As you join us, chief Dirty Pretty Thing and ex-Libertine Carl Barât is on the Southampton University stopover of his new band’s inaugural UK tour, a jaunt whose prime purpose is to introduce their sawn-off and bristling debut Waterloo To Anywhere to the masses.
“It’s surprisingly pleasant,” he says, indicating the bucolic surroundings. “There’s a babbling brook and green dales.”
Barât has always been in thrall to England’s general green and pleasantness. At their best, The Libertines specialised in quirky visions of olde Albion, mixing Edwardian pose, Dickensian raffishness and cockney wide-boy cheek. Like an Anglocentric Manics, they were a sparky little combo whose records didn’t always match the aesthetic – but you had to like ’em for trying. Here was a band who were unabashed about their own culture, from Orwell to Orton, The Clash and The Jam.
“It’s definitely part of our spirit, although I don’t make a point of going around the world trying to promote my own locality,” says Barât. “It just happens to be thing that I relate to most, it’s in my make up, my vocabulary if you like. I mean, I’m just as open to other things.”
Oscar Wilde once said that English people have a limitless appetite for being told what shits they are. Bearing that in mind, it’s a tonic to find a songwriter with a willingness to explore his own country’s past rather than import it wholesale from America, and who refuses to be burdened by his ancestors’ colonial transgressions.
“Well, you can say England went out and busted up the world and nicked everything and then kind of said, ‘Have your country back… and come ‘round ours anytime!’ That’s the multicutural aspect I think… I’m not sure where I’m going with this!”
Carl Barât seems a thoughtful, easygoing character, but not an especially verbal one. His mumbled diction and limited attention span mean you never really get a chance to dig under the skin of things, which is frustrating, because one suspects there’s a lot going on behind the feral features and floppy hair. Barât was born in Basingstoke and grew up in the nearby village of Whitchurch, and the surname, in case you’re wondering, has its origins in Normandy.
“In school they used to pronounce it Barrett,” he says, “but traditionally it’s pronounced Bar-ah.”
The paradox is the father of the man. His dad worked in an armaments factory; his mother was a CND member.
“She was very peace and love, my mother, she travelled around to communes and things,” he says. “Most of my childhood was spent in a council estate with my dad really, but summers and weekends I’d go and join that life, which was the polar opposite.”
One imagines that segregated him from his schoolmates somewhat.
“I was particularly unpopular and considered a bit weird, until marijuana became popular, and then at the age of 14 or 15 I had the know-how. I think that was probably the doorway.”
By 1996, Carl was studying for a drama degree at Brunel University in Uxbridge. How serious were his aspirations?
“Pretty serious, although I was quite confused, not really knowing what I wanted to do. I dunno, drama seemed to be the thing where you had to put the least amount of effort in. You just get paid for playing. But it was a shit course full of shit people.”
Barât’s sister Lucie also harboured acting ambitions, her most notable role being a small part as Helen’s handmaiden in Troy, before she chucked it in to front The Fay Wrays.
“Yeah, she gave it all up. Troy is still the biggest thing she ever did, athough her part got cut. She could’ve done well but she packed it all in, she wanted to be a punk singer.”
It was at Uxbridge that Barât met Amy-Jo Doherty, sister of Peter. The rest is history: Doherty abandoned his Eng-Lit studies and moved in with Carl on a flat on Camden Road in London. Both men assumed dual front roles in The Libertines (the name derived from de Sade’s 120 Days Of Sodom). There followed a succession of minor classic singles produced by Bernard Butler, and two promising but patchy albums, the second helmed by Mick Jones. Throughout the band’s relatively brief career, Barât and Doherty had a close but volatile relationship, exacerbated by Doherty’s escalating heroin and crack cocaine addiction (which, at one point, resulted in his burgling Barât’s flat). During the recording of that eponymous 2004 album, bodyguards were hired to keep the two from inflicting GBH on each other, although they’ve since made their peace. The Libertines finally split in December 2004, Doherty having already launched the car-crash panto that is Babyshambles (acidly referred to by Barât as “Pete’s denial band”.) In the aftermath, Carl underwent surgery to remove a tumor behind his ear and also set up a weekly club called Dirty Pretty Things at the Infinity Club in the West End.
“I wanted to keep my finger on the pulse and be involved in what was going on,” he explains. “Also, I wanted to have the kind of night that I wanted to go to, I felt that things hadn’t changed, the world didn’t have enough dirty pretty things in it in the rock ‘n’ roll club-going sense, somewhere you can go out and see variety. Y’know, we used to have burlesque dancers and comedians, just trying to bring entertainment into it, as opposed to the other ethic, which is getting out of your senses, going into a dark place where you can’t hear each other talk, bellowing in some bird’s ear and trying to sleep with her. I wanted to reverse it to what it used to be. It seemed like a bit of a bold thing to do, but that was the idea anyway, it was like a manifesto. And also to give a stage to people who deserved a stage. Having been in a band I could always blag big names to bring the punters in and then on top of that show more of what I really wanted to do.”
In September of 2005, Barât announced the formation of his new band, featuring former Libertines drummer Gary Powell and touring guitarist Anthony Rossomando, plus ex Cooper Temple Clause bassist Didz Hammond. Dirty Pretty Things played their debut shows in Italy and France last October before recording Waterloo To Anywhere in Los Angeles with producer Dave Sardy (Supergrass, the Dandy Warhols, Marilyn Manson).
Despite the band’s collective experience, the new record has all the energy and crackle of a rambunctious young act let loose in the studio for the first time.
“It was quite a catharsis,” Barât admits. “I think it’s pretty much what we set out to do. I hate to make it sound like a comic book, but everyone’s got their own special skill and their own outlook and everyone’s on the same page and it’s quite democratic, which is something I’ve not experienced before.”
And at 11 tunes in 33 minutes, there isn’t an ounce of fat on the record.
“That comes from having a very short attention span. You never know, that might change someday, but right now, that’s just what we need. The tour’s been incredible, especially seeing as nobody knows any of the songs. I fuckin’ hate watching bands where I don’t know any songs. And it’s not just old Libertines fans either, standing there casting aspersions about the past. It’s a lot of new fans as well who, when the Libertines started, would’ve been still at school. It’s great to see that reaction. They’ve treated us very well.”
But then, one can never underestimate the rate of turnover with college-age audiences. Every four years there’s a changing of the guard.
“That’s true, but it’s almost like a rotation at gigs, the ones who were there before are a couple of rows back, and then there’s the new ones who move a bit less, and the ones who stand at the back and nod appreciatively. And we still get some old Clash fans coming down.”
It must be a bit strange playing to diehard Libertines fans, I venture, like stepping out with the new girlfriend while the old one’s watching.
“Yeah, I guess there’s an element of that. But me and the old bird are on good terms I think! There are people who bitch on the website, but it’s really of no importance. There’s only about 10 of them, and they come to the gig anyway and don’t say a thing. I used to get upset about it but I couldn’t give a monkey’s now about haters and stuff.”
Well, it’s a kind of pathology to want to convince every last person in the room.
“But that’s what I used to do!”
All the same, there must be a pretty bittersweet element of doing press for the new record at a time when Carl’s former bandmate is dominating the tabloids.
“It is – it’s always going to be hard, but you have to remember that part of the reason we have a mouthpiece is because of that. It is a pain in the arse when it overshadows the music, but I knew it would be hard to get out of the shadow of that. But I’ve managed to. Just about.”
One of the things that bugs this writer most about the unfolding Doherty fiasco is how it’s overshadowed the rather fine Babyshambles album.
“Yeah, yeah of course. Pete’s a household name, but just a tabloid target really.”
Plus, when you see Doherty described as a ‘talentless junkie’… it’s not like he’s Sid Vicious.
“People still idolise Sid Vicious though, don’t they?”
And they shoot horse. Don’t they?