1996.09.DD - Kerrang! - Neurotic Outsiders: Duff and Matt talk records

The first record you ever bought

Matt: 1966, A Hard Day’s Night. I saw The Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show — I was six years old. I wanted to be a drummer when I bought that record — I was playing then too.
Duff: There were a lot of records around in my house so I didn’t have to go out and buy them — James Gang, Beatles. The first one I actually got was Kiss Alive I and an Aerosmith bootleg, but I didn’t buy them, I stole them. We had a system. In the record store there was a pinball at the back with a window above the door. I used to put them in a bag, have one of my buddies go outside, and then put them through the window.
The last record you bought
Matt: I bought about ten at the same time: Radiohead The Bends — a little late, but I bought it — Porno For Pyros, Smashing Pumpkins’ Mellon Collie and the new Soundgarden.
Duff: I think Soundgarden was the last one I bought, or the new Prince album, Chaos and Disorder.
Matt: Did you get any records the other day when we did that in-store in Tower?
Duff: No.
Matt: I nicked some on my way out.
Duff: Don’t they have those things on them?
Matt: No, I got them at the new releases, grabbed a bunch of them.
The record you’d put on before a night on the razz
Matt: Elastica, believe it or not. When I’m getting dressed I usually turn on the TV. I used to put on a lot of early Van Halen — party records.
Duff: For me it’s IceT, the Power record. I bet you’re going to ask what’s a good record for sex?
The best record for having sex to
Duff: Any Prince record, preferably the singles because they last a long time, 1999.
Matt: I’ve fucked a lot to that Sarah McLaughlin record. She’s a very beautiful singer, very mellow. It’s almost like Enya but a little heavier. Check out the record — it’s awesome. These rock fans are going to go, ‘What’s up with Matt?!’
The best record for a hangover
Duff: I haven’t had a drink for two and a half years — and I never had a hangover before, because I just kept drinking. Morning records are like Lenny Kravitz, ‘Let Love Rule’ or something like that.
Matt: Let me see — Radiohead. That’s good stuff for mornings, or Roxy Music ‘Avalon’.
Favourite record sleeve
Duff: Roxy Music, Siren, all of those with the girls on front. Especially as a kid, like 13 years old, buying thoes records those girls were something.
Matt: Blind Faith, the original with the very young girl, or Led Zeppelin II.
The record that changed your life
Duff: Mine was a single. I heard it before I’d heard The Sex Pistols — D.O.A, ‘The Prisoner’. These guys were like 150 miles away from me, in Canada, and they just opened my eyes. I didn’t think of it in terms of punk rock then, it just made me go ‘Wow, I can go play.’ Then I got the Pistols record and The Damned and Stiff Little Finger, The Vibrators and Johnny Thunders. But D.O.A and Johnny Thunders were probably the ones who changed my life.
Matt: Kiss Alive was the first concert I ever saw in the ninth grade, so I bought that album, but it was probably Led Zeppelin ‘Good Times Bad Times’ that made the biggest impression on me or Ginger Baker playing drums on Fresh Cream.
The most embarrassing record in your collection.
Duff: I don’t have any Poison or Warrant records, if that’s what you mean.
Matt: I got a lot of weird shit for free. Probably an Extreme album.
The record you wish you’d played on
Duff: I wish I’d played on any of Prince’s early records, like 1999 or even the ones before that. That’s a mind I’d really have liked to tap into.
Matt: I wish I’d played on Appetite For Destruction.
Duff: There it is, man!
Matt: Or ‘Burn’, Deep Purple. I used to play along with Ian Paice as a kid.
Three records you’d give a 5-K! review to
Duff: There’s so many — this is really hard. Raw Power Iggy And The Stooges, Aerosmith Toys In The Attic and let’s go into the 90s, Soundgarden Superunknown.
Matt: Genesis The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway, Black Sabbath Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, and the first Pretenders record. Every song on that album is a fucking hit.
Duff: You’ll start killing yourself tomorrow. ‘Oh, I should have said.....’!
The record you think Kerrang! readers should rush out and buy
Duff: Sly And The Family Stone Greatest Hits — go get it, all you metalheads, and get some back beat to your shit, right Matt?
Matt: Unanimous on that one.