Rodent Emporium: The Scottish punk satirists lampooning sports jocks

Friday 11th September 2009

Tony Cummings charts the history of Scottish punk iconoclasts RODENT EMPORIUM

Rodent Emporium
Rodent Emporium

The intro paragraph of the biography for Scotland's punk satirists Rodent Emporium is as near to standard band history as you're likely to get from this notoriously madcap band. "During a long drive to visit a brother in hospital after he had suffered a stroke at the age of 30, ridiculous lyrics were sung back and forth to lighten the mood. The outcome of those lyrics was a two-piece rebellious parody of all that was pretentious within the music industry, as well as a simple outlet for two creatively frustrated post-pubescent single males in the form of Graeme Watt and Stuart Gilmour."

Graeme and Stuart turned some of their surreal inventions into completed songs and began performing them at a small venue in Falkirk. In 2006 drummer Owen Innes joined the band after seeing a phone video of the duo's performance and with first Garry Daniel and later Barry Topping on bass the group began to make a major impact with punk and hardcore audiences who took to their wild stage act and songs that ranged from the surreal to hard-hitting social commentary. The band's material took in topics like a shuttlecock thief ("Badminton"), the UK's unfair tax burden ("Peter The Farmer") and feminist fascism where Scott is exhorted to "embrace your beautiful testosterone" ("I'm A Man Not A Woman"). In 2007 the band recorded their album debut 'Music Without Fear Of Reprimand' on singer Stuart Gilmour's label Void Avoidance (which now functions as an education and awareness raising service on self-destructive behaviours). Wrote the Cross Rhythms reviewer about 'Music Without Fear Of Reprimand', "Scottish comedy punks Rodent Emporium unleash their musical vision on an unsuspecting public. Musically varied and interesting, without being groundbreaking, it's really Stuart Gilmour's vocals which grab you. As varied as the music is, he screams, shouts and speaks his way through the tracks here, sometimes revealing a melodic pop baritone just to confuse us further. Drawing on influences as diverse as The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Spinal Tap and Five Iron Frenzy, this is an album that grows with each listen as you discover and understand more of their humour."

The track on the album which became a firm on-stage favourite was "Chickens Of Thought". Stuart Gilmour tried to explain to broadcaster Greg Sammons the bizarre theme of the song. "It's about chickens that are running around in your head and you want to get rid of them, but you can't coz they're in your head. It sound ridiculous but we're not all Christians in this band and to me it sounds like a spiritual attack. Thoughts that come and tell you that you're a loser, you're defeated, and all that sort of thing. It started out with just a loose influence but descended into madness, so it's about fighting those thoughts. But whether anyone actually listens to that and says, 'Well, that helped me through a tough time,' I really doubt it."

The release of their album debut landed the band the chance to play at America's premier hard music event, Chicago's Cornerstone Festival in the summer of 2008. Stuart Gilmour explained how the invitation came about. "With the help of some friends we had this thing called Rock And Roll Zombies, a promotions collective in Scotland. An American band called Flatfoot 56 had got in touch with my friend Douglas and said they were coming over to Europe. They were staying at Douglas' house. We were recording a Christmas single and I was doing my vocals, and they happened to arrive in the middle of it and thought it was pretty good. Their manager said, 'You should come over to Cornerstone.'"

Rodent Emporium: The Scottish punk satirists lampooning sports jocks

The performances of Rodent Emporium at Cornerstone 2008 were to make a lasting impression. Remembered Stuart, "At our first show at Cornerstone we played to about 20 people. We played three other shows that festival and for some reason the folk at Cornerstone just seemed to love us. It was really cool. We went from playing for about 20 to playing in front of 300. Maybe it was just the novelty of us being Scottish and we weren't playing metalcore. I christened it 'chocolate core'! The guy from Raging Storm Records seemed to think that we were good and he liked the buzz around us. He sat us down and offered us a deal."

Now their debut on Nashville's Raging Storm Records is out in the USA and already pulling in some rave reviews. Read one in Seattle's Weekly: "Scottie hotties Rodent Emporium aren't your regular, run of the mill, 1-2-3-4 Ramone-a-bes. Track to track, these boys teach a history of punk class that wisely 'borrows' from the likes of the Replacements, Black Flag and the holy trinity of 'dead' bands (Boys, Kennedy's and Milkmen) infused with a little ska, a little reggae, some C&W and a heaping helping of satirical wit. Take their homage to Rollins and Co, 'Sports'. Sung by a guy who looks like the love child of Elvis Costello and Johnny Rotten and sings with a soaring falsetto, the song is fuelled by sports rock clichés like the arena wowing keyboard intro (ala the starting line-up at basketball games) and Bon Jovi-esque solos; the chorus is a grunted chant of 'SPORTS, SPORTS, SPORTS.' It is so well executed that it'll probably go right over the heads of the jocks it mocks and become their adopted ironic anthem."

With the band currently in the USA undertaking a two month tour of the hard music clubs things are building and building for Rodent Emporium. Yet with all the laughter the band are determined to retain their spiritual bearings. Said Stuart Gilmour, "What a blessing it is to go into the darkness of underground punk scenes, vibrant night life and entertainment and to meet with people normally completely opposed to all things Christian, and to be able to make them laugh, and hopefully think about the big questions through our respect for them and unconditional acceptance." CR

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.
About Tony Cummings
Tony CummingsTony Cummings is the music editor for Cross Rhythms website and attends Grace Church in Stoke-on-Trent.


 

Reader Comments

Posted by Colin Ryan in Milton, FL @ 20:05 on Jan 7 2011

I've seen Rodent Emporium several times at Cornerstone Fest. They are very entertaining and the croud grows with each performance. They first performed on a generator stage near our camp site and are now playing the bigger stages. Lots of fun. Hope they can keep coming back. We look forward to them and Flatfoot56 every year.



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