Beerzone (from 2001)
Back in 2001 I spoke with Iain from street punk band Beerzone. I have “borrowed” this intro from the Beerzone Myspace page:
Formed in 1997 by former Intensive Care vocalist Iain Kilgallon. The band play catchy sing-along streetpunk and have been described as a nice mix of Peter and the TestTube Babies meets The Exploited. The band have released 4 full length studio recordings ( on Beer City, Ghetto Rock, TKO & Cyclone ), 2 Live records ( Captain Oi! & 77 rpm ), a slew of EP and compilation appearances, as well as several 7″ singles. Beerzone have played all over Europe, as well as touring the states 10 times in the past 10 years, including a 5 week tour alongside the Dropkick Murphys. Other notable, if not infamous supporting tours include those with The Business, Fear, and UK Subs. The band have also performed at damn near every Holidays in The Sun Festival ( aka Wasted, Rebellion) that has ever been put on around the world.
Hi, Can you give us a brief history on Beerzone?
Formed in the summer of ’97…played around 200 gigs in the UK and Europe…four full US tours since September 1999 clocking up well over a 100 gigs over there…1st tour was with Dropkick Murphys, Anti-Flag, Blood for Blood and Bombshell Rocks (we were 4th on the bill)…2nd tour was as main support to the Business…3rd tour was 12 night with the Dropkick Murphys as main support then 25 nights as headline with Runnin Riot and the Vigilantes as support…4th tour was another headline tour…5th tour planned to start 11th October and will only be an east coast 10 night job then January a west coast tour then spring the middle etc….played on three Holidays in the Sun festivals with four more already been offered(London Astoria 24th Nov, Dublin spring 2002, East Coast US next summer and Morecambe July 12-14 2002……played with legendary bands like Suicidal Tendencies, Damned, SLF, Cock Sparrer, Sham 69, Test-Tubes, Exploited, UK Subs, Agnostic Front, Bad Manners etc….two albums out to date, 3 singles, 7 compilations(I think but we have another 4/5 we have been asked onto recently)…been played on Jerry Springer show twice…been played at Middlesboro FC on match days before…been on a punk documentary funded by Rolling Stone alongside Stranglers, Dead Kennedys and UK Subs…our first album, They Came, They Saw, They Conquered, was the highest advanced orders in TKO Records( San Francisco streetpunk giant label) history. Paid our own fares (£3000) to play at the now legendary Streetpunk 99 in the US Midwest and got offered 5 US record deals from that one show prompting the Dropkick Murphys to get our singles and promptly offering us a deal with them to tour and record…the new album, Strangle all the Boybands, is out on Cyclone Records of New Hampshire, USA and is the label that launched the Dropkick Murphys…it has been out about two months and is selling very, very well in fact it crashed straight in at No3 in the Pulped sales charts this month outselling a host of bigger names including recent releases by Vice Squad, Conflict, Dead Kennedys, Test-Tubes etc…and the only new release keeping it off the top is the new Business album which will no doubt sell 50,000+ we have received very favorable reviews in a host of magazines both sides of the atlantic including Kerrang. Kerrang, Metal Hammer, Terrorizer, Record Collector, Scootering, Pulped, Maximum Rock’n’Roll, Flipside, Fracture etc. all gave the first album very good reviews and the new reviews should be out imminently…Virgin Megastores nationwide are stocking the new album…apparently Dexter Holland mentioned us on tv recently saying we were one of the best punk bands at the moment (don’t know if this is a good or a bad thing!)
How did the band get together?
The band got together originally to put a rocket up the local music scenes arse in the Sussex area and the plan was to play a few gigs and finish on New Years eve 1997 but after being offered a record deal at only our second gig then the US thing etc. things began to alter dramatically.
What would you say was the best thing about being in Beerzone?
The best thing about being in Beerzone is watching all your life savings disappear as you begin to tour all the time and watching as you amass huge credit card bills!!!! No seriously the best thing is playing somewhere thousands of miles from home and having kids up the front going crazy and singing every word of your songs, that’s awesome and very flattering. Also getting mail from weird and wonderful places like Russia, Phillippines(a lot), Mexico, Australia etc.
What’s the punk scene like in your local are?
The punk scene is not too bad in our area but there are far too many kids who look like punks but only listen to Marilyn Manson, Limp Biskit or whatever you call them…listen to some good old fashioned punk you braindead c###’s!!!!!!!
Do you feel that the scene is quite strong right now and how do you see it progressing?
The scene is the best it has been for a good 15 years, there is no doubt about that and is going from strength to strength with new bands cropping up all over the country.
You’ve toured the US before? How do you go down over there and do you get large crowds at your shows?
As mentioned earlier we have toured the US four times to date, we go down extremely well over there and we get some big crowds and some small crowds but you have to work the US very hard as it is so huge and it does not matter the size of the crowd, you must always give it your all as these people have made the effort to come and see you so you can’t let them down. As we have seen even the really big bands suffer from low turnouts frequently, especially on midweek nights but you are over to play so you would rather play to a small amount of people than have a day off as you are there to get your music out as often as you can. We have played to crowds from 20 or so to 7000 on our tours but on our own tours we usually play clubs that hold 200-500.
Any other countries Beerzone have taken in?
We have played, Scotland, Wales, Germany, France, England and the USA but have gigs coming up in France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Denmark and Ireland as well as the US again.
Which would be your favourite bands that you’ve played with?
Fave bands we have played with: Dropkick Murphys, H20, Agnostic Front, Cock Sparrer, Test-Tubes, UK Subs, Murphys Law, Business, Foreign Legion, Runnin’ Riot, Anti-Heros, Blood for Blood.
If you could play with any band dead or alive who would it be?
To be honest we have been lucky enough to have played with most of the ones we like but The Clash wouldn’t be too shabby I suppose and The Rezillos.
How can the readers get hold of your releases and contact you?
You can get our releases from www.pulped.com, www.cyclonerecords.com, www.amazon.com, www.beerzone.net or Virgin or HMV if you are lucky but www.pulped.com has to be fave as they sell absolutely loads of our releases (they buy them in at either 50 or 100 at a time regularly!!!!)
You can contact us through www.beerzone.net or at PO Box 89, Crawley, Sussex RH10 7PD.
What do you feel the future holds for Beerzone?
The future looks very promising indeed for the band but our aim is to play Europe and the UK a lot more as well as the USA.
Thanks to Iain from Beerzone for answering our questions.
This interview originally appeared in FPM Zine back in 2001.
UPDATE! Beerzone have formed a new band called Control. It features members of Beerzone and is a more current, harder hitting band. For more info, check out www.myspace.com/controlrocknroll or the official site at www.controlrocknroll.com
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