john o' neill interview

7/30/2019 John O' Neill Interview

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INTERVIEW with JOHN O’ NEILL from THE UNDERTONES

35 years on from the release of The Undertones’ youthful stomper ‘Teenage Kicks’, its creator

John O’ Neill is, unexpectedly, fretting about his own lack of adolescent adventure.

‘I’d love to turn back the clock and be a bit wilder than I was’, he reflects. ‘We weren’t

hedonistic at all in the early days of the band. We were very sensible, which I think is due to the

fact we always stayed in Derry. That kept us away from the temptations of drugs and other

things’.

Indeed, there was always something pure, even naïve about The Undertones; whilst other raw

guitar bands like The Sex Pistols were seemingly intent on self-destruction through the rampant

excess of the short-lived punk era, the Derry group got their kicks by relentlessly sculpting their

art. That, and simple shyness, meant O’ Neill’s crew maintained a sense of privacy and thus

enjoyed a longer lifespan than some of their contemporaries.

‘We didn’t move to London and get into say, heroin, like a few other punk bands did’, says the

55 year-old guitarist. ‘Because we were out of the public eye a lot, and didn’t promote ourselves

much, we fell off the radar at times. We were like a gang; we kept ourselves to ourselves and

were in awe of the things we were doing and seeing when we got outside of Derry. We never

dreamed we’d be able to do things like tour with The Clash’.

Intra-band divisions eventually lead to a split however; albeit a less dramatic one than the

Pistols’ fatal dissolution. Even in the late seventies, when ‘Teenage Kicks’ was being blasted out

every night (and once, of course, back to back) by highly influential DJ John Peel, and previously

uninterested record labels were suddenly scrapping to sign The Undertones, there was an ever-

expanding chasm between singer Feargal Sharkey and the rest of the group. O’ Neill

acknowledged this at an early stage and never attempted to deny the rift.

Today, he doesn’t speak to Sharkey and his stance on the matter remains the same. He even

rather alarmingly speaks of ‘how relieved we were’ when The Undertones called it a day in 1983.

‘There was no fun left in it anymore’, he sighs. ‘The gap between us and Feargal was getting

wider and wider. Feargal was never really even in the gang; it was more like it was all of us and

then him. He didn’t have the same passion toward music as we did. He didn’t write any of the

songs. He was getting more and more frustrated with Derry and with us in general. Obviously

Feargal became successful after The Undertones, but he was certainly never behind any of the

songs when he was in the band.’

On the tour for ‘The Sin of Pride’, the band’s fourth record, Sharkey and O’ Neill (as well as lead

guitarist and younger Brother Damian O’ Neill, bassist Michael Bradley and drummer Billy

Doherty) loitered in separate parts of the bus, reluctant to even attempt communication. For aband originally built on closeness and ‘community spirit’, this was a desperate state of affairs. It



was no surprise then that when The Undertones eventually reformed in 1997, Sharkey was not

involved.

O’ Neill claims not to have experienced an initial comedown period after the break-up was

announced, perhaps emphasising how much of a chore, with little or no pleasure involved,

being in The Undertones had become for him. He points out that he formed another moderately

successful band, That Petrol Emotion, straight away. At any rate, he says, ‘I was always writing,

so there was little time for reflection on how things had gone wrong’.

Of course many things went right for The Undertones in 1978. Terri Hooley, founder of Belfast’s

Good Vibration records, worked tirelessly to promote the rough demo (which included an early

version of ‘Teenage Kicks’) he had been handed by a friend of the band, who warned him this

promising Derry bunch were on the brink of collapse. Hooley was on his way to a venue to meet

another band he had promised to sign, but this effective ultimatum forced his hand and he

impulsively snapped up The Undertones instead. A cynic might argue this was a skilful

marketing ploy on the part of O’ Neill’s mob, prompting Hooley into siding with them, but the

guitarist insists this threat of evaporation was genuine.

‘We were about to break up at the time of the ‘Teenage Kicks’ EP! We really weren’t thinking

very far down the line at all. We just loved pop, and tried to reflect the typical things in teenage

life; growing up, falling in love, breaking up with your girlfriend etc.’

Everybody knows what kind of themes The Undertones initially set out to portray with their

music, but perhaps what is more intriguing is the topics they chose not to explore.

Given that the band formed amidst much conflict and tension in Northern Ireland, one wonders

why in the early days they didn’t write specifically about the troubles. O’ Neill offers up an

interesting reason for this.

‘We were all Irish Catholics, and if we had written songs from that political standpoint they

would have been anti-unionist and anti-British songs. To do that would have been to take our

own lives in our hands. We didn’t want to become anybody’s enemy. Anyway, the troubles

weren’t overly relevant to our lives. You have to remember we were so young; we tried to be

intelligent about our songwriting and not overreach ourselves at such a young age’.

Is O’ Neill in contact with Hooley today?

‘Oh yeah. I see more of him now than I ever did then actually. I only ever talked to him about

twice in those days. There was a big cultural difference between Derry and Belfast; we didn’t

like going to Belfast much and, really, we were always outside that Good Vibrations thing. We

were always outsiders.’

With replacement singer Paul McLoone having been on board since the reformation, The

Undertones remain a close-knit gang; O’ Neill assures us ‘the boys are all good friends still’.

‘Paul lives in Dublin, and my brother Damian in London, but the rest of us are still in Derry’, he

says, ‘so keeping in touch is not a problem’.



The guitarist lived in London himself for a while before returning to his hometown to raise his

two children, Ciaran (23) and Aoibheen (28). ‘They’re not kids anymore’, remarks O’ Neill, with a

hint of melancholy. ‘I never forced them into playing instruments, and they’ve never been in

bands or anything, but they still love music’. Does his current touring affect family life at all?

‘Well we normally only play at weekends, so I think my wife’s glad to see the back of me for a

while!’

O’ Neill, along with bassist Michael Bradley, has been at home quite a bit recently, helping out

with Derry’s European Capital of Culture celebrations.

‘We did the music for a play by Gary Mitchell called ‘Re -Energise’, he says. ‘It’s all about a

Belfast band’. The production, which ran in May, followed a rock collective that formed at the

height of the hunger strikes thirty years ago before splitting and then regrouping much later

with all the members in their fifties. Sound vaguely familiar? The Undertones are planning an

end of year gig with compatriots The Moondogs too, to round off Derry’s time in the limelight.

They are also playing in Bangor, County Down in August as part of the Open House festival.

O’ Neill admits that ‘although our set is simple enough, I still make mistakes sometimes!’ Well

you wouldn’t want a punk band to be too polished now, would you?

He has no qualms about reeling off the old singles on stage (songs like ‘My Perfect Cousin’ and

‘Here Comes the Summer’ as well as ‘Teenage Kicks’ and many others), because ‘those ones

are quite clearly what people want to hear, and admittedly they still sound the best’.

O’ Neill may believe he wasn’t ‘wild’ enough when he was a teenager, but 35 years on he

certainly seems to be getting his kicks from performing with his old pals. As he says: ‘It’s a

totally different world now, but we’re doing it as much for ourselves as anyone else. The

pressure’s off and we’re having great fun’.

The ‘An Introduction to The Undertones’ CD and DVD package is available to buy from June 3.

By Edwin Gilson

john o' neill interview

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