Andy Interviews...

"Symposium"

Symposium are the baby-faced psychos of British rock. Their live performances feature extreme behaviour on the verge of stupidity, but we love it. At Reading this year, they had to be dragged off stage by security before they would stop playing. So imagine the excitement of being sat in a room with two such wildmen, lead singer Ross Cummins and guitarist William McGonagle. Watch out! They'll eat you alive as soon as talk to you!

"Want a drink?" asks the slightly roly-poly guitarist, fully garbed in Q.P.R. football kit. "Wow! What'll it be," I think, "Jack Daniels, Jim Beam?"

A can of Red Bull is placed in my hand, and the interview commences. "The tour's been going alright, yeah," says William, with general disinterest.

"Yeah, it's been going really good," says Ross more enthusiastically. Clearly he's been on the Red Bulls. Gives you wings, you know! "All the gigs we've been doing have been sold out, and we're doing bigger places now. It's been brilliant, everybody knows all the new songs and everything."

Clearly Symposium love their touring, but to the point where they begin to list details of specific dates, specific tracks?

"Warwick wasn't quite as full as we'd hoped, Brighton was good, but we weren't feeling too good ourselves..."

Hold on, this isn't what I wanted! I want rock and roll heroes, not performing trainspotters! Come on boys, tell us a rock and roll story! How about videos? They're always great for stories.

"The one day we went to do the video for 'Bury You'," explained Ross, "it was pissing down with rain the whole day. It was supposed to be a really sunny day. It looked really sunny, but actually it was pissing down with rain. Every was going 'Yeah!' but really we were getting soaked."

So Symposium are professionals, even at such a tender age. They can strap on a happy face with the best of them. They have been having fun times though, like when they said to the crowd at Glastonbury '97,

"Everyone throw mud at the stage on the count of three. One, two...."

"I should've worn my boots on stage that day," laughs Ross. "It was more muddy on the stage than it was in the field I think. They got a bit pissed off, 'cos Michael Eavis came on at the end and told everyone to stop pissing around. He was a brave man."

Then there was Reading '97 too.....
"You know those little cars," starts Ross.
"Like golf buggies," adds William.
"We were driving round, and were slightly pissed," continues Ross. "Me and my mate stole one, and hot-wired it. It's really easy, you just stick your key in, shake it round, and it starts. We drove round, BRRRM, and went up this massive hill. It had been raining that weekend as well, and there was this massive truck down the bottom of the hill. We started going down it really fast, going 'Wooooh, yeah!", and I went to put the brakes on, and we slid, and were still going well fast and we were just sliding, and crashed into the side of this truck. We looked at each other for a couple of seconds, like 'Shit, we're dead', and hit the side of this big truck. I thought I'd broken my arm, but I was alright, and we both started laughing. Then we realised we'd slammed into the side of the oil tanker, and thought 'Shit, better get out of here', tried to drive off, turned round, then reversed back into it."

Some story. Slightly better than TV's out of windows too. People have been crucified for less, not least Beastie Boys, who played on the same stage at Reading this year. So far, it would seem that they have escaped condemnation by the public for their fun, but what about contemporaries like those hip-hop gods, who they have to share all these golf-carting privileges with? What about the rumours than they didn't get on with the Foo Fighters when they were touring together?

"We went on tour with them, yeah. Dave Grohl is just really nice, so down to earth. He used to come in our dressing room and stuff..."
Oh yeah?

"We're quite good mates really. We met him last year and got chatting with him, and it all developed from there."

Symposium nearly toured separately with Sleeper and Echo and The Bunnymen, but Ross broke his leg and they couldn't. Are they as close friends with these guys as with Mr. Grohl?

"No," states Ross bluntly. "Thank God we didn't do that. Sleeper, man!

They just said 'Do you want to support them?' and we were like, 'No!', then they said, 'Oh, but you should support them, it'll be good for you.' Then I thought 'Oh, fuck it,' and broke my leg. Then we had a big rest, and done nothing."

At such a tender age as Symposium are, most of us don't have a clue what we want to do with our lives. When your career takes off as much as theirs has, it is hard to keep your feet on the ground. So do these young men manage to hang out with their real mates, not these celebrity phonies, as much as normal 20-year olds?

"Not as much as we'd like to..." mumbles Ross.

"They've all gone to University now, anyway," adds William.

"It's quite funny actually, 'cos every place we go away to now, there's someone we know there," continues Ross. William takes it up again. "Even if we weren't touring, or in the band though, we still wouldn't see them, 'cos they'd be away at University, and I'd be working in a supermarket."

There goes Symposium's glamour....

"I reckon I might be at University," explains Ross, "but if I'd have gone I probably wouldn't have made it past the first year. It's easy in the first year, isn't it, but then you've got to do work, and it's like 'Oh, No!'. If I wasn't in a band now I'd be on some kind of acting course or something. It would have to be a course which doesn't involve doing any work."

Back in the real world, Symposium are well on the musical track, from small beginnings playing to their mates in London, to the amazing live act they are now.

"When we started," explains William, "we didn't actually think that anyone would want to watch us. For a year, nobody did like us. We just used to smash it all up, then stick it all back together the next day. It wasn't about getting a record deal or anything like that, it's kind of like just us five getting mad for an hour, and just getting really pissed up and that was it."

Symposium have few pretensions. They don't pretend to be clever-clever like a lot of bands around. Though their words are often sad, there are no hidden messages or sulking because they're "misunderstood" here. Instead, they go out to rock, maybe cut loose some anger, have a good time, and give the audience a good time. They succeed too. So, if you ever feel like rocking your way out from the pressures of real life to a night of good rock music, you could do much worse than seeing Symposium.

Click Here to get more details about "On the Outside" Symposium's current album and other material produced by the group.

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