Interview with King Koen - Evil Thingies, 9 May 2003

NB - How did you start to listen to rock'n'roll?
K. - Well my parents still have a tape of me singing 'Yellow Submarine' when I was 4 years old. Not exactly rock'n'roll but apparently that's what I did all the time. Listening to the radio and singing along. When I heard something that I liked I kept singing it for hours. I didn't care just what it was, as long as it had a good beat.

NB - What was the first record you ever bought?
K. - I got a Shocking Blue greatest hits for my 10th birthday and I was hooked straight away. So the very first record that I bought was 'Inkpot', the new Shocking Blue 45. I had a Mariska Veres poster on my bedroom wall for years. I wasn't into sports or anything, just music. I got my first guitar soon after that, trying to play along with my records or songs on the radio. The guitar was completely out of tune but I didn't care. I tried to tune it by looking at another poster on my wall, ha ha! I adjusted the tuning machines so that they were in the exact same position as the one that the guitar player was holding on the poster. I had no idea what I was doing. But then my uncle came along and he tuned it for me. There was no stopping me now!!! I got myself a guitar chord book and that got me started. I started to write songs straight away. At least that's what I was trying to do. I also got myself a 'Beatles Complete' songbook and I started playing that. By then all my classmates were listening to prog rock which was something that I couldn't relate to. I just didn't get it and most important of all: I couldn't play it on my guitar. So why bother. I didn't give a shit about all that prog stuff. There wasn't anything I liked in those days except for glam rock. This was the early 70's, remember. A few years later there was this guy in my class who was a real outcast, everybody hated him and he never said a word. One day he gave me a tape because he figured that I might like it. I played the tape and it struck me instantly. A compilation of some punk 45's that he owned. No names or songtitles or anything, just killer stuff. I new about Ramones but the rest was all new to me. I didn't care who or what it was, but I dug it. The songs were easy to play, nothing else mattered. I knew what I had to do. I needed a band fast, but every guy who owned a guitar was only interested in playing Simon and Garfunkel or Cat Stevens shit. And no one I knew played drums or bass. It all began to change with the arrival of a new band in my hometown. They were called Wolfgang and they were awesome. They looked like the Rolling Stones did in 1965 and they covered just about anything I liked. They released a killer 45 called 'Nee Nee Nee'. Check it out on 'Bloodstains Across Belgium #3'. All of sudden all my friends picked up an instrument and a few months later I formed my first band: the Purple Tits. That was the most punk type of name I could come up with. I didn't know any better. The tape that my classmate had given me came in handy and we covered a lot of those songs. There was one song that I particularly dug so we decided to give it a go. I didn't know the song title, but that wasn't important. I thought the song was called 'Hot Dogs In Space' and I made up the rest of the lyrics. 'Hot Dog In Space' became our most requested song. Couple of months later someone showed me the original 45 of that song. It wasn't called 'Hot Dogs In Space' of course but rather 'Love Comes In Spurts' by Richard Hell and The Voidoids!?! However, I kept singing 'Hot Dogs In Space' until the band folded a year later. I told that story to Marky Ramone some time ago - he was a member of the Voidoids before he joined the Ramones - and he almost fell over laughing.

NB - Evil Thingies is your great new band. For me Evil Thingies 10" - 'New Shapes In Sound' and 7" - 'Chante / I Can Only Give You Everything' are both really marvellous records. What do you think about them? Are you satisfied or you think they could sound even better?
K. - Hey thanks! I'm very happy with the results myself, I think it's the best stuff I've ever done. I wanted to do something like that for quite some time, I just had to wait for the right people to come along. We rehearsed about 10 times and recorded everything in the place where we rehearse. No overdubs or anything, everything was done live in one take. No fancy stuff, it's gotta be real. I didn't want to wait for a couple of months because I wanted it to be pure and rough. Mixing the recordings in mono was another must. I've been trying to figure out stereo for 30 years and I still don't get it. It only distracts and adds nothing to the songs. The only reason why people invented stereo is because they can sell twice the amount of speakers. I don't know, stereo just ain't my thing. It's got nothing to do with nostalgia or retro because I hate it as much as the next guy. We're sometimes billed as a 60's garage punk band and I don't like it because we're not. We are not a retro band at all. We're a NOW band and if you happen to like 60's garage you'll definitely dig what we do, but that's not the whole trip. And the reason why 'New Shapes In Sound' and 'Chante' are only available on vinyl is because I feel the same way about CD's. Some people think I'm crazy and they say that we're definitely going to sell less albums. But I don't give a fuck. I'm not here to please any yuppies. Fuck them!

NB - Can we expect more Evil Thingies gigs now - all around Europe and overseas? Are you preparing some new material for a LP or another 7"? Tell me what are your plans.
K. - Well, a lot has changed over the past few months. John, Bart and Alexandra are no longer with the band. They're all playing in other bands as well and it became more and more difficult to combine it with the Evil Thingies. Alexandra's band Speedball Jr. just released its first LP and they're like playing all the time. Bart is also a member of Fifty Foot Combo and they're on the brink of major breakthrough. It was a hard decision because that line-up of the Evil Thingies was so good and we recorded a killer album together. We never had the chance to prove ourselves, too bad. But I started a new line-up with Evelyne straight away and the new line-up is even better. I asked Frank, Yannic and Kurt - who were formerly in Rat Fink A Boo-Boo - to join last week and it sounds excellent. Next week we're gonna play our first gig and I'm looking forward to it already. I've written about 15 new songs for the next album. I had planned on recording the second Evil Thingies LP in June with the old line-up but it's gonna have to wait until autumn or the end of the year I suppose.
But first there's a second single coming out soon. It's going to be a split single with Shutdown 66 on Corduroy/Tear-It-Up Records. This will feature a different version of 'Gotta Get A Grip' than the one on the album and yet another version of 'I Can Only Give You Everything' called 'Tu Es Impossible'. 'Tu Es Impossible' is probably the best thing we recorded. We're going to play several garage festivals this year. Wrestlemania 2003 in Eindhoven, Cosmic Trip #7 in Bourges, France, Beat Fever #3 in Verona, Italy and Wild Weekend #4 in Benidorm, Spain.

NB - You are currently playing in 3 bands. Can you tell me more about other 2?
K. - Well no, actually I'm not anymore. The Ewings split up for the same reason - Steven is also in Fifty Foot Combo - so wedecided to break up the band. We're gonna do 2 final shows, the very last concert will be in Eindhoven on May 28. The Ewings is also a garage punk band, but a lot harder. More of a Stooges/MC5/Nashville Pussy/Zeke etc. type of thing. We also had a 10" album out on Tear-It-Up Records called 'Rock and Rule'.
I'm also back with the Spanks right now. I was originally with that band 15 years ago. They were probably the very first garage band in Belgium and they released quite a few records on Punk Etc., Boom, Wipeout and Get Hip Records. We're going to record a new album in September.

NB - Maybe this question sounds a bit funny, but do you know in how many bands you actually played till now?
K. - It's hard to keep track of what I've done in the past. Even for me! I was in 36 different band before the Evil Thingies. Let's see which ones I can still remember. After the Purple Tits I formed a couple of other punk bands. One of them was called De Dinges and they were pretty cool. That was the only time I sang Dutch. After that I recorded about 5 albums on the AKCP cassette label. Crazy avant garde weirdness/noise much like Suicide or Billy Synth. Total freak out stuff, I thought it was cool at the time although I must admit that I haven't listened to any of this in the last 20 years. But I kept forming garage punk bands during that time as well, the Outtastyle being one of them. Nobody knew about 60's garage back then, so you could go out and play a whole set of Pebbles/Boulders/Nuggets covers and everybody believed that they were songs that we had written. Same thing with the Paranoiacs, when we started we had a set of 74 covers and 1 original. Nobody knew... After that I was in the Kinda Weird, the Spanks, the Greenhorns, the Nails, the Snails, the Wyld, the Ones and various other bands that I can't recall right now. Right before I formed the Evil Thingies I was in a band called Bonedaddy, also with Bart. I formed the Evil Thingies the same night Bonedaddy played its last gig. John, Alexandra and Evelyne were in the audience and I asked them if they wanted to be in my new band with Bart. Easy as that, I don't spend a lot of time organising things like that. A spur of the moment kind of thing. If it feels right, I just do it.

NB - Which one of these bands is your favorite or which one is the most important to you?
K. - That's a hard question to answer, I really can't tell. I don't really care, playing in a band is all I ever wanted to do. Form a band, rehearse for a few weeks, do a few gigs and record straight away. The sooner, the better. I don't believe in polishing a sound or rearranging songs for the benefit of creating a hit. I don't care about that at all. I just wanna have some fun and if it doesn't work out the way I want it I just form another band. As simple as that. I've never recorded a demo in my life, I don't see the benefit of it. I just record my shit the way I want and if someone wants to release it, that's fine. If they don't, that's OK too, I don't want to waste my time kissing someone's ass. There's so many things that I want to do, I'm not going to let a minor setback get in my way. Right now the Evil Thingies is all that's important to me.

NB - What was your most successful band?
K. - That must have been the Greenhorns. We did an LP called 'Upfront 'n' Straightforward' that sold about 5000 copies. Most of the other singles and LP's I did were limited editions of 300-600 copies. Even I don't have a copy of everything I ever did. For some reason the Greenhorns LP was a hit in 1989. I scored a radio hit the year before and I got a record deal out of it. I never cared for that album, I think it's best forgotten. The songs were OK but we fucked up in the studio. But the critics liked it and it got played a lot on the radio. It's total rubbish and the whole situation disgusted me. So I left the Greenhorns and got myself a new band. What's the point of being famous, it doesn't mean anything. I just drags you away from the essence of it all. It's just a load of bullshit. You tend to believe all that nonsense and before you know it you're living someone else's dream. I don't want any of that because it's all a big mistake. I was called the Godfather Of Belgian Garage recently, what the fuck does that mean!?! I don't want to be anybody's godfather or anything. Get a life, will you! Besides, I've seen those Godfather movies and Brando and Pacini are much better actors than me...

NB - You played in so many bands and you still do, and you had a hit with the Greenhorns. Can you live from all that?
K. - Ha, ha, that's a good one. I'm not in it for the money you know. I'm afraid that this is only costing me money. Playing vintage gear is nice but these bloody things break down all the time. Especially fuzzboxes. I've got a whole closet filled with broken fuzzboxes. And I got to have a vintage fuzzbox in order to create this sort of mayhem. A Maestro Fuzztone or an Electro Harmonix Big Muff. Right now I use a Coloursound Tonebender but I don't know how much longer it's going to last. True, you can throw modern fuzzboxes down the stairs and they still work but that's about the only advantage. I can't get the right sound with modern fuzzboxes. Same thing with modern amps because they suck bigtime! They all sound the same: rotten! What you're hearing on the Evil Thingies records is a Vox Phantom VI guitar, a Vox AC30 amp and a Coloursound Tonebender. You can't beat that sound.

NB - You are in the garage scene from 80s. Did things in that scene change during all these years?
K. - I'd say that the difference is huge. I don't want to be part of any scene but today's garage is much better than 15-20 years ago. I hear much better garage stuff now. A lot of the 80's garage discs are ruined by sound engineers that didn't have a clue what they were recording. That big 80's drum sound for instance, what the hell was that!?! How on earth did that horrible sound got mixed up with garage? Beats me! A lot of 80's garage is just crap, pure unadulterated pop crap. A weak pop tune with a fuzz guitar and a Farfisa is still a weak pop tune. But don't get me wrong, a whole lot of bands got it right of course. But some of the biggest names in 80's garage were just poseurs. That paisley thing or those wanna-bees with their leather outfits. I never cared for that. A lot of pop bands jumped onto the garage bandwagon and I won't bother with them because they simply suck. The best 80's garage band were the Miracle Workers, just listen to their Moxie, Sounds Interesting and Voxx stuff, you can't beat that. Just timeless... And a major influence on the Evil Thingies!

NB - You are also big record collector. Any idea how many records you have?
K. - I really can't tell. I've got a whole bunch of records that I haven't even listened to, but one day... Record collecting is one of the craziest things a person can do. The more you got, the more you want. And it never ends... But I got a headstart because when I started collecting 60's garage punk they were simply giving 'em away. I went to Amsterdam every 2 or 3 weeks and you could get original Standells and Chocolate Watchband LP's for 5 Dutch Guilders! Those were the days... Sealed and everything!

NB - Your favorite band of all time?
K. - The Kinks are my all time fave band. Everything up to and including the mighty 'The Kink Controversy' album is unbeatable. Can't think of any other band that influenced me more. I'm still ripping off the Davies brothers to this day. Killer stuff! And thousands of others. Right now I especially dig the Satelliters and I want to record a Satelliters track for our next album. I believe that every cool band in the world should cover one of their tunes.

NB - Any other new band(s) that you really dig?
K. - I think the Makers are awesome. A lot of people hated their 'Psychopathia Sexualis' LP but for me it's every bit as good as their previous albums. I saw the Makers twice in concert and it's two of the best concerts I ever attended. The Trouble Makers are another great live band, a 1000 times stronger live than what you hear on their Screaming Apple LP. You should have seen 'em at the Wild Weekend in Spain 2 years ago. The Monsters are a fantastic band as well, both live and on record. I guess there's dozens of other bands I admire. I saw the Cherry Valence recently and I liked them a lot. The Hunches, the Immortal Lee County Killers, I sure dig that crazy shit! What I don't like is mod because 95% is just bland pop music played by people who are more interested in fashion than music. It's just boring and they're totally missing the point. They all cite the Small Faces as their heroes but when you hear their records they're nowhere near to what made the Small Faces so unique. The Small Faces are one of the only sixties bands that never made a bad record but it seems that all that these modern mod bands want to do is dress like Steve Marriott. And talk about scooters. I don't want to be associated with mod or anything. What a fucking waste of time! The Small Faces could do anything and get away with it. I really hate 'Runaway' by Del Shannon and I never thought I'd ever hear a decent version of it but the Small Faces proved me wrong. And it's the only good version of that song ever!

NB - What's the idea behind 'A Peek In Jeff Conolly's Record Collection' web site?
K. - Well I got to know bands like the Wailers, Sonics, 13th Floor Elevators thanks to Jeff and I'm forever grateful for that. He made me discover so many cool bands and records so I wanted to do pay my respect. People told me not to do it because according to them Jeff was just one crazy SOB. But I didn't care and did it anyway. I don't know who told Jeff about it, but Jeff was one of the very first persons to contact me once the site was finished. And he dug it! He's a nice guy. Besides that he's the biggest record collector in the world, I can learn a few things from him!

NB - I know your most favorite song is 'I Can Only Give You Everything'. Do you remember a moment when you heard this song for the first time?
K. - Same as most people I suppose, the Little Boy Blues' version on Pebbles #2. I thought it was the greatest song I'd ever heard. And it's even easier to play than 'Louie Louie'. What more do you need?

NB - How many versions of this song did you manage to dig till now?
K. - I've got 103 right now. I didn't exactly start collecting 'I Can Only Give You Everything' straight away. About 10 years ago a friend of mine wanted to play it with his band and he asked me for a tape. I knew I had a couple so I asked him which version he wanted. 'Just put on every version you've got', he said. So I started looking for all the versions that I could find and I got about 35. I didn't even know I had that many different versions. It seemed like all my favorite bands had played it one time or another. When I started the website 2 years ago I had 75 versions. And now the total is 103. But I'm sure there's gotta be more.

NB - Can you tell me about Belgian garage scene - 80s till now? Please name some, in your opinion, good bands.
K. - There's never been a real garage scene in Belgium. There's always been good garage bands around but nobody wants to book 'em and nobody want to see 'em. I see the same 20 or 30 people at every garage concert I attend. There was a 6 volume garage series called 'The Second Belgian 60's Boom' but a lot of it is just guitar rock or plain pop. Too bad that several great 80's Belgian garage bands never made a record. I guess you could make one really good compilation out of the 6 Boom LP's. Right now there's practically nothing. The surf scene is still pretty big and some of them have some garage elements in their sound but that's about it. Catacombo are a great garage band and I hope that someone will release their album soon. They recorded it 2 years ago and although it's awesome no one has shown any interest. It's a cruel world...