Interview: Haircut 100 Returns To America With New Music and New Tour

Haircut 100 are making up for lost time. Currently on tour with ABC and Howard Jones, their singles, “Favourite Shirts (Boy Meets Girl),” “Love Plus One,” “Fantastic Day,” and “Nobody’s Fool” were all top ten singles in Britain in 1982 and 1983. Their seminal debut, “Pelican West,” a classic album from 1982 has never sounded dated.

A global smash that made them instant pop stars, “Pelican West” spent eleven weeks in the British top ten. “It also charted in the US and Australia.

Following the success of their debut, frontman Nick Heyward left Haircut 100 in 1983 to pursue a solo career. His solo efforts included another top ten title, his debut solo album, “North of a Miracle,” as well as eight other albums.

But their story does not end there. Having previously reformed to celebrate the rerelease of their debut, “Pelican West,” singer and guitarist Nick Heyward, bassist Les Nemes, guitarist Graham Jones and drummer Blair Cunningham have reunited again for a series of festival dates and a tour of the United States.

Heyward and Jones chatted with Review STL about their career, their tour, and making new music four decades after they made it big.

Haircut 100 has had a couple of reunions. How does it feel to be back together and doing this one?

NH: Amazing. It’s like a bit of a dream come true. We always expected to get back together but we couldn’t stay together because we didn’t have management. But this reunion has happened so organically. We even have a brilliant management company who specialize in bands like Wet Leg or Manic Street Preachers.

So that’s why we stayed together, and that’s why we’re continuing. That’s the very thing that we did not have back in the day. Back then everything we wanted to have happen didn’t. It was a bit chaotic and a bit shambolic. Now, with this tour, everything is in place.

GJ: Yeah, the impetus has changed. It is a natural continuation. There’s always something to look forward to, and there’s always something positive to attach ourselves to.

When we decided to do this again, we did some rehearsals beforehand to kind of knock the songs that we were going to do into shape. We got a real feel for our sound quickly. Everyone contributed and we fed off each other. It was terrific.

NH: When we gel together it feels great.There is this collective smile when we know that we’re making something great. With this new song, “Dynamite,” we just knew it and went “there it is.”

How did this tour come about?

GJ: Initially, we reformed for the 40th anniversary album release for “Pelican West” and we expected there to be something to promote. So, we got together for the artwork and sleeve notes to produce this with Demon records.

It was amazing. We did some interviews which led to a sold out show in London at Shepherd Bush Empire. That led to us deciding we wanted to tour again, so then this opportunity came up and we jumped at it.

So how do you guys approach making music now compared to how you did back in 1981 and 1982?

NH: It’s on a budget, so it’s still the same thing. It remains us in a room playing live together. Recently we’ve recorded with Sean Reed, from Dexy’s Midnight Runners in his studio in Hackney.

It was still Les Graham and I in a in a room together, close, and Blair in another room, in a drum booth. We were just playing, and we put down the tracks. We were only meant to do a few, and we ended up putting down ten tracks.

Sean said, “I get Haircut 100 now. It’s like you’re a real band.” Of course, we are, we have been playing together since we were young, and we’ve been in different bands. We’ve been all through punk and new wave and mod and ska and everything. But we’ve been there as a band through all these cultural waves. We’ve always just been a band.

It felt like it did when we started, Haircut 100. We really lived and breathed being in a band. We lived together in one room above a flower shop, and we would introduce ourselves as Haircut 100 to people when we went out on a Friday night.

We lived together like that, and we were just one. That’s what you get when you come to see us live. It’s just like we are one thing, like a pitchfork into a haystack.

You guys are touring with Howard Jones and ABC. Will we hear new material and how are you approaching playing live?

GJ: We’re not going to have much time to experiment, but we will be playing new material.

NH:  We havegot “The Unloving Plum,” our new single that we’ll be playing. But mostly that’s the rest of it is, like, “Favourite Shirts (Boy Meets Girl),” “Fantastic Day,” and “Love Plus One.” None of us are doing full sets, so get there early because we’re going to be like a little burst of sunshine, and then we’re off.

Forty years on “Pelican West”does not sound dated. What fond memories do you have of making that album?

NH: It sounds fresh, because it wasn’t really, of the time. With “Favourite Shirts” it didn’t come through Kraftwerk and the industrial period, and it wasn’t from Manchester or Liverpool in that way. We were more influenced by American bands like Talking Heads. For us, it was all about being a band. I think that’s why we worked with Bob Sergeant, who was working with The Beat. What we liked about him and about The Beat was that they sounded timeless. Those records still sound fresh. I think we had a definite late ‘70s New Wave influence, because they were our biggest influences at the time.

GJ: Bob had worked with Mick Ronson. He’d also done a lot of the BBC sessions and worked with a lot of the greats doing late 1970s music production. Our debut album was one of the first digital albums to come out after The Beat who released the first digital album in the UK. This was when everything moved from analog into the new world.

NH: There was clarity in there too because of the digital sound. What we liked about The Beat was that they sounded crisp. That was because of Bob and his experience with music.

For that album’s digital, 3m sound at Roundhouse Studios, when we were working there, our engineer was John Gallen who worked on “Night at the Opera” by Queen. So, when we started making the album we knew we were in safe hands.

Funny enough, “The Ace of Spades” was being recorded next door by Motorhead, and Uriah Heep were also in the studio when we were doing Pelican West.

Looking back now, we’re grateful for everything that’s been, everything that is, and everything that will be.

What was it like to be big in America during that time?

NH: We couldn’t believe what was happening. We went to America, got off the plane and went to the Gramercy Park Hotel in a limousine. Then we heard “Love Plus One”on the radio. It blew our minds. We went to LA, and it was another world. It was so bright. I’ve never experienced light like it in my life. I mean, if you’re brought up in South London in the ‘70s, you did not see sunlight. It was grim. It was really grim. I could not believe it.

Is Haircut 100 going to do a proper tour on their own after this one finishes?

NH: We hope so. This tour is like a calling card, isn’t it?

GJ: That is the plan. It is what we would like to do. Ultimately, we’d like to come back, whether it’s by ourselves or with another package.

Do you think your audience in Britain is bigger than in America?

NH: We don’t know. I mean, who knows? I mean, it was always bigger in America, wasn’t it, Graham?

GJ: The audiences always felt different. Our American audience seemed to appreciate us musically, whereas the UK audiences were more fascinated by our image.

NH: Americans seemed to appreciate the musicianship of the elements within the band. They really got off on the live playing and the fact that we were a real band.

What are your memories of making it big in the early 1980s?

NH: Haircut 100 came out in the New Wave era in the UK, a time when a lot of the bands in the ‘80s were becoming less real. It wasn’t so much about the playing. By 1982 the sounds were more electronic.

GJ: It was the birth of the MIDI, So you’d go into the guitar shops, and they would have guitars, but there’d be a whole section dedicated to keyboards and MIDI instruments.  It was synths, and there was a kind of split between the live bands and the electronic bands, which was great. It was brilliant. There was room for everyone.

What can audiences expect from the live shows?

NH: People coming to see the shows will be seeing the same band that was in rehearsals in 1977. That is amazing. They’ll be seeing those magic moments when we all smile together and go, “that’s it, that’s Haircut 100.”

It doesn’t seem like you guys missed a beat at all. Is that true?

GJ: Oh, we do that. When we get on stage and get any technical problems out the way, we settle into it. Then we get a live interaction between us and the audience. That’s when we feel happy and natural.

NH: We are privileged, and we know that. We’re privileged to have met each other and made music together. It’s that thing of the magic of bands. That’s why I love the story of bands. I love reading about the story of bands as well, because I feel like I am so privileged to have been in this band and had the experience of having that magic come from our playing together.

What are you most looking forward to with this tour?

GJ: For me, I am looking forward to experiencing America from the ground level and meeting people at the gigs.

NH: I am looking forward to people getting the spirit of the band because once they get that it is a special thing. I still enjoy that. It is a magical thing.

Haircut 100 performs live at The Factory on August 26^th with ABC and Howard Jones. For more information visit thefactorystl.com.

For more information on Haircut 100 visit haircut100.com.