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Godfathers Hail From Lon Don

Marty Racine
Staff

As I was saying, we've had our fill of funny haircuts and cutie-wootie fashion dandies from England hogging the pop charts. What we need, from the nation that reinvented rock in the early '60s, is a good ole meat-and-potatoes rock 'n' roll band like the Yardbirds or the Kinks.

'' Voila!'' The Godfathers, Saturday at Fitzgerald's. But first, as I was saying, it's Terence Trent D'Arby, tonight at Xcess ...

The Godfathers, touring on their U.S. debut, "Birth-School-Work-Death", have actually played the States twice but are making their initial Texas appearance. ''Saturday night in Texas, we can't wait," said bassist Chris Coyne in a thick South London accent on the phone from San Diego Monday. ''It's Western, and you've got skyscrapers!"

Coyne and brother Peter on vocals headed a mid-'80s band called the Sid Presley Experience, which, if you believe ''this" press item, ''had become one of underground Britain's most talked-about units, as much for their onstage brawls as their music." Two years ago the Coynes recruited Kris Dollimore (lead guitar/vocals), Mike Gibson (guitar/vocals) and George Mazur (drums) in the look-Ma-no-keyboards Godfathers because - and this is the part I really like in the bio - ''they refused... to relinquish the front pages and the airwaves to a host of dance-music poseurs and gutless 'rock' glamour queens."

''The boys (in the Sid Presley Experience) didn't want to work," said Chris. ''So we got some lads who were ready to work and who we're friends with."

The all-for-one approach extends to the band's songs, on which ''everybody writes,'' said Coyne. ''It works five ways. We all jam together, rehearse together. It's easier that way, cuts out so much grief. As long as everyone keeps pulling their weight, it's sweet."

And the fine title tune? ''It's just a combination of things, really. It began with another dreary, bloody four years of Maggie (Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher). It's the whole birth-school-work experience, really. It's hard to encapsulate the whole thing in one song. You touch on things, and this is as far as you can go, really, without having to explain the meaning of life."

Coyne added that the band has had some free time on this tour ''so we've had a chance to meet people, just generally look at a place, instead of a whole tour from the concert hall and hotel room. It's great for us, because we're actually out seeing the country and not just reading about it in the papers and all that. You get such a bad idea of America in England because they publicize all the worst aspects - the mass murderers, the psychos. So it's nice to come over and see how really different it is. It is a media generalization."

Coyne has little more respect for the British rock press: ''It's fickle. It's so trendy. You've a favorite this week, and they'll kill you the next. The trouble about the music press in England, the people who write are not very interested in music, really. They've got an attitude that really has nothing to do with music. It's all the party line. They're just trying to keep their jobs, really. It's very wage-oriented. There's nothing wrong with that, but it smacks of 9-to-5 writing.

''That's what's refreshing over here. The people you talk to about music, they're into music full-stop. They're not into haircuts."

Chris, you'd be surprised.

Tickets: $7.50 in advance at the Fitz box office, $8.50 at the door, $10.75 reserved seats. Show time: Godfathers should do a solid-length 90-minute set shortly after midnight following the Kiljoys and Cult Figures.

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