The clock is ticking off the minutes until the very first gig of his band's debut North American tour. Seven more weeks inside this silvery tour bus and he'll know if his band has a chance of cracking the ultimate market. Here is where the British can either take the single biggest step to rock'n'roll heaven, or else be chewed up and spat right back across the Atlantic like so many before them. And the one thing that John Power of Cast is not lacking is a positive outlook.
"I have a good feeling about America, the whole theory of it, the history of rock'n'roll." The words race out of his mouth in a gobby torrent of optimism. On his chest is a John lennon T-shirt that proclaims We All Shine On. Power, one-time sideman in Liverpool's lost legends The La's, is an almost mystic believer in the twin concepts of heritage and destiny. "The roots are in American music and it keeps getting resold to them, even though the roots are already here. I'm looking forward to it because I think there's a big gap in America for bands who, like Oasis, are already doing it in their own style. Cast's battle will be won on the streets, at venues like this. They've heard rumours. They'll come and see us and then they'll get it. We're confident, but not in blind belief. We can see the path we've got to go down."
.
Outside in the sunlit alleyway behind the small Vancouver club, Power's fellow band members suck on bottled beers and shoot the breeze with awestruck clusters of the band's Canadian fan base. Some clutch copies of the All Change album that has just gone platinum back home in Britain (sales of 3000,000 and rising), or of its spin-off singles Alright, Finetime, Walkaway and Sandstorm - brittle, bratty, guitar po nuggets, from a collection whose every song seemed like a single. The band has been here once before, for a one-off show in San Diego, but Power understands that his bus is parked on the edge of a gigantic landmass. For every devotee outside there are millions for whom Cast aren't even a rumour.
"We know it's not going to happen overnight," he surges on. "But we're gonna bug the Americans! We're the real thing, it's not a pantomime. We haven't got the yellow leotards and the long hair but we have got the rock'n'roll. I was always sure of America. Even before we signed in Britain I used to think, Britain's so fickle and fad-oriented and you have to get through this. But I was more sure of America cos I know we've got what they want. Even if they don't know it yet.
"It's a fucking continent, it's a long graft. We've got it all to do but we're confident. I'm highly charged. You either know it or you don't, and that's not arrogance. I've been writing these songs on me jack, on the dole in Liverpool since I left The La's, and the feeling is so strong. I do question it sometimes. Am I being stupid here? But it keeps popping up, you see the look in people's eyes, the reaction when we play. There's just a line that cuts through things.
"The thing is, la', we're here for a reason and we're not fools. We're ambitious but we're not clinically ambitious. We're not a preconcieved idea, like a lot of bands are. We understand what's expected of us and what the job entails. You don't bite off more than you can chew, but we know we've bit off a fucking big piece of cake,la', so we better start chewing. But we're up for it. We've got a destiny to filfil. We're gonna be the biggest band in the world at being Cast."
.
The journey of a thoudand miles, so the proverb goes, begins with a single step. But tonight Cast stumble. Their opener, Back Of My Mind, collapses in a mass of technical messiness and the four musicians stare at one another in dumb confusion. "That was the alternative version," announces Power whose reslilience is impressive. "We can't be arsed to do that again." His nostrils twitch. "And who's smoking skunk and not passing it my way?"
They bash on bravely. The front-line boys stand pretty static, putting the audience's visual attention on drummer Keith O'Neill, a five-armed thrashing machine of the Keith Moon school who works his face muscles as furiously as any other part of himself. Bass-player Peter Wilkinson perfects a dark, self-effacing presence as only bass-players can. The lead guitarist is Liam Tyson who may well be a six-string hero in the making, evidenced by the freak-out soloing that he unleashes on Mirror Me, the only new song attempted.
Seeing them play, their sternest critic could not deny that Cast are a band with a lot of heart. And yet, for a time, they seem boxed in by something - possibly by a combination of first-night rustiness and the familiarity of the old material they must stick to in a new teritory. It's the gently gliding ballad, Walkaway, that is first to really fill the room, and the applause elicits Power's first "Nice one!" of the night. With Fintime, half way in, the band hits it's stride and the next song, Alright, is obviously a great thing to have on your side in a fight. Most fascinating is the treatment meted out to the finale, Two Of A Kind, which they extend to a realm of spaciness that even surpasses the album version, culminating in a lengthy spell when the remains of the song are dragged senseless to the end. Such indulgence could be the ruination of a gig, but there is a hint in here that Cast have prog-rock ambitions which might liberate them in the future.
.
There is no encore, and no particular clamour for one. But the dressing room mood is happy and relaxed - you get problems, say the band, and you sort them. Onwards and upwards. They're not even othered that they have to climb right back on the bus in an hour and drive to Seattle by morning, where they'll play two sets for radio before flying on to San Fransisco for tommorrow night's gig. There are no moans in the air, just a sweet fug of smoke.
"Forty thousand years ago," murmours Tyson, taking a meditative draw on the communal cigarette, "there were hippopotamuses in the River Mersey. I took my little dog out for a walk the other week and this fella says, Eh mate, I like yer yo-yo."
But the curly-headed singer in the John Lennon T-shirt is already thinking about life after America. "My head is full of the new songs," Power confides. "Straight after this tour we're gonna go and record, and that's where me enthusiasm is. I'm gagging to get on to the new stuff but that's cos I've heard it. I've even got me eyes on the third album. We're gonna come back with a few songs that really are classic singles. That's why I'm laughing now, mate, co I know. It's the right time for Cast. Me fire's still burning but there's more subtlety, the songs can bend a bit more to left and right. I wrote the early songs with what utensils I had, but I'm getting better on guitar and at singing."
Miror Me has already been recorded and was to be the next Cast single - until Power scrapped the plan. "I threw it into the set, and it's a real stomper, it goes down brilliantly. But me feelings are that I've got better songs. One or two listens and you're hooked, so tough. We wouldn't loose ground with Mirror Me, but with Cast every new song has to move forward. It's a nice problm to have, too many good songs!
"It's a natural thing, not a planned mathematical thing. I ain't calculating and doing the Pythagoras Theory of music. What I am doing is getting in there with spontaneity. Capture it and keep moving. We ain't got time to spare. I can feel it and the feeling hasn't chnged since I got Cast together. Apparently we're successful, but I don't know that, I'm always looking for the next song. I've got six albums to write and maybe then I'll move on to the next thing - poetry, short stories, I don't know, maybe just living."
Across the room O'Neill the drummer is begging bassist Wilkinson to stop calling him Bowlhead, the result of a disasterous recent haircut. "I would mate," replies the other, mournfully. "But the first thing I'll see when I wake up on the bus tommorrow is you. And I'll think, Bowlhead. What can I do?"
Outside, in the alleyway, North America waits in darkness.
*** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***
~ Keith ~
~ Back To Mars ~
~ Yellow Pages ~
