Introducing - Fatale

What is it about you Uddy (Uddingston) boys and The Velvet Underground?

Back in mid-April, my friend Derek sent me a cryptic WhatsApp message, and then followed it up with soundcloud links to a young teenage band called Fatale . Del had produced and engineered demos for two songs; Moves You and a cover of The Velvets Femme Fatale.

Fatale soundcloud

Del was excited enough to also post in the Teenage Fanclub Fanclub Facebook group with the statement  - If you like Catholic Education era Teenage Fanclub then you'll love Fatale.

Fatale, as you might have guessed from Derek's comparisons, love electric guitars that crash, collide, chime, blur, reverberate and fuzz together in the glorious way that I have loved for over 3 decades.

Hailing from my home town of Uddingston (on the outskirts of Glasgow), I was determined to find out more about this young band that seem to be bursting with talent, taste, looks, great hair (I found out upon meeting them), energy and enthusiasm.

Moves You is the first song that they have released. The overdriven guitars are fired up beautifully, there is a sublime dreamy breakdown, before they burst back into life. Vocally, this is pure So Far Gone/God Knows It's True era Fanclub, raw and soulful harmonies, young romantic lyrics sung from the heart.

Would you find a price for all the stars that shine on you?

Meanwhile, their cover of Femme Fatale is gorgeously raw and warm, sounding like a lost Fanclub cover they recorded for Bandwagonesque era b-sides.

I caught up with guitarist Christopher Jollie to find out more in the interview below. It was also great to bump into the whole band after the BMX Bandits show on Friday night. During the gig they stood to the side, shaking their heads in time and singing-along, Chris wearing a Eugenius t-shirt. They looked like a real gang, tight friends, a band. 

I can't wait to see them live. Read on for info about how they formed, influences, writing and news about their next gig.

1. How did the band form? Where are you all from? How did you get to know each other?

Our singer Ben and lead guitarist Euan are cousins and both of them had came out of playing with other bands. Myself and our bassist Oscar had been school friends with Ben and had played in a drumless, gigless band just before Fatale. A total shambles. Euan and our drummer James had also been school pals but had never played in a band together. 

From James perspective Euan was playing songs with his wee cousin (he thought he was nine) and wanted him to drum with them. When we show up at his garage for a jam, to his surprise there’s three eighteen year old's with guitars. The band just took off from there.

2. How did you start creating music together? Does anyone take the lead on writing? Or do you jam ideas?

We started off with acoustic demos recorded by Ben and Euan, and built up from there. It’s a collaborative process we go for, with everyone coming in with their own songs, and fleshing them out in practice. I’d always hated showing folk my own songs, but I had Moves You as a demo on my phone from months before and tried to show it to the guys. I had to do that another twice before we sort of took it seriously as a song, and now we’re in the process of getting it recorded and produced. We do have very diverse influences, which allows us to do different things with each song.

3. What kind of music are you listening to at present? Have any bands influenced you?

I was just at the Barras seeing Dinosaur Jr. and wow. They’ve always been a band that I’m just in awe of. I’ve been listening to a lot of soul music and bands like Big Star, the Kinks. Apart from that I’ve been getting dead into Eugenius, who had sort of passed me by when I was discovering the Fanclub. Scottish music has shaped our sound unlike anything else. There’s just something inside a lot of Scottish bands that just can’t be replicated. We are very keen to keep that sort of thing going.

4. How did you get on playing McChuills at the start of May?

McChuills was our first gig together, and it was a sellout. We were opening for a very good Irish band, The Labourers, and playing alongside our good pals, Bogle, as part of the Vicar Street Social night. We were originally scheduled to play a Sunday Soundclash on the 4th of May but due to the football it was cancelled. 

That had left us without a gig until July, but thankfully our mate Ben Brown managed to pull some strings and get us a spot on VSS thanks to a demo recorded by Derek McKee. We played 7 songs, including covers of the Scream’s Velocity Girl and the Velvet’s Femme Fatale. Our closer, Moves You ended up getting played twice since we didn’t have another song and the crowd were wanting more. I had already plugged out my guitar when Ben tells me we’re replaying it. You can’t plan for the energy in the room, and everything came so naturally.

5. What do you have coming up in terms of gigs, recording and releasing?

Our next gig is a part of King Tut’s Summer Nights Festival. We’re opening for a band we know called The Violet’s on Sunday 20th July, so it should be another great night. TICKETS

We’re also looking at our options for getting Moves You recorded and released in the next month or two, to keep the excitement going. Del done a great job of our demo so we’ll be looking towards him for potentially recording some covers to put out over the summer. We’re also in the early stages of setting up a once or twice a month event, looking at platforming the sound of young Glasgow. It’s exciting times for us, but it’s just the start of something that we truly believe in.

Eugene Kelly at The Doublet

I really love The Doublet bar in Park Road, Glasgow. It's handy for Kelvinbridge Underground, Kelvingrove Park, Woodlands, Great Western Road and Gibson Street. But it's still just nicely out of the way to stand on its own.

The Doublet is a traditional old boozer, beloved by musicians and artists. So, when they announced they were putting Eugene Kelly with support from Molly Linen on in their upstairs function room, I knew I would have to be quick to grab a ticket.

Eugene is an artist I fell for back in my teens and I guess I have been extremely fortunate that a lot of the bands and artists I discovered back then have had long careers; Teenage Fanclub, Eugene and The Vaselines, The Pastels, BMX Bandits, Primal Scream, The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Lemonheads, Dinosaur Jr ... all still making music.

Upstairs at The Doublet holds 50 at a squeeze, so this was a special intimate show. Molly Linen played a beautiful set, her voice is gorgeously pure and her guitar playing is intricate, clever and melodic. Linen released a 10-inch EP via Lost Map at the end of 2019 and I will certainly be checking that out and hoping to see her again in the future.

On to Eugene Kelly of The Vaselines, or one-time of Captain America until Marvel Comics threatened to sue him, so he changed the band name to Eugenius 'which no-one could spell or say.'

People were literally sitting (on the floor) at the feet of a Scottish indie legend last night. The intimate setting was informal and friendly and Eugene dove way back into his catalogue to play songs of love, lust, frustration, bitterness, tenderness and humour.

The opening Wow! and Bed In from the Captain America days translated easily to an acoustic performance, making me appreciate them all the more.

New songs, School Sports Day and Dogs Best Friend, made me long for a follow up to Eugene's 2003 album Man Alive, from which he played a number of songs. Eugene brilliantly combines raw punk energy with brilliant pop melodies, riffs and hooks and it was thrilling to see him perform in such an intimate setting.

Jesus Don't Want Me For A Sunbeam is a song that has traveled around the world thanks to Nirvana covering it on their Unplugged album, here we were watching its author perform it in his local pub - a joy.

New song Is She Into Me? was brilliant - hilariously brilliant. The lyrics and melodies flowed as Eugene told a story about a guy doubting himself through a string of events. I so hope he records it.

Eugene ended with classic Vaselines songs Mollys Lips and Son Of A Gun to rapturous applause. This was a very special show from someone who displayed his very special talents.

My only disappointment was that Eugene didn't have time to play If I Could Talk which he co-wrote with Evan Dando and The Lemonheads recorded.

But hey, what a night!

Serious Drugs - A film about the BMX Bandits

Yesterday I headed along to the Glasgow Film Theatre for the world premiere of ‘Serious Drugs’, a film/documentary about the cult guitar pop band, The BMX Bandits.

The producer is a guy called Jim Burns who discovered the music of the Bandits during a period of very heavy depression in his life. The revealing Q & A at the end of the film saw Jim really open up about this, describing a time when he was ‘emotionally numb’, he couldn’t feel anything good or bad. Yet somehow, the music of the BMX Bandits broke through the ‘numbness’ and reached Jim.

So Jim set about trying to discover ‘who or what are the BMX Bandits’, ‘what makes a BMX Bandit’ and ‘why can the songs of the BMX Bandits reach me when I am so down?’
The answer comes in the form of the leader of the BMX Bandits, Duglas T Stewart. The film, an incredibly personal project for Burns who funded the film himself, was shot over a 4-year period following Stewart and his fellow Bandits, interspersed with rare footage and photos from the Bandits career.


The Q&A at the end was relatively short, but it revealed a great deal. Burns had never picked up a camera before, let alone attempt (or even think about) making a film. That innocence probably helped to make the film as special as it is. It is clear from the start that there are no barriers between the band and Jim, he is accepted. Indeed Jim did say at the end of the Q&A that this is ‘the closest he will ever get to be in a band.’

To many people, the BMX Bandits are essentially Duglas T Stewart and he is naturally the focus for the film. However, throughout the film Duglas is very keen to highlight the importance of his fellow Bandits and how important they are to allow him to create the music he hears in his head.

There is a great bit in the film where Duglas is creating a very colourful and neat BMX Bandits family tree. Norman Blake (Teenage Fanclub), Eugene Kelly (The Vaselines, Eugenius), Sean Dickson (Soup Dragons), Francis MacDonald (Teenage Fanclub) and David Scott (The Pearlfishers) are just some of the names that have contributed to the 25-years of music by the Bandits. Duglas may be the lead Bandit, but he realises the importance of his fellow Bandits.

The film takes us on a 25-year rollercoaster, discovering Stewart’s ability and desire to perform at an early age. Duglas reveals how he used to be taken around the classes at school to perform impressions and how he was particularly good at Frank Spencer! Early pictures of the Bandits show them busking in Sauchiehall Street with Duglas’ performance generating large crowds. There is also grainy footage from someone’s living room and back garden, everyone is always smiling, a feature that continues to this present day, regardless of who is involved with the band.

Humour is evident throughout the film, whether it is direct from Duglas, or via the producer. Nice words and reviews from the likes of Kurt Cobain, Sounds and the NME are shown directly before reviews that pan the Bandits. There is a hilarious interview where someone asks a young Duglas about being a sex symbol, some good stuff from Alan McGee and Duglas is on top form throughout, whether comic or candid.

It is all relatively good fun until the release of the single ‘Serious Drugs’. The film suddenly changes from being about a fun guitar pop band to commenting on depression. Stewart reveals how he was on medication when he met a new girlfriend and she told him she didn’t think he needed it. 3-weeks later she was saying that his medication could be stronger, hence the line ‘I said I don’t think I can take it much longer, she said ‘maybe your tablet should be stronger, get some serious drugs’, I need some serious love.’

I originally anticipated Jim Burns being shown in the film and talking about his own depression. Instead he allows Duglas to reflect on his own, which in turn reflects on Jim’s.

My personal highlight from the film is probably the scene where Duglas is in his kitchen making Cheese & Toast, a very un rock’n’roll (and therefore a very BMX Bandits) thing to do. It is late at night and Duglas can’t sleep. He has been warned that cheese can bring nightmares, yet he finds that it brings him good dreams, so he continues to make cheese and toast at night. Duglas pours his heart into his songs, he lays himself bare. So he writes a song called ‘Cheese & Toast’. The song is on the 2006 album ‘My Chain’, the album that got Jim Burns into the BMX Bandits.

The last two Bandits albums have really seen them develop and mature. The lovingly endearing ramshackle guitar pop of debut single ‘E102’ has grown into brilliant pop, but in a more Beach Boys (Brian Wilson is a hero for Stewart) vein. The layers, harmonies and musical ability of the band has developed (as you would imagine over 25-years) considerably. Despite this, many of the media still view BMX Bandits as some kind of joke group. Something referred to a few times throughout the film.

I can only hope that this film may readdress that. Stewart writes songs about love, life and hope. Simple, yet powerful, funny at times, moving at others.

The last two albums have seen the addition of Rachel Allison (vocals) and David Scott (keys and many other things) and they seem to have helped inspire Stewart to some of his best work to date. Not that he can’t rely on others to help when it comes to the Bandits.


Norman Blake, Stewart’s great friend, features throughout the film and towards the end he likens being a BMX Bandit to being an Army Reserve; ‘you could get called up any time.’ Indeed Blake features on stage at the Bandits 25th anniversary show at Oran Mor in January 2011, a few songs are included in the film.


So how would you summarise Serious Drugs? Well, it is kind of like the Bandits; There is more than a splash of humour and fun, it is one man’s vision – yet with the help of others, there are many layers to it and ultimately it may prove to have a cult audience.


I was tempted to ask Jim at the Q&A at the end what he intends to do with the film now. However I opted not to. He is taking a well deserved holiday and he has seen the result of 4-years of work with his favourite band displayed on the big screen in his favourite cinema surrounded by family, friends and fans.


I do hope that Jim finds the time and energy to take this further – would BBC Scotland/BBC3 show the film? Could he take it to some independent film festivals?


Anyway, Jim has captured the spirit of one of Scotland's most endearing bands and artists. I look forward to hearing what Duglas and the Bandits come up with next.