Ruth PO!

Back in 1987, PO! was a great name for a band: This was the exact moment when we decided to call the band PO! - outside a white-tiled cinema in Leicester ................... and look at my Walkman on the ground! PO! was short, so that you could print it in font size 300 to be easily seen on a poster. It was trendy to have an exclamation mark back then. I chose the word PO! because it meant lots of different things in different languages; it was a common word around the world  but a bit intriguing for the English.  In 1987, there were no other bands called anything like PO! as far as I know.  This photo session was done while we were talking about possible names. The original band members were me - Ruth Miller, bass player Julian Glover and Drummer Marc Fuccio. If only we had thought a bit harder about possible future inventions that might impact on us.... In 2019, PO! is about the worst possible name for a band.  Internet protocol means ...

When I started PO! I had some thoughts that could have been principles but I never stuck to them. 1. It's important that females play instruments in bands and girls shouldn't just be the singer. 2. Girl guitarists are particularly cool when they can play interestingly well. 3. Don't form a band with someone you're in a relationship with. 4. Don't have a relationship with anyone in the band. 5. Don't get in a more competent male player to cover up any female lack of ability. These ideas came from punk, from bands like The Raincoats and The Au Pairs which I liked when I was younger. It has proven hard to stick with them and I'm not even sure that they're right. The original version of PO! (Ruth, Julian Marc) and the second version of PO! (Ruth, Jan, Mary) hit my targets, only to be disrupted by the much more tuneful, jangly and downright competent sound when Terri Lowe joined the band, countering principles 4 and 5. From Ducks and Dr...

At an indiepop festival, a friend asked me,  'Is that the theme? Do all indiepop bands have to have females in them?' My answer? 'No, you don't have to have females for a band to be indiepop; it often just seems to happen like that.' Getting to basics, indiepop has three core elements: The punk ethic that anyone can form a band and be listened to. A joy and wonder in the world reflected in tuneful, often simple songs. Small-scale media publicity via word of mouth, fanzines, blogs, podcasts and mixtapes. The toy industry's idea of an 'indie-girl' Being male or female has nothing to do with these; it's just that indiepop doesn't set itself up as a boy's club. Women and girls may feel more willing to have a go within this genre, feeling that their ideas are welcomed. I guess that the child-like joy and wonder thing often correlates with middle-class decency and romanticism, which is why so many indiepop bands look like a bunch o...

This is a ridiculous question. How could there be a female guitar style? People are people. There's no female way of eating, or sleeping, or going to the toilet.... hang on a minute. The proportion of female to male guitarists is tiny; there are very few females whose playing is considered noteworthy. I think there's two issues going on. 1. Confidence 2. Lack of ownership I'll start with lack of ownership. Modern guitarring is usually about churning out lightning-speed blues runs. It needs a lot of practice and a strong wrist. Boys are often more dedicated to putting in the time with this kind of activity. The hobby/collector/trainspotter mentality runs through guitarring, too. The memorising of names that could be lorries or amplifiers ACs and JCs, the discussions about the merits of digital, analogue, diesel. I find that my memory doesn't tend to hold these numbers and letters easily. BUT I DO KNOW WHAT I LIKE. I won't even mention the guitar as penis...

I'm just about to put together a website and make PO! songs available in a digital and physical way again. It might take me a few months, but I'm determined to do it. In the days when letters came through the post and I parceled up cardboard on a daily basis, it was fun to run a record label, but I guess it can be just as fun with instant downloady technology, analytics and 'likes'. Just got to get used to it, that's all.  In the meantime, here are links to all the tracks I can find online at present:  A Page A Day  Northern Wonder Danny's Girl Your Shout Appleseed Alley  I Took My Head on a Date Sunday Never Comes Around   Treasure Haunt You Fay  Good Behaviour  Jacqueline's House Things That Might      https://soundcloud.com/user-795124448/things-that-might Bus Shelter .... in the Rain   https://soundcloud.com/user-795124448/bus-shelter-in-the-...

Before I had cancer treatment, I had retired from music. I wrote in my blog that it would be unlikely that I would ever play with  PO! again; I was too old, nobody would want it and it just seemed a crappy thing to do.  But after having a whole body and hair reboot, the idea of making music with friends just seems like a fantastic idea, because making music IS fantastic. If nobody wants to listen then they don't have to, and it doesn't matter what anyone thinks, because I could have died and not had this opportunity.  Strangely though, my interest seems to be coinciding with other people's interest in PO! Some are old fans whose names I know from the old mail order business; others are much younger people who have grown up with Japanese fanzines and Spanish vinyl and somehow know that PO! are part of the indie-pop furniture. 2016 got off to a good start when Mark Hibbett emailed and asked me to play a gig at Totally Acoustic in London. A few weeks later, Mari...

My first experience of seeing a band rehearse was in Newark, Nottinghamshire when I was about 15. Before that, I had never considered that a group might need to play their songs over and over again with a bit of arguing, blaming and shouting in between. At the end of the '70s, there were two significant rock bands in Newark: Paralex and Overlord. Although I was too much of a punk to admire the hard rock of these bands, the different youth cultures tended to mix together in such a small town. Paralex were the first band I ever saw rehearsing. They went on to join New Wave of British Heavy Metal One Sunday afternoon in the late 1970s, someone took me and a friend to see one of these bands rehearse - I tend to think it was Paralex. The rehearsal took place in a small detached bungalow. Each member of the band was in a different room, with cables running down the hallway. The noise was unbearably loud, even as we walked up the road, but worse still inside. Looking back,...

My ambition for PO! was serious; that's why I paid for a Post Office Box so that we could receive letters and not have people knowing where I lived. I also thought it made us look very professional. PO! recorded three tracks for a demo tape, funded by Leicester City Council and sold copies of the cassette at gigs. As a result, someone called Charlie offered to make a flexi-disc to go with his fanzine ‘Samantha’ The songs were 'Confidence' and 'Appleseed Alley'. At this time, before the Internet and social media, the only ways to find out about new indie bands were through fanzines and John Peel’s Radio 1 show. The mainstream music press, such as the NME also promoted a small number of ‘next big things’ according to the whims of the writers. The PO! flexi peeking out from Samantha Fanzine Fanzine Charlie was a lovely person; he was so dedicated to promoting new bands and single minded in his efforts to make his fanzine successful. In fact, ...