Gene (band)
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| Gene | |
|---|---|
| Origin | London, UK |
| Years active | 1993 – 2004 |
| Genres | Rock |
| Labels | Costermonger, Polydor, Contra |
| Members | Martin Rossiter Steve Mason Matt James Kevin Miles |
Gene were an English alternative rock quartet who rose to prominence in the mid-90s. Formed in 1993, they were popularly labelled as a Britpop band and often drew comparisons to The Smiths, because of their Morrissey-esque lead singer, Martin Rossiter. Gene's music was also influenced by The Jam, The Small Faces, Style Council, and The Clash.
Contents |
[edit] History
[edit] The Go Hole and Sp!n
Gene's origins lie in a previous band first called "The Go Hole", named after a fictional 'Beat' club in John Clennam Holmes' novel Go, and later renamed "Sp!n." Vocalist/rhythm guitarist and songwriter Lee Clark, bassist John Mason, lead guitarist Steve Mason, and drummer Matt James were original members.
The band was initially formed by Lee Clark (vocals/guitar) and Daz Walton (bass). Then John Mason took over playing bass and Matt joined on drums. A few years later, Lee, John and Matt recruited Steve Mason (John's younger brother) to play lead/rhythm guitar and free Lee's vocal style, which was limited by his mediocre guitar playing.
After cutting their teeth for several years in Woolwich, London, Sp!n became a promising Stone Roses-like band who were sadly the victims of a serious road accident. Bassist John Mason suffered a serious head injury and went into an 11-day coma. Their road manager Daz Walton retired as a result of the crash. In a strange sequence of events, the day prior to the accident, Lee (the original vocalist, and main songwriter of Sp!n) had also offered his resignation in a letter to the rest of the band, due to his dissatisfaction with the way the band and the record label Foundation, were guiding its course. "The final straw for me," stated Lee, "was calling the Sp!n album "In Motion" - a play on word-association which was so naff, that it beggared belief."
John, disappointed with the music business, went on to become a writer. Lee briefly recorded demos with Andrew (Snake) Newton, who had been the live sound engineer for Sp!n, then gave up 'serious' music to become a primary school teacher. John felt that tales of chaos, romance and terror were better suited away from the manacles of fashion. Lee felt he was getting a bit old to be a rock star and decided to play and record only in his own bedroom. Daz is now with the band Somewhere Outside New York.
Wanting to continue together in a band, Steve Mason and Matt James recruited bass player Kevin Miles who had a long association with the band through Daz. All that was left was the task of finding a singer, accomplished with some serendipity in a London nightclub. The story goes that after seeing Watford-based Welshman Martin Rossiter cross the floor of the club, Mason approached him and they began to talk (a process Mason once described as "like trying to pull a lady"). Their meeting ended with Rossiter handing out his business card ('Martin Rossiter: Soothsayer to the Stars') and Mason giving Rossiter a chance to sing with the band. Rossiter appeared on Sp!n's last demos as 'Martin T. Falls' (a nod to the Mancunian band The Fall) shortly before the decision was made to adopt the name 'Gene'.
Rossiter's eloquence and warm, emotive voice proved an effective pairing with Steve Mason's intricate pentatonic guitar riffs, whilst Kevin Miles's melodic basslines and Matt James's expertise in various rock drumming styles ensured a solid musical base for the group's successes.
[edit] Breakthrough
By the time NME journalists Keith Cameron and Roy Wilkinson encountered Gene, the band had already gained some live experience and had written several songs. Cameron and Wilkinson were impressed enough to form independent record label Costermonger, created with the sole purpose of promoting Gene to a wider audience. Their début release, the double A-sided single 'For The Dead' / 'Childs Body', was released on the fledgling Costermonger label in May 1994. The landmark single received a great deal of attention from the music press: Select named it 'Single Of The Month' claiming that it "swaggered with self confidence; everything a pop single should have", whilst the NME acclaimed it as a "remarkably lovely record that manages to transcend its influences just by being so damned good", promptly making it their 'Single of the Week'. BBC Radio 1 included it on their playlist, playing it over 100 times.
Unsurprisingly, the limited edition of 1,994 copies sold out in two days. Live show followed live show, but it was Gene's performance in support of Pulp at The Forum in London that revealed the band to be a real force to be reckoned with: "Gene have just played third on the bill and willed the crowd into treating them like headliners who are very, very big indeed" gushed the NME, just before adding "He [Martin] has made people love him, and now he's loving every minute of it." With Gene already developing a devotional fan-base, a new single was planned to consolidate their popularity. The second single, a triple A-side consisting of 'Be My Light Be My Guide', 'This Is Not My Crime' and 'I Cant Help Myself' was released on August 1st via Costermonger. Melody Maker immediately awarded 'Be My Light...' its 'Single Of The Week', scribbling that "this record delights in its own sophistication". Select singled out 'This Is Not My Crime', calling it "strong on grand gestures and subtle instrumentation", whilst the NME claimed that 'I Can't Help Myself' was "a joyous country strum which wouldn't be out of place on Sticky Fingers."
[edit] Popular Success
After achieving the top spot in the UK indie chart and number 54 in the UK national chart, the band played their first UK headlining tour that included a show at London's Paradise Club which sold out immediately, cramming 800 people into the venue. The plaudits hadn't gone unnoticed by the big record companies, and Gene eventually signed a deal with Polydor Records. For many observers, this was to prove a turning point for the band. After a successful appearance at the Reading Festival, the band released their third single 'Sleep Well Tonight', just prior to embarking on a large national tour, preceded by several sold-out French dates. Through 1995, Gene were still going from strength to strength. Featuring strongly in both critics and readers end of year polls ("they [continue to] outshine every other band around with heady, faultless grace" - Melody Maker), Gene were the proud recipients of the inaugural NME Brat Award for 'Best New Act', and as such played at the sold out Brat Award ceremony at the London Astoria. They adorned the covers of both the NME and Melody Maker, who voted them their 'Brightest Hope' for 1995. Their fourth single, 'Haunted By You', became the band's second Top 40 hit (reaching number 32), whilst their debut LP Olympian reached number 8 in the album chart following a plethora of excellent reviews. The album also gained Gene their first silver disc, recording sales of over 70,000 in the UK alone, and when the final single from the album was released (the epic 'Olympian'), it went straight into the national Top Twenty.
The summer and autumn of 1995 were spent touring the world, including a well-received performance at Glastonbury Festival, headlining Reading Festival, a tour of Japan and Europe and then a foray into the USA. With Christmas looming, the band entered the studio again for pre-production on their new album, scheduled for release the following year. 1996 began with a remixed 'For the Dead' which subsequently became Gene's biggest hit (peaking at number 14 in the Top 40), leading to their début appearance on Top Of The Pops. To See The Lights, an LP of rarities, live tracks, radio sessions and acoustic versions of singles, was released in January and reached the number 11 spot in the album charts. A national tour was undertaken during most of the same month, culminating in two sell-out London shows at Shepherds Bush Empire and The Astoria.
In anticipation of their second studio LP, October 1996 saw the release of 'Fighting Fit', an up-tempo rock song which reached number 22. The start of 1997 heralded the release of 'We Could Be Kings', another epic rock song which again proved to be very popular, reaching number 18. The LP Drawn to The Deep End takes its name from a 'Fighting Fit' B-side, and it revealed a lavish production replete with strings, far more prominent guitar solos from Mason, and a rather warbling vocal affectation from Rossiter. The album showed some measure of musical development from the band, which was reflected by the inclusion of a keyboardist in their live shows (Grand Drive's Julian Wilson [1996-98, 2004], former Style Council keyboardist Mick Talbot [1999-2001], Marcus Brown [2001], and Angie Pollack [2003-2004]), and the fact that Rossiter was starting to master the art of singing live whilst playing the keyboard for some songs. Lyrically speaking, the dominating themes of the album were loneliness and deep yearning. Indeed, Rossiter was in the depths of depression during the making of the album and the songs resulting from this period remain some of the band's most powerful work. Drawn to the Deep End was another critical success, with Q magazine awarding it four stars. Like its predecessor, the album entered the top 10 of the album charts, and subsequent singles, 'Where Are They Now?' and 'Speak to me Someone' both made the top 40, at 22 and 37 respectively.
Arguably the defining moment of the band's career came in March 1997 when they played with a full orchestra to a sell-out audience at the Royal Albert Hall. Transmitted on Radio 1, the event was commemorated by the release of two live EPs in tandem with the last two singles from Drawn to the Deep End. They also played in Hong Kong that year as part of the festivities of the UK's ceding the island back into Chinese hands.
By late 1997, Rossiter in particular had gained some press attention in his newfound status as a minor celebrity. He had already appeared as a guest on Never Mind the Buzzcocks and various articles speculated on his sexuality (much to Rossiter's bemusement. As he told Sorted magazine: "I've never hidden the fact that I've slept on both sides of the bed and people find that very odd that I was quite happy to say 'yeah, I'm bisexual and it doesn't really matter.") He also hit the headlines due to a war of words between Rossiter and comedian Paul Kaye which culminated in Rossiter headbutting Kaye in a nightclub.
[edit] Revelations and Leaving Polydor
1998 served as a fallow year for the band, used for writing new material as well as a few low-key shows and events such as Radio 1's Sound City. In fact, the most newsworthy article about Gene during this year was of Martin Rossiter's 'drastic' change in image. Gone were the suit jackets with white shirts and the floppy side-parted hair, in favour of the mod-like Fred Perry polo shirts, jeans and a very short haircut. The new look was to be reflective of the band's rockier forthcoming studio LP, Revelations. On their return from relative wilderness, it appeared that Gene had lost a lot of their prestige during their year out of the limelight, and were no longer the golden boys of the indie scene. First off the LP, released in February 1999, was a Jam-like political single called 'As Good As it Gets', which entered the charts at number 23 to lukewarm reviews. Revelations was released that March to very mixed reviews; the NME awarded it 5/10, concluding that the album was "pretty thin on the ground."
Revelations carries some very political songs, such as the aforementioned 'As Good As it Gets', 'The British Disease' and 'Mayday'. Rossiter, who had an occasional political spot on BBC Radio Five Live, launched a vitriolic critique on New Labour's first term in office. It might be said that the band somewhat misjudged the public's attitude towards the government as one of anger, rather than disenchantment. Naturally, any artist would contend that their songs are not written with the intention of reflecting public opinion, but nonetheless, some of the more political lyrics smacked of clumsiness and were even cringeworthy at times. That said, the album contains some of Gene's finest songs, including the wistful 'Something in the Water' as well as one of their most acclaimed tracks, 'You'll Never Walk Again'. The album charted disappointingly at number 23, and the second single from the album, 'Fill Her Up', charted at number 37 that April. Despite a successful and comprehensive tour around the country, again selling out many venues, as well as making a successful appearance at the Reading festival of that year, Gene and Polydor parted ways. It must be said that the band felt somewhat undermined by their label's lack of support and failure to market the album adequately. As Rossiter explained: "Only when we got to Gretna Green did we realise that Polydor had disembarked at Crewe." Whilst the band made the best of Revelations' raw, live sound during the album's promotion, as well as the fact that the recording of the album took less than a month to complete (the marketing literature said it was in order to best convey the energy apparent from their live shows), after the split they claimed that they could have made it a better album had they been given more time by their label. Certainly, Revelations was by no means a failure, and it probably would have been a greater popular success given the right backing. Although Gene lost a lot of the benefits of being on a major label, they did at least gain artistic independence again.
[edit] Artistic Freedom and Libertine
Despite the lack of the support of a major record label, Gene spent a good portion of 2000 touring the world, which climaxed in a sell-out tour of the USA. One of their shows, at the Los Angeles Troubadour, was broadcast over the internet in what was then a record-breaking webcast, screened to at least 60,000 people worldwide. Only two months after the recording of that show, Gene released Rising for Sunset, a live album recorded from that Troubadour show. The webcast and album were promoted with a pioneering international internet-only campaign resulting in 40k units sold upon its universal release. As well as rehearsing the band's hits, they released two new tracks, 'Rising For Sunset' and 'Somewhere in the World'; promising songs that bade well for their next studio LP and marking a return to the romance of their more popular tracks.
That album, entitled Libertine, was released in 2001 on Gene's own label, Sub Rosa Records. It conveyed the next stage in the evolution of Gene's characteristic sound. Some critics described it as a more sleazy rock-style record, but overall, it was a strong album with glimmers that harked back to Gene's earlier material.
[edit] Split
Despite further successful live shows in subsequent years, Gene opted for an amicable split in 2004. It is said that the band felt they were somewhat stuck in a rut, and had achieved as much as they felt they could. They realised that, although they had a loyal fan base and plenty of critical acclaim, they were never going to become world-conquering greats. Gene's last live performance was played on 16 December 2004 at the London Astoria, and there are not expected to be any further recordings or appearances.
The band members have all continued to work in music, in a variety of different ways. Roy Wilkinson went on to manage the band British Sea Power while Snake Newton went on to mix an assortment of acts including Duran Duran, Sugababes, Pet Shop Boys and Snow Patrol. Kev Miles is now a qualified college lecturer working with bands in Nottingham and plays in a blues/soul cover band in Lincolnshire.
Steve Mason and Matt James went on to form a new band Palace Fires [1] (early 2006) with singer Ed Bannard and bassist Mike Buchanan. The band played their first ever headline show at the Charlotte in Leicester on the 11th April 2006. Lead singer Martin Rossiter is now the manager of Access to Music Brighton and is recording a solo album.
[edit] Discography
[edit] Albums
- 1995 Olympian
- 1996 To See The Lights
- 1997 Drawn To The Deep End
- 1999 Revelations
- 2000 Rising For Sunset
- 2001 As Good As It Gets: The Best Of
- 2001 Libertine
- 2006 The Collection
- 2006 The John Peel Sessions
[edit] Singles
- 1994 For The Dead
- 1994 Be My Light, Be My Guide
- 1994 Sleep Well Tonight
- 1995 Haunted By You
- 1995 Be My Light, Be My Guide / I Can't Help Myself
- 1995 Olympian
- 1995 Still Can't Find The Phone (Germany)
- 1995 Olympian (Japan)
- 1996 For The Dead (Re-issue)
- 1996 Fighting Fit
- 1997 We Could Be Kings
- 1997 Where Are They Now?
- 1997 Speak To Me Someone
- 1997 We Could Be Kings (Japan)
- 1999 As Good As It Gets
- 1999 Fill Her Up
- 2001 Is It Over?
- 2001 Does He Have a Name? (Promo)
- 2004 Let Me Move On
