Tor Abyss – Lucifer Star Machine – Interview Exclusive
Written by Dom Daley
Tuesday, 12 October 2010 05:00
Tor Abyss is the frontman for London based rockers Lucifer Star Machine. After hearing the very impressive ‘Street Value Zero’ I decided to track Tor down and find out what it is that fuels Lucifer Star Machine and where they are heading. Read on for the wise words of Mr Abyss……
Firstly, can you give us a brief insight as to who’s who in Lucifer Star Machine and how the band came together?
It’s Laughing Boy Fernandes and Dave Malice on guitar, Phil Good on bass, Fucking Hell Morrell on drums and me singing. The best fucking line-up this band had since it was formed! I wanted to start a punk rock ‘n’ roll band when I moved to London from Bavaria several years ago. I was obsessed with ‘Apocalypse Dudes’ by Turbonegro at the time and wanted to do something similar. Two of my mates filled the drums and bass positions and I placed adds to look for a guitarist. A second guitarist was added later on. We did a few demos and a 7 inch single off our own back and then got signed to a German label who released our first album. Our early stuff had glam rock influences but we completely dropped those over the years and our sound got more aggressive.
Who are your influences?
Currently I’d say early Misfits with Danzig, Ramones, Motorhead and maybe a bit of Social Distortion.
What are the plans for the rest of 2010 and beyond?
We’re writing our third album at the moment. It’s coming along nicely. So far we have seven songs finished. It’s still gonna be foul-mouthed, in your face punk ‘n’ roll but more melodic with less screaming and more singing. We hope to start recording early next year and then look for a good label to release it.
You also mentioned getting on some decent tours as support – is there anyone you have in mind? And why do you think mainland Europe is a more viable place to tour whereas the UK seems so lukewarm towards rock ‘n’ roll at the moment : there are lots of bands who play Spain, Germany, France and Italy but don’t even play London, do you notice a difference in the rock fans from country to country?
Well, we’d like to play with any decent band who’d fit with us musically. If you ask me which band we’d really want to support then the answer would be Motorhead. The problem in the UK is that promoters don’t wanna pay you properly, don’t provide accommodation and sometimes are even funny with providing a rider. On top of that audiences seem to be more reserved. In Europe you get treated totally differently – decent fees, accommodation and a 
proper rider plus punters have a good time in the moshpit. It seems that people on the continent are just more into rock ‘n’ roll.
How did you come to get Rat Scabies to co-produce the first album? What was he like as a producer?
He didn’t do our first album. He co-produced our first single with Dave Allen who was the producer for The Cure amongst others. We supported Rat’s band The Germans once and he liked us so we kept in touch and he ended up helping us with the single and also got Dave Allen on board. This was in 2003 and we hadn’t really found our style back then. We kinda sounded like The Cramps meets T Rex. Really camp and the lyrics were incredibly stupid. When we did our first album our style had completely changed and we played the balls-out rock ‘n’ roll that we are known for today. Rat did an alright job as producer. The sound of the record was good. Maybe he could have guided us a bit more, especially with the construction of the songs but this is old hat now anyway.
You’re signed to the Nicotene label – how did that come about? Was there any other interest in the band from closer to home? Nicotene have some excellent bands on the old roster.
We signed to Nicotine who released the album on CD and another Italian label, Tornado Ride, who released it on vinyl. The guys behind both labels are great and run their labels for the love of rock ‘n’ roll and not to make some fast cash. Gallo from Tornado Ride put on some shows in Italy for us and flew us in. It was fucking awesome! We had no interest from any UK labels. It’s kinda funny, we are better known and respected in most other countries than here in the UK.
We play festival gigs and sold out shows in France for example but we don’t get much attention in Britain. I hope this is gonna change with the next album. We just need to find a label who can do the marketing right and has a bigger distribution circuit. And maybe some decent booking agent who can get us good support slots for bigger bands and festival gigs.
Did you insist that the album was released on vinyl? The way people buy their music has changed dramatically over the last 10 years with lots of independent stores closing down which I’m presuming is where a band like yours would get most of their sales. Is it important therefore that you play live and do your own sales? Do you think there is more control towards bands with their sales and what they release since the Internet boom?
Everyone is downloading these days and not many people give a shit about buying CDs. As you said, many record stores are closing down so people who still wanna buy physical CDs get them from mailorders or at gigs. Personally I sometimes buy CDs at smaller shows if I like the band but apart from that I just download everything. Still, if I like an album a lot I might buy it on vinyl and I think many people who are into punk rock, garage punk etc do the same. It’s definitely more collectable than CDs, therefore we really wanted the album to be released on vinyl. Anyway, it is important to play live and do your own sales. What small record labels
usually do is pay for the manufacturing and the release. The main payment you get is free CDs and vinyls of your release for you to sell. The cash you get from small labels for your sales is not worth talking about.
You also produced ‘Street Value Zero’ yourselves – is this how you think the next album will be done or is there anyone you have in mind to produce?
We do want to work with a producer who knows what he is doing and can give us the sound we want. We worked with the same guy on our last two albums but it’s not easy to work with someone who inhabited a serious drug problem. The first album was fun to do but the last 
album was a fucking nightmare. He engineered the album but we had to take over and produce it ourselves. We’ll work with a young up and coming producer on our next record and use a different studio but I don’t wanna mention a name just yet.
Introduce us to the members of LSM and give us a fact that would surprise us about each of them?
Laughing Boy Fernandes, hailing from Madeira, a man of few words, impressive beard, solid as a rock, what may come as a surprise is that he doesn’t laugh.
Dave Malice, the Northern guitar wonder from Redcar. Don’t know if that’s really surprising but both of his parents are she-males. He was born with no sex organs and we sometimes call him Action Man Malice.
Phil Good, the masked English gentleman wanker. That little cunt is full of surprises, runs his mouth like a motor and basically never shuts up. But what’s quite interesting is that he owns the first successful cross between a heron and a shark.
Fucking Hell Morrell, English bred pitbull, once drummed for punk legends Chelsea. There’s no surprises here unless you find it surprising when you get punched in face for no reason…
and the most surprising fact about me is that I have an erection the size of my cock.
What have you got playing on your mp3 player at the moment? Put it on shuffle and give us the next five tracks.
The Hexxers: ‘Bones By My Bedside’
New Bomb Turks: ‘Rat Feelings’
Blood For Blood: ‘Bitch Called Hope
GG Allin: ‘My Sadistic Killing Spree’
Demented Are Go: ‘Stake In The Heart’
What can people expect from a LSM live performance? Any chance of some UK dates?
Real rock ‘n’ roll and not some fake shit. We’re playing The Gaff in London on 29th October and then a private show for the Hell’s Angels. We haven’t got anything more planned at the moment as we are concentrating on writing the album but some shit might come up. Have gig, will travel.
Now you know what Lucifer Star Machine are all about why not grab hold of a CD and impress your mates with your musical taste and the fact you know what’s hot before they do.