Podrophenia - In Conversation With Chris Constantinou: sessions from Adam Ant to Wayner Kramer

The April Podrophenia is a rockin' rollin' conversation' with bass player Chris Constantinou.
From his early days with Drill and touring with Slade, travelling the world with Adam Ant, playing Live Aid, working with Chas Chandler, Annabella Lwin, The Dandy Warhols, The Wolfmen.... right up to latest projects The Mutants (Wilko Johnson, Norman Watt-Roy, Wayne Kramer), One Thousand Motels (with Rat Scabies) and Rude GRL & CC it's all there!

Including stories you'll have never heard or read anywhere else! Plus a playlist of tunes from across his varied career.

Buckle up for the ride below...

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The Wolfmen and Dahler Mehndi

Chris Constantinou · Daler Mehndi Feat The Wolfmen

Wilko, Wayne Kramer and Rat Scabies during a Mutants session - Chris and m'self on the far left

New project with RudeGRL

Podrophenia salutes ten years of The Railway..

Pretty much around the same time I started this blog - The Railway in Southend opened it's doors with new owner installed Dave Dulake . It's a three storey, ex hotel - that's since gone on to become one of the most celebrated boozers in southern England - if not the entire country..

Film crews, TV broadcasters and Sunday supplement scribblers all have made their way Southend Central-wards to capture the music and magic of the venue. And Wilko Johnson is such a regular - his boat-race has ended up on the Pub's banner.

Podrophenia has been broadcasting from The Railway for four years, putting on live nights their for five, While I've been  quacking on about it since this...

So for the latest Podrophenia Piley and self celebrate 10 years of Southend's most musical and vegan foodie boozer - The Railway. There's a beautiful acoustic set from Dave Woodcock (with news on his second Blow Up album). Fi Dulake is in for a chat about the history of and future plans for the pub..

And we bring you tracks from some fave bands and gigs that have taken place over the last ten years at The Railway including a track from the due soon Steve West Weston album

Plus  a pop quiz: what is the live Wilko tune played and which artiste gets on the playlist twice in TWO diff turns

Screen test: spot the Mondo blogging bass player and Fi Dulake on drums...


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Podrophenia Art and Cultcha

The Art Podrophenia is up for download and features two special guests - video director and photographer Carl Hawkins - chatting about his work and spinning some top tuneage.

And artist and guitarist Jack Browning endorsed by Wilko, Russell Brand and Ace Frehley Brush up on samples of their work above and download a freebie DL of Podro which comes loaded with a Bowie cover, a Steve Hooker newbie and pallete-loads more

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Vive Le Rock - Mutant Moments....

Your recommended reading for this month: the most rock 'n' roll mag on the shelves Vive Le Rock

From me, you've got a meet The Mutants feature, catching up  with Chris Constantinou about the band and how the Mutie co-conspirators were recruited. Also an interview with Wilko on how the MC5 changed his life..

Reviews-wise Ian McLagen's newbie and a Wilko Johnson double-barrel best of are under the spotlight as well also Barry Cain's Wet Dreams, Dry Lives.

Other nuggets between the covers include the Eight Rounds Rapid album reviewed. interviews with Bob Mould, the Bunnymen, Neville Staples, Sisters of Mercy and the Bermondsey Joyriders.


Available at WHSmith and all in the know newsagents...

One Chord Wonders, Eight Rounds Rapid, Podrophonic double-decking and a visit from Wilko.

TV times, Smith and Johnson - photo by Paul Hughes

We really do get the best guests, bands, boozers, dancers, photographers and audiences at our Podrophenia bashes. Saturday the 7th, was another hat-popper of an evening with assorted Southenders coming together and mixing with London callers all collecting together for the Retroman, Southend Punk, Podrophenia team up of ...

Eight Rounds Rapid - photo by Simon Siggs

Eight Rounds Rapid: who powered through an atom-splitting set of fan faves and new tunes (Bully Boy, I Want a Drink) like an Estuary-fed rhythm 'n' new wave groove machine.



After run of dates playing to 3000 gig-goers at Koko and similar size venues around the UK, 8RR's presence and power has bulked up Bruce Banner/Hulk style to the point where there's almost not enough stage for the band's skittering, riffs and rapid fire attack. And what a way to encore - with limited edition single (Podrophenia Records) Writeabout...

It's also the first time we've seen a press pit of photographers at any Railway gig

Punk'd TV - photo by Paul Hughes

TV Smith's: third innings at The Railway was a crowd rousing reunion at one of his favourite UK venues. A pure and practised pro, TV kept the crowd onside while working through a string break, managed to wing in a Christmas song, finished his set backed by a Southenders stage invasion and pulled in soundman Duncan Leslie for a duet on his One Chord Wonders encore.



Downstairs, post TV, Piley and self span in a selection of Podophenic mixtures. disco, funk, garage, mash ups, covers and ska eventually wrapping up at 1am with an improve sing-along to Prince Buster's Enjoy Yourself by the Rail(way)-voice choir...

Song of a preacher man - Podro a go-go

A huge thank you is due to anyone who raised a glass, shook a leg, took a pic, played a note and generally joined in with the most spectacular of Saturday Night shakedowns....

The Mutants are Coming: an MC5th, a Feelgood, a Blockhead, an Ant and a Rat - all on the same historic session

It's that photobomber again - 2nd from right

While I'm still in recovery from the broken shoulder - how about catching up on what's been sizzling away over the summer months - and backtracking to the evening of 27th June, when all of punk, pub and garage rock's historical planets came into alignment.for a due soon album The Rhythm and Punk Revue

At the nucleus of this cross-generational get-together was the re-teaming of Wayne Kramer and Wilko Johnson - a pairing reunited for the first time since sharing a bill together at The London Rock n Roll Show 1972. Where the Feelood's were backing Heinz - and a gig Wilko has repeatedly gone record as saying changed  his life. In fact, dig into the vid below for the King of Canvey in full flight - telling the tale himself.

Be warned - contains tales of mild peril and explosive effing and jeffing from the get-go...



This glittering gathering has come together under the banner of The Mutants working up new tunes written by Chris Constaninou and Paul Subsource and recorded with a roll-call of new wave, ska and punk legends. Dig about the latest issue of Vive Le Rock and in between a bulgiing edition covering the birth of New York Punk, Ian McCulloch interviewed - you'll find Chris giving the back story to these Mutant moments

Dig around the back pages and you'll find me reviewing Norman Watt-Roy's first solo album Faith and Grace - as well as Wilko's homecoming gig at Southend's Village Green festival...

Not him again - in the orange!

How was last week's 'Writeabout' launch at Southend Central's most rocking assembly point - you ask?

Photos by Paul Hughes

Swishy, sweaty and spectacular - is the answer! And where we were joined by London based label bosses, journalists, DJs - and our surprise, special guest, watching from side-stage - Mr Wilko Johnson..

Round One... Swindle.
With fourteen songs, one set list to sequence and only two evenings for me to rehearse (at home, playing along to the records) - we set up our stall of seditious and subversive standards, opening with a triple-fisted slam of Bodies, I Fought the Law, and Neat Neat Neat - exiting stage left, one plectrum-snapping, sweat-heavy, sticky-steaming hour later. -  closing with a sing-a-long final lap of Pretty Vacant, Blitzkrieg Bop and Another Girl Another Planet (for the encore)

Round Two - Eight Rounds Rapid
The last time Eight Rounds stepped onto a Southend stage,  prior to Wilko's Farewell tour - was for our Podrophenia/8RR/Thee Faction team-up. During the course of a sixty minute set mixing known faves and new songs (Bully Boy) 8RR took The Railway apart track by track. Of course there are shadows of the Feelgoods in the sour expressions and ruffled 'n' dusty suits, but these boys are an all-new threat, with the heavy-level menace and cocksure manner of villains at a secret speakeasy planning an international blag.

 Lee Watkins jabs and batters his kit like a boxer at a sparring session. Bass player Juju prowls, grins and winks like a card sharp, while Simon Johnson is all fidgets and tics, hoovering around the stage crackling and overcharged as if he's been wired directly into to the national grid. By contrast Dave Alexander's static, crisp 'n' dry delivery, face-front manner and unblinking stare have the command and control of Michael Caine's performance in Get Carter. A game-raising display that saw the Eight Rounders literally drawing blood, sweat and tear-ups for the assembled home crowd and visiting London callers

Round Three - Podrophenia
For the after-show in bar from 11 onwards, Piley and I tag-teamed between nineties indie-bits and obscure popsters, to soul shakers, funky covers and something that's becoming a standard - passing the disco baton from K C (me) to Donna Summer (Piley).. And behold - as Mike Herbage, he of Department S, takes a breather from shaking a Podrophonic leg to our tunes… (stage right, glasses - holding a drink)

For the full glory and gallery of the evening (and until we re-group again in December) have a thumb threw Paul Hughes Flickr sets hereabouts

Village Greenery 2013: VG Tips - but who are the special guests?

Hurrah and hats aloft for Metal's 2013 Village Green Festival. And what a compendium of mixed-mediums and musical doings are in store for Saturday's seaside shindiggery..

From out-of-towners: The Skints, Skinny Lister, DB Cohen  and the mighty Mika Bomb



To local heroes: David Woodcock, Plantman, White Devil's Cause, the Lucky Strikes.
and The Wobbly Lamps with Zoë Howe on drums



To Lieghterati style music and movement: Middle Age Spread, Sundown Arts and Old Trunk… 

Concluding the day on the main stage is a mystery special guest - but who? The whispers are rattling about town like washers in a charity box with names from Wilko to Bowie being bounced abou

The full fat programme of events is viewable here , downloadable as a PDF. Or keep in touch via Twitter.

Although, this year's event is still all for free it's ticketed via wristband - which I believe are all gone, excepting a limited amount released on the day for early birds, and available on the gate...

Thumb through the the Village Green previous back issues here - or review the 2012 highlights in HD below....

Vive Le Wilko

Centred in the twelfth issue of  Vive Le Rock - amongst features on The Adverts, The B52s,Tom Tom Club and The Cramps you'll find ten pages of wall-to-wall Wilkoness.

Editor Eugene Butcher offers an exclusive and emotional interview with the King of Canvey Island. While I've pulled together eight pages of features and contributions from assorted pals.  

Piley brings you a Dr Feelgood biography, Wilko biographer Zoë Howe hand-picks five key tracks from his back catalogue. Barry Cain pitches in with a Lord of Oil City interview from 1977. While Dave Alexander (Eight Rounds Rapid) , Steve Hooker, Dave Dulake and Roman Jugg all give unique insights into what gives Wilko his Wilkoness.  

Me, I chip in telling the tale of the day we did an improv gig together, chat with Wilk's about his hero Chuck Berry, and review his final farewell show at Koko....



And worra result to be DJing last Sunday, when Wilko dropped in to catch his favourite local band Martin McNeill - where  I happened to have VLR handy for him to put his squiggle on.

Picture by Wilko's best pal French Henri

Five reasons to grab yourself a copy of the new Level 4.. ...

1) Piley's interview with Eight Rounds Rapid - yes the very same 8RR as played on Mark Radcliffe recently. Channel Swimmer in fact - dig in below..

2) Marmite Boy's music reviews...

3)  My previously unpublished interview with Wilko

4) The photography of Paul Hughes (see Wilko and Eight Rounds pics)

5)  It's completely free and available at these locations

The Sunday Sessions - Wilko approved and with added Digby

 

Martin McNeill and the Bottletop Blues Band will be blazing away from 4 today at Southend's most rock 'n' roll local and epicentre of the swelling scene..  The Railway Hotel

Expect a jazz spin on this Sunday's swing-ding as legendary trumpeteer Digby Fairweather is aboard as the special guest

But don't just take my word for what hot-rocking heat Martin McNeill and pal's generate - they're rubber stamped 'approved' by Wilko Johnson - who, in our just published  interview (more on that later) had this to say...

They're a bloody good band. The whole of the band is really good - they're playing proper blues, which is quite a rare thing. The whole band is good - rhythm section, guitar - and the man himself.

And I couldn't let the death of the blackest of mambas go unmarked - so expect to hear..


 

Solomon Burke - Maggie's Farm

The Sunday Sessions: Flats and Fifths

Swinging at the Sunday Sessions - get me in the floral shirt!

Flats and fifths: those steps and semitones that give jazz and blues their particular modal moan. Jive along to The Railway this Sunday and you'll be for in an afternoon of flats, fifths, blues and boogaloo - live! As the always excellent (and one of my top ten favourite guitarists) Martin McNeill and his Bottletop Blues Band take the floor from four. 

The Bottletops are something of revolving repertory (excepting JJ Zarbo, who 'never misses a gig' on bass) - with a different musical mix each session - sometimes keys, sometimes sax, sometimes special guests: Wes Weston - harp, Wilko Johnson - guitar, Digby Fairweather - trumpet.

So if you're spinning anywhere around the SS postal code zone this sunday - why not ramble your way to The Railway from four and see who's sitting in for this Sunday's session

Dig'n' the Bottletop Blues Band 

I'll be operating the in-house stereogram, spinning in jump blues, New Orleans shufflers, funk work-outs, hammond happenings and reggae shakers 

A couple from the crates popped into the pot may well be...

Count Machuki - Pepper Pot






Thanks to Bluey for a borrow of the pics....

Looking Back at Wilko...

Take a stroll to the bottom of this post and you'll see the cover of the latest issue (# 8) of Vive Le Rock, an edition frothing over with interviews: Richard Hawley, Kevin Rowland, Steve Jones, Wayne Hussey - also album, book and gig reviews.

Take a thumb through the reviews section of VLR and you'll find me holding up score cards for the New York Dolls, Suzi Quatro, Dirtbox Disco and Zoe Howe's Wilko Johnson biography - written in collaboration with Wilko himself.

Understandably with such a packed programme, editorial tweaks and changes were  necessary to keep to the word count. So, here's my submitted review of Looking Back At Me - and the published version. A tip of the titfer is due to all at VLR HQ for trimming it down, and, keeping the essence intact.

You'll also notice a couple of questions pitched at his Royal Wilko-ness, click on the VLR cover pic to get the rest of our chat and natter...

It's no overstatement to say I've probably ploughed through too many rock biographies in my time. Although only a handful are so supremely sculpted that they will stay with me forever. Looking Back At Me is one for this hand-picked library. Much more than the sum of it's parts - and larger than a life story, this is John Wilkinson walking and talking you through an oral and pictorial history (school reports, rare paintings/photo's memorabilia) of all that is Wilko: academia, anarchy, art, rock 'n' roll and carrying forward the tradition of journeymen blues musicians handing down their tales of troubles and travels.

If you've been lucky enough to have met Wilko ( I have, several times as we drink at the same pub) you'll know what you see onstage is exactly what you get offstage, an explosion of arm flailing, bug eyed-expressionism, intellectual theorising and raconteurism. Wilko isn't someone who knows stillness in anyway. There is no off button.

Zoe Howe's sensitive positioning of all the multi-faceted pieces that make up her study, perfectly renders Wilko's unrelenting restless energy and constant forward motion - she's pulled off the impossible trick of bottling Wilko's (smokestack) lightening. There's blood on the scratchplate, Canvey mud under his nails and the Thames Delta blues runs through him like a stick of Southend rock. Looking Back at Me is a stunning reinvention of the rock memoir format - a combination of compendium and confessional - creating a new standard which all future music biographies should measured against.

To catch the rest of our Looking Back chat - click on the VLR pic

As mentioned at the top the page, the New York Dolls blitzing new album Live From The Bowery is lent a critical ear in VLR - taste test one tune from it here....

New York Dolls - Funky But Chic

One Chord Wonderful and Norman Watt-Roy's masterclass in bass soloing

Wilko at Village Green - photo by Paul Hughes

Behold! a three way video review of some recent weekend action ...

From Friday the 22nd June, TV Smith at The Railway..watch out for the stage dive at 50 seconds in







Wilko with a fluid fingered solo from Norman Watt-Roy at 8 minutes in..


 It really is all on the upswing in Southend at the mo'..

It's another Wilko weekend at the Village Green Festival

Although this won't be an improv pop up performance similar to the recent Railway runs.

No, no - Wilko (accompanied by bass legend Norman Watt-Roy) is one of the many local legends and homegrown hitmakers appearing at the 2012 Village Green festival. Musically the main stage pitches up a live playlist pooling togther:

Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly, Jake Shillingford (My Life Story), • Wilko Johnson • The Correspondents • Canvey Island Allstars • Little Dog • Under the Ice



On the Sundown and smaller satellite stages are The Lucky Strikes, John Hegley, Dead Poets. Along with a hay bales and campfire acoustic drop in run by Dave Crix of Rhythm shack.

Although music is only one component in this all day buffet of art, poetry/comedy (John Hegley), Kiddie friendly bits, and foodie stalls all parked up in Chalkwell Park making this one of the South East's most family friendly festivals and capping off with a civilised finish at 8pm

And the Chalkwell cherry on the top - it's all completely free!

So if you're round and about Southend way this Saturday come along and dip into this jamboree bag of bands, arts and entertainment on the banks of the Thames Delta - dig in to the details here...




Should you fancy a warm up, a preview, a sampler of all that is Village Green: live music, dancing and doings - then haul your boogie to Chalkwell Hall for a one off Listen To This from 7:30 tonight - Morton Valence , Dooyah!, Clout, The Tupenny Bunters - are on the bill with Andrew Branch and Daryl Easlea a' hosting and a'DJing.. A few tickets are still available here

What an evening, what an event - what a weekend! And Wilko Round Two

Where shall we start: Friday's ram-out at The Railway perhaps. Southend's most rock 'n' local was packed to a bubbling and sweaty swell before the sun had set, with gig-goers gathering together from North Yorkshire (John Medd - whose match report is recorded here) to North London (Mark Underwood, Alan Powell) and all points inbetween including: designer Sophie Lo, photographers David Apps,  Eric Waring and guest of honour Gaye Black (formerly Advert) in attendance.

Andy J Gallagher played the first hand in tonight's three way split, with a roaring set of rafter raising rock. Dick York livelied up the night, with sing-a-longa Southend solo set. And ripping up the Railway's massed capacity crowd  - TV Smith's set of stripped down acoustic punk, which with his songbook reduced to an unpolished raw-rooted form - punches through and carries forward  a foot-stomping, fist clenching tradition of both protest folk and delta blues. And you know it's been special night when there's stage-diving an at acoustic gig.

The full gallery of grinners, gurners, drinkers and dancers, is viewable here - thanks to Paul Hughes for another snaptastic recording of the night.

A huge Podrophonic honk is due to Fi Jacobs, Dave Dulake (and all at The Railway) , Retro Steve, Johnny Medd, Piley, TV, Gaye, Steve Pegrum for threading together such a special event.

Saturday saw us parked up in Leigh Library Gardens for the all things folkie at Saturday's section of the Leigh Folk Festival including a jazz/blues set from the spectacularly talented Jess Noah.

Photo by Marmite Boy

And what a way to wrap things up of a Sunday - a return to The Railway with Marmite Boy for our Sunday Sessions,  DJing around Martin McNeill's jump blues tunes - which bonus of bonuses included yet another surprise guest appearance from Railway regular Wilko Johnson!

How in the name of Dr Feelgood did I end up playing bass with Wilko Johnson last Saturday?

And we'd only popped to the pub for a mid-afternoon set by a barbershop quartet who never arrived. All true!  Mrs M and myself had peddle-powered the fifteen minute cycle ride from home to Southend's most rock 'n' roll local The Railway, and parked ourselves with three generations of Piley to take in the afternoon's open mic spot.

You may remember I'd had some banter recently with Pal Wilko for a Vive Le Rock feature - so a pleasure then to spot him at the bar for a quick hello and a handshake, while he was enjoying a gin, with Southend legend French Henry. Midway through our natter, MC and pianist for the open mic (and recent Blow Up signing) Dave Woodcock asked Wilko would he fancy doing a spot. After some gentle nudging and shuffling with Wilko on a lent guitar (why he's not playing a regulation Tele), a borrowed bass for me and pub owner Dave Dulake installed on drums we were off and away within minutes.

This improv gig blasted off so smartly there was no time to text or alert mates who may have been out, about or nearby, including Feelgoods fan Piley who'd left only a few moments earlier. I can't give you a breakdown of 20/30 minute Jubilee Jam, but Wooly Bully, High Heeled Sneakers were in there. And how mind-bogglingly bizarre to have been watching Wilko on Friday's Punk Britannia the previous evening putting Southend on the musical timeline, and just a handful of hours later to be playing Feelgoods classic She Does It Right, looking left and there's the skitter-king working his Thames Delta voodoo.

(he band L to R: me (bass), Kate Johnston (guitar), Wilko, Unknown (percussion), Dave Woodcock (piano ) Dave Dulake (drums) not pictured

As it unfolded, this spontaneous set felt like a fuggy is-this-actually-happening blur - while it was actually happening. Almost a week later, it still seems like some surreal waking dream. Thankfully Mrs M had the good sense and presence to snap a few pics (full set here) and luckily I was chatting to a chap on Sunday who videoed the entire set. I'll be sure to keep you posted....

Speaking of all things Railway related - Marmite and myself will be back there, DJing this Sunday from 4 til' turnout time playing, funk, soul, jump blues, R 'n' B, funky covers in around the bands. With Southend's finest jazzers The Basey Brothers fronted by the spectacularly talented Jess Noah firing up from 8pm. If you can't make the gig, redirect your ears to Radio Novalujon. for a live broadcast.

One possible from my playlist and a track covered by the Feelgoods is Freddie King's romper-stomper of a shuffle..

Freddie King - I'm Tore Down

Wilko Johnson on debut gigs, dodgy venues and Cloud 9

Terribly grim business this week with Donald Duck Dunn and Donna Summer -  Larry does the pitch perfect tributes to both here and  here . For my part, in no way a smirch on the life of Donna Summer - but, more a celebration of the deep-reach of her magnificence. Behold the Bollywood refit of I Feel Love....

A snatch of background: On the day I phoned Wilko Johnson for our Vive Le Rock interview, the line was beeping with a gut-rumbling engaged tone. A ticker tape of terrors rattled across my noggin - wrong number, dead line - he's forgotten! It turned out to be none of the above. Wilko had been busy on the helpline to Her Majesty's finest telecom's advisors, trying to untangle the mangle that is his old age pension.

You won't read about his rights, entitlements and allowances in issue 7 of Vive Le Rock. No, no we stick strictly to the script of Dr Feelgood's first gigs in Canvey and London. revealing - which gig does Wiko dispute as the band's debut, where did he have to avoid bashing his head - who barked at him for dragging amps across the metallic floor? All this can be read and digested between the covers of the latest Vive Le Rock in this edtion's You Should've Been There feature

 

The Quinn Martin style epilogue : I bumped into his Royal Wilko-ness while DJing at The Railway last Sunday (also in attendance was NME photographic ledge Dean Chalkley) - and can confirm he's even more of a gent and a legend in person....

If you fancy more musical based chat and chanter - grab yourself a copy of Tuesday's Radio Podrophenia (theme:Money) where Piley and I were joined by champion chap and choon chooser - Daryl Easlea for a chatter-about on days working at record shops, writing sleeve notes (over 300 to his credit) interviewing Lee Perry and the lost magic of ABC's Beauty Stab

Radio Podrophenia - Money