AP2014.001 APRIL 2014
GeZ Addictive – vocals / Ollie Hoon – guitar / Ben Hanson – bass / Kevin Nixon – drums
UK PUNK LEGENDS Anti-Pasti have come roaring back with a powerful new album on the way – the first to feature new singer GeZ Addictive.
And while 2014 marks the opening of a new chapter, Anti-Pasti’s street fighting punk’n’roll anthems for the underdog strike a chord as relevant now as it’s ever been.
The industrial rumble of their Midlands home may have given way to the sleek hiss of hi-tech engineering, but Anti-Pasti’s thunderous locomotive rolls on untamed.
“I like to think of us as a socially aware band,” explains drummer Kevin Nixon. “The new stuff has that certain power, as did the old, but perhaps with a little more maturity and a wider world view. GeZ is a genuinely angry guy, so you can expect the delivery to be pretty up front and the music reflects the current mood of the band … this is Anti-Pasti for the 21st century.”
GeZ Addictive adds: “Within the band, a big deal for me was politics. I'm known for staying true to my beliefs and wearing my heart on my sleeve. The first conversation about me joining was politics, to make sure we're all on the same sheet.
“With the new material the whole band have input and their own ways of embellishing parts, so it does create subtle layers that take songs that could be good anthemic chants into something a little bit more crafted. This band is raring to go.”
Although Anti-Pasti sit proud among the list of bands who rode the wave of early Eighties punk, there have been qualities that always set them apart.
“Musically, we never thought of ourselves as being like many of our contemporaries,” says Nixon. “We had great arrangements and key changes although at the time that was partly to hide musical limitations.
“The nuclear countdown clock was ticking loud in the early Eighties so of course that was a hot topic and a lot of our lyrics were anti-war – you look around the globe now and not a lot has changed.
“We wrote songs about the rising dangers of extremism and the corruption of belief, but we dropped some of those back in the day as we were worried that it may attract the wrong type of punk or skinhead, because at the time violence and hooliganism were rife and we didn’t want that label.
“Our new material is very much the in the same vein, using topics that provoke a bit of fury. This is a new chapter … Ben and Ollie are fantastic musicians and GeZ has brought his vocal talents to the party but it’s gonna be a whole new thing with a different trio in front of me. We can’t wait to get out there.”
Founded in 1978 in Derby, Martin Roper on vocals, Dugi Bell on guitar, Stu Winfield on bass and Stan Smith on drums released their debut EP, "Four Sore Points", featuring the all-time punk rock classic "No Government", on their own Dose record label.
Winfield and Smith were soon replaced by Nixon on drums and Will Hoon on bass before the group signed to Rondelet Records and re-released "Four Sore Points" and the "Let Them Free" single in January 1981. The same year their debut album, "The Last Call" reached number 1 in the Indie Charts and spent seven weeks in the UK Album Chart, peaking at No. 31.
Third single, "Six Guns", reached number 1 in the UK Indie Chart, as did the joint 12” single with The Exploited "Don't Let 'Em Grind You Down". The two bands and Discharge were part of the legendary Apocalypse Now UK Tour in 1981.
Single "East To The West" was released in 1982, followed by the last Anti-Pasti album and single, both titled "Caution In The Wind", which featured Ollie Hoon, Will's brother, on guitar. A self-titled singles retrospective surfaced a year later, but the group split in 1983 following the departure of Roper. There was a reunion in 1995, mini-tours of the UK and Germany, and further shows in 2013 before Roper’s departure.
“Far from being the last hurrah of old punks about to settle into middle age; make no mistake, Anti-Pasti is a visceral beast of a band, lean and lithe, supple and sinuous” – Louder Than War, 2013
“Vital and vibrant … a no-nonsense statement of intent” – Vive Le Rock, 2013
Web:www.facebook.com/antipastiofficial