{"id":1841,"date":"2012-06-05T10:00:48","date_gmt":"2012-06-05T08:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/?p=1841"},"modified":"2012-06-12T21:21:25","modified_gmt":"2012-06-12T19:21:25","slug":"the-rebel-abides-in-search-of-ben-wallers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/1841\/the-rebel-abides-in-search-of-ben-wallers\/","title":{"rendered":"The Rebel Abides: In Search of Ben Wallers"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Photography by Jesper List Thomsen<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Even by the generous standards of modern garage lo-fi hipsteria, Benedict Roger Wallers seems inept and incongruous; a charismatic lone wolf in a cowboy hat or trilby and a tie whose electrified howls are too idiosyncratic to be broken down into market-oriented terms. It is difficult to sketch a thumbnail summary of a musician who has amassed a vast and unwieldy discography under a variety of names and genres: the most widely acclaimed is probably the Country Teasers, but he also moonlights as, or in, the Rebel, the Company, the Male Nurse, the Beale, the Stallion, the Black Poodle and Skills on Ampex, across folk, country, garage, post-punk, no wave and electronic pop.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wallers has amassed a near-unquantifiable discography over the past 20 years, from scores of more or less \u201cofficial\u201d LPs, EPs and 7\u201ds to seemingly endless self-released cassettes. Back in the mid-1990s, he started making records as the leader (singer, guitarist and main songwriter) of a garage combo that would go on to develop cult status: the County Teasers. The Teasers were on Tim Warren\u2019s legendary Crypt Records before joining In the Red\u2019s burgeoning roster. With full-lengths such as Satan is Real Again, or Feeling Good About Bad Thoughts, Destroy All Human Life and Science Hat Artistic Cube Moral Nosebleed Empire, the Teasers liberated garage rock from its clean-cut orthodoxy of the past, splicing it with satirically vitriolic lyrics, surreal themes and nontraditional sounds like outerspace explorations, spastic rhythms, hip-hop beats and dissonant synths. The Teasers released albums regularly until 2008, but in the meantime, prolific Wallers had already started churning out solo work as the Rebel\u2014a name under which he remains musically active to this day, having just released five synth-driven tracks for a split 12\u201d with Year of Birds on the English DIY label Ack! Ack! Ack! Records. However, in spite of its umpteen releases and the current worldwide hype surrounding all that is lo-fi and garage-like, the Rebel is still mainly a private pleasure shared amongst a happy few whose antennae are susceptible to weird signals. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t call it country, it\u2019s just music\u2014melodies and rhythms in the style of western pop\/rock, with a bit of avant-garde to keep it spicy, harmonies where possible, disharmony too,\u201d Wallers says.<\/p>\n

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Wallers is generally understood to be Scottish, although Wikipedia states that he was born in St Albans, just outside of London, and Wallers himself tells me that he was \u201cborn in the basement of Gieves & Hawkes, Savile Row, London\u201d and now lives \u201cat the top of the Waterstones bookshop on Piccadilly, which used to be the DAKS Simpsons building.\u201d He also says that he holds a day job \u201cspotting new looks among the upper middle and upper haute bourgeoisie for a number of fashion houses in London and the other major rag-trade cities\u201d. Clearly he is enjoying exercising his renowned gift for sarcasm and purposeful provocation. But as the discussion deepens, the masks fall. \u201cI hate racists, I hate bores and I hate narrow-mindedness,\u201d he says. \u201cEdinburgh is the most sophisticated place for humour I\u2019ve ever lived\u2014I loved it. Humour, that\u2019s the best. London\u2019s a bit humourless, unfortunately\u2014too busy, too tense, too fast for humour, too political. I feel Edinburgh. Edinburgh is like anti-Scotland for me, more sophisticated than London, and I like London a lot.\u201d He reveals that he is currently living in London and makes a living at the Camden Garden Centre (yes, it exists).<\/p>\n

Like many other underground figures, Wallers is not a professional musician, nor does he wish to be. \u201cI am an amateur,\u201d he says firmly. \u201cIf I started trying to do it for money, I\u2019d really make some bad music. I\u2019ve never worked with major labels. No one ever asked me. I might have ruined it by swearing too much, or by not playing in tune. For me playing music is a hobby. It\u2019s also definitely a form of therapy\u2014I have to do it; if I don\u2019t do it I feel terrible, I get fucking depressed; but also I express my love of God with it. I don\u2019t write this shit, He does, I just channel it.\u201d The God bit could, of course, be more of Wallers\u2019 provocation. Unless his God is one who takes the \u201cspastic swastika\u201d (Wallers\u2019 own creation and the symbol of the Rebel, it is a swastika with a broken arm) as his emblem and now preaches lustful sermons with titles like \u201cBitches\u2019 Fuck-Off\u201d, \u201cPlease Stop Fucking Each Other\u201d, \u201cYoung Mums Up for Sex\u201d, \u201cDon\u2019t Like People\u201d and \u201cCountry Fag\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cFucking hell no way! I do not literally mean everything I say in my songs,\u201d Wallers reassures me. \u201cMost of it is irony. I\u2019m singing the opposite.\u00a0Satire, I learnt it off William Burroughs, Jonathan Swift and Lenny Bruce. When I sing, whether on stage or off stage, sometimes it\u2019s me; actually sometimes the person I am when I\u2019m singing is more me than the person I am in society. But yes, other times I get into a character to do something funny or set up a dramatic scene; there\u2019s a lot of acting and pretending to create atmospheres and stories.\u201d As for his dress code, the Rebel explains, \u201cI just wear a suit and tie. Before going on stage I check that my tie is correctly knotted and that my shirt collar is right. For about 14 years I\u2019ve worn a cowboy hat or a trilby; recently I\u2019ve been phasing this out.\u201d Although Wallers is rarely, if ever, photographed for press, he is remarkably vocal when it comes to style. His favourite colour is chocolate brown and his favourite brand is DAKS Simpson, the iconic, mod-favoured precursor to the DAKS label that was founded in London in 1936 and is still going strong.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI can\u2019t stand ugly, badly dressed bands,\u201d Wallers declares. He confesses that he has kicked people out of his own bands for crimes against fashion. \u201cYes. I have done this,\u201d he says without a hint of remorse. \u201cA haircut got one guy sacked; another guy got sacked because his shoes had square toes.\u201d Since the very earliest days of the Country Teasers, Wallers has had a clear vision in mind of the style he wanted his bands to project. \u201cIt was really just sober suits and shirts and shoes,\u201d he explains. \u201cBut not big collars or 1950s shit, just a suit you would wear to work in the City if you had an income of, like, \u00a3100,000 per annum plus. I like the opposite of what Caesar liked. \u2018Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry look,\u2019 he said. \u2018Let me have men about me that are fat.\u2019 I like the thin, mean ones.\u201d<\/p>\n

He is happy to play the game of describing the outfit he would wear every day for the rest of his life. \u201cBrown Oxfords, a pair my wife bought me, they\u2019re just correct, normal, traditional shoes,\u201d he muses. \u201cQuite thin, shiny brown. She got me a great suit by Hackett for about \u00a3500, dark grey, one-inch turn-ups. I love that too. But I\u2019ve got another suit that was my grandfather\u2019s that I like too. Sort of dark gray with very faint green pin-check. It\u2019s just a City banker\u2019s suit. Slightly larger lapel, and it\u2019s from about 1977. But my favourite suit is now defunct\u2014I wore it out. Look at photos of me on the web from 1996 to 2006, and I\u2019m wearing it all the time. Brown. Neat. Straight. That was my grandfather\u2019s too, and I used to wear a beautiful brown felt trilby, which was made by\u00a0Stetson but it wasn\u2019t cowboy. I got it for \u00a37 from a junk shop in Edinburgh in 1993, but a cunt stole it off my head in Glasgow after a concert. My favorite shirt was a blue silk shirt, almost see-through from age; it was my dad\u2019s from 1960. Medium-size collar. My collar size is 15 1\/4. I like cufflinks. I\u2019ve got a beautiful set of cassette-tape cufflinks and tie-pin.\u201d Surprisingly, Wallers\u2019 style bears no mark of the bands he most loved in his teens. \u201cI always agreed with Mark E. Smith that the Fall were the smartest band in the 1980s,\u201d he says fondly. \u201cThey just dressed how they dressed, a bit tidier maybe. But I also liked the way Robert Smith of the Cure dressed, believe it or not. And Bauhaus I thought looked pretty good. I really hated punk, and new romantic, and goth, and new wave. All of those looks sucked. The Rolling Stones looked good on Exile on Main St. D.A.F. looked good, of course.\u201d<\/p>\n

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As a teenager, in the late 1980s, Wallers used to love the sounds of Elton John, Roy Harper, JJ Cale, Brian Eno, the Beatles and Supertramp. \u201cI envied the guys in the school band,\u201d he recalls. \u201cThey didn\u2019t invite me to join, so I formed my own band. I wanted to play the Cure\u2019s guitar melodies, so that\u2019s how I learnt, playing along. I learnt by ear. I had learnt piano to Grade 3, which I failed; I learnt sax for a year or two at school too. Fucking hated it. But I could play the solo at the end of Pink Floyd\u2019s \u2018Two Suns in the Sunset\u2019, the tragic climax of The Final Cut.\u201d As he grew older, Wallers got into country music (\u201cTammy Wynette is my favourite, and the Carter family\u201d) and also hip-hop. \u201cIce Cube\u2019s The Predator hooked me, then the Wu-Tang, Ol\u2019 Dirty Bastard, then Kool Keith,\u201d he remembers. \u201cI don\u2019t like hip-hop lyrics in general\u2014only Kool Keith breaks the mould and creates totally original lyrics. I like the rhythms and melodies of his stuff, and the tough tunes on Ice Cube\u2019s classic first three albums.\u201d Early on, the Country Teasers covered Ice Cube\u2019s \u201cWe Had to Tear This Mothafucka Up\u201d on Science Hat Artistic Cube Moral Nosebleed Empire (the record also features an amazing cover of 2 Unlimited\u2019s \u201cNo Limit\u201d).<\/p>\n

Wallers is famously a wild, energetic live presence. However, the Rebel is more about recording than performing. \u201cRecording is such pure, absolute joy,\u201d Wallers says. \u201cWhen something goes wrong or gets difficult it\u2019s a nice puzzle to figure out. I would enjoy playing live but I hate practicing and I hate telling people what to do. I love improvising with the band but I really can\u2019t manage a band. I couldn\u2019t manage a second helping! Collaboration is really unpleasant for me. It\u2019s a compromise; I\u00a0hate it.\u201d These days he collaborates mostly with his wife, who plays drums in most of his projects.<\/p>\n

As for his favourite recording space and gear,\u00a0he rattles off a list: \u201cMy room, wherever it is. Scar Studios in Camden, the practice space we\u2019ve used since 1996, which I love. If I have to record some drums I do it there. I love the Fostex X-30 four-track. I\u2019ve got through about five of them\u2014they don\u2019t last long. If any of your readers have one they don\u2019t use, I\u2019ll buy it off them. I use a Fostex DMT-8\u2014I think it was the first digital eight-track they made. It\u2019s fun to use but it doesn\u2019t have a sound, it\u2019s pretty thin. But I love it. I love my piano, a Kawai CityLife, and my synth, the Realistic Concertmate. But I just got the best guitar ever made, from my wife, for my birthday: the Vox Phantom guitar-organ. They only made 80. Famously temperamental, it\u2019s a guitar and an organ, with all sorts of crazy knobs on. It\u2019s still being renovated at the moment. I hate using a computer because I need knobs, switches and faders, and tape if possible. I don\u2019t like mice and doing it all visually. Recording is constantly reinventing and making new, constantly experimenting, finding new games and toys in music. It\u2019s never-ending\u2014it\u2019ll never get boring.\u201d<\/p>\n

[br]<\/p>\n

\"Photography <\/a>
Photography by Jesper List Thomsen <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Photography <\/a>
Photography by Jesper List Thomsen <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>\n

[br]<\/p>\n

Interview\u00a0originally\u00a0published in Dapper Dan magazine\u2019s fifth issue, February, 2012;\u00a0Photography by Jesper List Thomsen<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Even by the generous standards of modern garage lo-fi hipsteria, Benedict Roger Wallers seems inept and incongruous; a charismatic lone wolf in a cowboy hat or trilby and a tie whose electrified howls are too idiosyncratic to be broken down into market-oriented terms. It is difficult to sketch a thumbnail summary of a musician who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[38,32],"class_list":["post-1841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issue-05","tag-interviews","tag-music"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8QZgE-tH","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1841"}],"version-history":[{"count":35,"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1841\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1952,"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1841\/revisions\/1952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dapperdanmagazine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}