"I think we’ve got a bit of balls about us." The Theme's frontman Gary Davis interviewed.

You’d be hard pushed not to have seen The Theme’s name floating around the London music scene within the last year, especially within the mod scene. The Theme have gone from strength to strength playing live prolifically in and around London, releasing their debut EP ‘In This Town’ last year.

The Theme’s front man Gary Davis talks all things mod discussing their first EP, playing live and what the future holds.

I’ve never done this before!

I was keen to have a word with you guys as there aren’t many local mod bands, what with being a mod myself.

The strange thing is our sound is a bit more of a rocky sound. With the mod thing… we love the mod scene, for us it’s more the image. We don’t see ourselves as a mod band, we love the mod scene but we’re a bit worried about being branded solely mod because if you get labelled a mod outfit people expect a certain thing.

It’s a bit of a double-edged sword that. There isn’t much about you guys online so I’m going to start with the basics. How did you form?

I worked with Paul Bassom who’s the lead guitarist about 10 years ago. The bass player Anthony Morgan is Paul’s mate. Reece Wiggett the rhythm guitarist, he’s a Millwall fan. That’s how I met him, through Milwall. We’ve got quite a big fan base but the Millwall thing has helped. You know like Oasis, they had the indie and the mod interest but with them you had that football terrace thing and I think that’s what we prefer. Because of our sound we tend to have gigs where someone wearing some Stone Island is standing next to a mod and that’s what we want, we want all people coming. So anyway Reece got to know the band and joined. With the drummer Martin Gamby, I put something on Facebook and he liked it. So I messaged him saying who the hell are you! Turns out I’d met him in a mod shop in Carnaby Street, Sherry's about 4 years ago and had never spoken to him after that. So he liked the comment on Facebook and we started chatting. I said to him that we’d just formed a band and that we were looking for a drummer. He said I’m a drummer, so there you go, fate.

So how long have you all been playing together? When did The Theme officially form, once you had all met?

Our first gig was June 28^th 2011 but Reece joined the band in August/ September. So say 9 months.

So you’re still a pretty new band, 2011 was only last year!

Yeah. We’re very new.

So where did the name The Theme come from? It’s pretty hard to come up with an original name these days, especially in the mod scene.

What it was, was me, Paul and Ant are very Britpop. I’m 32 so when I was a teenager the Britpop thing had just started. That’s what got me into music and I think it’s got that kind of mod thing about it as well. We like that link between the Britpop and the mod, the name seemed to fit.

Yeah so it links your image and music together…

Yeah and it’s easy. The Theme. (laughs)

So how would you describe your music to people that have never heard you before?

I’d say rock but not heavy rock. If I had to categorize it I’d say like we sound like Oasis when they first come out. We’ve had people come down and see us and say god you remind us of The Jam. One geezer even said The Sex Pistols!

I can see The Jam but not really The Pistols…

To be honest it was only one song he compared us to them. It’s just another band we’ve been likened to!

A girl from Newcastle mentioned The Enemy, like when they first started.

I’d just say we’re indie rock.

On your Facebook page you say “Mod has re-invented itself in every generation. We love the music, we love the clothes, but this is our music and this is our sound” which is something I totally agree with. What edge do you feel you have put on the mod aspect of your music? Or do you feel that your music has no mod at all in it?

I think there is a bit of mod in our music. Paul who is 35 was brought up on the Small Faces. One of his favourite bands is The Who but you think of The Who you think of the mod. I say we’re more like The Who of the 1970s when they were more of a rock band with tracks like ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’.  

One of your songs has a very Who-esque introduction…

Yeah ‘Change Of The Times’. I think the influences are very clear. The radio station Glory Boy Radio said Oasis and The Who rolled into one.

But again with the mod thing I see mod as a much cleaner sound. In the 1960s you know not much distortion and things like that.

Like The Kinks…

Yeah even like the mod revival period. Well a couple of bands, I don’t really know them. We’ve supported a couple of them. There’s a massive mod scene that’s come back. We supported a band called The Scene in Cambridge. I’ll tell you what I was impressed. If you listen to their stuff when they first come out it’s very jingle-jangly if you know what I mean, a very clean guitar sound. The way I see it and the way I say to people is that I think we’ve got a bit of balls about us. I love that fucking guitar rock sound. That’s why I can’t get into any bands like Two Door Cinema Club because I just feel like they’ve been given a guitar and they’re too scared to play it.

They’re a bit too happy?

Yeah.

How important to the band is fashion and you’re style?

Very. That’s where I think the mod thing really comes into it. For the 10/11 months we’ve been going, for people like Andy Crofts (Vocals & guitar for The Moons) to say to us what you’ve done in 10 months is more than a lot of bands have done in 2 years means a lot. We’ve played The 100 club, Scala, big gigs like that. Big gigs like that I can guarantee you two of us will go shopping two days before. Just for that gig, to get a cravat or something. When we played the 100 club I spent £150 on my outfit. I went to The Face in Carnaby Street got myself a John Smedly jumper, a white shirt and a cravat just for The 100 club. It’s a big gig. you know what I mean!

On the day of a gig we have a couple of pints and before the gig I bet one of us will text someone saying what you wearing (laughs). So fashion is very important.

We played Camden Rock a few months ago. We walked in and done our set and after it two geezers came up to us and said the moment you walked in you stood out and we’ve had that said to us four or five times now.

How often do you gig? As a new band is that a top priority?

Gigging yeah. The EP came out January/ February 2011. We’ve been continuously gigging around London. Actually at one point it was one gig a week even though we’d only been going 6 months. We had promoters ringing and no manager so I was dealing with it or Paul or Reece was. Then we actually got a bit of a crowd but we were worried that we were going to bore them (London crowds) so in May, June and July we actually went out of London. It was daunting to say the least. We played Norwich at a charity gig, Cambridge, Birmingham at a mod rally which was a charity one for Help The Heroes. There was about 700 people at that one. We played Bristol on a tour called The Uprising tour. Dave Wyburn set up this tour and it’s going around the country. We’re playing Brighton too. We purposely went out of London for two or three months to get us known a bit further.

You’ve played Danson festival, Chislehurst Rocks and Clapham Grand recently and you mentioned you’ve got Brighton to come. What’s The Theme’s diary looking like for rest of year?

Yeah, I think it shows how far we’ve come when we were made the main support for the main act at Danson. Clapham Grand is a brilliant venue. We’re playing the Fiddlers Elbow in Camden at the end of July, August 4^th we’ve got a mod rally in Knockholt called the Big 7 scooter rally and August 11^th is when we’re down Brighton.

One thing we’ve got to look forward to in the next couple of weeks is our first music video for ‘Take Me Away’. The film company we are using is a person who has massive contacts in America. He worked out there for 20 years. I think we’ve hit gold there, but I think that will push us to another level.

So it’s taking off quite gradually at the moment? It’s going well?

Yeah definitely. A question we get a lot is how long have you been going? When we say 10/ 11 months people can’t believe it especially the venues we’ve played at, the venues we’re going to play and our 2,500 following on Facebook.

It is pretty word of mouth the mod scene. I clocked onto you guys via the News Shopper, which is why I turned up at Chislehurst Rocks.

Yeah it is. The Chislehurst Rocks gig I think showed we’ve become good as a band. Reece couldn’t make it so we got a harmonica player to step in last minute. He’s played with us before so he had an idea about the songs but we weren’t worried at all. We just went out there and played.

How important is it for you as a local band with this image to break through into the mod scene and create the contacts you have? You mentioned earlier before we started the interview that you’re playing with Steve Cradock soon. It must be important to you. What does it do for you as a band?

It’s massively important. Hopefully it’ll get us out there. I think we’re quite well known in the mod scene already, especially locally. A lot of people have heard of us. People like Steve Cradock will help us with the mainstream. Again we love the mod scene for the image and the culture but not many people remember mod bands, like The Chords. I mean I like them but did they get the recognition they deserved? And I think to myself, you never hear bands like that on XFM. So it’s a mixture. We’re trying to concentrate more on the mainstream, the mod scene I think is there already and we love it. I think playing with Steve Cradock you’ll have the mods already there as well as the mainstream indie rockers. The gig with Steve is September 29^th and it’s an acoustic night at Dirty South, Lee Green. Funnily enough it’s a massive gig for us but it’s probably our most local. The most local gig we’ve had before this was at the New Cross Inn.

Have you ever played an acoustic gig before?

We played one in a shop in Norwich and that was the first time we’d ever done it. So this one will be our first big acoustic gig.

Looking forward to it?

Yeah I’m really looking forward to it. Especially being just the singer, it’s good because I think the vocals come out more.

Our manager isn’t letting us on to much but he is in contact with Ocean Colour Scene about supporting them in January/ February next year 2013.

How accepting do you find the original mods of your music?

It’s very hard, very hard. If I’m ever nervous on stage it’s at a mod rally. Playing at a normal gig or even at Scala where we played in front of 600 people I’m okay, but then that was everyone from indie people to people going to see their bands to mums and dads, that kind of thing. You go to a mod rally and the way I see it is that they’re set in their ways. It’s more the image and the culture than the music. Someone who’s spent two hours getting ready in his brand new suit with his parka and polished his scooter would go there and rather listen to a covers band. When we played the Birmingham rally the other week it was hard. I was listening to this band there and I said to Paul they’ve thrown in two or three covers here, we haven’t it’s all our own stuff. One band literally played all covers. We went up there and we got a lot of recognition afterwards but it’s so hard to please at a mod rally.

Do you think they judge you as soon as they see your image and think, “oh they’re one of us” and don’t realise you want to be your own thing not a carbon copy?

Yeah we want to be our own. I think I’d probably go as far to say what you’d call a proper mod is not open to change. That day in Birmingham you had mods slagging off other mods because they liked ska music and they didn’t. I was thinking your all supposed to be here supporting mod together. Like I said if I go on stage at a mod rally I’m more nervous than normally.

I think mod is very subjective like music really…

Yeah. Very subjective.

Mod was renowned for being a youthful scene. Do you see many youths today when you play?

We have done. To me the mod scene has got bigger. At Chislehirst my mates son had a Harrington Jacket, a Fred Perry and a pair of desert boots on and he’s 15 years old, but he didn’t know nothing about mod. I think it’s coming in again and I think it’s become popular with the youth without them actually knowing where it’s come from, the influence and that. When we were in Norwich there were two 16 year olds there that had the mod look about them but they had plimsolls on. They came to see us, it’s definitely coming back.

As a band or you personally, do you have any mod icons? Be it style wise or musically?

Me personally, I love the Fred Perry polo shirt. I probably wear that more than anything else where as our guitarist will wear a suit. Our drummer, now he’s a proper mod brought up in a mod way. He doesn’t know anything about anything else. If you mention Britpop he slags it off. He hates Oasis just doesn’t like them. His dad was in a band called The Fixations and they actually got signed. I think Paul Weller had to choose between them and The Chords to take on tour once and he chose The Chords. They didn’t do too badly. Our drummer will turn up in a suit, he won’t give anything else a chance although he’s one of the youngest in the band he’s only 24. He’s dad was a drummer as well and is a massive influence on him. With me Oasis was the lynchpin. I was 14 years old when they came out. I didn’t know anything about music then the moment they came out I gave anything else with a guitar and a drum a chance. Now I’m into The Who, The Beatles and The Rolling Stones thanks to Oasis.

So let’s talk about the EP. It’s called ‘In This Town’ and came out towards the end of 2011. Is this your first EP?

Yeah, that’s our first EP.

How well was it received?

Fantastically as far as I know. I’ll give you an example. A geezer from Newcastle has been asking us when we are going to be up there to sign his copy of our EP! Someone from LA bought it and has been in contact. We’ve sold a few in Spain, Italy and China. There’s a massive mod scene in Japan and China and Italy and Spain as well. When we played Cambridge there was a mini bus of about fifteen maybe twenty geezers from Bury St Edmunds all with The Theme badges on. Never met them before so you know you’re doing something right!

Listening to your EP I described it as refreshingly nostalgic. It’s got some heavy mod and Britpop sounds going on. Your vocals and the quality of the drumming/ guitar riffs were second to none. Despite your heavy influences track by track it’s actually quite a mix bag.

‘Change Of The Times’ as we mentioned earlier has The Who written all over the introduction…

We’ve had comments saying it’s just like something Weller would have written in The Jam.

I think your most Jam like song is In This Town. Especially your vocals…

That’s when we used the London thing. We’re Londoners and we’re proud of London. We’re proud of being from London. So it was more like instead of singing it use your accent, so I purposely went for the ‘Landan taan’.

It’s good to hear London getting positive press from a band!

Your acoustic track ‘Opened My Eyes’ has something of a slower Weller track about it. I loved it...

Weller yeah. My vocals have been compared to Rod Stewart on that track. We chose five songs to do the EP and that acoustic track was thrown in on the weekend we were recording the EP. I was actually reading the lyrics off of a sheet! We’d practised it a few times but because of the gigs we do we only get a half hour set. So we can’t go off stage and change guitars meaning we never get to play that track live.

And ‘Take Me Away’ has got a very Oasis feel to it…

The influence for that song was actually the Small Faces. Their track ‘Tin Soldiers’ the beginning of it especially. I think when Paul wrote it he’d been listening to a lot of Small Faces at the time.

You can draw a lot of comparisons to many of your tracks but they’re all so different. You have your own sound, a crazy energetic merge of influences with your own edge on top of it all giving it flair.

So what’s next record wise? Is their an album on the horizon?

We have plans for an album. Our new stuff will fit straight in. Our manager always asks how many songs have you got now? He lives the other side of London and never gets to see us practise really. Off the top of his head Paul penned down 35 songs. Not all polished obviously but we’ve even got plans to do an acoustic EP of four or five 5 songs to keep people interested while we plan the next lot.

One thing people have got to realise is that we are all normal working class geezers. It costs over a grand to do an EP, you know what I mean? It’s sort of when we can do it more than anything. We’re skint as a band but the recognition we are getting from people all over the country is priceless, you can’t beat it. I get out of the blue encouraging messages on Facebook. I got one the other day saying my vocals were outstanding in Birmingham and I think to myself, that’s why I do this.

35 songs! Who writes the songs?

Paul Bassom is the main songwriter. One good thing about us is Paul and Reece will alternate, as they’re both lead guitarists but they both have totally different styles.  Paul is very Small Faces, Noel Gallagher. His lead is very Noel Gallagher like the lead on ‘First Time I Saw You’ that’s his. The lead on ‘Take Me Away’ or ‘Get Away’ is Reece. He’s come from a bluesy background, his old man was into that. So we’ve got two lead guitarists that both play different styles so they alternate on different songs. It varies it a bit.

Sounds like you’ve got  a Pete Doherty, Carl Barat partnership going on!

Yeah. (laughs)

So have you got a record label now?

No, not yet!

Did you say you were being managed now though?

He’s not even management. He’s just helping us out. We’re so new that we’re literally having to do things on our own.

Have you got anyone sniffing around yet record label wise?

We’re always hearing things…

Rumours?

Yeah, rumours. The latest one is that a record company was going down to Danson festival or someone that knows someone is coming down to watch us then.

So it won’t be long then!

Well I hope not. I want to leave this bloody job! (laughs)

Radio play must be vital for local bands especially as you’re starting out. Have you been exposed to much Radio play?

Yeah. We’ve had a massive reaction from the North. Two or three radio stations up that way have played our tracks. One was a radio station called Teenage Kicks in Sheffield and Glory Boy radio in Stoke.

Have you ever played those areas?

Nah. Not yet anyway. We’ve had three or four of them digital stations play us too. One of them was American. A few podcasts all over this country have played us too.

So you’re music's getting heard quite a bit and not just in London…

Yeah.

How important do you feel it is for local record shops to push new and local bands such as yourselves? They’re a dying breed independent record shops nowadays.

It’s very important. That’s why we done Chislehurst. Unfortunately with the way things are today, say we played in here tonight we’d have to rely on our mates because the live music scene for local bands is very hard. It’s the same things with the record shops, if they aren’t getting the interest…

It’s the big chains killing them off?

Yeah. Exactly.

I like to look at our Facebook up to two or three days after a gig. One thing we’ve had said is that fans prefer us live. We tend to mix it up live. The drummer goes on a mental one, he is our Keith Moon! If we get signed he’ll be dead in a couple of years! (laughs)

We’ll have a website soon. We need to sort out our Twitter page but we’re on Facebook for now. In the ten months we’ve been going things have gone so quick we haven’t had time to set up stuff like this. Again what Andy Crofts said that what we done in the time we’ve been going some bands don’t do in two or three years. He’s been keeping tabs on us. Things have gone so much quicker and gotten much busier than we had expected. It’s finding the time to do it all. Two of the lads have got kids, I mean like I said we’re a working class band. It’s all in the pipeline.

Final couple of questions. How far do you feel you’ve come in this small amount of time?

I can’t believe how well we’ve done. Brilliant! I was in Covent Garden the other week and a geezer come up to me and had his picture done with me. Said he’d been to four of our gigs, lives in East London.

That must be quite surreal?

Of Course.

So where would you like to be as a band this time next year?

Signed up. I don’t want to be working! (laughs)

Nah signed up with an album. We’ve got a time plan for doing two albums next year if we can. That’s not including an acoustic EP if we can get that in but again it’s just money.

I look forward to hearing that.

What’s your stand out track from your EP if you had to pick one?

My personal one has got to be ‘Take Me Away’. Even when I put it on now it makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand.

Is that your favourite to listen back to or is it your favourite to perform live?

Both. Probably because of the lead guitar. When Paul writes a song he loves his choruses. When a producer came in one thing he got into us was a hook. That lead bit drags people in, fishes them out of the sea. We do spend a lot of time on choruses and hooks. We’re very much a lead guitar band.

You can download The Theme’s ‘Take Me Away’ for free via the Reverb Nation app on the link below.

Reverb Nation App

Purchase The Theme's 'In This Town EP' through iTunes here.

To stay up to date with all things The Theme like their Facebook page thethemelive.

Photography by Little Photo Moments.

Check back soon for a follow up article 'A quick chat with The Theme's drummer Martin Gamby' and a list of The Theme's gig dates.

The Theme's 'Take Me Away' is this months Bowman Recommends... which can be listened to at the bottom of the home page.