» Bare Cheek: Local Lives
Brian Mitchell & Joseph Nixon’s thoroughly scurrilous Brighton column
A new Bare Cheek feature in which we talk to local residents about their working lives. This week: Rick Melon, local musician
“I generally crawl out of bed at about two in the afternoon. Unless, of course, it’s a dole cheque day, in which case I’m up at the crack of midday to grab my giro as soon as it comes through the door. I think it’s pretty disgusting that the government gives us so little. How are we artists meant to survive? At this rate there’ll be no Shriekback or Ned’s Atomic Dustbin for the next generation.
I’m in eight bands – Mork, Spatula, Glitterporn, Spectrum Blue, Dead Racoon Drive Truck, Shrapnel Baby, Rotolo, and Bearded Clam – as well as a couple of tribute bands (I play keyboards in Artificial Cream and Theremin in “Xeroxy Music”) so I’m usually busy, and generally have as many as two gigs a week, which can be pretty exhausting. Mork’s my main band though. We play all sorts of venues of all sorts of sizes – from Upstairs At The Three And Ten all the way up to the basement at The Latest Music Bar.
A lot of people have an image of musicians as being lazy, vain, dimwitted, self-indulgent, and oversexed, but that’s totally not true. To an outsider it might look as though I’m just sitting around playing ‘Assassin’s Creed’ in my pants, but mentally I’m always working – considering the next chord sequence or trying to think of something that rhymes with ”luggage.” Unless I’m completely boxed, obviously.
As well as regular gigs we do a lot of stuff on the side – weddings, parties, that sort of thing. It can be a bit of a drag doing the same old Beatles and Stones numbers again and again – for the punters as much as the band I think. At the last wedding we played I could tell the guests were getting bored with our usual set list, so we decided to switch to our own material. That certainly galvanised them. I’ve never heard an audience shout so loud.
Gigging pays the bills but the real work is the album. That’s my magnum opus. We’ve been recording it for the past seven years. I know, I know! I can’t help it – I’m a perfectionist. I tell you though – when it’s finished it’s going to be one crazy piece of work. It started off as a sort of trip-hop/ Spaghetti Western thing, but now it’s more of a happy house/jazz/brass band hybrid. After a lot of thought, we decided to release it on our own label, Odd Sock, as we didn’t want the lack of autonomy associated with a Major. It should be out by 2012 at the latest. Or 2013.
I’ve got a lot of plans – a club night, a film I’m writing and soundtracking about a hit man who becomes a porn star, and a possible tour supporting Dumpy’s Rusty Nuts. I see a long career ahead of me, unless I burn out in a crazy drugs and booze bonanza like all my heroes of course! (Only joking, mum, if you’re reading this.) I can’t imagine I’ll stay in Brighton too much longer, though. A true artist can’t be tied down to one place. Wherever I lay my hat, that’s my home.
Speaking of which – I don’t suppose anyone’s got a room going spare? Only my girlfriend chucked me out last week. Oh, go on. I’m very quiet really, and I make a mean paella.”
