| THE EXPELLED |
| The Expelled #1 (1981-82) Jo Ball - vocals, Tim Ramsden - guitar Craig 'Macca' McEnvoy - bass Ricky Fox - drums |
| ON RECORD |
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| The Expelled Discography: 'No Life, No Future' EP (Riot City, 1982) 7" 'Government Policy' (Riot City, 1982) " The Expelled: A Punk Rock Collection' (Captain Oi!, 1999) CD |
| The Expelled were formed in Rothwell, just outside Leeds, during that long, tense summer of 1981. Put together by drummer Ricky Fox and bassist Craig 'Macca' McEvoy, they chose to round out their original line-up with Tim Ramsden on guitar and a young lady name of Jo Ball fronting them. Aware of the growing similarities in sound between many of the punk bands emerging at the time, Ricky desperately wanted an original edge to his band, and seeing as he was a huge fan of Vice Squad - there was only really Beki Bondage flying the flag for aggressive female singers when The Expelled first got themselves in gear - getting a girl singer seemed the perfect solution. Ironically, they got a female vocalist to avoid those constant comparisons to all the other bands out there, but as a consequence lived out their short existence in the perpetual shadow of Vice Squad. Such is the costly price sometimes of good intentions. "Constantly being labelled the next Vice Squad was pretty annoying at the time," recalls Ricky. "We always set out to be different from anyone else and while it seemed that loads of new punk bands were all sounding like each other, we had a similar sound to just one... but people like Garry Bushell could never mention The Expelled without saying Vice Squad in the same sentence!" "I never really thought about the comparison between us and Vice Squad," claims Jo. "I'd actually never heard of Beki Bondage - it was our drummer Ricky who worshipped them - until we played with Vice Squad ourselves. And when I did hear them, it was fairly blatant that they were so much better than we were! 'To be honest, I wasn't really influenced by anyone, 'cos I wasn't a trained singer. In fact, I never had any aspirations to be a singer at all, it was just something that happened. Subsequently, I never took any of it too seriously; I was too young and inexperienced... even though I felt mature back then!" Such considerations are only really relevant in hindsight though, because at the time, things moved along for the band at a frightening pace. They were spotted by a local promoter at their very first show just a few months later, and were soon treading the boards opening up for the likes of The Exploited and The Business. And then their very first demo tape secured them a deal with Riot City Records... all within six months of their first rehearsal! To be fair, there were definite similarities between The Expelled and Vice Squad, and it wasn't just Jo's vocals either. Both bands favoured pacey tempos and abrasive guitars, and once they were on Riot City and became label-mates with Vice Squad, it was almost inevitable that they would soon be gigging together. Members of Vice Squad even ended up lending the their experience as informal producers for some of The Expelled's studio sessions. And Ricky remembers some of those early gigs with his mentors very fondly. "Probably the best gig we ever did was at the 100 Club in London with Vice Squad. It was great to play at such a well-known venue, the place was packed, and we got a tremendous reception seeing as it was our first time in London. |
| The Expelled #2 (1983) Jewlie - vocals, Tim Ramsden - guitar Craig 'Macca' McEnvoy - bass Ricky Fox - drums |
| The Expelled #3 (1983) Penny - vocals, Tim Ramsden - guitar Craig 'Macca' McEnvoy - bass Ricky Fox - drums |
| The Expelled #4 (September 1983) Tim Ramsden - guitar Craig 'Macca' McEnvoy - bass/vocals Ricky Fox - drums |
| The Expelled #2 (2003) Becky Lawrence - guitar/vocals Dougie - guitar Craig 'Macca' McEnvoy - bass Ricky Fox - drums |
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| "And one of the craziest gigs we did with them had to be the Leeds Bierkeller. They were staying at a B&B just outside Leeds. After the sound check they wanted to go there to check in and pick up the keys, but they didn't know where it was, so I went in the van with Beki, Dave and their driver to show them the way. But after checking in, the van wouldn't start; it took us half an hour to get it going and we arrived back at the gig only to find The Expelled already on stage without me, with Vice Squad drummer Shane behind the kit! Fortunately when I arrived they were only on the second song, so I was able to take my place for the rest of the gig." The first fruit of the Riot City deal was the 'No Life, No Future' EP, which saw the band down in Bristol's Cave Studios, re-recording the three best songs from their demo. The EP was a roaring success, with one song in particular, (the Very girly' in Jo's own words) 'Dreaming', catching the ear of the record-buying punker. Every band has their defining moment, and the majority of fans would agree that it was with 'Dreaming' that The Expelled earned a place in the punk rock history books. The other two songs - namely the title track and 'What Justice?' ("The thought of trying to sing that fast now invokes an asthma attack!" laughs Jo) - were both solid enough too, but lacked such a punchy memorable chorus. The overall effect though was still of a very strong debut from a promising new band. In fact, the only thing to let down the EP was the desperately unimaginative sleeve. Never ones to hang about, they appeared on Riot City's very successful 'Riotous Assembly' compilation - with the track 'Blown Away', which had been recorded at the same time as the EP - and then raced around the live circuit to promote both releases. Mere months later, they were back in Bristol - this time at the more prestigious SAM Studio - to record the follow-up. Actually bettering such a cracking opening gambit was never going to be easy, but The Expelled pulled it off with great aplomb. 'Government Policy' was another classic track, with Jo adopting a slightly deeper pitch that worked perfectly with the urgent choruses. The song on the flip-side, 'Make It Alone', although the weaker of the two tracks, was picked up by John Peel for frequent plays on his show, and actually resulted in the band being offered one of his coveted sessions. Things couldn't have been going better when, as is so often the way, disaster struck, and Jo decided to leave the band to get married. "One can only drink so much cider, eat so many chips, sleep in a Transit van with several flatulent youths and tolerate so much groping and spitting," she recalls. "We didn't have the motivation that comes hand in hand with proper promoters, managers and agents; it wasn't a professional set up at all. Everything we achieved was definitely through more luck than judgment. And we never made a bean either; to this day I can only recall receiving �90, and I only got that 18 months ago!" |
| "I think we were a bit naive and lacked experience," agrees Ricky, "But at the end of the day, if Jo hadn't left when she did it probably wouldn't have gone so wrong so quickly, because replacing her proved to be a major problem. Her decision to leave was due to personal circumstances; she got herself a new boyfriend who was quite a jealous character and he made her leave as he didn't want her touring around with three lads. It didn't leave a bad taste as such but sometimes I wonder what might have been..." |
| Things were all downhill from there. Rather than miss out on the Peel session, they took a chance and recorded it with an inferior vocalist, Jewelie, who they soon parted company with following a short UK tour. She was replaced by Penny, a girlfriend of Vice Squad guitarist, Dave Bateman, who recorded two new songs with the band, but never set foot on a stage with them. The songs did actually see the light of day on Volume One of the Rot Records compilation, 'A Kick Up The Arse', a year after the band had split up, but sound a tad immature compared to their previous singles. As a last ditch attempt to keep the Expelled dream alive, they decided to make a go of it as a three piece, with bassist Macca handling vocal duties. Although this no doubt surprised the band's following, who had grown accustomed to a fetching female fronting the band, the excellent songs recorded for their unreleased 12", Waiting For Tomorrow', suggest that there could have been a new era about to dawn for The Expelled - if only they'd been given the chance. Attendances were dwindling at their gigs, Riot City called it a day before the aforementioned 12" could be released, and Macca bailed out to join The Underdogs. "Although I say it myself those four songs we did with Macca were head and shoulders above anything else we ever recorded," recalls Ricky wistfully. "So when all that happened and they never got released, we just couldn't believe it. We did send some demos off to other labels but by 1984, record labels didn't seem interested in signing punk bands anymore; they were more interested in anyone with a synthesizer! Riot City going under was definitely the most frustrating thing that happened to us and that was basically the end of the band." And that was all we heard of The Expelled until 1999 when the enterprising Captain Oi! label released a compilation CD, and Ricky was so shocked by the interest it generated he decided to resurrect the band. "I genuinely couldn't believe that people would still buy Expelled stuff after all this time! Also I still went to punk gigs and would bump into a lot of old faces, some of whom would get onto me saying we should reform, so I decided to get in touch with Macca. I knew he was still on the circuit playing bass, and when I asked him he was very apprehensive about the idea at first, but said he would give it a go. The main problem was that Jo and Tim had not done anything for years and it's not that easy just to pick up where you left off after all this time, and after a couple of rehearsals it was obvious things weren't working out as I had intended and we went our separate ways. "For a time it seemed that was it, but deep down it had always bugged me that The Expelled had ended prematurely and I really did want one more go. Also during this period I'd joined a band called The Tricycle Thieves that contained a female singer/guitarist, Becky Laurance, so I asked Becky if she fancied fronting The Expelled. After she said Yes', I once again contacted Macca who agreed to give it one final go. He brought along Dougie, the lead guitarist from his other band, The Poison Hearts, and we took things from there. "Personally I thought we sounded miles better than before," reckons Ricky wistfully. "And although I say it myself Becky was by far the best vocalist we ever had; the thing is, she didn't want to play the old songs all the time and quit the band after we played Morecambe in 2003. It's a shame 'cos it was the best gig The Expelled ever played... but at least we went out on a high." (Expelled History notes nicked from the highly recommended 'Burning Britain' book by Ian Glasper) |
| THE EXPELLED: 'No Life, No Future' (Riot City EP) This sounds better than it is, by which I mean it seems nice and tuneful while it's playing but is actually about as memorable as Roy Jenkins' last speech. Or indeed Roy Jenkins himelf. What I do remember is the band rip off 'Babylon's Burning' and juicy Jo sounds a lot like Beki Bondage (shiver, cold shower,tremble, shake, etc.) Still, with 99 per cent of young punks trying to sound like Motorhead (and never getting the guitar right) the Expelled stand out for their brightness and potential. There's definitely a good band in here straining to get out. By the way, the b-side features two good but basic thrashes, 'No Life' and 'What Justice', the latter starting with an Old Bill siren possibly in an attempt to get it in the Guiness Book Of Records as the most over-used cliche of punk rock history. (Garry Bushell Sounds 1982) |
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| THE EXPELLED 'A Punk Rock Collection' (ahoy105) CD 1999 Police sirens drag this 17 song compilation into the 21st century as the early 80's get revisited once more by Captain Oi! records. The Expelled a four-piece from Leeds, UK who existed between 1981-84 were one of many UK punk outfits who made a small dent on the scene in the second wave of punk. They had numerous lead singers, but their main weapon on this session being the original and cuddly big Jo ball. She gave the Expelled that Vice Squad touch but without quite as much power and attitude of Miss Bondage. The Expelled were a band truly walking in Vice Squads stiletto heels. And using the Vice Squad drummer as producer/guru made it all the more obvious. The song structures and style are so close on these recordings it's eery. But they did manage to create their own sound on songs like 'Government Policy' , 'No Life No Future' and 'Blown Away'. Basic rifferama guitars backed by adequate bass 'n' drums powered em along in the early 80's but 20 years on they don't half sound tame. By 1982 big Jo the Bodacea of the Leeds punk scene made her exit from the Expelled punk rock arena and opted for married bliss to a British Squaddy. We are then given the next best thing which turned out to be Bristolian punkette Penny, who does a pretty good job in the studio at short notice on 'Cider' (the humourous amber nectar song) and 'Violent minds'. But for some dubious reason the compilers fail to include any tracks featuring the other girl vocalist who actually gigged with the band, the raven haired Jewelie. She was apparently inadequate for our ears but done a Peel session with the band which of course makes you wanna hear her all the more if she was really that bad! But hey what do you expect from biased producers wielding their control. And the inclusion of some obvious filler tracks was a bit of a let down as far as us completists are concerned. Near the end of the bands career, the bass player Macca takes over vocal duties which works really well on the epic 'Waiting For Tomorrow' probably their most intricate piece. Although the other numbers he sung on were pretty dull in comparison. We then retreated back to some Jo fronted demos with the 45 'Army Life' adding to their better numbers. Apparently bands like the Expelled are now big influences on newer all-female punk outfits like the Devotchkas from New Yoik???, which only leads us into one conclusion.....hope they sound more powerful. AVERAGE (NIHILISM ON THE PROWL!) www.captainoi.com |
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