Ric: As a band, you're drawn from quite a large geographical base. How did you come to be playing together?

David: Well, when I first started Rachel Stamp, I had been in a band in Wales and at that time there wasn't really a music scene in Cardiff. Bands like Catatonia were starting but there wasn't really anywhere they could play, so really, when my band there broke up I knew I had to go to London to do anything. Feeder, who are from Newport, who had already moved to London and started doing things. I knew Jon Lee and now and then I'd see him in Wales, so it was really obvious that I had to move to London. I had a demo tape with about six songs on it that I had recorded and I'd sent it to Anxious, which is a publishing company run by Dave Stewart of Eurythmics, and they rung me up and said "I really want to do something with you" so I moved to London. Then obviously it was just me and I couldn't do the gigs so I put an ad in Melody Maker and Will replied. We discovered that we like the same bands, like Red Kross and Cheap Trick, which no-one else really liked, especially at that time.

We couldn't find a drummer or a keyboard player. We had a few people stand in, and Jon from Feeder came and played with us at quite a few gigs when we first started. We got signed to Warners, and the drummer from my original band in Wales joined, and we met Mike Rowe who is the original keyboard player, and then we had the whole Warners saga. Do you know about that? We recorded an album with them and the people who signed us left the company. The people who were still there didn't like us because they thought we were offensive. They would keep calling me in and tell me off over songs that we'd written and it was obviously going to be a disaster. We released a few singles then they dropped us basically. Mike Rowe and Cliff [Harris, the original drummer] left the band, then my flatmate bumped into Robin, who I had also met in Wales, and I just gave him a call and said "Can you learn ten songs in two days?" and he said yes so he joined the band. Shaheena used to come and watch us play and we just knew her, then it turned out that she could play the keyboards, and again, with about three days to go, she learnt ten songs and came on tour with us.

Ric: So you were each already in London?

David: Yes, we were in London from different places. I mean, Shaheena's from Quebec, and Will's sort of from London... I think it's the place that people move to to escape other places.

Ric: I've read quite a lot about a scene called Romo from around that time, with bands like Rachel Stamp and Persecution Complex.

David: Well what happenned with Romo was that just before our first record came out, Simon Price, who was a journalist for Melody Maker, came up to me in a club and said, "You've got to launch yourselves as a new romantic band, it's going to be the bigest thing, you've got to do it." I was like, "Well, we're not a new romantic band, I don't really want to do this." So this thing called Romo came up, which was basically bands like Dex Dexter and Plastic Fantastic. Persecution Complex were on the fringes of that but didn't really involve themselves in it. Romo was put all over the cover of Melody Maker, and they did a tour. It was a disaster, no-one went to see it, and all the bands broke up. We weren't really involved in it although I used to go to the clubs where the bands would play, and I became friends with them. Zav, the singer from Dex Dexter, played keyboards with us for, like, two gigs, so we had all this stuff going on, but this was before we were Rachel Stamp as people know us. We were never really involved in the Romo scene though because we were too rock. All that scene was people trying to be very 80s synth, which we'd done a bit of on our Warners album - stuff like I like girlz which was on there, and My sweet rose EP - so people tried to push us into that but we knew we were something different.

Vicki: What inspired Homemade sex change?

David: You know the director John Walters who made Hairspray?

Vicki: Pink flamingos scared the hell out of me.

David: So you're familiar with his work. A lot of his early films like Polyester and Desperate living were kinda... sick. I share his sick sense of humour. Will came in with a riff and I decided I wanted to make almost the soundtrack to a non-existant John Walters film, which is what that song is.

Vicki: What brands of hair dye do you prefer?

David: Well when I had green hair I used 'Directions', and when I had pink hair I used 'Directions' as well, but at the moment I just use... anything. You have to keep changing it because when you dye your hair it doesn't always go the right colour.

Ric: I understand you've been playing some new songs live in the last couple of months.

David: Yes, because we're writing stuff for a new album which we're recording anytime now, so we're playing a couple of songs that we've written for that. One is called Queen of the universe, the other is called Hard on for rock'n'roll, though that may or may not make it onto the album.

Ric: Do you have any plans to record anymore covers?

David: Possibly. We haven't got any definite plans. We normally do those on EPs or whatever, just because we like the songs so do them. But we recorded Calling all destroyers, the T-Rex song, because everybody would compare us to T-Rex. I love T-Rex but I don't think we sound anything like them, so we recorded what is quite an obscure T-Rex song, and people would hear it and wouldn't even know it was T-Rex. It was quite nice; "Say no more. You think we sound like T-Rex but you can't even recognise when we play a T-Rex song."

Vicki: At the Leeds Festival a few years ago there were loads of people wearing Pixies t-shirts, and Frank Black and the Catholics were on stage, and they didn't know who it was until they played Where is my mind? as the final number, when they all came running.

David: I went to see Red Kross once. They were supporting Teenage Fanclub and they weren't going down very well, and they brought two of Teenage Fanclub out onstage, and people in the audience didn't know it was Teenage Fanclub even though they were at a Teenage Fanclub gig seeing them, which I thought was a bit strange.

Ric: The overall feel of Oceans of Venus seemed very different to Hymns for strange children but fairly similar to the unreleased Warner album. Do you feel wither sound typifies you or that there isn't such a difference?

David: When we first started at Warners we didn't do any gigs. We were basically going to the studio a lot, so we were experimenting with the sound. Even though there's only four people in the band we weren't restricted to everybody just playing one thing at one time. We would do songs that, y'know... we'd find some synthesizers lying around so we'd write a song and just do it on synthesizers, or we'd do an acoustic song and we'd get a string section. It didn't really come from playing live, then when we did Hymns for strange children, it was the songs that we had been playing live, so that was much more basic, and then when we did Oceans of Venus it was more back to the freedom that we had in the studio when we didn't want to restroct ourselves. I think in terms of the recording process, it is a lot more similar to the Warners album, but also we wanted to change. We're not a band who want to make five albums that sound the same; we like to make them sound different and the next album we do will sound different again.

Ric: Did you consider branching out into acting after starring in Greenwich mean time?

David: Not really, because we didn't really have to act in Greenwich mean time. I think the thing we had to do was at one point the director went "OK, a fight has broken out, look shocked by it" and that was it. I think a lot of people in bands would like to be actors but acting is a real skill and I don't know whether at this stage any of us are necessarily skilled enough to be actors. It's not something we'd discount; if anything came along that was the right thing to do and we thought we could do it properly, we would do it, but it's not like we're clamouring for an acting agent.

Ric: What is your favourite seminal TV detective show?

David: Starsky & Hutch, and I'm really offended that they've made it into a film. I mean, Charlie's Angels worked because the original wasn't very good so they made it better, but with Starsky & Hutch the original series is really good, it had a lot going for it and they just turned it into this parody, which I find annoying.

Ric: I really liked Starsky & Hutch until they went undercover as hairdressers.

David: I can't remember that episode.

Ric: Then there were episodes which had neither Starsky nor Hutch in them.

David: I don't remember that either, my knowledge of Starsky & Hutch has been exposed. I only saw the good bits.

Ric: That's the one question that we ask everyone. We've got a leaderboard on the site; Colombo is currently winning.

David: I don't really like Colombo, it always depresses me, I don't know why. I do like Diagnosis: Murder, though that's not strictly a detective show.

Ric: What music are you listening to at the moment?

David: I just bought an album by someone called Brett Smiley, who made an album in 1974 that never got released, then got released last year. People put him in with the 70s glam thing, and he realeased one single at the time, but this album sounds like Phil Spector with this guy speaking over it. I really like that, so I've been listening to that a lot. Other than that, there's this band from America that were around in the 70s called Grand Funk Railroad and I bought their album We're an American band. It's a really big album in America and I bought that when we were over there recently. As far as new bands, there's not many new bands that I like. I like My Ruin but they're not really new. I just like old things, I don't know why but I find it a bit more exciting discovering things that were around 20 years ago.

Ric: Would you rather see the KISS / Aerosmith tour or the KISS / Poison tour?

David: KISS / Aerosmith. Is there a KISS / Poison tour? That's really bad. And I think it's really bad that they're going out with two non-original members in the original people's make-up. With one they could kind of get away with it even though it's bad in principle. If they would have given them original characters then it would be all right, but then they wouldn't have been able to cash in.

Ric: Didn't they originally have five members when converting from Wicked Lester to KISS?

David: I think when it was actually KISS it was only three members: Gene, Paul, and Peter.

Ric: Wasn't the original drummer painted like a fox though?

David: No, Peter Criss was the original drummer - KISS are my favourite band so I know everything about them - and when he left in 1980 they got Eric Carr in who was a fox, then Ace Frehley left and they got Vinnie Vincent in who had the Egyptian make-up, and then they took their make-up off for Lick it up. I really like KISS but I think it's too money orientated now, and despite what Gene Simmons says I don't think music is all about money, and I don't think KISS was always about money, I think they did it because they wanted to be a good band. They're still OK, but it's a bit 'got to keep going, doesn't matter if everyone leaves, get anyone in make-up and make some money'.

Ric: Have you heard the Carnival of souls sessions with Bruce Kulick?

David: No I haven't, because I stopped buying their records when I bought Hot in the shade and I thought it was crap.

Ric: That's from 1997, the last new material that they did. I think it's really good if nothing like KISS - it's actually sounds closest to Alice in Chains, so quite fashionable for the time. Anyway, personally I'd go to the Poison tour.

David: Well their first album was good and then after that they were rubbish. With the first one, it sounded really raw, and the songs were really good and they looked really good, but then it went too slick. I stopped liking current rock music around that time, I just didn't really like Warrant and all that stuff.

Vicki: Have you heard the latest KISS tribute bands compilation?

David: No, not this one. A lot of these tribute albums are OK. If you really like a band in the first place then they're fun to listen to but they don't really improve on the songs.

Ric: Are you any closer to finding a permanent drummer, or is that not really a priority?

David: Well we're looking for somebody permanent, but at the moment we have Belle from Killing Miranda playing and he's really good. It is a priority to get somebody but it has to be the right person. We've tried a few people out, but they didn't work out personality wise. I think it's very difficult to come into a band like ours, because we've been going for quite a while and we're so close as people. Often people have a preconceived idea of what we're going to be like, and often it's nothing like what we are like; they think they have to come in and act like what they see Robin acting like, and that's not what we want. Robin's not in the band anymore, and we don't want someone like Robin in the band, because we're not looking to replace him but to bring something new into the band.

Ric: Have you heard the stuff that Robin's doing now?

David: We'll he's in various different bands. He's in one called Tat who I saw him with the other day. I think Robin's a really good drummer, but he's in so many different bands it's hard to keep track of what he's doing.

Ric: We told a few people that we were going to speak to you, and they each came up with things that they wanted to ask, so that's what we're moving onto now. You played with Wednesday 13 recently. What did you think of him?

David: Well I'd seen the Murderdolls before and I really liked them, I liked their attitude and their show. I don't think they're a brilliant band at the minute, but I think their second album will be really good. I met him at the show and he had heard all about us because the Murderdolls guitarist Acey is a big fan of Rachel Stamp and Wednesday had heard him talking about us. We got on really well with him, he's really cool, and he's definitely got a vision of what he wants to do; I like that about him. The Murderdolls as well - they've made a commitment to what they are doing.

Ric: I was really suprised that he left Frankenstein Drag Queens for Murderdolls.

David: Well I don't think he necessarily left them, because Frankenstein Drag Queens was basically him. From what I gather I don't think there was anyone else who was permanently in the band, but I don't know much about them.

Ric: That's what suprised me - that he was the drive and creative input for Frankenstein Drag Queens, and now he's in Murderdolls who have the same set black and red, and it just seems that he's taking a back seat.

David: Well I don't know much about the workings of that band, I just know I like them.

Ric: Are you ever going to play Canada?

David: We would play Canada, we're not adverse to playing Canada! The tour we just did of the states was meant to go to Canada, but for one reason or another it didn't go. But yes, we will play Canada one day.

Ric: How did you like living in Wales?

David: It was all right, it was just a bit boring. That's why I had to get out. The thing is, where I lived in Dinas Powys, it's a nice place and whatever... At one point Cardiff was really good, there were a couple of really good clubs there, one called Bogies, which was a rock club that was really amazing, and a place called the Square Club, which was a kind of alternative, indie club. These places were really good, but when they shut down it just became really quite violent, and I was just sick of it, sick of the narrow-minded people who were there. Plus, the music scene was really dead, so I had to get out of there, but it was a good place to grow up. The good thing about there not being much on when you're growing up is that you really had to search things out, so I'd often go to London and look at record shops in London, and buy something and take it back to Wales. I think we wouldn't be the band that we are if that wasn't where I was from.

There's a lot of places like that all round the world. When we've been to America they have been places like that, and when we went to Sweden there were places like that. I just think that people in small towns need to realize that they can save up money and go somewhere else, and they can do that and it's highly recommended that they should do that. If people don't like where they are, they should just get out. I love London, I think it's brilliant. A lot of people are snobbish about London and think it's pretentious there, but there's lots of things to do, lots of different people there; you can go to a museum, go to see a band, do anything...

Vicki: Join the Church of Scientology...

Ric: That was quite terrifying. Last time we were there, we must have walked past it one way and not seen it, but it was like it had just appeared.

David: The Church of Scientology's like Brigadoon, it just turns up.

Vicki: I keep hearing there's a music scene in Bristol too.

David: I think Bristol's OK, we used to go to Bristol quite a lot to see bands. I went there to see Jane's Addiction and Mudhoney when I was a kid - get whoever's got a car, go over the bridge, see these bands, come back...

Vicki: What's the last book that you read?

David: The last book I read would have been A dream goes on forever, the Todd Rundgren biography. I read a lot of books about pop music, I don't read novels very regularly.

Ric: You're the first person to have said anything other than the Motley Crue biography.

David: Actually, I started reading that because I like Motley Crue, and I was appauled by it. I thought 'If I finish this book, I'm never going to be able to listen to them again' because they are so horrible, so I purposely stopped reading it. I'd like to think that deep down, Nikki Sixx is a nice person.

Ric: I was shocked that they called the best of Music to crash your car to.

David: Yes, that's just stupid, that's just really offensive. I don't think they were thinking about it, I think they just called it that, but somebody should have gone, "But hey, you killed somebody and injured two other people for life." I don't think they're the most intelligent band in the world, put it that way.

Ric: Do you think that the international community should have condemned the murders in Rwanda as genocide at the time rather than only now in retrospect?

David: OK, I don't know enough about that to comment on it. What I do find interesting in international politics is that in this country we learn everything from the TV or reading the newspapers, but I also know that this is so censored in terms of what people are and aren't allowed to report, so I think it's very difficult... if you're not there, then truthfully you don't really know what's going on; you can react to somebody's reporting of it. I'm sure there are a lot of things happenning in the world that are a lot worse than are made out - I think people are horrible, basically, I think human kind is kind of sick and destroying itself and it's just a shame. I think anywhere where there is violence and war, people being oppressed, and then obviously you get some people how have to fight for their human rights, and that's the only time I find violence acceptable really. I think we're really lucky in general in this country in that we don't have wars on our doorstep. I have no idea about that specific thing though.

Vicki: Have you heard anything by any of the bands who are supporting you tonight?

David: No. I can't remember their names, I'm really bad at that. It should be really interesting. One of the things we're doing at the moment with these gigs is playing in places that aren't on the normal gig circuits. Last week we played in this place in Rotherham which was basically the basement of this pub where local kids put on bands, and they were really shocked the we agreed to play. I like doing that, because we're not touring at the minute, to come out and play places that we wouldn't normally tour. We get to see a lot of bands... I presume that these bands are quite local? That's one of the best things about music, that we get to go around and see loads of things that we wouldn't normally get to. When we finish the album we're definitely going to do a proper UK tour. That will probably be September.

Guy at door: None of your stuff's set up yet.

David: OK, I'll come when I've finished here. Let me sign these for you... Isn't that [Didn't I break my heart over you?] the worst cover you've ever seen? I complained to them that I didn't like the other covers and I think they got angry with me and gave me that. The red and white US [Oceans of Venus] cover, that's what I wanted the original cover to be, be we got stuck with this one. Rachel Stamp and record sleeves, or at least me and Rachel Stamp record sleeves is a whole can of worms. I hate nearly all our record sleeves. I like this one [Spank], I really like this one [Hey, hey Michael, you're really fantastic (live)], I like that one [Hey, hey Michael, you're really fantastic]. You can't really see but I'm wearing rollerskates on that one. I can't skate, I spent the whole photoshoot clinging onto things. This one [I wanna be your doll] is horrible. I like that one [Black cherry], that one [Pop singer] is all right... The American sleeve is by a Russian artist called Vania Zouravliov, and I've wanted to work with him for ages. I love that cover.