Kasabian Interview - Their Time Is Nigh

Sensibly enough, most successful rock stars are initially quite guarded when first meeting music journalists in an interview situation. Tom Meighan, lead singer of Kasabian, is an exception to that rule. Actually, it quickly transpires that the manic 33-year-old frontman is an exception to a lot of rules.
As a couple of somewhat tense-looking Japanese females scurry hurriedly towards the exit of London’s Home House private members’ club, your Hot Press correspondent finds himself greeted with the kind of joyful exuberance most normally witnessed in airport arrivals lounges during Christmas week.
“Hey man, I’ve been fucking looking forward to meeting you all fucking day!” enthuses Meighan in his East Midlands baritone. “Irish, yeah? Fuckin’ unbelievable, man! Irish! Love it, man! Love it!”
I’d been warned that the Kasabian frontman could be a little, em, full-on, but nothing quite prepares you for the experience. Having warmly shaken my hand, he throws a welcoming arm around my shoulder and chummily guides me into the adjoining room.
“What’s your name then, mate?” he asks. “Olaf? Brilliant! Proper fuckin’ Irish name, yeah? Amazing! Love it!”
He whispers conspiratorially into my ear. “No offence to them, but I’ve had these foreign journalists all morning. Fucking hard to have a proper conversation, you know what I mean? But you’re fucking Irish! Ha, ha!”
Although we didn’t actually speak to one another, I first laid eyes on the Kasabian singer 24 hours earlier in Abbey Road Studios at an exclusive media playback of their new album, 48:13 (so named because that’s its exact length rather than being any Bible reference). Like a proud dad at a baptism, Meighan was suited and booted for the occasion. He doesn’t look like he’s slept much since then.
He has, however, changed clothes. This afternoon he’s wearing tracksuit bottoms and a black t-shirt with a big magic mushroom on the front. Scruffy chav chic is most likely against Home House’s dress code, but when you’re an instantly identifiable rock star you can get away with such sartorial transgressions.
Guitarist and songwriter Serge Pizzorno has apparently had to return home to Leicester for some unspecified reason, leaving all international promo duties in Meighan’s capable hands.
He’s swigging heartily from a glass of white wine. It doesn’t appear to be his first drink of the day.
“So what did you get up to last night, then?” he demands. “What? You went to Soho? Fuckin’ hell! Were you naughty? You was, wasn’t you? Look at you! Course you was!” He gives my knee a friendly squeeze. “You’re Irish, ain’t you? Love it, man! Fuckin’ love it!”
By now, we’re sitting together on a comfortable coach in a beautiful high-ceilinged room overlooking Portman Square. Despite Home House’s austere Georgian elegance, this is obviously its dedicated rock ‘n’ roll area. There are mounted electric guitars and framed caricatures of the likes of
Pete Townshend, Jimi Hendrix and Mick Jagger on the walls.
“It’s fuckin’ horrible that one, innit?” he says, pointing out the Jagger picture. “Poor old Mick has had a tough time recently. I’d say he’d fuckin’ hate that picture.”
Do you hang out in places like this often?
“This place here is a members’ club, but it’s not like fucking Soho House or The Groucho or something where everyone’s up everyone’s arse,” he proffers, scratching his beard. “This is private here. It’s nice. If you go to them places, you’re just asking for trouble. You are, simple as that.”
What’s the worst thing that’s ever been written about you in the press?
“Someone in Scotland said I had an eating disorder,” he says indignantly. “I was really like, ‘Wow? What?’”
An eating disorder?
“When I was born I had this really small gullet,” he explains. “Anything my mum would put down me, water or milk or whatever, would come straight back up, projectile vomiting. So I had an operation to open my gullet up and that’s why even now I can only eat sandwiches or snacks, not really a big meal. It makes me feel ill.
“So I saw this story saying I had an eating disorder, and that all came from me telling that story about having a bad belly when I was a kid. I had lots of nervous energy. I used to puke all the time. I’d use charcoal to line my stomach and all.”
He rubs his belly and laughs. “Bit old fashioned, isn’t it? They don’t do that anymore! There’s been a few bits and bobs, not really that bad. I think if I was dating some massive celebrity, it’d be fucking game over because they’d follow you. It’d be a living nightmare… you wouldn’t be able to breathe.”
In truth, with Kasabian’s fifth studio album set to be released, an American record deal on the cards, and a headline slot on Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage coming up, Meighan and his three bandmates – the absent Pizzorno, bassist Chris Edwards and drummer Ian Matthews – are very much on the verge of becoming massive celebrities themselves.
They’ve been perched on that particular brink for quite some time. Since first forming in their native Leicester in 1997, Kasabian (named after Linda Kasabian, a key member of Charlie Manson’s notorious ‘Family’) have gradually progressed from being regarded as a poor man’s Oasis to becoming one of the UK’s biggest and most promising rock acts.
From what I heard of 48:13 at yesterday’s playback, it could well be the album that breaks them over the Atlantic pond. But did they actually record it at Abbey Road Studios?
“Nah, Abbey Road is just where we did the playback,” he explains. “One, because it’s a beautiful venue and, secondly, because it’s just nice to put people in a room and serve some beers and relax instead of just going, ‘Here’s the record’
and turning the lights off. It’s kind of horrible, imagine that?”
He asks did I enjoy the album. I tell him that I did. As electro-rock as ever, but far more polished and smoothly produced than 2011’s Velociraptor!, it’s possibly their best work to date. However, it was a little off-putting listening to it in a recording studio with a group of noodling music journalists, while the band themselves looked down on us all from a glass-fronted overhead sound-booth.
“Yeah, it was like a lab,” he says, scrunching up his face. “Some experiment or something. I thought, ‘This is a bit fucking weird’. It was a bit weird, but there was booze there and shit going around. It was nice, there was nibbles going around, you know what I mean?”
Suddenly he leaps to his feet and lurches urgently across the room. “Do you want another fucking drink, bruv?” he calls back.
“I already have one,” I (half-heartedly) protest, pointing to my glass of lager.
“Oh, fuck off, course you’ll have one!” he insists. “You’re Irish! Love it! Here! Here! Do you want a fucking Sambuca as well? Course you do!”
By now, I’ve already formed the opinion that the only way any reasonably-minded person could ever take a dislike to this disarmingly charming man would be if he was being introduced to you as the surgeon about to perform your appendectomy, the pilot of the plane you’d just boarded, or your daughter’s new boyfriend.
Having ordered the drinks from the Sony PR person outside the door, Meighan bounds back across the room and re-joins me on the couch. “Fucking mental!” he laughs, patting me on the shoulder. “Ha, ha! Irish! My family is all Irish!
Love it!”
I manage to get a pertinent question in. With Pizzorno writing all the songs, does Meighan ever have an issue with his lyrics and say, ‘I don’t want to sing that!’?
“Well, Serge is the Pete Townsend, he’s the leader,” he mulls, pointing at the Townshend caricature on the wall. “Nah, I never have an issue. The only issue is in my fucking head. I’m Serge’s brother, you know? We’re like John and Paul. Without me, it ain’t Kasabian and without Serge, course it ain’t Kasabian, but he always writes songs with me in mind. I’ve never had any issue with anything. What’s so difficult with Serge is because he writes so many great fucking songs, I’ve got to be able to come up with some good stuff.”
Legend has it that Pizzorno first came across the teenage Meighan drunkenly singing in a Leicester park and was so impressed that he immediately asked him did he want to be in a rock ‘n’ roll band. Signed to Sony in the early noughties, Kasabian released their self-titled debut in 2004 to mostly positive reviews and reasonable sales. Although their line-up has changed occasionally over the years (most recently their touring rhythm guitarist Jay Mehler jumped ship to Liam Gallagher’s Beady Eye), Pizzorno and Meighan haven’t really looked back since.
“Serge has never held me back with ideas or anything like that,” he says. “I did some stuff over the summer with my brother and a friend of mine. It’s only demos that we kept under wraps, but he’s never said a bad word. He’s not like that; he’s always supported me in whatever I want to do. If I’ve got a song for him, and it’s good enough, we do it, but until then… I’d best get some more ideas, you know?”
How does it feel to be fronting what’s probably the biggest UK rock act since Oasis?
“Yeah, trying to be,” he nods. “I don’t know. It kind of just passes you by. I’m not being rude or anything. It’s kind of like, ‘Where the fuck did 10 years go?’ – or even 17 years, since we started as kiddies. It’s a marriage, innit? Where does the time go? You have to grasp it and hold it and tuck it in, or otherwise it will just leave you.”
He shifts around on the couch and takes an unhealthy swig of wine. “The Glastonbury thing and the Leicester show, because it’s the fifth album and it feels so right. It feels like we’ve made a debut album again. It’s weird. It’s like we’re reborn, I can’t describe it to you. It’s so much better than Velociraptor! We’re using interludes, electronics, straight directing this time. It’s quite an emotional moment because there are so many fucking things going on. Fifth album, it’s great and everything, Glastonbury this and that and that…(rubs hands over face in exasperation)… and you’ve got to just try and take it all in. You’ve got to be strong to take it.”
Do you get nervous about things like the Glastonbury show?
“Yeah, I mean, I had a dream…,” he says. He tears up slightly and points to his forehead. “This is my conscious, you see? It was horrible. We played Glastonbury and everyone just left in their thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands. And there was just one or two people left and I was shouting at them, ‘Where do you think you’re going? What are you doing?’ and that’s just me...” He shakes his head sorrowfully.
Meighan suddenly seems so downcast that a hug wouldn’t be inappropriate. “Cheer up, man,” I say. “That’s not going to happen!”
He brightens up slightly and shrugs. “It’s a conscious thing. You know when people are dead and that, and they revisit you in dreams, and it’s lovely? It’s strange, I woke up and went, ‘Oh, fuckin’ hell that was horrible!’ I felt really ill. The pillow was wet. It wasn’t me getting killed or something or falling off something or a nightmare. Normally I dream about a climbing apparatus at primary school and I fall off and hit the ground with a jump. It’s weird. But this one, fucking hell, I dunno.”
I attempt another question about the album, but he suddenly interrupts. “Excuse me if I butt in?” he says, reaching across and stroking my face. “You look like a younger version of my dad. You look like Tom Senior. It’s really fucking me up! I mean it in a good way. Fucking hell! It’s killing me, man! Can I take your photo?”
He fumbles in his pockets for his mobile, but then gets distracted by the arrival of our drinks. Inevitably, talk turns to family. He asks about my own children and listens interestedly before telling me about his own daughter and his long-term partner. They all still live in Leicester.
“I have a baby girl named Mimi,” he declares proudly. “She’s nearly two. She’s called Mimi Malone Meighan. Nice, innit? My girlfriend’s a Scouser, but she’s Irish as well. Lots of Irish went to Liverpool. Her mother’s an O’Toole.”
Some parenting notes are swapped. We’re both in agreement that Peppa Pig is probably one of the most annoying children’s TV programmes ever made. “Oh my god,” he laughs. “Fucking George Pig crying! That’s not good for kids, man. He fucking cries at everything. It’s annoying that George pig, innit? I just want to say, ‘Fuck off, George!’ You know when you’re watching kids TV and it just goes straight through you? You seen Thomas The Tank Engine lately? They’ve got a fucking horrible new theme song!”
Are you a hands-on dad? Do you change nappies?
“Yeah, I’m really fucking good, really quick,” he chortles. “But I prefer ‘em to be solid. Give me a solid shit. If it’s diarrhoea, it’s a nightmare. It makes it harder, don’t it? Ha, ha! You know?”
What do you think you’d be doing if you weren’t in Kasabian?
“I’d run a chocolate factory!” he announces, gleefully. “Willy Wonka style, fuck yeah. I’d get a load of Oompa Loompas in and say, ‘Can you make this candy that good?’” He whirls a finger around his ear with an evil whistle. “Warp their minds, man! Ha, ha!”
What’s been the lowest point of Kasabian’s career?
“There’s been some not very nice moments,” he admits, after a pause. “Obviously, like, breaking up with Chris Karloff [the guitarist and keyboardist who left in 2006] wasn’t very nice because he was one of us and stuff, you know? That wasn’t nice at all. I think he had other ideas, and we had different ones, and it was just one of those things. When it starts doing that thing, kind of crossing, it can just be horrible. Yeah, that was awful. He’s got his band now though and stuff and I’m glad he’s happy and shit. No malice or any of that stuff because I dig him. He’s one of us.
“Another low point? We went to America two years ago, lost the plot a little bit… (taps his chest) selfish bastard, you know? But we’ve been together a long time, and sometimes you need to malfunction. Something’s gotta break down. I’ve been smiling for the last 10 years on TV and records and sometimes… that’s got to go.”
Are you always as wired as you seem to be today?
“I’m not on any fucking drugs, by the way!” he protests. “I swear on my kid’s life! I’ve got enough energy anyway! You can see it, can’t you?
If you do take drugs, do they make you much more intense?
He laughs. “I think they make me slower. It calms me down actually. It’s lovely, innit? I’m very energetic. I think that’s good, though.”
How do you relax generally?
“I love reading biographies and stuff. I’m really intrigued by people’s lives. I love watching a movie, having a few glasses of wine. I’ll make a stir-fry and sit down in front of a movie. I can’t cook, mind, but I fucking do it anyway. Ha, ha!”
It comes as little surprise when he admits to having always been quite an impulsive character. “I just do it, like, BANG! How you doing? On impulse, you know? Yes or no? Do it! No? Alright, goodbye! All my life. I do it all on impulse, mate.”
Are you hopeful that 48:13 will break you in America or is that not a big concern?
“Nah, I’d love it!” he nods. “We’re going to sign a record deal in America. Big record label want us, which is great news. We’re getting play-listed loads on the radio over there with [new single] ‘Eez-Eh’ and we never had that kind of exposure before, which is fantastic. I just hope we go over there and it goes alright.
“We’ve got unfinished business in America. Once that goes, the whole fucking thing goes. It’s not about the money, I don’t give a shit about the money. I didn’t have any money when I was kid and neither did my family. It’s not about that. It’s just to pop it and be like (shouts) ‘COME ON!’”
From Suede to Stone Roses to Blur to Oasis to Keane, many a mega-hyped British band has totally tanked in the US. He’s aware that there’s probably a lot of hard work ahead if Kasabian really want to make their mark.
“It’s a difficult market,” he concedes. “The Arctic Monkeys taught that to me. If you want to conquer America, you’ve got to commit yourself. They moved there and got on that American vibe, didn’t they? Leather jackets and shit. Fair play to them, though, they toured it for like eight, nine months and that’s a commitment.
“You can’t just fucking do three to four weeks,” he continues. “You’ve got to be there fucking half a year or over. You’ve got to commit yourself for almost a year and keep travelling around. It’s so huge, you know? I can’t knock the Monkeys. They spent so much time out there, I can’t knock it.”
It has to be said that he’s no stranger to knocking other bands. In the early stages of Kasabian’s ascent, Meighan garnered a bad reputation for publicly dissing other bands in the press. “These clowns won’t be around for much longer,” he declared of My Chemical Romance. “Their make-up will flake off and the scene will die out. And it can’t happen soon enough.” And so on…
“Oh god,” he sighs. “I mean, I was 23. We were all silly and fucking young and we shouted and screamed at the world that we were ‘the best band in the fucking world! Arrrgh! Fucking hate you! Hate you! Hate that!’ and it had an effect. The media kind of got it wrong, but what are they going to write about, though, if you say stuff like that? Course they’re going to pick on you. So we got put in a box of ‘You’re idiots!’ - that sort of thing. It was our own fault, really, but it was great in a way. We’ve grown up now.”
My time on Planet Meighan is just about up. Shaking my hand several times as we bid each other farewell, he has some important final words.
“As long as we can leave some sort of legacy to some kids who play guitar then my job is done,” he declares. “I don’t give a shit about being fucking Brian Eno or fucking whoever. I’m not bothered. As long as I inspire kids, that’s my job done.
“I’m just trying to be happy,” he continues. “There’s nothing worse in life than being miserable and dying a tortured soul on your own. As long as I make people happy with my rock band, I’m not bothered. I’ve done my job. I’ve earned my right to be on Earth and procreate - and then that’s it, and then you die.”

48:13 is out now through Sony Music. Kasabian play Dublin's O2 on December 8 & the Odyssey in Belfast on December 9.