- 6 months ago
This is the story of Rob Mathew, known as Rob Redhead, a young musician from the northeast of England who joined a heavy metal band in 1985 and spent the next four years checking off all the boxes of rockstar life. Atomkraft was one of the first new bands to emerge post-NWOBHM, and they were at the forefront of the evolving British heavy rock and metal scene. Signed to the same label as the up-and-coming, world-dominating legends Venom, both bands shared the same management company. However, the cozy world of British heavy metal exploded in the mid-1980s with the arrival of American thrash metal bands. Atomkraft had to quickly up their game and adapt to survive, as a faster, more aggressive style than ever before took the metal music world by storm, led by bands like Metallica and Slayer. At just 16 years old, Rob was not only thrown into the deep end of learning, recording albums, and playing to thousands but also had to rapidly adapt his songwriting abilities to this new thrash genre, as did the other band members, to survive and hopefully thrive.
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00:00it's the end of 1985 and it's been a pretty good year
00:07um 16 years old and pretty much ticked all the boxes straight out of the box
00:15so i recorded an album in a recording studio you know proper recording studio big mixing desk and
00:24everything what watch everybody dreamt of doing if you're a musician back in the 70s 60s 70s and 80s
00:31and even the 90s uh so big recording studio um i went into art europe supporting exodus and venom
00:42and played in big venues every night for three weeks a month whatever it was and done all them
00:53rock and roll things that you imagine uh like say a 20 year old would be having a whale of a time
00:59well you know i was like 16 so it's like for me it was it was uh scary it was scary as as much as sort
01:09of having a whale of a time so you know which is obviously you're seeing all the prostitutes and
01:15you know uh you know the sleazy lifestyle and you know the rock and roll drunken mania behavior and
01:24you know um just trashing bars and all sorts of stuff you know just everything you know uh
01:33yeah you know sort of um all of that in one year and i can't elect recollect when
01:46or if it was the end of 85 i think was the the beginning of 1986 now 1986 was a different year
01:54all together in fact the outland craft years 85 86 87 and 88 four years were completely different
02:06you know each each year was a completely different uh experience and also sort of a different band lineup
02:15really and the music was evolving as well you know so in 86 um
02:25tony dolan left the band and what had happened was he wasn't happy with eric the manager of us
02:35who was managing venom as well and uh you know the the drummer in apple craft was jed cook so jed wolf
02:47so jed wolf cook was er you know part of that and so was abaddon as well because abaddon was just sort
02:54of tour managers abaddon the drummer of venom was the sort of tour managers as well with us on the tour bus
02:59and that was he was like that all the way through on the other tours were done as well
03:03and um so i always felt with that and craft like um i was sort of observing from in the middle really
03:13there was like um there was always a a pulling to and fro between uh you know the camp dolan camp and
03:23uh the jed and eric camp you know sort of like this pulling to and fro you know who who really what
03:32who really was the band i mean there's so much i don't know that went on behind the scenes and
03:38everything and um so tony dolan leaves jed tells us tony's left right and
03:49so now we get we get replaced replacements jed sorts out replacements so he got swifty in
04:01ian davison swift ian swift right so and i was impressed by this uh one because uh he was the event he
04:13was the singer from avenger and you know a year a year earlier sort of year and a half earlier me and
04:21brian the drummer we we'd been buying albums from neat records of tyson dog avenger raven and venom
04:30you know and and we're doing the research because we were wanting to get when you had to get into
04:35neat records and we weren't now what the competition was you know this is two 15 14 15 year old kids not
04:41wanting to know what the competition is with the other bands and how good musicians were how good
04:46the songs were uh you know what the competition was so when jed says we've got swifty and i thought oh
04:54good guys because i'd been i'd been listening to the avenger album you know for reference and
05:02i thought he was a good singer swifty i thought oh getting a proper rock star in but i was even doubly impressed
05:07with swifty because again he was older but he had a his car he had this sob and it was it was like
05:16fucking you know i thought god this guy's this guy's hit the big time you know he's driving around in
05:23this sob you know uh so rock star in the band great and then there was a lad called darren cooper
05:36who was a bass player a local lad he was like he would have been 17 something like that he was a year
05:43older than me so so i i could uh you know breathe a sigh of relief that i was still the youngest in the
05:50band type of thing uh because that sort of competition was there like you know amongst
05:57you know there's other bands and all that you'd look around and you know you'd want to see as a 16
06:04year old 17 year old you only know what the competition is with your exact age not anybody
06:09old i didn't didn't matter you know and certainly wouldn't have been anybody younger because that
06:14would that would be just like odd you know so you know and i that that you kick that kicks up every
06:22now and again on the internet you'll get like a sort of 12 year old kid at a music festival flying up
06:28and doing the neck but um that that was that's just very rare that happens anyway uh so darren comes in
06:36get on with darren fayne he's a fantastic bass player and we'll start rehearsing and
06:49what one was i had some new sort of riffs songs where i would write i would at this stage i wasn't
06:56writing lyrics i was writing uh or particularly vocal melodies really i was i was i mean i could but i was
07:05i was wanting to learn the craft of of the heavier the metal the heavy metal you say so it was all
07:11about the songs writing the songs which included all the riffs and also the names as well i like
07:17i like to come up with the names as well so uh at this time as the four of us are now rehearsing and
07:23it's the beginning of 1986 i came up with the riffs for queen of death and um
07:31um yeah protector so and i remember as well sort of playing queen of death and and swift he had put
07:42his his own vocals you know and i think it was a little bit of collaboration with jed uh as well
07:49like when he on on the sort of how the voters would go although i'm i'm not sure about that but
07:54uh i remember playing running through the song and um i must have put the which i would do i would put
08:06the the the songs in musical all the songs basically on to tape the set and you'd give the tape set to
08:14the singer you know and then they would write the lyrics and the melodies over the top of that
08:19and i remember like in the rehearsal we're running through queen of death and abaddon tony prayer was
08:27there you know um tony was always there like you know whatever was going on he was just he was just
08:36just loved his music and that you know he wanted to be involved and everything so um i remember i'm
08:42saying i think like say jed or somebody was saying like oh we need it needs to stop there you need to go
08:49into the like there uh you need to it just needs to be four balls and then go to go into the chorus
08:55and i must have been sort of not so sure about that and then then abaddon tony said no rob you know
09:02you really it really needs to it needs to gone like into the chorus there like and because abaddon spoke
09:09up you know i thought well okay then it was it must be right you know so uh suppose you could have a
09:16little song credit for that he probably did anyway uh and i didn't so that's that that that's what was
09:24going on there so there was songs been rehearsed we're gonna do a new album now the album would
09:33turn into an ep which was like an ep is like a small there's less songs right now i think neat records
09:43were sort of uh i don't know what was going on i don't know what was going on anyway but this there
09:49was the talk that you know if you're doing ep it's going to be louder because the grooves are going
09:53to be wider in the vinyl right so i i don't know anyway it it it was it was an ep of something like
10:01five or six songs and um
10:04half the songs were what i co-written with tony dolan before he left right the album was going to
10:12be called queen of death and i had an idea for a cover and uh the cover would be um
10:22um a um a derelict bedroom like there's been a nuclear bomb gone off right and kind of like
10:31the zip zip floor cover where you've got the the the picture on the wall on the front and then when
10:38you open it up you've got it's like it's like a wall in a derelict block of flats well it was along
10:44that i long that lines but on the front cover you could certainly say everything was going on so you
10:49would have the bedroom uh it's been a kid's bedroom and there's a guitar on the bed and half
10:54the wall's missing and in the background you can see like you know where the nuclear bombs went off and
11:00you know everything's been flattened and there's a poster hanging you know half ripped off the off
11:07the bedroom wall with the atlamp craft school and there's like sort of uh you know rays of light
11:14coming from its eyes down onto the guitar right and uh but you know that the little guitarist lads
11:23nowhere to be seen and i've done a sketch of this and i showed jed it uh and i thought would have made
11:30a gray color and jed says well where's he looked at it he says oh well it's a guitar is it i says yeah
11:37he says well well can it not be a drum i says well you can be whatever you want i so
11:47that wasn't gonna happen and they came you know like a month later when we recorded the album i was
11:55studying the records and the office and jed comes up with the the album cover that he must have had
12:00somebody commission and uh he says right yeah rob got the cover and he showed us the cover she's what
12:07you think you know and i says it's he was like shot you know she's why what's the matter with it i
12:15says well it's it's a bit amateur in it you know which you know which it was like you know but then
12:22you know a lot of a lot of artwork was like back then like you know but i was uh it was a bit obvious
12:29uh i mean why was the crystal ball there and uh i just thought it was naff you know you know
12:36but uh a lot of album covers were naff a lot of logos were naff i was looking at the
12:42app and craft logo i mean it's pretty yeah the you know the original sort of ones pretty pretty
12:47basic you know i mean you know put this with tony dolan at least he had a ruler and a pencil like
12:54but uh you know it's amazing in this world of ai what you can do now like uh it doesn't make the
13:01music any better like so i thought my little idea would have been a better cover but there again
13:08so that was that but the music was good anyway the production was handled by kevin ridley who they
13:15brought in now i don't know what the politics is is there but kevin hung around like uh for in in
13:21doing another production with other bands so but i was very impressed with kevin because he he was um
13:30he was lightable and he would listen and he wouldn't be condescending you know even if you are
13:36young like i was so you know he wouldn't be condescending to me because i was young in fact
13:41and it was also that was the same with tony bray as well abaddon like he would be uh
13:48quite often he would ask is what do you think rob you know because he knew like i was that i was the
13:55the the the the the pulse of the youth you know so that that was that that was clever that he done that
14:01i remember one day on the tour bus he was talking to uh exodus or somebody some of the american bands
14:10he was going on about uh i hadn't heard of status quo and he was saying how great status quo were
14:18and then he looked at to the american band probably exodus and he looked at me he says
14:22status quo are great want the rob and i says well no they were shit the shit and he was like
14:30fucking shocked and i says he says what do you mean the shit i said well it's just the same thing in it
14:34it's just it's just the same thing all the time and that was uh i think tony realizing that uh
14:40i think i might have made him feel a bit old in that moment because you know those
14:45i mean i don't know why i was in the status quo like fucking hell but then i find i find out
14:50a poor weller was also into a the jam was also in the status quo there's a lot of them in the
14:56status quo like i never got status quo uh so what we're doing now so we've got the the albums
15:05the albums recorded kevin ridley's done a great job uh the songs sound powerful i mean it's it's what
15:13it's what i wanted for the first album you know you could actually hear the guitar
15:17uh the whole thing was a powerful punchy mix not much reverb which is which is always a plus you
15:27know you start adding reverb on anything and you just it just gets lost i mean that's rule number one
15:32like you know uh you know reverb doesn't make anything sound bigger it makes it sound further away you
15:40you know so you've got you've got powerful ep a passable cover and that gets released
15:55there's a promise of an american tour and all that year all of that year i kept on saying to eric
16:03the manager when we're going to america eric and you see what i always say i'm working on it rob i'm
16:11working on it and we never went well i did later on in lifeline but um i made sure of that like
16:19uh so that's happening all of that that the ap comes out it gets it gets guns down really well
16:30karan liked it a lot uh and it was just it was just like lee the singing everything was just sort of
16:38late years ahead of the first album you know so it was a massive jump
16:49and i'm still asking eric when's the american tour happening i'm working on it rob i'm working on it
16:57and still it wasn't happening and i was getting frustrated with this i know what the hell's going
17:01on here you know and you know what is that four piece uh rob matthew guitars ian swift vocals jade wolf
17:12drums uh dc rage darren cooper bass you know shit hot like great great four piece and i'm thinking
17:25well where's the gigs you know we didn't even gig as our four piece we didn't even d1 gigs our four
17:30piece and then jed says to us probably about the autumn of 86 after this great album that came out
17:44but there'd be no gigs nine out jade says i've got some news for you oh what's that tony donan's back in
17:53that bond
18:00you
18:00you
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