Thompson
Rollets
This article originally appeared in NFH #22 in
the winter of 1992.
Yet another of the
current crop of excellent French bands is the Thompson Rollets. I'm not sure there's a
correct tag to put on their music...to say that it's passionate rock and roll would be
accurate but doesn't paint a very clear picture. They're probably a little more
mainstreamish in the way they put songs together by comparison to many other French bands;
they don't have any Sub Pop tendencies, but I also wouldn't say they are particularly punk
or garage sounding. What they are is a strong guitar band with a good sense of melody and
a singer that can convey a good sense of urgency. Good enough? It's the best I can do.
This article is based
on an interview in which the band's manager Geordie asked the band questions that I sent
him. They answered on tape in French and then Geordie transcribed the gist of what they
said into a letter. So most of the quotes are from Geordie but are based on what the band
members had to say.
The Thompson Rollets
formed in 1986 with Jean Jean (vocals/guitar), Igor (drums/vocals) and Looli
(guitar/vocals) playing 60s/psych influenced music. After a few gigs without a bass player
they lured Christophe away from a rockabilly band that he was tiring of. They started out
playing gigs in their hometown of Perigueux, and after a while their sound began to take
shape. During this time they got a gig opening for Les Thugs and Les Thugs drummer
Christophe Sourice agreed to produce a three song demo for them in April 1988. The songs
were "Bollocks Life", "The War Drags On", and "The Victim"
("War" was a Donovan cover, of all things). This got them a deal for a single
with French label Go Get Organized, which was produced by Died Pretty's Brett Myers, a
match that seems a little strange considering that the other things Myers has produced
tend to be a little more mellow. The single was "Crazy Soldier"/"Never Be
Like You", and a third song from the recording ended up on a compilation lp.
After this it was
decided that Jean Jean should drop guitar to concentrate on the vocals and they added
Philibert and his Gibson SG to beef up the attack. After a couple of fanzine freebie
tracks, Christophe left the band and was replaced by Philippe (ex of the Scuba Drivers).
With this line up they recorded a solid 8 track mini-lp called Thompson Rollets; it
was recorded in Germany and features a good variety of tracks all of which seem to have
something different to offer. It's quite a switch from the way so many bands these days
confine themselves to one very narrow style and seem extremely hesitant to venture away
from it, but two themes stay the same throughout; strong guitar hooks and strong vocals.
After the lp, Looli
quit the band so Jean Jean strapped on his guitar again for the tour to support the new
record. The album got lots of good reviews, but it was only out on vinyl and that kept it
out of a lot of shops where it might have sold more copies. In addition, the label they
were working with went under just as the record was due to come out, so the band had to
pay the pressing costs and handle all the distribution issues themselves. They're still
trying to get out from under the debt; as of the interview for this feature they were due
to tour in February with the hope that the proceeds would pay it off, and that they might
then move on to a new recording.
The record has an
interesting cover photo of the band sitting on a white backdrop wearing shirts with paint
spattered all over them. For some reason it reminds me of the first Damned album, mainly
because of the vacant expressions on the faces. Apparently I wasn't the first to suggest
this comparison, either. But the similarity was never intended...it was the label's idea
and since the band didn't have any ideas that they liked better they did it.
As for most bands,
the gig situation is a constant struggle. "We play in bars, venues, and night
clubs", says Philippe. "It's cool to play in bars but we don't get paid very
well and most often these places are not made for rock and roll gigs so you have to start
playing early, like about 7 or 8 PM and stop at 10 so that you don't disturb the
neighbors. And sometimes the police come and you have to stop playing. That happened to us
in Bordeaux last week. And the bar owners are more concerned with the sound of money
filling their pockets than the sound of the band that's playing. But it's usually in this
kind of places that it's more fun because we're closer to the audience, there's no stage
and the energy passes better. Except Philibert we all like playing in these places.
Without these bars we wouldn't be touring too much."
"We prefer to
play in the venues and MJC, because we play in good conditions even if sometimes it's
small places (capacity 200 or 250). We get to play with a decent sound system and the
people who are running it are really into rock and roll. There are associations that are
non-profit making and do it just for pleasure, for fun. When they call you to come play,
usually it's because they DO love your music."
"The worst place
to play is the night clubs because you have to wait til 1 AM to play and you have to do
two sets or more. You do the sound check about 7 or 8 and then you've gotta wait until 1
AM and listen to all the shit music they play. And most of all, the people who go to these
clubs are not real rock and roll fans; the tickets and drinks are fucking expensive and
the rock and roll audience can't afford that."
Philippe tells a
story as a sample of some of their travails: "One day we were supposed to play in a
bar in Bretagne (in northwest France). When we arrived the bar was closed and nobody knew
we were going to play. So we started to worry a little bit and called our manager. She
said "No, no, nothing's changed; you're supposed to play in that bar. Maybe they are
late or something; stay cool." And then when the bar opened the guy told us we were
supposed to play in another bar 20 km away. And NOBODY told us! That's rock and roll in
France!"
If you're a person
who bought some of the earlier records by French bands, say from the early to mid 80s and
you're expecting a similar production sound from Thompson Rollets, forget it. Says
Philippe: "I think that French bands are better on stage and vinyl today. A lot of
bands made the mistake of putting out records with bad production in the past, but then
studios and the people working there weren't very competent. It was mainly the sound
engineers that didn't know what to do when you came with distorted guitars. They didn't
know what it was all about. Now most of the bands have their own sound engineer, which was
not the case a few years ago."
Philippe is pretty
disgusted with the mainstream French music attitude. "The so called specialized rock
press (Best, Rock'n'Folk) don't care too much about French rock'n'roll bands. They only
write about bands that'll make them sell more copies of their shit. Fortunately we have a
lot of good fanzines (Violence, Abus Dangereux, Les Bruits Defendus, Flying Charentaise,
etc) but the problem is far from being resolved. The fanzines are read only by people who
are already interested in rock'n'roll, so it's the same people who read fanzines and buy
records, so it just goes around in a circle."
"The majors
don't give a damn. If a major happened to sign a band and support it with a big promotion
I think it could work out. When I see the last Nirvana lp being a raving success here I
tell myself maybe nothing's lost. You can make people swallow what you want; when you play
a song ten times a day on radio or TV people end up liking it."
"French people
have an a priori attitude against French bands. They venerate anything that comes from the
US, UK or Australia and they don't care about French bands. Even though we have some
pretty good bands here that sound as good as US or UK bands, like Les Thugs, City Kids,
Dirty Hands, Suspense, Real Cool Killers, Mad Monster Party, Kid Pharoan, Blind Folded,
Backsliders, Burning Heads, Wet Furs, Crybabies, Waterguns, Mister Moonlight and a lot
more."
At this point I made
the major mistake of asking them to name some of their favorite bands from outside France.
An avalanche of names followed, including the Happy Hate Me Nots, New Christs, Godfathers,
Hoodoo Gurus, Soul Asylum, Neil Young, Undertones, Who, Doors, Aerosmith, Jam and closing
with "there's a lot missing!" These guys are serious fans.
With a little luck
they'll finish selling that first lp and get out from under their debt so they can afford
another record. That's the main goal for the future for them; that and to play as many
gigs as they can. Good luck to 'em.
