Dublin duo The Prongs (Niall Toner Jr and John Fleming) play the Project Arts Centre, Dublin this Saturday, 8 July 8th at 8.00pm sharp with a full band. We asked John the BIG questions . . .
They will also launch their new album, Theme Music from The Now Now Express, along with advance copies of John's new novel.
Tell us three things about yourself . . .
Age 58. Dubliner. Have lived abroad.
How would you describe your music?
It’s new-wave-driven spoken word. An eternal ghostly nod to the offbeat pop/post-punk music of the late-1970s and early 1980s. Back then, after the first raucous howl of punk, something more literate and knowing crept into what often operated as "obscure" music (often termed "independent" for the reduced sweep of its alternative supply chain). A lot of it percolated from urban centres in England. In Dublin, a small cohort was tightly tuned to this via John Peel, Vox fanzine and the weekly NME. Such music was ambitious, dramatic, inventive, colourful, and vivid. Niall Toner brilliantly echoes these swirls and splashes in the music of The Prongs - the essence and sharpness and economy of the era is there. Toner’s tunes serve as a brilliant bedrock for my lyrics - he has sonically accommodated my spoken voice and underscored an arena in which the words and delivery shine.
Who are your musical inspirations?
The Fall (early especially) and The Blue Orchids are very important - the jagged musicality and dexterous lyrics were often delivered in what was effectively spoken word. Something bigger than "smash the system" or "baby baby" was being articulated. I always took this for granted so it infused my tastes from day one. For all of Elvis Costello’s lush song writing and melody, his first four LPs have the syntax of diatribe or even monologue. The majestic epic stab of Beasley Street or Belladonna by John Cooper-Clarke hinted at early dimensions for me and fostered a dormant ambition now finding form in The Prongs.
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In Dublin at the turn of the 70s into the 80s, a tallish teen could get to see local bands in the Dandelion and the Ivy Rooms or The Magnet. There was a world around record shops like Advance, Hector Value or Golden Discs on Liffey Street. It was populated by Public Image Limited and Magazine and Costello and Gang of Four and XTC and The Clash. One song, The Revolutionary Spirit by The Wild Swans, really stands out. Dublin bands of the complex and captivating calibre of The Atrix, The Radiators and DC Nien were local ambassadors for some international movement. A scene around The Ivy Rooms featured bands like Chant! Chant! Chant!, A Further Room, Amuse, The End - these were local manifestations of ambition and served as signposts to somewhere. Still echoing are the bouncy metaphysics of The Teardrop Explodes, the magnificence of Joy Division, the spiked dramatic wit of The Passage. All of this predated the clear lyricism of The Smiths, The Go-Betweens or Microdisney.
What was the first gig you ever went to?
I recall a childhood evening in the Olympia with my mother to see some Cossack dancers, an amateur production of HMS Pinafore (great lyrics) and a record recital (78s) of John McCormack in I think the Gresham Hotel: I would have been about seven. Later there was an Up the People event in Croke Park, a week or two after a great firework display in the same venue. But the first gig I attended autonomously I think was U2 in the Dandelion, supported by The Epidemix. Around this time, I recall a seminal gig: The Atrix in the Magnet, supported by a very young Microdisney.
What was the first record you ever bought?
I purchased a record in Grafton Street’s Woolworths called The Rip-Offs Play a Golden Tribute to The Beatles. To this day when I hear the originals, they sound wrong, not the way I heard them first. The first discerning LP purchase was Costello’s My Aim is True downstairs in Roches Stores in the home electronics dept. I was initially bitterly disappointed with its monochrome sound - it didn’t mesmerise me with the full magic of the new wave. But I encountered his LPs in the correct sequence, getting This Year’s Model a few weeks later. Then, in real time, I got Armed Forces when it was released just after Christmas of 1978.
What’s your favourite song right now?
Fake Samuel Pepys by The Prongs.
Favourite lyric of all time?
"The rats have all got rickets/They spit through broken teeth… A lightbulb bursts like a blister/The only form of heat."
If you could only listen to one song for the rest of your life, what would it be?
Leave the Capitol by The Fall, from Slates, the 10-inch EP that came out in 1981 after Grotesque the previous year. The whole thing is an oddity and I love it as an artifact but not as much as the previous record, Grotesque. After a jagged maze of words and a scarifying tune, Leave the Capitol hits you with its wonky psychodrama of apparently anti-urbanism. Its TS Elliotism stuns with lines about "hotel maids smiling in unison" and laughing at the great god Pan etc etc. It is one of the most complex tunescapes I know, and I loved it from the first hearing: it mystifies and pleases me greatly.
Where can people find your music/more information?
The Prongs are on Facebook, YouTube and Bandcamp. We play a special theatrical show with a seven-piece band and video projections at the Project Arts Centre on Saturday at 8pm sharp. Our CD Theme from The Now Now Express will be launched at this event.
