Page 43 - Classic Rock (January 2020)

s the first decade of the current
Renaissance men: (l-r)
Ginger, Danny McCormack,
there’s a lot of people who haven’t been let down
millennium ended, so did The by the band. A lot of people consider it’s a career
Wildhearts. This shouldn’t have worth following. Like, The Damned, Mötorhead,
CJ, Ritch Battersby. been a surprise to anyone who Ramones, I never gave up on those bands.”
A had followed the band for the first It’s half-one in the afternoon and the singer is
20 years of their career. A group for whom still in bed, drinking an Irish coffee. His daughter,
volatility was as natural as breathing, they had split the singer Jazmin Bean, has just put out a new
up many times before, sometimes for weeks, single, Saccharine. “It’s got over 400,000 views on
sometimes for years. YouTube,” he says with a father’s pride. “That’s
But this was different. It was final. Their most more than any single I’ve ever made. I’m glad I was
recent album at the time, the anaemic Chutzpah!, useful for something, even if it’s just my sperm.”
had come and gone with a whimper – a far cry I talk to CJ a few days earlier. The guitarist is
from the fuck-the-world roar of their audacious, in the basement of his flat in Harrogate, North
brilliant 1993 debut Earth Vs The Wildhearts and Yorkshire. The sump pump broke just before
its follow-up PHUQ. Their latest tour had ended The Wildhearts embarked on their most recent
three days before Christmas 2009 with an tour, and the flat was flooded, causing a couple of
undersold gig at London’s 800-capacity Islington thousand pounds’ worth of damage. “I was up all
Academy. They had reached the end of the road, night bailing out water,” he says, sounding more
broke, demoralised and ultimately kaput. “The chipper than a man who had to chuck out a load
Wildhearts was over,” frontman Ginger says now. of ruined carpets should.
“So I got on with loads of other things.” Irish coffee and soggy carpets is the story of
Guitarist CJ, who co-founded the band with The Wildhearts right there. Their whole career
Ginger in 1989, went even further. He didn’t just has been a patchwork of glorious hedonism and
quit The Wildhearts, he also quit music. He ended inglorious pathos. The Hollywood pitch would be
up “running a couple of cleaning crews”, clearing 24 Hour Party People-meets-Carry On Camping.
the houses of hoarders and taking care of the But the second half of this decade has brought
aftermath of suicides. “I earned some unlikely stability,
more doing that than I did something that has intensified
in The Wildhearts,” he with Renaissance Men. Their first
says wryly. “Our ability to studio album since the ill-fated
Ginger and CJ might hold a grudge Chutzpah! a decade ago, it's not
have been done with just the artistic high-water mark
The Wildhearts, but was f**king of this umpteenth act of their
The Wildhearts wasn’t career, but the commercial
done with Ginger and Olympic. But we one too. When it was released
CJ. Two years later they got together early this summer it reached
were back together. No.11 in the UK chart, their
Now, a full decade again and said, highest position since PHUQ.
on and several more ‘Why the f**k According to Ginger, it would
corkscrew turns along have gone higher, except the
the roller-coaster that did we fall out?’” label didn’t press enough
is their career, they physical copies.
have reclaimed their Ginger “We ran out of CDs,” he says.
crown as the greatest “We were doing signings all over
British rock’n’roll band of the modern the country in HMVs and there were no copies
era. Their new studio album, this year’s of the record. It would have gone a lot higher had
Renaissance Men, is the first to feature the anyone cared. I didn’t.”
classic Wildhearts line-up of Ginger, CJ, Ginger and CJ agree that they could never have
drummer Ritch Battersby and long-absent made this album earlier in the decade. They know
bassist Danny McCormack since 1995. More this because they tried, sometime around 2017.
importantly, it’s the most exhilarating and “We got around to booking studio time, we
brilliant album of 2019, and one that could go toe- had a producer, but we never turned up,” says
to-toe with their own early-90s peaks and come CJ. “Me and Ginger had a big falling out in Japan
out triumphant. and we didn’t talk to each other for four months.”
“Yeah, I’m surprised about all this, cos we never This happens a lot in The Wildhearts, obviously.
thought we’d still be alive,” says Ginger. “But put it “Oh yeah, we routinely fall out. It’s nothing new.
this way: I’m fucking delighted we are.” There’s always going to be drama with us.”
The spark that lit the touchpaper that fired
he resurrection of The Wildhearts is only Renaissance Men into life was the return of Danny
unexpected if you haven’t paid any McCormack in 2018. The bassist last played in
Tattention to the previous 29 years of their The Wildhearts in 2005; the interim years had
career. Still, it’s a cause for celebration, even though seen him battle heroin addiction and endure the
the wider world will do what it has always done amputation of his leg following a brain aneurysm.
and ignore them completely. But rock’n’roll needs McCormack’s first show back with the band
bands like them: crazy, passionate, mercurial, was at a 2018 benefit show for one his own
always a Rizla’s breath away from flying off the replacements, American bassist Scott Sorry, who
rails, punching each other out, or serving up the was undergoing treatment for a brain tumour.
greatest anthem you’ll ever hear. In rehearsal, Danny told CJ and drummer Ritch
“There’s always a few people always waiting Battersby he needed a quiet word.
for the car crash,“ Ginger says today. “But then CJ recalled: “He said: ‘I’ve been shitting
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