Mixies Men Interview - 06 July 2020

An appearance on X-Factor, a rubber chicken, a  blow up skeleton, a hand-held barking dog puppet, a dildo on a chain, dry-humping, shaving foam and a semi-naked man could only mean one thing. Mixie and his merry men! We have a chat with Mixie about his band -  Mixies Men and his 35 years of causing mayhem and shock to the local punters of Birkenhead, Liverpool and further afield......

DLW: Hello Mixie and thanks for agreeing to do the interview, so first obvious question is when did you start the band and how did it come about?

MIXIE: I was at Withens Lane College doing an acting course, then went to Liverpool Theatre School as we needed an Equity Card to start acting. There I met Simon (later known as Eddie Cockroach) and we started a band up to get our (Equity) cards. We got the cards and once we got them, the band split up but people were asking us to get the band back together so we did. I did some film-work and other TV stuff which dried up so I then focused on the band more. The band just took off then. I did some stuff on my own. 

DLW: So you did some solo stuff then?

MIXIE: Yeah, I'd done a few gigs on my own as Mixie as I didn't have a band at that point so I went out with backing tapes supporting Hocky's band.

DLW: So how did you get Roger and Gordon involved?

MIXIE: I used to go into Hammersound and Roger (Rocker) worked there so I asked him, as I knew he played bass, if he'd like to join the band and he agreed. Then we were looking for a drummer, we found Gordon (Dr. Sexx) and he came along to the first gig. At first he wasn't too keen as he was in another band and he reckoned they were going to be really busy but he agreed to do a few gigs for me. He came along and once he saw my act on stage, he shit himself and started to pack his gear away! I asked him what he was doing and he said 'We're gonna get our heads kicked in' I told him it was all part of the show and not to worry. After the gig, he saw how much the punters enjoyed it so he then asked if he could join the band full time.

DLW: So with reference to your stage act, is that something you've always done from day one?

MIXIE: Yeah, I don't plan what I'm going to do, I just do it. In the earlier days, it was a bit less chaotic and calmer but I've since found out how far I can go now and don't push it too far. In a pub it's a bit tamer than if I played a club.

DLW: What was the initial reaction then from the people who came to see the band live?

MIXIE: Oh, they hated us. People boo-ed us and we got escorted out of places but I stuck to my guns. People asked us to change and do covers but I thought 'No' I'm not changing my act. I'm gonna do what I wanna do.

DLW: Where you doing covers initially or writing your own stuff?

MIXIE: Mainly our own stuff but we threw a couple of covers in, in the early days but they were quite obscure covers that people probably didn't know.

DLW: So what covers did you throw in?

MIXIE: The main cover was 'Anarchy In The UK' but the obscure ones were tracks by The Cramps and we did a Rezillos number 'Where's Captain Kirk?'

DLW: What the very first line up?

MIXIE: The first line up was Simon (Eddie Cockroach) and his brother and a lad called Phil Evil. 

DLW: For me the definitive line up was yourself, Eddie Cockroach, Roger Rocker and Dr. Sexx.

MIXIE: Yeah that was the line up that stayed together the longest.

DLW: So when it comes to band nick-names, who thinks them up? Is it you or the lads in the band at the time?

MIXIE: I usually make them up as the lads usually ask me. How I got called Mixie was.....

DLW: Yeah, I was going to ask you that how you got the name Mixie.

MIXIE: Over the road from where I live, I went to a party and this girl said "bye Mixie" when she left the party but I was fast asleep when she said it. The next day, this lad said to me 'Did you hear what you got called last night?' So I said no and he said Mixie. Later  on in the week at the same house, some bloke was drawing on my coat, he drew Mickey Mouse, he asked if I wanted anything else and I said write Mixie. That's how I got the name!

DLW: Getting back to band nicknames, do you have any personal favourites?

MIXIE: Wank Marvin makes me laugh a lot, Eddie Cockroach is a classic name. There are others as well, we had Tom The Hom, The Amazing Eff because he was fucked up, we shortened The Amazing Fuck Up to The Amazing Eff. We had Roger Rocker, we have Gringo in our band now, Gringo was already his nickname, there was Austin Space too, who's now back in the band.

DLW: How long has Austin been back?

MIXIE: I'd say at least three or four years  now. He was retired but I keep bringing him back out of retirement. We have a lad now called Guy, I used to call him Sly Guy but everyone said just call him Guy instead.

DLW: Who writes the lyrics then?

MIXIE: Mainly me at the moment, I'm the sole writer as none of the others will write anything. I come up with a tune in my head what I want and then put it to the band.

DLW: In the past has anybody else written any tunes and/or lyrics?

MIXIE: We had Charlie Landsborough junior who wrote a couple of songs that we recorded. One of them is called Rabbit "She's got a rabbit and her battery is dead!" Simon did a bit of writing, he wrote 'Rock Ferry'.

DLW: What was the first song ever written, can you remember that far back?

MIXIE: Probably 'Daddy' which is one of the ones I wrote.

DLW: So playing live, what are your personal favourites?

MIXIE: I like 'Bangor' but we've got a new one now called 'Cock-A-Doodle-Do' which we're bringing out soon.

DLW: You have an album out, do you have any more releases planned?

MIXIE: Another album, 'Cock-A-Doodle-Do' will be on it, I want to do another version of 'Bangor' as we've added to it now. I'd like to do a version of 'What's Inside A Girl?' (The Cramps) We also do a speeded up punky version of 'Somewhere Over The Rainbow'

DLW: You've also got other songs released haven't you?

MIXIE: We did a tape first, then we did a single on vinyl called 'Rock Ferry'. Simon left the band then and we ended up re-releasing 'Rock Ferry' on CD but changed the lyrics to 'Tranmere' and it became known as 'The Tranmere Song'. We also had a song on a compilation tape called 'Werewolf In Birkenhead Park'. We got signed up to do the Tranmere single and we asked him if he then wanted us to do an album as we had a lot of material to record and he agreed. We were going to get done by Cilla Black because we have that song 'Cilla Black, Show Us Your Crack!' The album still came out but the promoters, management, record company dropped us because of that song. There was no promotion though and we couldn't get a gig for love of money so I went off to Manchester and started working my way up in Manchester to get gigs there. I had a few contacts up there.

DLW: To date, what would you say has been your biggest gig? The biggest band you've supported?

MIXIE: We've supported The Damned, Ten-Pole Tudor, UK Subs, GBH, Ed Banger & The Nosebleeds and recently we did one with Peter & The Test Tube Babies.

DLW: How were the band received by these audiences?

MIXIE: When we did The Damned, people were still shouting for us. At the Ten-Pole Tudor gig, the band were saying how do we follow that? Peter (Test Tube) was asked what they thought of us (me) and he thought I was crazy. Apparently even the bouncers walked in to watch us.

DLW: Getting onto your stage props, the rubber chicken being one, what other props do you use these days?

MIXIE: I had a blow-up skeleton but they kept getting robbed so I don't use them anymore. I had a fake hand which I used to pretend to wank with, a plastic dick on a chain which I pretended to stick up my bum. I have a little hand (dog) puppet for when we sing 'Lux' but don't use it a lot now as it was always getting taken off me and people would run round the pub with it. I went through a bad time recently and I gave up the band for a while but people asked me to start doing it again so I agreed but I wanted to come back in a different way to what I had done and not play some shitty pub in the middle of no-where so me and the guitarist applied to go on the X-Factor.

DLW: I was going to ask you about the X-Factor, how did that go?

MIXIE: We when in for it in Liverpool and we got moved into the next section. They don't tell you what happens next if you get through, you just get a phone call. So we got the phone call a week later asking if we could do an interview. Another week after that we got invited to Leicester for half ten in the morning, so we had to leave at half five to get there on time, we called ourselves the MG's. Mixie and Guy. They filmed all day and at half eleven at night, we went in front of the judges.

DLW: What song did you in front of the judges?

MIXIE: Lux The Dog. But we did a clean version!!! I had to change some of the lyrics. 

DLW: Lux was the name of your dog wasn't it?

MIXIE: Yeah, he was named after the lead singer from The Cramps and if I got a female dog I was gonna call her Ivy. So when we got through, we then went to see them in Manchester we got through again, we got four yes votes.

DLW: At that point, was it the main judges?

MIXIE: Yeah it was Simon Cowell, Louis Walsh, Sharon Osbourne and Nicole Scherzinger. Nicole was a bit wary but she put us through. We shared cakes with Simon Cowell!! When we left, we were given a letter to say we'd got through then we were invited down to London. And that was when we were kicked off the show. It was all filmed but never got shown on TV.

DLW: This is something I've always wanted to ask you. When you go on stage, you have a symbol painted on your forehead, what does it signify?

MIXIE: I used to just do a squiggly line on my head that I'd seen before and I never knew what it meant until somebody told me. I've always done it and I thought it must mean something. It's a straight line at the bottom, then a point above it with a  half circle. Basically it means we're straight to the point and round the bend!  And there are another four dots which basically represents the band members. I believe that some girl actually got the symbol tattoo'ed on her leg.

DLW: So we've spoke about your best gig, what was your worst?

MIXIE: There's loads haha! We did The Pacific once and we came on, I had these pair of knickers on with a big long dick attached to them and this bloke started shouting abuse, calling us shit and threw a glass at the stage but luckily enough, I knew a few lads in the audience who asked him to stop throwing but he ignored them and threw another and before you knew it, there was a big kick off, everybody was fighting with everybody. The band hid behind the drum kit armed with a drum stick each! I saw a girl getting stretchered out. I saw her a week later and she told me she had been knocked out. 

DLW: Due to the nature of your act, dry-humping women etc. Have you ever been slapped by a woman?

MIXIE: Yeah, I've been started on many a time. I've been threatened, I've been escorted out of pubs with bouncers around me. I've been hit, I was in Runcorn and this girl scratched me, all down my back and dug her nails in really hard so that I was bleeding. 

DLW: Have you ever done a gig where you've been genuinely scared and actually stopped the gig?

MIXIE: We did one in Ellesmere Port where they started throwing cans, bottles etc, Once the bottles started coming over, I pulled the plug. When we play somewhere new, I always tell them what the show is about, it's definitely an over 18's gig!!

DLW: Where have you enjoyed playing?

MIXIE: A few, Stairways, Halfway House and The Grange in Moreton. The Witchwood in Manchester is a good venue, I enjoy playing there. We got offered a gig supporting The Rezillos but that never happened as one of them was ill on the day so they gave us another date supporting The Beat. It was full of Mods and we thought we were gonna die here. I said to the lads - Let's just get on with it and we went down really well. After the gig these Mods came over and said it was good, my voice was an octave higher when I replied as I thought they hated us haha!!

DLW: How would you describe your music Mixie?

MIXIE: I had it etched into our first vinyl single. We call ourselves Thrashabilly!!! I'm a big kid at heart, I've never grown up. I sing about silly things, simple stuff. But it has to be in a filthy way but comical, a-la Benny Hill style. Not filthy like The Macc Lads.

DLW: Have you ever done gigs where you drop the 'act' and go out and not abuse the audience or cover yourself in shaving foam?

MIXIE: Done a few but wasn't feeling right. People wanted us to go back to what we do so I started using the props again.

DLW: Have you ever had any comments from people who say that you're a bit of a joke band or not a serious band?

MIXIE: Not really, I once did a gig and this lad just kept staring at me all night. He wouldn't take his eyes of me.

DLW: He might have fancied you!!

MIXIE: Haha, possibly but anyway, he still kept staring and when we finished, he walked up to me and said that was shit. So I replied with 'Thanks mate, glad you enjoyed it' And carried on packing the gear away.

DLW: Bit of a joke question now.... If you were a wrestler, what would you call yourself?

MIXIE: It has to be 'Mad Mixie'

DLW: If you were interviewing yourself, what question would you ask Mixie?

MIXIE: Why are you mad?

DLW: I think that is an ideal place to finish the interview. Thanks for taking the time to chat to me.

MIXIE: No worries and thank you!

So there we have it, an insight into what goes on in Mixie's world! If you fancy something a bit different, then go and see Mixie's Men but be warned, don't get too close or you could become part of the show. Unless of course you like being smothered in shaving foam by a half-naked man in knee-length stiletto's! Fuck or Fuck Off!!!!!