPORA (rocking punk, 2nd LP out now), V.I.R. (dark crust in the vein of some old UK bands like HELLBASTARD or AMEBIX, split 7” w/DREAD 101 out soon, UK tour in 2005!), ZEMEZLUC (punk as fuck w/tons of vinyls out, playing since mid of 80s, toured UK for 3 times already), AD CALENDAS GRAECAS (fast punk attack w/some pretty original parts, a bit like DEAD KENNEDYS – LP and split 7” out), VYBOR VEREJNEHO BLAHA (sadly just split up – great bastard of hip hop and punk – LP and split 7” w/HOMO CONSUMENS out), MALIGNANT TUMOUR (grind/mince veterans playing since early 90’s right now they sound like UNCURBED/MOTORHEAD mix, tons of vinyls out, UK tour in 2005!), LYCANTHROPHY (fastcore/grind mix, new split 7” w/MALIGNANT T. out now), RED INSECT (punk as fuck like VARUKERS or BROKEN BONES, great split 7” w/NEMA BARIKADA out now, toured UK in 2004), GUIDED CRADLE (new band w/ex-DREAD 101 and V.I.R. people, total crust, BASTO (another new band w/ex-FESTA DESPARATO people playing spastic raw punk in the vein of old Finnish bands), SHEEVA YOGA (power violence/jazz in the vein of SPAZZ, MEXICAN POWER AUTHORITY etc., some split EPs out), MORE BAD NEWS (technical hardcore in CATHARSIS vein, full 7” + split 7” w/SHEEVA YOGA out, ex-SYIH drummer beating skins here), MAC GYVER (driving hardcore/punk, full 7” out now)… The list of some better-known bands who have already splitted up and who have been active in last cca 10 years includes MINDLOCK, DREAD 101, MRTVA BUDOUCNOST (fuck – my own, sorry for shameless self-promotion!), LIES AND DISTRUST, EXEKUCE, TELEFON, HEARTLINE, PANGS OF REMORSE, LOS SOMMROS (our drummer’s band), CUL DE SAC…
Labels: Insane Society Records, Ultima Ratio, Phobia, Malarie, Impregnate Noise Laboratories, Beer Is Not Drink, Drugs Kill Your Mind...
Zines: they are all in Czech language as far as I know. I do HLUBOKA ORBA zine since 1993, new issue should be out now, but today it’s more like a thick book in soft cover than zine, I also manage to put it out only once in a year.
 
3) YOU JUST COMPLETED A TOUR OF THE UK WITH HOMOCONSUMENS. HOW DID THAT GO? DO YOU THINK IT WAS VIABLE FOR A BAND FROM THE CZECH REPUBLIC TO TOUR ON A TOTALLY DIY BASIS OR WAS IT A FINANCIAL DISASTER? HOW DOES THE DIY SCENE IN THE UK COMPARE TO THE DIY SCENE IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC? AND WHY WERE YOU SO LATE ARRIVING FOR THE BOSTON GIG? (HA! HA!)
 
The UK leg of our September 04 tour was organized by our good friend Zina from Edinburgh who migrated from village near Brno to marry Paul (ex-BEERGUT 100/SOCIAL INSECURITY, now in AFTERBIRTH). She has also helped DREAD 101, EXEKUCE, ZEMEZLUC and RED INSECT before. We have played in London, Boston (since we put the photos on our website from your town we get e-mails from Americans asking us, „You guys have played Boston, Massachusets?“), Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Bradford and Bristol. On the way to UK we played in Germany, Switzerland and Belgium, on the way back home in Belgium, Netherlands and Germany again: 15 gigs in 16 days in total.
This was our third European tour with SEE YOU IN HELL and probably the best one – mostly thanx to UK! I used to tour with my old band MRTVA BUDOUCNOST every year since mid 90’s and SYIH started to tour in early 2000’s, but even like 2 years ago we would never even think about the possibility of UK tour. I had always an impression of totally dead scene with just few good fast hardcore bands in North who are more respected in mainland Europe or in USA than in their own country. I have read horror tour stories of bands who had 10 bored people on every gig they have played in UK. But when we have talked with some other Czech bands, who went to UK recently thanx to Zina, they were pretty enthusiastic about this experience, we decided to give it a try. And in the end it was fucking excellent! With the exception of Bradford, where we sucked a bit (fucking high stage, partying in Edinburgh day before untill the morning and also the people seemed to be a bit tired when we played in the end of the all dayer fest etc.), all the other UK gigs were great – the best and wildest were definitely Edinburgh and Bristol. Especially Bristol was a blast! We are (well 3 of us) already in our 30’s, so usually we feel a bit „old“ at gigs here in Czech – in Bristol we felt like teenagers. The city which gave the world classic acts like RIPCORD, CHAOS U.K., AMEBIX, DISORDER... fuck, the ultimate crust city! We liked Boston a lot as well – there were maybe like 15 people, but most of them seemed to be really into it which is totally fine with us. Cheers to PATIENT ZERO, one of the best bands we have played with during this tour! Also Scotland was very nice, London was punk as fuck (it was just 1st or 2nd gig ever in new Poison Club Depot just 2 weeks after it was squatted), it was nice to visit 1in12 Club finally after all these years when we just read about this place... One of the greatest parts was to meet people I use to correspond with for long years already and in general just to see that most of people were really friendly and seemed to appreaciate the fact that bands from Eastern Europe came to UK. And also there could not be better touring partners for us than HOMO CONSUMENS – ultimate raw punk drunk as fuck bastards.
The tour was financial disaster (for the first time in our history), but I think it wasn’t so much because of the UK. Yes, the ferry was expensive and the petrol (and everything else) is also much more expensive than in continental Europe, but the payment we got for the gigs was usually pretty decent. We lost much more in Belgium and especially in Netherlands, so next time we go to UK we gona skip most of mainland dates and will go straight to UK. In the end we didn’t loose much as we sold lots of records and T-shirts, so we paid most of the 800 EU (for both bands) debt this way.
The most significant difference between Czech and UK scene is the age of punx – over here are most of people in early 20’s or younger, in UK it goes from late 20’s until 40’s. This is just great and it shows that punx not just for teenagers.
We arrived so late to Boston because of fucking Stonehenge visit... sorry we are not only punx, but sometimes (very rarely) stupid tourists as well!
 
4) APART FROM THE UK, HAVE YOU TOURED OUTSIDE THE CZECH REPUBLIC BEFORE? WHERE IS THE STRANGEST PLACE YOU’VE EVER PLAYED? ANY HORROR STORIES OF DISASTOROUS GIGS? BEST GIGS YOU’VE PLAYED? ANY BANDS OR PLACES THAT REALLY SHOULD BE BETTER KNOWN FROM EASTERN EUROPE?
 
Yes, we did two weeks tour back in 2002 with GRIDE (Czech Rep., Germany, Netherlands) and another two weeks tour in 2003 again with GRIDE (Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Slovenija, Austria). We did also some shorter tours with MINDLOCK and THE PUBLIC – Hungary, Slovakia, Poland... So far we did around 130 gigs and I think that atleast half of them were outside Czech. Strangest place... well, we have played twice in this wooden ex-factory for socks in eastest part of Slovakia. The place was later „de-constructed“ brick by brick by people from nearby Gypsy ghetto. Here in Brno we use to organize from time to time gigs in our rehearsal room, it’s just for 30-40 people and the room is really small, so it can be pretty wild. Last time we did gig there with LAHAR and HOMO CONSUMENS it has turned into total frenzy with lots of flying objects... There is this gig place in Northern Moravia – Ostrava city, which is just converted changing room for miners of abaddoned black coal minery. We have never played there, but I saw some photos from this place and it looks really surreal.
Ofcourse we have our good share of horror tour stories including broken vans/cars, crazy drunk experiences or some unneccessary conflicts with people’s stupidity, but in general we are doing pretty fine so far, I would say...
Best gigs... it’s a bit difficult to choose just few of them, but the last one, celebrating 5 years of our experience was a total blast... but I will talk about it later, OK? Other than that, as far as my memory goes, I would say that gig in Prerov/Goblin Club with NARCOSIS and S.A.F. back in April 2002 was great (the lightning was torn down by wild stage-divers), the same place, but different gigs with OUTCOLD and QUATRO STAGIONI as well, last year’s Obscene Society Fest (celebrating the 9 years anniversary of Insane Society and Obscene Prod. labels) in Pardubice surprised us as well as we are not used to play in front of 400 people and they went crazy, all the 3 gigs we have played in France in 2003 with GRIDE during our tour were so great (Dijon, Montbrison, Bordeaux), also the gig in Basque country we have played during this tour... And I have already talked about UK gigs, so... I think we have still better and better gigs, they seem to get more out of hand each time we play and that’s pretty cool.
Worst gigs: lots of them especially during the first 2 years of our existence. I think that we have tried to play way too complicated style, which was sometimes difficult to transform live and not to suck in the same time. Also our old drummer was kind of hard person to deal with and our backline back then was just a total mess. In general some of our worst gigs have been on bigger fests – now I don’t mean some commercial gatherings, but just hardcore/punk fests for 1.000 or more people. We found out that this is really not for us and we will probably never play these events again. Over here they seem to be pretty popular (Fluff Fest for mostly S.E. bands, Obscene Extreme Fest for grind bands, Antisociety Fest for punk rock bands – we have played the first two back in 2002), but for us they are already way to big and hyped up.
Well, I am not totally sure if something like “Eastern Europe” still exists and honestly, I am no big expert when it comes to touring this part of the world. Living in this part of Europe and being active in punk scene for some years, I definitely don’t hold any idealistical views about f.e. touring places like Balkan or Baltic countries. SEE YOU IN HELL played gigs in Hungary and Poland and they were nothing way too special, some my friend’s bands (S.I.K.A., PAZI SNAJPER) toured Lithuania and Latvia and they were treated really poorly in some of the places with almost non-existant payement, no food and zero attendance on their gigs. Now I see that these countries are poorer than Czech for example, but still you should treat the bands you invite as your guests (atleast we try our best here in Brno to do it like this) and give them atleast decent food, sleeping places etc. – in general good treatment. Similar experiences had also MASS GENOCIDE PROCESS and MALIGNANT TUMOUR when they toured Serbia, Bulgaria etc. in May 2004. So I am not so crazy about touring East Europe - sometimes it can be good, sometimes it can suck hard.
About bands from Eastern Europe – check out LAMANT from Belarus, GEORGE HARRISON from Russia, ANTICHRIST (r.i.p.) from Poland and their new band UNANYMOUS SOCIETY PARADOX, also INFEKCJA from Poland as well, SUPERAPE X from Slovakia, LECSA PUNK from Hungary... There are tons of great obscure bands from 80s or early 90s who don’t play anymore, especially Poland used to have so great punk scene in the 80s, definitely check out any old recordings by DEZERTER, TZN XENNA, REJESTRACJA, SIEKIERA, ARMIA, TRAGEDIA, ABADDON, MOSKWA etc.
 
5) RELIGION SEEMS TO BE A MAJOR DRIVING FORCE IN SEE YOU IN HELL. DO ANY OF YOU COME FROM RELIGIOUS BACKGROUNDS? WHAT EXACTLY IS IT ABOUT RELIGION THAT YOU DEAL WITH IN YOUR LYRICS? DO YOU THINK RELIGION ACTUALLY HAS ANY REDEEMING FEATURES? WHO DO YOU WISH TO “SEE IN HELL”?
 
Haha, that’s a good observation! I know that atleast three of us were baptised after birth, but back in the 70’s it was more like a provocation or an act of disagreement with the rulling Communist regime (which promoted atheism really hard) from our parents side, who were definitely non-religious. It has also lots of to do with the fact, that our region is most religious part of the country, but Czech Rep. in general is fortunately very atheist, which is great. I think that the main message from our lyrics concerning religion would be this: religion makes you blind, people should think with their own head and one of the most important weapons of a human is his/her ability to form a critical view about things surrounding him/her. Religion has already „answers“ (better therm would be dogmas) for almost everything, lots of them already pretty outdated. Fuck this – we want to promote free-thinking, not the book of rules, which everybody has to follow. I would like to see all these so-called „Christian hardcore/punk bands“ in hell – burning in hell.
 
6) SOME OF THE SONGS ON THE 12” SEEM TO ALLUDE TO SOME SORT OF “SECRET POLICE” OR “BIG BROTHER” SCENARIO (“ENEMY” AND “TOTALITARIAN ARCHITECTURE”). IS THIS A REFLECTION OF LIFE IN EASTERN EUROPE? DO YOU STILL FEEL THAT YOUR EVERY MOVE IS BEING WATCHED? OR IS IT A MORE GENERAL OBSERVATION OF THE MODERN WORLD?
 
Yes, it is. The control of every aspect of your life during the Communist times was really crazy. It was so absurd, that even rock bands were forced to show their lyrics to cultural comissions, who then decided, if you can or can’t play officially. Ofcourse that most of punk bands had to play in total DIY conditions and even this was dangerous, lots of gigs have been attacked by police and even some punx were forced to cooperate with secret police as agents (the singer of one of the best known punk bands from Prague called PLEXIS used to have secret nickname “Sid” given to him by police). So I would say that we are kind of “well experienced” in the area of control and manipulation and this is reflected in our lyrics as well. Modern capitalist democracy has just more subtle means of total control. Have you heard about Tesco stores in UK who are putting microchips in their products, so they would know what exactly you prefer to buy?
 
7) AFTER THE FALL OF COMMUNISM IN EASTERN EUROPE, IT APPEARS THE CAPITALISM OF THE WEST HAS BEEN EMBRACED IN THE EAST. IS IT THE CASE THAT PEOPLE ARE LESS LIKELY TO OPPOSE CAPITALISM AS THEY REMEMBER “THE DARK DAYS” OF COMMUNISM? HOW DO YOU THINK LIFE IN CZECH NOWADAYS COMPARES TO BEFORE THE “IRON CURTAIN” FELL?
 
People over here used to welcome capitalism with open arms, which is no wonder after all this misery we used to have over here before 1989 (and by „misery“ I don’t mean famine or some humanitarian catastrophe, but more something like „collective state of mind“). The big problem since the beginning was that the loudest out of all these new politicians after 1989 used to be these fanatical lovers of „free market without any regulations“ - people totally worshipping Thatcher‘s or Reagan’s economics. These people were able to formulate pretty straight forward politics easy to swallow, while on the other hand politicians with more credibility, like these coming from anti-communist dissent/underground were mostly impractical intellectuals, which had big problem to speak straight to „masses“. So people either didn’t understood them or they didn’t liked them at all because they reminded them so strongly their own guilt and fault during Communism (when the rulling Communist party used to have like 2 million members and 99% of the population was more or less collaborating). So this part of the politics, which could have been atleast a little left wing or more critical towards the new pro-capitalist proccesses, was pretty weak since the beginning. Right now, 15 years after the „revolution“ people can finally see also the bad consequences – big unemployement in some parts of the country, permanently rising prices, much bigger criminality, social services cut down etc. And it’s clear that some most drastic things are just awaiting us (pension reform, national health care reform etc.). I think that neo-liberalism got a really great playground in the form of Eastern Europe and some of the totally cheap tricks from textbooks were used over here. Factories from UK or from Germany left their old countries, come here, promise the solution of local unemployement problem, receive tax holidays or land for free, force the local factories to close down, open their own factory here (the labour is still much cheaper here than in the West), produce something for 1 – 2 years and then just leave to Ukraine or Romania. I used to work in local social-ecological movement fighting the construction of new shopping malls, which is another clear example of neoliberal politics – shit like Tescos forcing their way into towns all over Czech not giving a fuck about the opinions of their inhabitants, causing huge traffic problems (which are then solved from our tax money), forcing smaller bussinesses to bankrupt, breaking the laws and regulations and then just throwing something like 1.000 pounds as an act of their generous charity to local social services house, when they open new mall. Nice, isn’t it?
 
8) ARE THE CZECH REPUBLIC AT ALL INVOLVED IN “THE WAR AGAINST TERROR”? WHAT IS THE POSITION OF THE CZECH GOVERNMENT IN RELATION TO THE U.S.A. LEAD INVASION OF IRAQ? HAS THERE BEEN ANY VISIBLE PROTEST TO THE “WAR”? DO YOU THINK THE “WAR AGINST TERROR” HAS ACTUALLY ACHIEVED ANYTHING POSITIVE? HOW DO YOU SEE THE SITUATION DEVELOPING?
 
Yes, Czech is involved as well, although as a country who was always under the rule of somebody else, it has now a little problem how to suck both dicks in the same time – how to satisfy both Americans, who just announced that we are part of their „Coalition fighting terror“ without asking us first (you know, that’s the usual way how to communicate with colony under your rule) and European Union who holds a bit laid back position in this issue. So we have some hospital or some cops in Iraq, but not an army as far as I know (I think that sending our brave troops to Iraq would mean an immediate victory for the rebels fighting U.S., so this may be some sort of explanation as well).
There used to be some protests against war, but unfortunately not so visible. Here in Brno we co-organized like 3 of them and at most there were like 200-300 people. Most of the general public is opposed to war, but people don’t like to show their opposition in the streets. Maybe also because of some of the organizations setting up these protests, who are kind of weird like fucking Trots, Commies or liberal foreigners living in Prague... I don’t know.
I think that the war on terror has atleast one good achievement – if you are not totally stupid, you can finally see how do the world scale politics work, like G.W. Bush said, „Either you are with us or against us“ – so you can now clearly see who is who. That’s cool.
How do I see the situation developing – don’t force me to quote DISCHARGE lyrics here...
 
9) READING YOUR LYRICS THEY COME ACROSS AS PRETTY BLEAK AND NEGATIVE. DO YOU HOLD OUT ANY HOPE FOR THE MODERN WORLD AND SOCIETY AT LARGE? DO SEE YOU IN HELL HAVE ANY POSITIVE SONGS OR MESSAGES OR IS AT ALL DOOM AND GLOOM?
 
Despite all this shit, you can always find a space in your life, where you can live for 100% fulfilling your dreams and desires. You just have to work hard for it. So this is probably the kind of positive message, which you can hear from some of our lyrics.
 
10) IF YOU COULD SEND 5 THINGS TO ROOM 101 (THE ROOM FROM GEORGE ORWELL’S 1984 WHERE THINGS CAN BE BANISHED FOREVER) WHAT WOULD YOU SEND AND WHY? (THIS IS USUALLY A FUNNY, LIGHTHEARTED QUESTION SO FEEL FREE TO SEND FIVE REALLY TRIVIAL THINGS TO ROOM 101!)
 
Haha... You don’t have to school me about Orwell, since he’s one of my favourite writers (along with Bukowski, Huxley, Mander, Moore...). Look, I am not so idealistical and I like to keep the things on some basic, ground level, so – I would like to banish smoking on gigs, shitty food for touring bands, emo, ska and pop punk. I know that these are not so ambiguous aims, but if this would work, it would make me definitely happy!
 
11) NOW IT’S TIME FOR THE X FILES PART OF THE INTERVIEW: DO YOU BELIEVE IN GHOSTS? HAS ANY OF YOU HAD ANY SUPERNATURAL EXPERIENCES YOU’D LIKE TO SHARE WITH US? TELL US A GOOD GHOST STORY? ANY GOOD CONSPIRACY THEORIES FROM THE CZECH REPUBLIC?
 
No. No. No.
 
12) GADGIE IS INFAMOUS FOR THE TALES OF CHILDHOOD FUN AND GAMES. TELL US A FUNNY STORY FROM YOUR CHILDHOOD!
 
Actually this one is not about any SYIH member, but about our very good friend, who runs the most known crust label in Czech Rep... I really can‘t disclose his name, as he definitely doesn’t like to talk about this little incident (but my girlfriend’s aunt used to teach him at school, so I know all the cool details!). Well, when he was around ten, he was kind of a loner, not having so much friends etc. (like most of us later punks!). Usually he liked to play alone just with a box of matches in the garden of his granddaddy and this garden was situated right next to local agricultural factory... There was a hole in the fence... Well, you can figure out, what has happened... The damage was something like one million of Czech crowns (back then in the 80‘s the average salary was around 3.000 crowns), so his parents weren’t happy at all that their son managed to burn the whole factory down. The best thing is that he really doesn’t like to talk about it even now (maybe this experience made him punk!), but we sometimes do joke behind his back about doing a cover song by BOY SETS FIRE or famous song „I am the Child Of the Flames“ by old Slovakian metal band TUBLATANKA just for him. You know, we are cruel bastards.
 
 
13) RIGHT, TIME TO SIGN OFF – WHO ARE YOUR HEROES? WHO IS THE BEST BAND TO COME FROM THE CZECH REPUBLIC? WHAT IS THE MOST EMBARRASSING RECORD IN YOUR COLLECTION? WHAT IS THE SCARIEST HORROR FILM EVER? WHO IS THE BEST FOOTBALL TEAM IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC? WHEN ARE YOU COMING BACK TO VISIT US IN THE UK AGAIN?
 
Fuck the heroes... I don’t have any. But I like Sherlock Holmes... one of my childhoood’s heroes...
Best band from Czech? HOMO CONSUMENS and GRIDE (I know that these are 2 bands, but really, I just can’t figure out, which one is better, sorry).
Most embarassing record in my collection – „No Surrender“ comp. LP on White Noise w/SCREWDRIVER and BRUTAL ATTACK... no, just joking, I just saw this record in MRR’s archive, when I visited San Francisco in 2003... Most embarassing record I have is probably Russian press of „Overkill“ LP by MOTORHEAD.
Scariest horror film? I am no expert, I don’t have a TV and don’t go to cinemas and last time I tried to go to see „Salo – 120 Days of Sodomy“ by Passolini, it was completely sold out, so I missed it.
Favourite footbal team... fuck the footbal. Man, you have some strange non-punk hobbies! Over here is organized footbal spoiled by hooligans‘ violence and dirty tricks of 90% of clubs (as recent police survey disclosed) bribing the referees not only with money, but with prostitutes as well... My favourite sport is changing the sides of records on my turntable.
We are coming back to UK again in September 2005, but check out also V.I.R. (in March 05) and MALIGNANT TUMOUR (in May 05 – maybe that the person from question nr. 12 is coming along, but don’t tell...) on their first UK tours.
If anybody want to help us w/Sep 2005, please get in touch and we will contact you with Zina, who is organizing our trip again. See you there, see you in hell!
 
14) You recently played your 5 year anniversary gig - how did that go? How have you managed to stay together so long when so many bands split up and form new"ex members" bands so often? What do you feel is the most notable achievement in your five year history?
 
This was pretty „out of - any - fucking – limits“ event. We borrowed very authentic monks suits from Moravia’s National Theatre, made big wooden cross and started our set with some great parts from old Czech film about middle-ages and inquisition processes against witches. Then we came on the stage and started to play “Comtess Bathory” by VENOM. The whole place erupted with some heavy moshing, stage-diving and flying objects (plastic bottles, children’s toys, rolls of toilet paper, paper crosses etc.). We’ve also had different singers for most of our songs – our friends from GRIDE, BASTO, FESTA DESPERATO, MASS GENOCIDE PROCESS and HOMO CONSUMENS. Our set was finished with cover of old Czech black-metal’s classic “Graveyard” by ROOT, 80s black metal band from our hometown. Our set was a part of the annual Killed By Brno Fest, which we organize every December and invite bands from all over Czech to play the mighty Yacht Club, our hardcore base!
I am not sure if 5 years is so long time, my previous band MRTVA BUDOUCNOST managed to stay alive for 6 years, so... I don’t know, I don’t have any universal recipes for this, just make sure to choose the right people to work with and always discuss everything in depth within the band. I think that the biggest achievement in our “history” is (besides all these tours and vinyls) that our current line-up suits us well and everything works out smoothly. I think that we all already know what do we want and how to reach it and there are no bigger disagreements among us at all. Three of us have already families and children (we produce daughters exclusively – the singer has 10 years old, drummer 6 and 3 years old and I have 10 months old) and we try to do our best to balance all our activities and other things, hopefully it will work out in the future as well.
 
15) COULD YOU GIVE THE PEOPLE OF GADGIELAND A DISCOGRAPHY AND CONTACT ADDRESS FOR SEE YOU IN HELL PLEASE?
 
SEE YOU IN HELL dis-cography:
 
-         demo (2000)
-         split EP w/MINDLOCK (2001)
-         full EP (2002)
-         split EP w/THE PUBLIC (2003)
-         split tape w/HOMO CONSUMENS (2003)
-         „Market Your Self“ LP/tape (2004)
 
Plus compilation songs on records/CDs/tapes all over the world (Indonesia, USA, France, Germany, Mexico etc.)
Plans: SEE YOU IN HELL/MASS GENOCIDE PROCESS split EP (out in March 2005), Japanese press of our new record on Too Circle Records (who will organize our Japanese tour in March 2006), some more compilations...
 
Thanx a lot for this great interview, we really appreciate your interest in our band. Thanx also for the nice treatment/hospitality we received in Boston and warm greetings to all our UK friends – we hope see you again this year.