You've Got it Far too Easy, Manchester

Words & Photo: Ollie Hopewell

From first playing in a talent competition at The Regent pub in Fenton in the early 1980s to selling out The Sugarmill for a “one-off” charity gig earlier this year, Andy Gower has been a goliath of the Potteries’ music scene for far longer than he would care to admit. And even in a career hiatus that saw almost 18 years of absence from the spotlight, Andy Gower’s presence and influence never truly left the music scene of Stoke-on-Trent and neither has his passion for live music, especially that which hails from his hometown.

As much as this is a love letter to Andy Gower, perhaps the term bromance is too on the nose, this is a celebration of all things Stoke and the way that Gower has continued to promote the city through everything that he does; from organising a charity gig for the British Wildlife Rescue Centre, which is ran by his daughter Abby, to getting longtime friends back on stage, the plaster has been well and truly ripped off and the enthusiasm for more is in full flow. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Often taking to the stage as 1/4th of Pop Punk band Reverse, the proceedings began with Nick Sharratt whose solo work is comprised of a man and his guitar delivering soft, introspective lyrics backed by the bright tones of his acoustic guitar.

I was immediately reminded of the all-too overlooked UK Country Music scene, especially the early work of Jake Bugg, when Sharratt began to play; it was a welcome surprise to hear this Singer/Songwriter cum pseudo-Country genre being sang in the glorious Stoke accent, especially in personal favourite Sullie’s Song, an ode to Sharratt’s dog Sullie. Sharratt also sings about his other dog, Ronnie, in the opening track of the same name on his debut album Up on the Downs.

In his own words, Sharratt was very happy to be sharing a stage with Andy Gower for the first time in “30-odd years” and was delighted to announce the two would be playing again together at The Wren in Stone on 31st July.

Second to the stage were Hardcore UFOs, a band who have only seemed to improve and refine their as each gig comes along, becoming exceptionally tight and much more outgoing in both their stage presence and crowd work (I’ve never been to a gig where the band on stage has handed out party poppers) as they powered through their set.

There’s a fun Pop-Punk aspect to the UFOs that they’ve blended perfectly to vocals that wouldn’t be out of place in a Power Metal band; think The Darkness meets Black Country, New Road, FEAR meets Biffy Clyro, or The Rapture meets Two Door Cinema Club. What I’m trying to put across is that the percolating drums of Al Jardine and the funky riffs of Mark Stevens could easily lend themselves to something far heavier, but the light tones of vocalist and guitarist Marcus “Fox” Keith Barker elevate the trio to something much more unique and interesting.

The best example of this, for me, would be in the unreleased Bomb the Airlines, a track which gives the group a perfect playground to show off their blaring bass and streaming guitars while creating something that is as grounded as it is fun. There’s a lot of exciting stuff going on behind the scenes with Hardcore UFOs as we approach EP and Album territory, and you’d be a fool to not keep tabs on them to see what comes next.

Not only was I fortunate enough to be in attendance of his triumphant return to the stage on the 3rd May, I was even more fortunate to get the chance to sit down with both Andy Gower and Hardcore UFOs’ frontman Fox just over a week later on 12th May at Tremolo Recording Studio.

Before taking to the stage to the crowd’s serenades of “Gow-er, Gow-er, Gow-er!”, I imagine Andy Gower sitting backstage messing about on his guitar as he was when I got the chance to sit down and speak to him on 12th May; following the usual spiel about the current music scene, brew duties, the geography of Fenton, and The Glebe’s cheese board selection, I asked Andy Gower about how he was feeling just before he took to the stage.

Were you stressed before you came out?

Fox: You were very stressed-

Andy: I think that’s because you ran over!

Fox: That was the first you said to me when you got into the dressing room; you were like, “oh, you’ve ran five minutes over.”

Andy: Ten! Ten minutes over! You went on stage, and I double checked with you twice – this is where we’re going to have a row – I double checked with you twice how long your set was, and you told me thirty minutes. It was fortyminutes.

Despite opening a can of worms between father and son-in-law, there was nothing on the night to indicate this pre-match bickering as Gower took to the stage to the aforementioned chants mixed with thunderous applause. Dressed in a black velvet shirt, Gower, accompanied by Barker, opened by thanking the crowd before jumping straight in with Go to America.

Andy: I tried to go for the Johnny Cash look, you know, before he died. I saw a video of me after the gig, and I actually wipe sweat on it and I thought “that’s too good a shirt to wipe sweat on” because I’m never gonna stick it in the washer am I? That’s real rock ‘n’ roll.

Even if there was the slightest hint of nervousness, it had completely dissipated as we rolled into Grab the World by the Balls and Morning Sun, as had any doubts surrounding the infallible talent of Andy Gower and his penchant for playing guitar. Equally unchanged was Gower’s voice which seemingly hadn’t aged a day in the near two-decade absence from the stage.

Andy: Yeah it’s back in my veins after a 17-year layoff. It is a bit bizarre to me still. Despite it being so long everyone still knows all the words to your songs, how did that feel?Andy: Nuts. They were singing every word, and they were even singing the new songs. One of the new songs, Back to the Moon, is only being recorded here today, so they’d only heard a little snippet on Facebook which was a totally rough idea, and they were even singing along to that! I was like “how do you know that?”

Fox: Just a bunch of nerds aren’t they?

Andy: Yeah it’s absolutely amazing when people sing your words back to you. I remember the first time it ever happened to me back in the day and I didn’t sleep all night; I was just sat up in bed going “what the fuck has just happened tonight?” and it felt the same this time. It’s incredible.

It wasn’t just friends and family that were singing every word either, as there were generations of fans, old and young, dancing and singing along to Gower and Barker regardless of the age of the song being played.

Andy: Yeah and that just blows my mind. People were bringing their kids as they’ve grown up listening to my music and they were obviously too young to come back in the day, and just the thought of all that – well I nearly mentioned it on stage, but I think if I had, I’m not a baby, but I think I would’ve choked up. I find it mind blowing even now.

Fox: The vibes at that show…wow; it was like going back to me being a kid when I was in the audience and now we’ve got songs I’ve known my entire adult life and there was…a lot of pressure, I put myself under a lot of pressure to do them justice and to get them locked down but-

Andy: We didn’t have a clue what was going on onstage did we? Fox: No no, the sound got messed up on stage and, even though soundcheck was amazing, sommat went wrong.

Andy: Yeah, so I couldn’t actually hear Fox and he couldn’t hear me so we had no idea if we were even playing in time with one another – I know we were now having seen videos of the night, but Fox had to look at my hands to see where we were in the song, but we battled through it, didn’t we?

Fox: Well yeah, we had to!

Technical hiccups aside, we were treated to new tracks like Trains, Planes & Automobiles and the previously mentioned Back to the Moon as well as classic tracks Got the Plague, Another Mistake, and The Less I Know.

There seems to be a quick turn around on songs at the moment.

Andy: Yeah, I mean with Three Chords and the Truth it came along really quick. We recorded it here, got drums on there, and then made a music video all within four weeks of writing the song, so it’s moved really quick.

Fox: We are banging them out at the moment; we’re working dead hard.

Andy: Yeah really hard. We’re making two here today, one’s called Girls Don’t Cry and one is called Back to the Moon, and we’ve even got ideas for videos but I won’t divulge.

Fox: Yeah, now we’re even making videos.

Andy: Yeah now we’re making videos with the multi-talented Fiona Konca and she’s right into it – I see her as a member of the band even though she doesn’t get on stage. Even though we haven’t got a band, the new stuff is going to be something we do justice; the drums, the bass, whatever, as long as we do justice by the songs. As long as I can still play them acoustically I think that’s okay, but there is talk of actually getting a band, but we don’t know yet.

Any ideas for band names?

Andy: Yeah actually, either Andy Gower’s Guns for Hire or Andy Gower’s Skyscrapers.

A Dizzy Mag exclusive for you there. Throughout the night, there was such an immense feeling of love from the audience and the energy in The Sugarmill was totally intoxicating; the style matched the substance throughout as Gower’s Billy Brag cum Paul Heaton charm hit every criterion for perfection, especially in personal highlights Dog Song, Square Peg, and This Town, the latter of which was sung at such volume that you couldn’t actually hear Andy or Fox on stage. The collective performance of the venue came to a perfect crescendo for the final song of the evening Three Chords & The Truth, with an impromptu choir forming onstage comprised of all of the artists of the night and the many friends and family members in attendance.

Andy: Yeah well I had my kids up there, and if you’ve seen the actual (music) video I’ve got my grandkids in there too, but I couldn’t really get them into the Mill as they’re only between eight and ten years old.

Fox: Yeah would’ve been a bit of a push really.

Andy: No but they can really sing, and everybody who came was really great. It was great, I had my son there, my daughter, my granddaughter, my niece, my friends – so yeah, it was a brilliant day. It was just a really good atmosphere. I think that there’s going to be another album. If not, then there’s definitely going to be another EP, but we’re thinking that there’s going to be an album.

Fox: We’ve totted it up and we’ve definitely got ten songs.

Andy: Yeah we’ve got ten songs and half of them are brand new; it’s going to be a mixed bag if we do the album, there’s songs that no one has heard that we’ve recorded here at Tremolo with Dan Rowley, some of them just acoustic and some with a full band.

Following such an emotional and important gig, I had some time to reflect on what questions I most wanted to ask before our interview, and one of the most pertinent was that of Andy Gower’s unrelenting celebration and promotion of Stoke-on-Trent.

What is Stoke to you?

Andy: What’s the phrase? It’s a shithole but it’s my shithole? Is it a shothole? I don’t think it is, but it’s still where I’m from and I’m proud of that. I think Stoke does get overlooked a lot in lots of respects; if you were in a band in the 90s and you came from Manchester or London you’d definitely get much more interest. People would ask where you were from and when you said you were from Stoke they just didn’t think it was cool, and it was much more of a battle.

Fox: But it is cool. Stoke is cool. It’s such a real place and there is absolutely no pretence here at all. We’ve got some absolutely wicked bands here now from Stoke, and I feel like maybe there was a slight lull around the twenty teens but now we’re so back.

Andy: Formal Sppeedwear, we love them don’t we?

F: Sppeedwear are mint. Mercury, mint. Smother, mint. Clay Lake, Average Joe, Sarcoline, Moral Slip when they were around, you’ve even got Discharge who are like Gods… We’ve got great bands, and we’ve got great venues too.

Andy: Yeah, like with the UFOs album, it’s not out yet, but I can’t believe that Foxy’s made it, I can’t believe that it’s being made in Stoke, and I can’t believe that it sounds so good.

Perhaps the only thing greater than the pairs’ love for the Potteries is their commitment to the British Wildlife Rescue Centre, a charity based in Staffordshire which rehabilitates sick and injured wild animals before releasing them back into nature in an effort to preserve the nation’s wildlife.

What does the British Wildlife Rescue Centre mean to you?

Andy: So, my daughter by runs it, and she started there as a volunteer, and I used to take her once a week. Obviously my daughter is Fox’s partner as well, and they just do an amazing job there. It’s her and a load of volunteers and it’s a proper vocation… They operate on a shoestring budget doing incredible work and they’re just so close to my heart.

Fox: Yeah I’ve somehow ended up being voted as Chairman of the Board of Trustees too, so it’s important to the both of us – anything we can do to help we will do as if it’s our duty, which to a degree it is. It was an honour to be able to do something we love with and for people we love to raise some money for the charity. Every show bar one that I’ve done with Hardcore UFOs has been for British Wildlife Rescue Centre.

Andy: We raised just shy of two grand (from the gig) which is brilliant, and we’re massively appreciative – I thank everybody from the bottom of my heart, especially those who gave what they could.

All of the gig’s proceeds were donated to the British Wildlife Rescue Centre and you can donate on their website here: https://thebwrc.com/

If you weren’t able to see Andy Gower and his Guns for Hire, that’s the name I’m vying for, there’s no need to worry as, in his own words, Andy very much has a taste for playing live again and you can catch him playing Bars Attack on 14thJune at the Artisan Tap in Stoke, playing The Wren in Stone on 31st July along side Nick Sharratt, and you’ll even be able to catch him on an upcoming Narrowboat Session, think of NPR’s Tiny Desk series but with the Potteries aspect dialled up to 11, around June time, with the proceeds this time going to Cancer Research UK.