ManBREAK: Fighting Injustice


"Do you know when Venus is gonna vanish? When it will be no longer visible? On December 22, 2012." Why is that then? "I dunno, you'll have to speak to Venus, it'll be no longer visible. The Mayans believe this age ends then, and that the previous ages ended with a shift in the sun's polarity, and that's the effect that it's gonna have on earth."
ManBREAK's endearing lead vocalist Swindelli is not your average rock frontman. Disillusioned with the social injustices inherent in society, he can talk at length about polemicists like Marx and Lenin an dexactly what's wrong with New Labour, admires the work of Orwell and Chomsky and in his time off he reads books about ancient civilisations.
Having quickly become disillusioned with the less than promising hand life dealt him as a young Liverpudlian ("Council estates, uninspiring teachers, crap diet, crap clothes - crap everything!"), Swindelli decided to get out. Tradition has it that the tried and trusted means of escape in such situations is either to play football or form a band. Having had a less than enjoyable 24-hour stint as school goalkeeper, Swindelli quickly decided that rock'n'roll was the one for him. After a relavtively successful spell with proto agit popsters 25th of May, Swindelli and guitarist Snaykee hooked up with drummer Stu Boy Stu, bassist Roy Van Der Kerkoff and vocalist/guitarist Mr Blonde and formed the ten-legged groove machine that is ManBREAK.
As you might well expect from a band named after a secret military program which involved the British government exposing their soldiers to low-level chemical weapons and then testing their performance on assault courses, there's a strong political stance that underpins ManBREAK's infectiously melodic, Happy Mondays meets Metallica tunes, and it's the driving force behind Swindelli too, stemming from his youthful dissaffection.
"It comes from just looking at the stupefying boredom of one's own background, the lack of any appreciation of culture outside of the television set," he recalls. "The system for a lot of people acts as an affront for meritocracy because it denies a lot of people's talent to flourish if they're not from a specific social background; they don't get the opportunities other people do get. So it's a rejection of that philosophy. I don't think that just because somebody goes to Oxford or Cambridge or has rich parents they're automatically talented, in whatever field they might gravitate towards."
But while Swindelli will eagerly enthuse about socialism and hte disenfranchisement of the working classes and slip topics like police brutality and chemical pollution into his songs ('Kop Karma' and 'Wasted' respectively), he's astute enough to realise the limitations of his own position, refusing to look on his role as an educational one.
"I think that would be presumptuous of us. First and foremost it's rock'n'roll, isn't it? And it has to be done to the best of our abilities. Even if the lyrics became as focused as I want them to be, I can say more in an interview that I can in a song. And I do not think that the aesthetic of the music is the most important single factor that has to be right. Even if you take the vocals away, what's underneath has to be interesting and entertaining, exciting to us as a group of individuals first and foremost and then what hopefully what we do is in line with people's tastes, or eventually will be."
At the moment ManBREAK's music is proving to be in line with America's tastes at least, with the band receiving rave reviews and support slots with the likes of Live. Back home things are taking a little bit longer.
"Well it's those bastards at Radio One isn't it? Motherfuckers..." hisses Swindelli. "As long as Radio One is run by a cabal of Oxbridge types, anyone who's got a sligtly social perspective on their work ain't gonna see the light of day until you're successful and can draw in an audience, and then a that point they might be interested."
Perhaps if ManBREAK lightened up a little bit lyrically, they'd be in with more of a chance. It's not like there's and songs on the album about being in love with the birds chirping and the sun blazing overhead, are there?
"That's true," admits the frontman, "but they're about having all of those things and the distractions of, 'Will I be able to afford the 'leccy bill? Will I ever get a job? Will anyone ever fall in love with me?' Which is the experience of a lot of people at the moment. 'Will I be able to get next Sunday off cos I've been working for the past six months". They are urban love songs. You talk about urban hymns, but they are urban love songs; it's the blues, innit? Maybe in me previous life I used to live in the Mississippi Delta of something; maybe I was crap. If you're crap, you're gonna end up in a crap band from Liverpool singing the blues!"
Still, if, as many believe, there actually is no justice in the world and it all fell apart tomorrow, at least there's other career options available for the loquacious Swindelli. Anyone who's had the pleasure of hearing his bizarre between-song banter knows that the world of stand up comedy awaits.
"Who knows? Either that or I'm gonna be a darts player. I'm gonna commit an offence, beat off a prison warden, get put in the cells for 12 months and practice darts for ten hours a day. When I come out, I'm gonna be the next Jocky Wilson".

-Author Unknown; from Metal Hammer

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