Interview with Andy Cairns on Suicide Pact—You First

by Dave Roberts for Muse (2000)

First they were three, then they were two and now they are four. Therapy? return with a new album and a familiar attitude. Dave Roberts plays doctors and nurses with Andy Cairns.

“We were all backstage and the tour manager came in and said there were only about ten people there and I was nearly in tears. When I walked out on stage, it was a football pitch and there were only ten people on it.”

Representing a serious rethink and some would say revision of the Therapy? musical blueprint, it’s a raucous record, as sharp as nails …

Andy Cairns has been having some very strange dreams lately. Therapy?’s singer and guitarist is obviously nervous as to how the quartet’s new album Suicide Pact—You First is going to be received. Representing a serious rethink and some would say revision of the Therapy? musical blueprint, it’s a raucous record, as sharp as nails but having few if any of the MTV-friendly concessions which have made them the only Irish band since Thin Lizzy to have spanned the bridge between heavy rock and chart success.

When powerhouse drummer and founder member Fyfe Ewing departed after Infernal Love, Therapy? not only replaced him with ex-My Little Funhouse sticksman Graham Hopkins but also recruited former Banshee Martin McCarrick as a full time member. Their first album as a quartet, Semi-Detached, featured many inspired moments but Suicide Pact—You First is a more defining record.

“We should have made a punk rock record instead of Infernal Love. Semi-Detached was introducing the two new members in the band. If this was our second album, it would be commercial suicide. For us Semi-Detached was the end of the corporate game. The poppy songs had to be the singles. We did two MTV-friendly videos and it gave out the wrong signals. We would have put out Tramline or Tightrope Walker which are much heavier and darker songs.”

A blessing in disguise came in the dissolution of their record label A&M and Hopkins breaking his arm. Initially it was a body blow to the band, but Cairns claims that in the long term it was ultimately beneficial. The lull gave them time to think about the record they wanted to make. They enlisted producer Head and booked the studio in Milton Keynes with the intention of financing the recording themselves. All were agreed it should be a return to the rawer, less friendly Therapy? of yore.

It wasn’t a case of not being able to stay in nice hotels or not have caviar—we were faced with the prospect of never being able to make music again and that was very scary to us.

“If we’d toured as planned with Semi-Detached, we’d be going into a huge studio with a big name producer and A&R men throwing around copies of Blink 182 and Lit albums going ‘think of America, lads’. Instead we were sitting around a cold rehearsal room with no drummer and no deal. It wasn’t a case of not being able to stay in nice hotels or not have caviar—we were faced with the prospect of never being able to make music again and that was very scary to us. It made us work out what our priorities are. In the early days it was always fuck everybody else, this is us and our music, and that’s the way we are now. You have to able to sleep at night. Saleswise I don’t think it’ll set the world alight but at least we can be proud of it. I look at Infernal Love and Semi-Detached now and think we fucked up.”

However, the new album is an awesome rock record. Propelled by some ferocious drumming from Hopkins, Suicide Pact—You First mixes the quartet’s love of classic rock a la Free and Led Zeppelin with some Beefheart type vocals and a raw unadultered guitar sound. It’s a record which will endear Therapy? to fans from all periods of their career. Sleep tight Mr.Cairns, you’re back on track.

Suicide Pact—You First is out now on ARK 21.

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