I can still remember buying my first BMX Bandits record, 1993's Kylie's Got A Crush On Us, from Impulse Records in Motherwell. I bought the 7-inch and CD single. I was already aware of the band through my religious reading of both the NME and Melody Maker every week. Also from homemade cassettes that would get passed around. The Bellshill Beat TV show was broadcast the same year, presented by Duglas and featuring the Bandits, Fanclub, Vaselines, Pastels, Superstar and The Soup Dragons. It was like the show had been made specifically for me.
All of this music seemed very real, pure and honest. Especially because it was local to me. The music weeklies were fixated on Manchester, Seattle or London. BMX Bandits and Teenage Fanclub in Bellshill were just a few train stops along the Glasgow line from me in Carluke.
Over the years I'd get to know Duglas a little and eventually become friends as we would always bump into each other at shows in Glasgow, whether his own, or bands/artists that Duglas was keen to catch live and support.
Lynn and I would go and see his latest incarnation of BMX Bandits, or Duglas guesting with bands, playing stripped back shows and at special gigs, like the Bandits 30th anniversary show at Oran Mor with Sean and Norman among the guests. One of my favourite shows was Duglas playing a tiny acoustic show with his friends The Wellgreen in The Lismore bar. Stu and Marco also had someone playing French Horn and it was just gorgeous. Duglas brings warmth and energy to every gig he plays, no matter the size. He loves to sing, perform, share stories and also play cover versions to show his love and taste for music, and turn people on to music they might not have heard before.
Duglas and BMX Bandits have featured in my blog regularly over the years. I also recorded a podcast with Duglas back in 2016 for his bands 30th anniversary! It's a fond memory. We sat on a bench in Glasgow Green, eating ice cream in glorious sunshine discussing music and Duglas chose some songs to play. Check it out.
I was delighted to learn that a new BMX Bandits compilation album, 15 Big Ones, is being released to mark 40-years since they launched into the world with debut single E102 on Stephen Pastel's 53rd & 3rd Records. Doesn't time fly?!
15 Big Ones is out on 27th November, as a single LP, or you can get your hands on a limited edition double vinyl version with bonus songs. ORDER from Monorail BMX Bandits have also announced a full band matinee show at The Hug & Pint on Saturday 14th November. TICKETS HERE
Duglas very kindly answered some questions and created a wonderful playlist. Oh ... and there might even be a couple of exclusives on what is coming up next for BMX Bandits ...
If you could go back in time to one moment or show in BMX Bandits history, what would it be, and why?
To quote one of our songs, "Go back, I can't go back. Go forward, I must go forward." I don't know if I want to go back, I think it would be too painful to find myself younger and full of hope with endless possibilities in front of me. But not wanting to be a spoilsport I'll play along with the idea and choose our first full band show in Tokyo at the club Antiknock in Shibuya. Looking out at the audience and seeing love there.
You have an incredible knowledge of music and superb taste. Could you create a tracklist for a 15-song compilation album of your favourite music? What would you call it?
I would call it 15 Loved Ones. I think of songs as being like friends that I can turn to when I need them to make the world feel better or to understand how I am feeling or soundtrack the good times and difficult days. So they feel like loved ones, that are precious to me. I’ve made you my 15 Loved Ones playlist and made it a selection of songs that have been important to me personally and also massively influential on BMX Bandits music over the last 40 years. Of course there are many others that I could have included.
3. I Never Dreamed by The Cookies
4. Break Away by The Beach Boys
5. Watch What Happens by Chris Montez
6. Who Do You Think You Are by Jigsaw
7. Storm in a Teacup by Lynsey De Paul
8. The Sunshine After The Rain by Ellie Greenwich
9. Someday Man by Paul Williams
10. Baiba Bimba by Tenniscoats
11. Schweden Espresso by Sofie Royer
12. Bye Bye Barbie by Daniel Johnston
13. Casaco Marron (Bye, Bye, Ceci) by Evinha
14. Metti una sera a cena by Enrico Morricone
15. Something Big by Burt Bacharach
How do you feel when new bands coming through (like The Cords / Fatale) cover your songs, come to your shows and highlight how much they love your music?
It means a lot of course. I think of it being similar to when we got to meet people like Alex Chilton or Evie Sands or Chip Taylor and became friends. Of course the gap between us in the 1980s was just around 20 years,,which felt a huge length of time to us then. The gap between us and Supersun, The Cords and Fatale is almost double that in time. It’s a bit like us doing Mills Brothers or Bing Crosby stuff, rather than The Velvet Underground and Bacharach & David songs. I remember seeing The Cords perform the BMX Bandits song I Wanna Fall in Love when I first met them and it sounded so beautiful to me. It was very emotional for me thinking that this song Francis Macdonald and I had written years before they were born had made a connection with them and that they would want to perform it. Since then we’ve actually had Eva perform it live with us a couple of times. She sings it so beautifully.
BMX Bandits has featured many members over the years. Is there anyone you would have liked to join (or guest with) the band for a while?
BMX Bandits and me out with BMX Bandits have been lucky enough to work with people who would have been on that list. I got to co-produce Alex Chilton,with David Scott and his widow said it was one of her favourite recordings by him ( a cover of the Beach Boys song I Wanna Pick You Up). We had Evie Sands in the studio doing backing vocals on a track on our album Bee Stings and we got to be her backing band for a live show and a radio session. One of my more contemporary musical heroes Saya from Tenniscoats produced a BMX Bandits track that I recorded at her home in Tokyo. Jowe Head from Swell Maps and the TVPs was one of the people who inspired us to start making music and we've collaborated several times. So a lot of musicians that I would have otherwise said have already done it. So I am now thinking fantasy and both of these people are sadly dead and so these choices will have to remain in the realms of fantasy.
A key part of so many of the records that I love are the arrangements and I've always paid great attention to what's going on with that aspect of pop music, paying attention to the choices of instruments and sounds in a recording, strings, woodwind, brass and other stuff. A lot of these records are from the 1960s and '70s.
There are two arrangers that I wish that I could have had the chance for them to work on some of my music and they are Arthur Greenslade and Nick De Caro. Arthur did the arrangements on some of my favourite recordings by artists including Serge Gainsbourg, Rod McKuen, Vashti Bunyan, Twice As Much, Del Shannon and my favourite 1967 David Bowie stuff like When I Live My Dream and Love You Till Tuesday. Nick De Caro was involved in a lot of those early mellow pop records on the A&M records for artists like Chris Montez. Harpers Bizarre, Claudine Longet, Roger Nichols & The Small Circle of Friends. He also worked on Here You Come Again for Dolly Parton and Andy Williams hits like I Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You and Music To Watch Games By.
If I was out buying second hand record shopping or buying cool sixties and seventies CD reissues in Japan one of the first things I'd be looking at was who was the arranger on the albums and if I saw Nick De Caro or Arthur Greenslade's name on there I would probably take a chance on it. So those are the guys I wish I could have worked with. There is also a beautiful Nick De Caro album called Italian Graffiti. where he sings and arranged the tracks and also go find his solo recording of Caroline No. I think it's greater than The Beach Boys version from Pet Sounds.
What has it been like to reflect on your 40-year discography? Did you 'rediscover' any songs that you hadn't listened to or played live for a while? (or forgotten about!)
Some of the songs have very strong emotional ties to people, times in my life and places that are gone now and it can sometimes feel a little raw hearing some songs for that reason. But unlike some of my friends who are in bands, I generally really enjoy listening to my own records. I don't do it all the time but I have friends who would never listen to their own work, they hate hearing it. I find that odd. Sometimes I will hear a track and I am surprised by it and it can sound better to me than I remembered it. I hadn't listened to some of the Creation Years stuff for a while and hearing Gettin' Dirty and our version of Jonathan Richman's That Summer Feeling again felt very pleasing.
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Norman and Duglas
On most of our albums the tracks that ended up being singles aren't my personal favourites and due to the nature of this release there's some of the tracks that I am proudest of in our history that couldn't be included here. For instance, I think Still from BMX Bandits in Space, How Not To Care from BMX Bandits Forever and A Missing Front Tooth from My Chain are among our very best work but they didn't seem to fit in with this release ...but hopefully listening to our 15 Big Ones will encourage people to dig deeper.
What next for BMX Bandits?
We plan to release a new album in 2027 and have already one track recorded for that. I don't have a title for it yet, which is unusual for me. There's been a few albums that the first thing I've had before any songs is the album title and the title has helped steer the direction/ narrative of the album.
I am doing a book that should be out hopefully around late Summer 2027. It's not an autobiography, it's a collection of essays about writing and recording some key BMX bandits tracks over the last 40 years. There is also a BMX Bandits stage musical in the works, it's not about BMX Bandits but it was inspired by our music and features a bunch of our songs. I went to the first read through a few months ago in my old home town of Bellshill and that was a lovely experience.
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