bis, eh? They're so brilliant. My life, pre-bis seems strangely distant - what did I play in the morning before I discovered bis? 'School Disco' was the first bis song I fell in love with when I heard it on the radio, although I'd been wanting to hear them since reading about them in SunZoomSpark magazine.
I thought they looked ace and their 'punk/disco' sound described made me want to hear them NOWWWW! I eventually caught up with a copy of 'Transmissions on the Teen-C Tip' and every single since then has been so mega exciting. It's impossible to pick my favourite bis song - I've got about ten favourite bis songs and I hadn't even heard the album yet!

I was getting increasingly jealous that everyone except me could see bis live, to the extent of pleading with their (now ex-) press man. They eventually set up an Aberdeen date on the 'Atom Powered Action' tour so I arranged an interview via their new press man and filled my notebook with questions. We thus felt a little silly when after sidling up to two tables of bis people and asking politely for my interview, it transpired that bis knew nothing about it. Luckily, bis like fanzines so they said they'd do it anyway. I'd also made a Hello Kitty t-shirt for the 'Hello Kitty Cutie' herself so that swung things in our favour as Amanda seemed fairly delighted. Steven wasn't impressed with this blatant favouritism, asking "where's mine?". I dodge this question by asking how the album's coming along.

steven "Why don't we ask it?" [looks behind chair] "How are you doing?"
amanda "It's almost finished. We'll be doing a few tracks from it tonight. But it's a lot different - a lot of people, I think, are going to expect sixteen 'Kandy Pop's but it's not going to be like that."
steven "It's fourteen 'Kandy Pop's."
john "And a couple of reggae numbers."
amanda "Very different."
steven "And everything's quite identifiably bis still and the same amount of people will hate it even though it's different."
amanda "Really annoying screeching..."
steven "Lots of shouting...and no swear words."
amanda "Your voice sounds really serious."
steven "Does it?"
amanda "Yes."
steven [In bright, happy tones] "I'm sorry!" [They all laugh] "But anyway...yeah, I'm sorry I'm sounding so serious."

marceline: Would you do a singles compilation?
steven "Thought about it."
amanda "There's not really much point 'cos you can get them all."
m: But a lot of record shops say 'last few copies'.
amanda/steven "That's 'cos they lie."
steven "That's what the distributors tell them so they'll buy more."
amanda "They sent a form round saying 'new bis single - only 500!', and it's like, 'aye, that's why there's box-loads at home...'. You can get them all. The first one is difficult but it's crap anyway so you don't want it." [everyone splutters with amusement] "We re-recorded 'Kill Yr Boyfriend' for the American release. It's much better - the vocals are less Saint Etienne..."
john "It's got feedback on it. You can hear the guitars."

m: Were you influenced by Riot Girl?
amanda "Yeah, I think it's really good that it's bringing all these people together. It does inspire because some girls think, 'I can't do this, I can't sing properly, I'm not pretty enough...', but the whole Riot Girl thing made...it didn't matter. If you had the attitude and you loved music you could do it. If you could scream or whatever you could be in a band, so it did help a lot and it's really good that it's given a lot of girls more confidence."
steven "The thing about Riot Girl is that a lot of people don't realise that it had a positive effect on boys as well. Boys were really bored with having to like heavy metal or stuff. A lot of people thought it was all "girl power' but it had a positive effect on me and probably on John as well in like, 'we can get involved in this' and we can do something more exciting than just your standard rock outfit."
nicolette: Did that politicise you?
amanda "Not too much. I'm not a political person at all."
m: But a lot of your songs go on about building your own world and smashing the system...
amanda "I think that's 'cos a lot of people kind of make you an outcast. When we started in the music industry they made you feel like you're a little kid, you're just a lot of rubbish..."
steven "So we built it out of Lego, that' s the thing they don't realise."
amanda "Isn't it better to be in your own little world, to feel on top of your own little world than at the bottom of everyone else's?"
steven "Mmmm...that's quite profound. I like that."
amanda "Thank you."

n: Are you worried about eventually having to sell out?
amanda "I don't know what people mean by the term 'selling out'. It means absolutely nothing to us. We're selling records the way we want them to look and sound and I think that's great, that's what everyone should do. If we changed, if we did nice glossy sleeves and had a nice..."
steven "Photo of us on the front."
amanda "...bis in nice lettering with flowers and a few models on the front, then we'd be selling out. But we sound exactly the same and look the same so... We love music - we want to continue the way we want it. We're not going to let someone with lots of money make bis big - we want bis to make us big."
steven "It does work against us because the press are really sceptical about us because we've had success on our own terms and stuff and that's not the way it's meant to be done. We do get people being really cynical and really looking forward to when we fall and..." [thumping music starts over the speakers] "Woah! It's going to get dead loud now." [laughs]
amanda "Keep it down!"
steven "WE'LL JUST HAVE TO SPEAK REALLY LOUD NOW!"
n: We'll just have a bit of a dance instead.
steven "Yeah." [laughs] "Pause for dancing." [music quietens slightly]

m: You've done fanzines, haven't you..?
amanda "We're still doing it. A lot of people say, 'are you not going to find it hard to do all these things and all your own artwork?', and it's like, 'NoooO!', because you can still do it - it just might take longer."
m: Would you like to do a magazine, like the Beastie Boys?
amanda "Yeah. If it was a band thing then maybe we'd have the money."
steven "It takes them two years to do one... they haven't done one for about two years so..."
amanda "Neither have you!"
steven "I know, I know." [music starts up again, much louder] "Why do soundmen play this type of music? It's like, Yello. They all play Yello. It bloody annoys me."
amanda "Who are Yello?"
steven "They're those two German guys. You know, they did that song, 'The Race'."
amanda "Oh yeah."

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