Making of - Lafaro

It's a cause for celebration - the return of princes of the riff Lafaro, who play their first gig of 2013 tonight (Thursday) at The Limelight, Belfast. Well we say celebration - we really mean it's a cause for Herb from the band to talk us through what makes him and his cohorts tick with another in our 'The Making Of' series! Published (almost!) word for word, here's what Herb had to say.....

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The first record that I bought was 'Adrenalize', an album of 'songs' by the 9-armed love machine known as Def Leppard; who at that point in their usually flourishing, occasionally floundering career had been reduced to the humiliation of being merely a 7-armed love machine due to the untimely death of founding member Steve Clark. Oddly, at no point in their career were 'The Lepp' ever an 8-armed love machine, which is indeed a shame as they then may have been a Rocktopus; perhaps even a Rocktopus with fully functioning aural faculties. This would, perhaps, have been preferential to being a deaf jungle cat. The hearing difficulties of said feline wildling are, of course, a sticking point. Especially considering their career choice.

The last record I bought was 'L'Enfant Sauvage' by European anger merchants Gojira. It's what I would call Heavy Metal, but not the sort of weak stylised 'Metal' that is thrust in my face via the medium of BLACK T SHIRTS YOUNG PEOPLE LONG HAIR PUT A SKULL ON IT, it's more intense than that and they don't put SILLY CHORUSES WHICH ALL HAVE THE SAME E-min TO C-maj PROGRESSIONS into their songs. So I like it. It's heavy and intense. Like sticky toffee pudding.

The gig that made me want to be in a band was Therapy? in the Ulster Hall, some time in the 90's, around the time of Infernal Love, which is still my favourite Therapy? album. Sorry guys. That's also the gig that made me want to be a bass player as the effervescent ... Michael McKeegan seemed to be having so much fun on stage that I relented and decided that 4 is better than 6. Yeah, that's right, I said I WANTED to be a bass player. Take note, failed guitarists

As cliché as it may seem initially, the musician who inspired me to start performing was Kurt Cobain ...

 The last gig LaFaro watched together, as a band, as a group of friends, was The Pogues in St George's Market in 2009 and we've hated each other ever since.

The last album LaFaro listened to together, as a band, as a group of friends, was the debut album byAdebisi Shank in 2008 and we've all hated ourselves ever since.

We always bond over Pantera, who were and are, the Heavy Metal equivalent of Wrestlemania. Ludicrous, macho, far too American and best served with an ice cold beer.

Not many things in this short life are certain and for that reason my answer to the query as to which local band we'd share a stage with every night is Therapy? because we did indeed share a stage with them every night. And it was good.

I was always under the impression that to be in a band you had to have a cool name or at least a cool nickname, so for that reason I would list the following as potential members of Lafaro - John 'Bonzo' Bonham, Andy 'Falco' Falkous or 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin, Jake 'The Snake' Roberts... I digress. Nicknames aside, let's say David Bowie.

Our first cover verson was Queens of the Stone Age 'Feel good hit of the summer', cunningly retitled to 'Feel good hit of the yuletide'. It was Christmas you see. I know, cunning. Like a fox that has just graduated with a degree in cunning from Cunning University. The last one was 'Juicebox' by The Strokes, at the Ulster Hall. I wore a vest and a handlebar moustache. On television. Later that week my father gave me a shirt and a razor.

Nothing, and I mean NOTHING, lifts the mood in the LaFaro van like an expertly timed play of Dave Lee Roth's 'Just like living (in Paradise)'. To us it's the musical equivalent of asking Gerry Armstrong about THAT GOAL.

K thx bye, lots of love, Herb xx