Do you still keep in touch with Fyfe?

Andy: No. I mean, there's no animosity there...there's no divide. He's just totally into his own way of life and thinking. And when we parted ways it was all very amicable. I wish him all the best, he's very talented. I dunno. I think... I think it's just one of those things. It's like an old girlfriend, where sometimes it's better not to stay friends.

I'm learning that...

Andy: I've got a lot of fond memories, and I think it's kinda good. He's gone his way and now he's happy and we're happy with Graham and Martin.

It's well documented that during the Troublegum/Infernal Love years the band was living the rock 'n' roll hedonistic lifestyle to its fullest. There was that article you wrote for Details back in '94 where, among other things, you talked about getting serviced by a groupie in the shower while two others folded and packed your clothes. Now a few short years later you're happily married and have recently become a father for the first time. And Lest we forget, belated congratulations on both the marriage and your new son!

Andy: Hey, thank you!

Andy: I think it's actually calmed me down and has made me concentrate more. It's given me a great deal more focus. I just love being in the band and playing, and what it does is that whenever I'm away from the band I don't worry about what's happening with it. Before when I was alone I would have gone home, sat around all day and just thought about things, and would have made myself really depressed thinking about all the negative things going on in the band. Now I go home and I spend time with people I love and care about, and when I come back to the band I have a totally clear head and I'm completely fine.

I think it took something like that to sort me out, because I was kind of pretty much in a downward spiral.

So are the rumors true that you named your son Johnny Ramone?

Andy: Ha ha! No, he's called Jona Ramone. Jona was the name of my wife's grandfather. And Ramone, just 'cause we like the Ramones. When he turns seventeen, if he likes he can opt to change it to Joey!

Fantastic! I had the honor of interviewing Johnny Ramone last summer  [Click here to read the Johnny Ramone interview]  and the thing that impressed me the most about him was how humble he was regarding the road he'd been down and how genuinely thankful he was for the Ramones fans, without whom success wouldn't have been possible. I see a lot of similarities between your fans and his; they've stuck by you through thick and thin. What do you think it is that's kept their loyalty?

Andy: Umm... I think maybe because a lot of people that I talk to that are fans. Some people say... I think it's because I've never tried to set myself up, none of us have tried to set ourselves up as icons. I think we're kind of fallible characters, so I suppose people see some of themselves in that.

You know, we don't come jumpin' onstage dressed in designer clothes and sort of stand ten miles above the audience and act like we're the stars and they're the peasants. The way we look--the working-class attitude and the way we come across--I think a lot of people can identify with that. There are highs and lows and they do stick with you. It's probably not the most glamorous and I'm probably not the greatest rock star material to start with, but I think that the people who stick with us can sense that. You know what I mean? It's kind of like we're all in it together. I don't want to sound corny, but we're one of them if you know what I mean.

Looking at the cover of Suicide Pact, is there any symbolism to the four masks on the cover?

Andy: Nah, we just can't afford the same kind of masks Slipknot can!

Is that you wearing them?

Andy: Oh no, that's Nigel Rolfe. He's the same guy that was on the cover of Troublegum. He's an old friend of ours, an eccentric six-foot-four guy who's a professor at the Chelsea College of Arts. He's also a performance artist who tends to do exhibitions. He really loves the band, has for years, and we had a chance meeting at an airport while we were recording the album. He said he had some time off to do some artwork, so he came over to the studio, hung out with us for a day and came up with the idea. I think it's suitably surreal and fits in well.

I was looking at the band's official website the other day and you had Atari Teenage Riot listed as one of your Top 10 bands.

Andy: My big thing at the moment... I really like Digital Hardcore stuff, things like EC8OR, Hanin Elias, Shizuo, things like that. And I like the last Alec Empire solo album. But I really, really love all the new stuff coming out on Sub Pop like The Go, Gluecifer, The Hellacopters, The Yo-Yo's and the Murder City Devils.

So it's either like really noisy, distorted splatter bricks or else kind of noisy old school garage rock 'n' roll. Stuff that sounds alive again. So much of this "alternative" stuff is like Gary Numan meets...whatever. You know, I don't really get it. That fishnet, makeup crap... I don't really get it,that whole side of alterna-rock.

Everyone's gotta do their cover of "Cars."

Andy: Yeah, that's the one everybody's got covered.

If I'm not mistaken, you're friends with Pitchshifter.  [Click here to read an interview with Pitchshifter's JS Clayden]

I've been told that you're not releasing any singles from the new album.

Andy: Yeah, no...we don't wanna go down that road again. I don't like putting so much emphasis on a song and then putting money into a video and crossing your fingers that it will "break" the band out. We just want to do it the old-fashioned way: do loads of live shows and blow people away.

I always used to look at Therapy? singles as being something for the fans. You guys put out so much in so many different formats that it became a quest to make sure you had every release.

Andy: After Troublegum and Infernal Love, A&M just went out of control and everything got ludicrous. Some guy would come up and listen to Semi-Detached and he'd hear four demos and go, "Yeah, man, that's a single!" All that kind of bollocks. Then they'd be sittin' there trying to hope for a high chart position and all that crap. And it's like, we're not up there with the big guns. We're not up there with the Metallicas and Guns 'n' Roses. We're not going to get up there--it's not going to happen. We're not going to do the big power ballad, we're not going to do the big emotional rock standing on a mountain thing. It's not happenin'. And I think the more they tried to push us to do that the more we backed off.

For most of the band's career you've generally avoided bringing the politics and emotions of Northern Ireland into your music (with, I believe, the exception of the liner notes to Infernal Love, where there's mention of a tentative peace process going on). While I realize it's not your intent for Therapy?'s music to become social or political commentary on the situations there, it seems to me that there are a couple of songs on the new album that appear to address some of what it's like to experience life under those circumstances. I'm wondering if I'm correct in thinking that, and if it's a result of you growing and changing as a songwriter and coming to terms with having grown up in Northern Ireland.

Andy: Yeah, there's been mentions peppered all over our songs from Day One about Northern Ireland, but it deals more with individual characters. We never want to go down the road where it's "us against them" or "black and white" or "fuck the system," and what not. That's not the way it works because it's such a complex issue. We deal with a lot of colloquialisms. For example, "God Kicks," it's an old phrase about kickin' with your left foot means you're a Catholic and kickin' with your right means you're a Protestant. It's little analogies like that that we talk about.

"James Joyce is fucking my sister!" from "Potato Junkie" might come close...

I have a bootleg of a show Therapy? did in Stockholm back in March of '94. Before the show you were interviewed by a female writer who asked you if Therapy? had any "purely romantical songs." You replied, "I sort of write from the darker side of love. I can't write songs about 'I'm happy, I'm in love, hip-hip-hooray.' Because that's not the love that moves and motivates me. Because that's when it's all over. Whenever you're content, then it's all over. It has to keep moving, it has to keep developing, it has to keep fighting...it has to just keep stimulating you. Love has to keep stimulating you the whole time. If I can do it, anyone can do it."

To me it seemed that the love you were describing could easily be the life that has been Therapy? And now that you've come up on the 10th anniversary of the band, are you happy with the road Therapy? have been down? Would you have changed anything? Are you content?

Andy: No, I don't think so. Hindsight is such a wonderful thing, you know! I'm totally happy at the moment. I suppose people at the record company and people in management would say that the thing to do back then was go and lose a bit of weight, act like a rock star, make Troublegum: Part II, and go up that kind of career ladder until you reach Metallica-size. Somewhere in the back of my mind I never thought that that was ever going to happen. I'm really, really happy just where I am. I feel absolutely fantastic. I mean, we're going onstage in about an hour and ten minutes and I cannot wait! I'm not pacing up and down the room going, "Oh God, I have to have one more gin and tonic before I go onstage!" The gig's sold out and I cannot wait to play!

I'm just really, really looking forward to getting better. I wouldn't change a thing actually. I don't know. I mean, I'm not content. I'll never be content. I'll always have a restless side to me. But in regards to the music, it's really cool now. I'm really, really proud of what we do and I can hold my head up high. So no, I wouldn't change anything. I think it's meant to be the way it is.

On the web:
Therapy? (official site)
Therapy? - Evil Elvises (fan site)

Inside Earpollution:
Semi-Detached (album review)
Suicide Pact - You First (album review)

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