Interview with Nico, Bass player and backing vocals for Randy Savages
My name is Nico, sometimes I go for Nitro, which is not due the fact that I think highly of my self but simply my name and surname combined. I am Italian (from the magical city of Napoli) but have lived in London since 2010 (with a short parenthesis in Lisbon). I lived most of this time in the Camden, Islington area, (can’t be fucked to get the bus to go home at night). I’m currently the bass player and pretty face for Randy Savages, probably the most fun and exciting band in town to watch live.
1. First Punk Rock band you ever saw Live? Where/when?
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For some strange series of events, my hometown (a few kilometres outside Napoli) was hugely prolific in the 80es and 90es and we had lots of good shows.
First gig I saw I think was MR T EXPERIENCE, most definitely that was the moment I have decided what kind of music I wanted to play.
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Worth mentioning the opening band that night, the locals “The Real Swingers”,
probably one of the best punk rock band in south Italy at the time.
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Must have been 1995 (I was 12 at the time).
A few weeks after, in the same place, The Donnas did an amazing show.
2. First Punk Rock Record you bought? What made you buy it?
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I didn’t buy my first punk rock record, but I got a cassette recorded from my older friend Mass (which I ended up being in a band with for many years later). I was in the bus to go home from school, this guy came up to me and said “I heard you play bass, take this”.
He gave me the first two Ramones records on a cassette (one each side). I didn’t have a stereo so I used to borrow my older
sister’s one. There was no way at the time I could afford to buy an original record. In those times everything happened real quick, you would find a bass or something that resembled a bass and you were in a band 2 days later. Someone handed you a cassette and two days later you had a leather jacket and long hair.
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I remember that the first cd I bough with my own money was a few years ago and it is “Tested”, a live best of from Bad Religion. I can tell you also my second one, Marky Ramone and The Intruders. I think I listened to that so much that it’s imprinted in my brain.
3. Favourite Venue to play in? UK or abroad
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I do love small, sweaty, foggy venues. I will always have big place in my heart for the 12 Bar Club, where I also worked
for years. The stage was weird, the sound was terrifying, amps were rotten and mics didn’t work. I fucking loved every moment of that stage. But I also love big stages cause you have a sense of “performance” when you playing with everything perfectly in place. I know it does not sound very punk rock but it’s my wanker musician side that comes out.
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I love to play in Camden, makes me feel at home.
4. Influences?
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Oh jeez. I listen to various types of music. From the classics (for me at least) to a very not punk rock material. I would say, in terms of geographical areas, I have always been more American type of punk than English based.
Again, I can listen to Nofx and Buena Vista Social Club in the same hour. I believe that some of it comes from my roots, I’m Southern Italian, which means plenty of Spanish and Greek, roots a go go!
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I can definitely tell you what I fucking hate! Everything that you can hear at a rave party, including people, most probably. And I don’t hate them but I really really, REALLY don’t like The Beatles.
But I also don’t listen to Bowie which seems to be the common ground for every human being so there must be something wrong with me.
Oh guess what? I thought Johnny Lydon was an idiot before it was fashionable. If Sex Pistols had another frontman, would have been a decent band.
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5. Any new bands impressed you and worth a shout out?
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Well, considering that I have not been to a gig in almost a year, I have to say NO.
But I can tell you what OLD band shocked me. Last year we got to open for Poison Idea and I remember not being able to take my eyes and ears off stage. It was pure energy, fast and precise.
It was so good, way more than I was expecting.
​6. What’s the future look like for you and the Randy Savages?
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The future is very bright. We are writing and recording demos
for the new record and it’s weird to not being in the same room
to do it, so it is a very different process from what we are used to.
But as soon as we got enough material that we rate valid, we gonna put out a rock’n’roll masterpiece.
The type of record you want to put on when you are doing the dirty things with your loved one, the type of record that is gonna intensify your orgasms,
multiple orgasms.
7. What is the craziest, most memorable thing which happened on Tour?
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Oh man. Once we were in a hotel in Holland and I was doing a live stream on facebook, just to fuck around and show people the fancies of rock’n’roll, then Liam came out of the shower with his ding out (he is on the edge of exhibitionism ) and basically accidentally showed his pendulum live on facebook. We basically got famous like the Kardashans after that. Also for some reason, he was playing Wham in the shower.
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Different story, different band, about 10 years ago, I was to on tour in California and we had a gap in the tour. We got asked if we wanted to fill the gap with a 16 years birthday garage show in Orange County. The answer was obviously yes and we ended up in a garage with about 100 kids, all into heavy music. One of them had the Ninja Turtles tattooed on his belly (legend) and he passed to me the biggest bottle of Jack Daniels I have ever seen til to this day. The gig ended up in a massive pillow fight. I though I was a king living the dream.
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Funniest moment was when one of the people on tour with me that year, shat himself in Mike Watt(Minutemen) tour van in San Pedro.
8. Horror Movies or Science Fiction?
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I don’t get the fuss about Star Trek.
9. What do you dislike?
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Misogyny. Racism. Bullism (I was bullied a lot at school) and Bad food. Yo maybe I am in the wrong country (jokes)
10. Guilty pleasure?
I spend too much money in Lego.
11. Is Punk Rock Dead?
I think there is a big misconception about the definition itself. The music, well that will never die as long as there is one person that play that and another that listen to it (can’t be your own mom).
But to be honest, I see a lot less “punk attitude” around. I got into punk because of the nature of it…no judgment, no bullshit, unity. In the latest years I see a lot more judgement, a lot less unity. I never thought that anyone that listen to the music, and live under those morals, could be anything but a good person. But then I see accusation of sexual harassment, I see racist or inhuman comments or simply dickheads behaviour and to me that is far from punk.
Interviewed in November 2020
