The Fatskins are back! After a hiatus of nearly 10 years the band is about to release the 12” EP “A Young Man’s Game” with six tracks of Fatskins’ chubby Oi! sound through Randale Records. Enough reason for me to have a little chat with Mike and Wynn about the band’s past, comeback and of course the upcoming release!
The fat is back! So first of all a big welcome back to you guys! How is everything going with you guys?
Mike: Life is great, thanks for the kind words and the interview! We're all happy as hell to be back at it
The band has decided to do a “comeback”, first of all why did you guys stop in the first place?
Wynn: I think we came on so strong straight out of the gate that it just burned us out a little. We were still kind of young and working on getting our personal lives in order and things went sideways.
Mike: I left the band after a bad breakup with a woman. I had just quit drinking after being a heavy boozer for a lot of years and things were just up-ended in my life. Didn't know if I was coming or going, just trying to figure things out I guess. Stupid thing to do.
And what decided you to form the band back together?
Wynn: Your first real band will always be your true love. Me and Mike had initially talked about just doing a little project, I had a few song ideas floating around, but it didn't take long for both of us to want to revive the Fatskins name.
Mike: Wynn suggested it and it took me a minute to agree but we both decided that if Tom and Wayne were on board we'd do it. It had to be the four of us.
Who is in the Fatskins these days? Are all original members still in the band?
Mike: The original line-up was Me, Wynn and Dave Knight who now plays with the 45 Adaptors, a GREAT FUCKING BAND by the way! We had a lot of fat bastard skinheads out here at the time and Fatskins had kind of become an unofficial crew name for us so we ran with it. Played with a few different bass players and I thought to bring Tom on board. I've known him for thirty years now and the chemistry was great, a lot of fun back then. Dave went off to college and Wynn knew a drummer after we parted ways with Clint.
Wynn: It's the lineup with our second drummer. Wayne came on board after Thinkin' Like A Fatskin was released. Wayne joined in '97 or '98. We tried to keep old school with everything, like having Jason Stedman do the artwork. Jason did the artwork for our very first shirt and had done various artwork for the band over the years.
Mike: And he'll be doing it for the rest of our releases in the future. He's family. Him and Kyle!
Soon the new EP “A Young Man’s Game” will come out through Randale Records. It’s almost been ten years since the last Fatskins release, excited?
Wynn: Extremely excited. I'm as, if not more excited, about any of our releases.
Mike: Hell yes! A lot of really good things are coming our way. Honored that people still remember us.
I heard it will be a 12” EP, I fuckin’ love ‘em! Especially with the cover artwork that’s going to be on it! How many songs will be on it? Can you give away some titles yet?
Mike: HAHAHA! Yeah, Jason killed it with that juggalo getting choked out. So funny. The guy's brilliant. As far as the tracks we've got, Young Man's Game, Chaos (It Surrounds Me), It's Time to Take It Back, Skinhead Fashion Show, Been too Long, and Hail to the Victor. So what is that, 6 songs?
How did the recording process go for these songs? I know Wynn doesn’t live quite down the block anymore.
Wynn: It went really smooth. From the time we decided to record new material to the first studio session, including all of the songwriting, only about four weeks passed. Mike and I have a system worked out where I record some ideas and email them to him and he really sorts out the arrangements. It's worked really well and Mike has a great ear for how the completed song should sound. Once we're happy with the complete package, Mike gets the songs over to Tom and Wayne to work on their parts.
Mike: It was good to have the opportunity to write and re-write songs. Gave us time to figure out some stuff that we really liked. Tom and Wayne just got thrown to the wolves on some of the songs. I think there were two or three that they had never heard until the night before we were to record 'em.
Will the release be supported with live shows? Got anything planned?
Mike: There's nothing set in stone yet but there's a few big ones that have contacted us. I wanna go to Europe. Everybody tells me how good it is over there. Hope this time around we get that chance. Big Ben, Parliament!
Wayne: Yeah, we didn't anticipate anything. we'll just see what comes our way.
Fatskins were active as a band in the mid/late 90’s / early ‘00’s, now it’s 2013. You think the scene has changed a lot over the past 10-15 years?
Mike: It has changed for sure. Some ways for the better but others for the worse. Internet man, great fuckin tool to have but it's watered down our culture and created a soap box for the shit stirrers to stand atop and scream from. Not a lot of broken noses handed out through the keyboard. Makes it painless to talk shit.
Wynn: During our heyday in the 90s the scene seemed to be full of younger people and now it seems there are more people our age, which means the scene is a little smaller because of us older guys have families and jobs to concentrate on. Although, I am starting to see a bit of a resurgence in the scene with more youngsters coming out.
What are the band’s plans after “A Young Man’s Game” is released? Does the comeback also inspire you to start working on material for a full-length record?
Wynn: There will definitely be a full-length happening.
Mike: Hopefully a lot more music to come. We're all in a good place again, future looks good.
In the past you also released 3 split releases with Patriot, The Opressed and Last Laugh. If you got to do a split release again with a band in 2014 who would it be and why?
Wynn: Already in the works...
Mike: We're doin a split 7" with the Butchers soon after "Young Man's Game" is released. Stu and Carl are family, really glad to be doing it with them.
Okay that’s it, if you got anything to add, feel free to do so!
Mike: I just want to thank you for the interview Mano! There's so many good people in this scene that are brought together with this sort of stuff and we look forward to the things that come. Also to Diana at Randale Records, THANK YOU for believing in us after all these years and for releasing this record. Hope it's the first of many, many more! VIVA!!!!!!!!
