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The BIG Judge Dread Interview

JUDGE DREAD

RAW & UNCUT!

In mid-April, 1997, The People's SKA Annual had the privilege of speaking to one of the key artists who were critical in helping ska music get to where it is today.Judge Dread's personal history reads like the history of Mod, Skinhead & skinhead reggae, 2Tone and more. Eminantly quotable, the entire interview is presented here, uncensored and uncut.

Noah Wildman:Thanks for getting back to me.

Judge Dread: I think they've never explained to you, I've been on tour in Europe. I've been out all over the place to Germany, France, Austria and God knows where else, with the Ring-Dings.

N: Dr. Ring Ding?

JD: Yeah, they me backing band in Europe. It works pretty well, we've been packed where ever we've been anyway.

N: The tour is in support of your new album?

JD: There? Oh yeah, and its doing pretty well. Grover Records is really doing well with it, sold out of it a few times on the road and had to go back and get some more, which is always a good thing. I always do a few tracks from it as well. I got another band, the Dreadnoughts, the UK band I got put together now. The usual things we play, because though we do the new ones, the old ones are better received, if you know what I mean. You can only go so far with new product, you can't do a complete set and completely change your format. Because it could be fifty years time and these people would still expect to hear your 'Big 6', your 'Big 7', '8' and things. That's why a lot of artists have failed over the years. Just because they're fed up with hearing them, they don't realize that the people who pay to come through the doors are not. You got tracks to be doing.

N: I guess you and the Rolling Stones have more in common than people think!

JD: Yeah yeah, that's right! That's how I started in the business. I worked for the Rolling Stones. That's how I first came into the business, I was a bodyguard for them in 1964.

N: Weirdly enough, I heard on the radio this morning it was 33 years today that the first Rolling Stones album came out.

JD: Yeah, I still have the white label copy of their album signed by every one of them including Brian Jones. That's worth a few dollars as they say.

N: Was that your first job out of school?

JD: No, I started in 1963 at a place called the Ram Jam Club in Brixton, which was really famous as a Mod club. I started the same day as Geno Washington and the Ram Jam band started. You see, Geno Washington was one of the big Mod bands, you see, all this business with the Who was always a figment of the Who's imagination and the power of money. They put themselves down in a film called Quadrophenia as being the Mod champions. I worked this club for so many years, and the ones they used to comeout for were Geno. Remember Dexy's Midnight Runners? They wrote a song about him. Geno there was actually an American GI who came over donkey's years ago and stayed. Of course he had a massive great following. And then the other Mod heroes were the sort of people like Zoot Money and the Big Roll Band. And then you had your people like Dandy and Jackie Edwards and Derrick Morgan, you know, those type of people. And the Who all of a sudden turn up one day in Quadrophenia as the band that sort of created it all. And the people who used to go and see the Who at the nightclubs were the same people who now go and see Oasis, who at that time would go to see Jimi Hendrix. It was that type of audience that they had. And all of a sudden these young kids were running around with these designer jackets with bullseyes on the back with the Who on it! Of course you know, for someone who was there, it's hard to swallow, especially when you tell people, you say 'look, it wasn't like that' and of course, yeah I was there since day one.

N: So you bounced at the Ram Jam club and did security for the Rolling Stones back then. How long did that last?

JD: That was on and off all the time. I was doing some weird and wonderful things for the manager and what-not. When there were some insults and things needed to be sorted out with people, it was my job to do that. At the same time I was working for various politicians as a bodyguard, and as I say that's how I got my insight into the music business because from the age of 19 up till now I did nothing but work in music, so I've seen everyone come and go since Rod Stewart all the way through. Rod Stewart used to give me cigarettes to let him go into the Flamingo on Waldorf St. so he could get up and sing with the band. That's how long we go back.

N: How did you translate jobs as a bodyguard and a bouncer into a musical career?

JD: Well, it's sort of in a way it came naturally by the shear fact because I like music anyway and I grew up in a black area, I grew up in Brixton, which was like I suppose like a white man sort of growing up in Harlem. That's the only way you could actually describe, except there was less sort of racial pressure at the time in Brixton, you know, there's never been that great divide like there is in other countries. I went to school with the first black kids who came to Britain from the Caribbean. So naturally I sort of adapted. I first met Laurel Aitken when I was 17 years old. And that was it, to see Laurel down at the blues dances, and Derrick Morgan when he had his sight. Of course, these are actually life-long friends of mine if you know what I mean. The strange part about it, when I started my running me own mobile sound system I had the first white sound system in Britain.

N: What year was that?

JD: That was 1968. I started in 68 getting all these records off Jamaican planters, which are boats that come over with all the bananas. I started getting all my records off of there, and that's what I was doing, playing while still working as security. And I was working as a debt collector for commercial entertainment. I brought all the artists in 1969. I picked Desmond up at the airport when he first ever came here....

N: Desmond Dekker?

JD: Yeah, Desmond. I picked him up at the airport. And the Pioneers, and things. I took the Pioneers on their first gigs out over here. And that's how long we go back. And I eventually ended up collecting debts for Trojan in the start of the 70s. The strange part of it was that I became the biggest selling artist ever on that label. Strange, when you talk about a story, I don't think there's a musical story in the world can combat that one. And the worst part about of it was in 1975 when they went under, I became one of their biggest creditors as well! So from collecting money in the beginning I ended up as one of the biggest people who didn't get paid as well, which is ironical. But, you know, then again, as they say, at least you're there to tell the story.

N: So what exactly happened between collecting debts for Trojan and recording for them?

JD: Oh well, you see, it all came by accident. The whole thing came by accident. Because I had the sound system I used to toast over the top. I'd been doing this sort of thing since 1968, and they'd always have (an instrumental or dub) b-side, didn't they, and I used to toast over the top of them. And I used to do this one, it was really popular, it was one of Ranglin's backing tracks, Earnest Ranglin. I used to toast over it and people kept asking for it. And to be honest, I got fed up with doing it in the end. I went into Goosebury, which was this four track studio in London and ended up doing a backing track, not really recording it, but doing a voice over the top if it. And back in the Trojan offices, pretty much in the early part of 1972. I was playing it to some of the lads there, you know, a band called Greyhound, who were originally called the Rudies that lived at the bottom of my garden where I lived in Brixton. And I was playing it to them, and then the owner at the time put his head round the door and he said, "is that one of ours?". They used to put out forty records per week. That's how it was, y'know an all sorts of weird and wonderful subsidiary labels. So he asked "is that one of ours? Whose that then?" And they said "It's him!" And he said, "are we putting it out?" And I said, "well, yeah, of course!" The next thing happened, we recorded "Little Boy Blue", what happened there was that I called it "Little Boy Blue" but because of the success of (Prince) Buster's "Big 5", they called it "Big 6". And that's actually how it came about, and then the 'Big' series started to evolve. I suppose its like when you look at a marker, like when you see a little man in the corner, like the 2Tone man, the 'Big' names just followed themselves. By calling them 'Big 6', 'Big 7', 'Big 8', everybody knew what was coming. Like with the 2Tone man, you sort of knew it was going to be 2Tone ska or you know, you got Buster Bloodvessel's little fat man and what-not.

N: Were you credited as 'Judge Dread' on the first single?

JD: Oh yeah yeah, I used to call my sound system "Judge Dread's Sound Machine" back in 68. At the time, this Judge Dread thing was only popular among the people in the songs, that's how I adopted the name. I then registered it here as a trade-in-name, and that's the problem Sylvester Stallone had later on because of the Judge Dredd movie. His is spelled D R E double D. They couldn't actually register it in this country as a trade-in-name because it was too near, as its pronounced exactly the same, it was too near my name. Of course as I sold millions of records under that name, they had a bit of a problem. And I was actually gonna sue them, but I needed to put about thirty grand down just to start with, and it could of been 6, 7 years before it even came to court. So what happens with that, they have too much money to fight. So I had to swallow that, but I could of had them over a barrel, that would of been really good!

N: I know on a recent Trojans record, Gaz Mayall took Stallone to task on "Judge Dread Vs. Judge Dredd".

JD: Oh yeah, I remember that boy when he'd go round with his dad, John. His dads really famous, a really famous blues artist. I remember when he was a little boy he'd bring him around in his nappies and what-not. The reason I say that, Rick Gunnel who used to own the Ram Jam and the Flamingo also used to manage John, he had John Mayall, Rod Stewart, all the early ones back then, all the Zoot Moneys, Geno Washington, Chris Farmer, all the Mod heroes. And that's what I found really annoying when I was invited to the premier of Quadrophenia and it was nothing like, it was nothing like it. And of course when they asked me what I though of it I couldn't lie. I said it's a load of shit. Of course I don't think I'm going to be invited to anything anymore. When your there and your the person who knows what you're talking about, know what I mean? Its a different matter if you weren't there and you could only go by books, then you got to accept that. But when you actually were there, and you help write the books, you can't sit there in all honesty and say, "oh yeah, it's great." It bloody wasn't like that, the mod thing was nothing at all like they portrayed it in that film. I'd of loved to have the money and made a proper one, made a real mod film, but you need lots of money for things like that. As I said, I've been in it since 1963, actually since 1961 I've been involved in West Indian communities, you know, that's when I went to blues dances, when I had me first Red Stripe, things like that, and me first bit of ganja and what not, and that was in them days when people were still calling it pot. Back in 71 I was using the word 'ganja' when they were still calling it pot. I suppose I was before me time. I'm the first punk, that's what they actually say, because of the rebellion bit of it, like when I always spoke out when I didn't like anything, I said you know, this ain't right. It doesn't get you a great deal of friends. It doesn't actually get you enemies, but it doesn't get make the friends you're supposed to get.

N: How was reaction to the first single, 'Big Six'?

JD: Oh, God, I saved press cutting, I still get loads of them, its unbelievable. What happened is, an old lady named Mary Whitehouse, which in this country shes so famous that she's actually the head of this broadcasting standards thing and of course shes got something like 36,000 members, they rule the airwaves. So she turns around and said that, y'know, because kids were going to school and singing the nursery rhymes in a different way and I was corrupting the minds of children and all the rest of it, so we got to go on this big debate on the TV and I would be answering that I'll show her how much money I'm earning out of it if she'd show me how much money she's earning out of it, you know. What gives her the right to tell people what they should do and what they shouldn't, and everything else? And ironically, a few years later her son got done for drugs. You know, this is the thing, people who don't get their own houses in order. Of course, we had this thing going in the paper and that was it, it went absolutely hay-wire after that, oh God you couldn't open a newspaper without me staring back! What actually happened before that, I sold nearly a quarter of a million (singles) on the ethnic market because no one even new that I existed. They just thought it was another black man making a record. Of course, because it was on Bigshot. The only reason it ever came to life, I went and done a (live) PA, and sung over the backing track and when they realized that I was white, they actually took the deal and sold the deal to Trojan. And after that, all Hell broke loose. It was like, every time I became notorious the record lasted in the charts for umpteen weeks, all they ever showed was a picture of me on Top-Of-the-Pops, it was really silly, it got really silly there. And that was just the start of it.

N: Was the record banned from the get-go?

JD: Well, it was actually banned from radio airplay, although I was selling something like 78 thousand a day at one time. You know, I was doing a quarter-million a week. People get the idea that it was banned from sales, but it was just banned from airplay.

N:....which can help sales.

JD: God, it helped me! The only trouble is, in years later it often back fires. For instance, I had the first charity record out ever, in 1973. That was a thing called 'Molly', that was on Trojan, written by Clancy Eccles. That was the first ever, that's going in the Guinness Book of World Records this year for this, the first ever charity record, it was for Ethiopia, thirteen years before Band Aid ever existed. And I also done the first ever Ethiopian charity concert at the Edmonton Sundance with Bob Marley & the Wailers and everyone else there, I the only white man on the bill. And I donated the proceeds of the record. That was coming off the back of three hits, Big 6, 7 and 8, doing this Molly and the BBC even banned it because it had a line in there, nothing at all having to do with anything, it said "she don't play with the little boys." But because it was me singing it, all imagery is read into a different text. It was the official Oxfam record, that's another side that no-one hears about.

N: What kind of touring were you doing during your time as a Trojan artist?

JD: Between the years of 72 and 75, I played over a thousand venues in three years, that's like doing sometimes two, three a night, touring and just showing your face and things. When Trojan went under, I went into another spear of it, and I went with Creole then, and started to get a number of other hit sides, like 'Big 10', and a few hit albums, a chart album with 'Bed Time Stories', 'The Forty Big Ones', 'Last of the Skinheads' was another really popular one. And I wrote that when there really were no skinheads, they were gone then, around 1975, 76. It was gone, it was nonexistent. It was just the sort of thing that people seem to forget. There was a big gap in-between where the skinheads were there and when they came back.

N: Did you have a lot of skinheads coming to your gigs back then?

JD: Well, in the early days I just about caught the end of it. What I actually done, when I started recording for Trojan, I actually kept them afloat for another three years because they were losing their identity. The skinhead thing had gone, it was on its way into history, I became more of a white 70s artist singing reggae more than a skinhead thing, that's how I held it together. When I did the 'Last of the Skinheads' album, it was more so for meself than for anybody else. I didn't think there was anybody out there anymore, y'know, I hadn't seen one for years, and the whole thing had gone into the usual things, flares and frilly shirts, and all the ones who said they used to like something were no longer in it, they were listening to the Jackson 5 and that sort of thing. If you ever listen to the song, right, the old lament is 'I suppose I better go out, don't play much reggae in the clubs' And that s really what it was, it died. It wasn't until the 2Tone thing started to evolve that all of a sudden it started to come back again. Actually, it rekindled what had remained asleep. Of course, I was really pleased when it came back. I was doing the cabaret circuit up until the 2Tone thing started. With the Madness thing, I remember the tape being played for me, because the guy Rob Dickens, the guy who found them, he asked me what I thought of them, and if I wanted to get involved (as producer.) And I said, "God, I couldn't do anything with that!" I said to be totally honest, I'd make it sound too black! You know, I wouldn't be able to make it sound like that. I heard (the Prince Buster song 'Madness') on a demo by a load of kids from North London, and you can imagine what I thought of, God, that doesn't sound anything like Buster! And so I said to Rob, I can't do anything with it, it would just sound black. Because that's always been the secret of the Dread thing, its black music with a white and singing it. And that is really the novelty of it.

N: That was the novelty of Elvis Presley, too!

JD: I got a tremendous amount of respect in Jamaica. I don't actually mimic the people, I actually do, I suppose you could call it cockney-reggae. Its cockney-reggae but it's something that I've always used because everybody whose anybody has played on a Dread record at one time or another, including Elton John on piano, Hugh Banton of Van Der Graaf Generator, Rick Wakeman (Yes), a whose who of Jamaican music on them. Its actually what they say and still is to this day, a musical phenomenon, its something that will never be equaled again. Its just a one-off person. That's what happened with the Madness thing. I knew that I would never of been able to produce that because it needed an indie producer, because even though I had a white way of working it, I had a black ear for music, and I would of made it sound (in a deep, slow riddim), "Madness, bup bup bup, Madness, bup bup" And it would never evolve like that, and I told the lads that, you know, because they all used to come and see me at the Music Machine and things like that when the 2Tone thing just started. And Buster and all that out of Bad Manners, I was his hero when he was in school. And so basically, the whole 2Tone thing evolved out of a another Dread thing. When you listen to it, and you listen to where it came from, the cockney sort of attitude was no new thing. I was doing it for 10 years before they came along.

N: So you found yourself with more gigs during 2Tone?

JD: Yeah, I found all of a sudden I was back working on to that circuit again, and all of a sudden skinheads appeared on the streets, and the only trouble was it got a little bit bitter and twisted for a time, I had to come off the road because I didn't like the other side of it. I was beginning to get sort of tired of the brush then. Though I had a fourteen piece band, 7 black and 7 white, I'd been branded all sorts of silly political things . Like the fascist business, and all this sort of thing. How can you be a fascist when you got seven blacks in the band? And you're made an honorary Ethiopian in 1973? But see the trouble was, if I hadn't come off the road, you know they say bad news travels fast. You got your unscrupulous sort of journalists, making people stick their hands up in the air. And though they're shouting out "Skinhead, skinhead!," they're saying their shouting out "Seig heil!" and things like that. And of course, within a few weeks of that, its not long before the councils that book the local halls all of a sudden are putting a ban on you. So I thought sooner than that, I'll come back off the road and wait till it blew over. And then, Europe started to get a whiff of it. And now, you can sort of believe it. In Germany, I now play to packed houses of skinheads, absolutely packed houses. Where they go to during the day I don't know. I never see them during the day. Its a bit like the elephant's graveyard! Where do skinheads go in the daytime? Because all of a sudden there's nobody, and all of a sudden its night time.....its a bit like the bikers I think. You don't see the bikers walking around in the day time. I swear they go home and change, turn into....because you don't see them, and in the night time all of a sudden a thousand or so turn up. Where do skinheads go in the daytime, because they certainly don't walk the streets like they used. I suppose there must be a place they all just meet, go into a phone box and change, turn into "Skinheadman". I did know a guy in an office who was into the biker thing, he was in the office by day, and turn into Leatherman at night! But its great now because skinheads has turned into a cult now, it didn't turn into the thing it was at the beginning of the 2Tone era. It began to give a really bad taste in this country. With this fascist movement that sort of came along with it, and of course during the punk era it didn't help matters. And of course I even got dragged into that! Because actually, I suppose quite rightly so, they actually branded me the 'Godfather of Oi!' which once again I suppose it was because I was doing sort of anti-social behavior long before the punk thing was invented, I was sort of saying 'fuck the Queen' years before that because I've always been one to have been spoken out on them subjects. We had so many debates on censorship and things and I always used to say what right has anyone got to use the word censorship? What makes them above anyone else, you know? If I don't want to watch something on television, I turn it over! I don't watch then complain about it. Like ballet, I don't like ballet, you know if its on television I don't watch it, I turn it over and I watch something that I like. So of course I've always been really notorious for sticking up to the underdog. Its gotten me into a lot of trouble, actually. I don't support designer football teams, like they do because they are the biggest team. My teams never do very well. You'll see on the new CD the team on there is Chatham Town, which is a little team in the Kent league, I think about 105 people watching them a week. My actual big team is a team called Millwall, which nobody likes anyway. We've always been noted as a team no one seems to like. But you know, I'll never change, I'll never change me way of thinking.

N: Have you ever toured the United States?

JD: I came very near in 1973. I had two bubblers in the American charts the same week. I had 'Big 6' and 'Big 7' on the label called 20th Century Fox. What happened was Trojan at the time double dealed with Casablanca records, who put them out at the same time (as 20th Century Fox.) The other guy got the asshole and pulled out. But it looked like they were going to go for the big ones. I had always thought that America has always lied there, the ideal thing would of been to put Judge Dread on the chat shows, y'know, and you'd have someone who could really talk on a chat show and not just talk about humdrum things, like "I was created by some mogul somewhere" and that was it. I came from root one. No one else in the business has ever come from Marlborough. I came from basically working on the door to the biggest thing of me kind in my own profession in my own sort of field of music. That's all without the aid of radio play, television coverage, all this been was word of mouth, newspapers and an underground cult following.

N: If you were starting out today, could you do it again?

JD: No. You know why, because the shock tactics are gone now. You know what would you define now as being sort of 'bad taste' record? You'd literally might have to get on some chat show now and piss on the desk or something like that to shock somebody now. See, we're talking about in the days when 'Little Boy Blue' was considered to be in bad taste. It didn't start changing until after the Sex Pistols time, that's when it sort of began to change. And now I listen to songs now, there's this one in the charts now, "would she go down on you in a Fiat" and things like that. These are things that are played at peak time with the children and what-not. You know, the whole TV coverage has changed now, people swear on TV, what do you do? It wouldn't last two seconds now because its all just really happy music. And I really think it cans till crack it on this level, but only for the shear fact for the shear track record and the knowledge of the name. But to actually start it from day one, it would really have to shock somebody now. You'd have to use some bad language and have some sort of picture disc where when you put it on a turn table, you put it on with a bit of rubber in the middle and it would come up like a dick coming through or something. No way you could shock anymore.

N: Any meaning to the theme of the title of the new album, "Dread White & Blue"?

JD: Yeah, yeah, always wanted to use that title because its an excellent title. It just about sums it up: Dread - white & blue. It actually is the union jack, its always been a British thing, I always wanted to use that title, for years I pondered with that one.

N: So what did you do in the 80s after 2Tone?

JD: Well for me, it never stopped because I've always had the band and things, I was just waiting for the 2Tone thing to blow over after milking a sizable chunk of it, and then I made a few records at that time for Corova, which was actually Rob Dickens again, who started the whole Madness thing. I had three records on Corova, one of them was 'Lover's Rock', then I had 'Phoenix City' by Rocker's Express which was another one then I had the Betty Bright one, who married Suggs in the end, the "Hello I'm Your Heart", that was another one of mine on there. Then I went into doing some disco stuff, did a version of 'Relax' which nearly charted, the company wasn't as strong as it used to be and it got in there but dropped out. I did a version of 'Jack Your Body', and a few other sort of dance stuff. Once again, once that fashion of music is gone again, you one got a very small hard-core of people. So if you still actually want to exist in the world of music you got to go for the other side of it as well. If you actually sit there and say, "Well, I'm going to make records for this X amount of people", you'll never really go any further. So you really have to try to hit the other markets. What I'd done is I went into working the disco shows and what-not, I went into those and I was coming across to another breed of people who didn't even know I existed. And all of a sudden I'm there in the 80s, even in the late 80s, working for kids who weren't even born basically when I first started. It keeps it alive and it keeps your knowledge up as to what's going around at the time. You got a good idea of the musical stuff. Even though I traditionally, personally have nothing to do with that type of music, the thing is as it's been living, I'm still working it, but I still have a massive great collection of records that some people would kill for.

N: I know I would!

JD: I got a massive collection of it, that's my own personal thing. I don't like the music now, you know, I'm not into reggae at all now, not the way it is now, which I think is horrendous all this 'Snoop Doggie Dogs', its all sending out some evil stuff and what-not. I still personally like the old 'happy' reggae. I'm just not into this stuff, I get a load of it sent through and God! what are they talking about! Its an absolute bunch of crap!

N: What's your impression of the ska being created today?

JD: What, the neuveau stuff? The Germans have nearly got it right! They've nearly go it right! They're beginning to slow it down a little bit, and realize it shouldn't go at the speed of light. this is where people make the big mistake, they will go at some really high lick instead of realizing that reggae and ska were never that fast. And the Germans I've noticed when I was there the other week. The Americans are beginning to slow it down again now because when I first heard some of the American stuff it was going at the speed of light. And it was like, and that's from the 2Tone era, because the 2Tone stuff always went at a fair speed. But when I hear something like the 'Carry Go Bring Come' I like to hear it in the traditional speed. When I heard a lot of this stuff first off I thought God, its too fast. Then again, its been the later years its beginning to kick a bit in America. For years we had a problem even getting records released out there, they just didn't want to know. It been the introduction of the music by companies like Moon and things like that that have actually taken the stuff out of late. It was a terrible job in the early 70s to get a reggae record released in America, that was really bad news. There was plenty of stuff that was huge here that meant nothing in America. I think they're beginning to get it right actually now, at least at the speed I like, anyway.

N: Have you ever played Japan?

JD: I went out to Japan in 1978, I went out there, once again before me time, before I was due out there, it was a bit strange, I was treated a bit strange, but when I think about it now, I wish I waited a bit later, because its another market again. I'm just happy to go these things. Like America, I will tour America this year, there's no two ways about it. I got a couple of people at the moment looking at setting one up and bringing my own band out , which I'd like to bring. By bringing my own band I know me own speed, if you see what I mean. At least I know its Dreadmusic that's coming out then. Its very hard to get anyone to play your music with the feel you make yourself, unless its actually people who are involved with you ground level. I reckon I'll be out there by November time. I'm also positive of it. I want to do a 14 day thing, just to test the water. Unlike most people, I actually talk to the people, the audience becomes an audience with me, not like what I see a lot of people do. I actually take time to explain the whole thing, and that's one of the parts of it, the ability to be an entertainer. And I think its best I go out there before I die! It would be great to do that.

I want all you skinhead to get up off your feet, put your braces together and your boots on your feet, and get the hell out of the house and see Judge Dread live this winter! You have been forewarned, by order of Judge Dread!

some words by skatunes:

Judge Dread aka "Alex Hughes" died during a concert in Canterbury, England on March the 15th 1998 because of a heart attack. When Alex was breaking down on the stage the audience and even the band didn't recognize that he was in serious danger. Both thought that it was a part of his show as we all know his bad jokes on society, behavour and that stuff.

Some of the audience reported, that the ambulance arrived late and the car broke down when it wanted to get dread to the hospital. Some Skins and Punks tried to help fast and pushed the car. But some residents who watched the strange scenery skinheads pushing an defect ambulance, called the police, in mind the skins are stealing the car. After the police had been informed, what realy happened - Dread was pronounce dead on arrival to the hospital of Kent and Canterbury.

so far skatunes_vienna

Out now is a new Judge Dread album: "Live in Vienna"
contact: http://www.dss.at for details (Longshot Mailorder Linz)

wanna more facts about dread?

How long have you been in the music business?

Ten years and I'm still cracking it. That was the beauty of it. When I started off, it was in the Glam Rock era with Slade, Sweet, T.Rex. But they're all gone now and the one they thought would be a one hit wonder is still here. I started off as a doorman and bodyguard at clubs in the West End and in Kent.

How did your first record come out?

I was working as a disc jockey in Chatham, at the same time working as a debt collector in a record company. I done a b-side of a record which was basically a backing track. I kept the tape and gave a few copies out to various D.J.s. I used to play it on my own disco. Various people heard it and liked it. It came out on Trojan, called 'Big Six', although it was supposed to be called 'Little Boy Blue'. It was just after 'Big Five' by Prince Buster came out and it got confused by that.

How many of your records have been banned?

Every single of them. You talk about punk, but I was a punk ten years ago. I was doing things against society long before anyone else. I've been shocking people for years. What it boils down to now, is you're always known for it. It doesn't matter wether it's clean or dirty. I've had the highest number of records banned in the history of music. 20 singles and 8 LPs. I've applied to Guiness Book of Records twice.

Do you think a lot of your success was due to the fact that your records are always banned from radio and TV?

The early ones got into the Top 20, some as high as No. 5 without beeing played, so I wonder what it would be like if they had been played. The BBC had control of the charts at that time and they probably fixed it so I wouldn't get to No. 1.

Have you kept roughly the same set over the years?

Yes, because people are there to see the numbers they know. I don't like the way other bands say they are sick of doing their hits cos that's what people come to see, not a load of new stuff that the audience don't know. There's certain ones I keep in the show all the time, like 'Big Six', 'Big Seven', 'Big Eight', 'Big Ten', 'Jamaica Jerkoff', 'Up With The Cock' and 'Dread Rock'.

How would you describe Dread Music?

It's got nothing to do with fuck all! Nothing to do with politics or voilence, just a good laugh. I got accused of being a racialist. But how can I be a racialist when there's six black blokes in the band? When I saw all the sieg-heiling going on I thought I've been in the business ten years now but I can't throw it away, so I decided to stop gigging for a while. It's paid off well cos everything seems to have died down now. My aim was to do a giant skinhead show but no-one would put it on because of all the trouble. There might come a time when I can do it somewhere like the Empire Pool.

What do you think is the difference between skinheads of the early 70's and the early 80's?

The early skinheads were alright. They were never as bad as they made out to be. I predicted in 1975 that skinheads would come back in a couple of years time. Nowadays skinheads are becoming outcasts.

How did the Bridge House gig go?

The plan was to play the Bridge House to do a video which is coming out this year. We needed somewhere like the Bridge House because it had a good atmosphere. I tried to capture the early 70's in the 80's and it seemed to work.

You don't seem to tour much.
It's basically a question of finance. It's no good touring unless you've got an LP or a single out, otherwise it's like pissing in the wind and the promoters won't touch you. I'd like to tour eleven months out of twelve but it ain't possible. You gain much experince on the road that you'd never believe.

Don't you try to do one-off dates?

If possible we try and get two or three gigs together. Also, I do a lot of cabaret and clubs because a lot of the blokes who used to see me back in 1969 are settled down and married with kids, so there's two markets that I aim for. The cabaret market and the new lot. I don't like playing sport halls cos there's no atmosphere.

When you do cabaret, do you tone your act down?

Yes, I tone the act down a bit. No-ones ever walked out from one of my shows. In the clubs sometime I bring a bit of skirt on stage and tit her up and do a bit of mooning. The Dread market ranges from eight years olds through to eighty year olds.

You do a lot of charity work, don't you?

Yes. Charity work can get a bit overbearing because people do try and take you for a ride sometimes but I like to help anyone out. People say I've got a lot of money from my records but I haven't cos I spent a lot of it. But if I had to choose wheter I'd do it over again I would.

Do you think the publicity in Sounds has helped you?

Yes, cos the other papers only write about dead bands. You go round N.M.E. or Melody Maker's office and they are all dead from the neck upwards. If I send a letter saying 'Judge Dread has got a new record out', they won't take any notice.

Why did you sign to E.M.I.?

I only signed cos they said they would advertise one of my LP:s on TV. "Judge Dread's Greatest Hits" got in the charts but there was no real push from the record company.

Why did you put out the "40 Big Ones" LP?

It was for all the new followers cos they were moaning that they couldn't get all the old records. It was a compilation of everything we've ever done. We've got pretty popular in Europe, especially in Germany, they don't understand the lyrics so we can go on the TV. We sell loads of records over there. In Germany their version of Top Of the Pops is called Musicladen and there was all these birds running around topless and I couldn't concentrate.

Who writes the lyrics and where does the inspiration come from?M

Me and Ted Lemon, the manager, writes all the lyrics and the inspiration come from everywhere I go. I mean, I eat in cafes, a bit of pie and mash and hang around shithouses. I'll never change even if I sold a million singles. People can relate to Dread music cos they can relate to me.

Is it easy to keep writing dirty lyrics?

No. People think it is. It is easy to write a love song but it's difficult to do an LP of dirty songs. There's a limit to how outrageous you can be on a record and I push it to the limit!

Is the song "Big Punk" a piss take?

Yes, in a tounge in cheek way but the reason we recorded it was originally to go in Malcolm McLaren's film "Great Rock and Roll Swindle" and if the film had been made as it should have been, I would been in it but the final product was a big cock up.

further details about dread and the whole story of his death:

http://www.skinheads.net/pulped/judgedreadfacts.htm