The Stool Pigeon music newspaper

Sitting opposite me in the lobby of a west London hotel is Rob Lind - a ruddy-complexioned, grey-haired Vietnam veteran. He’s dressed casually and conservatively: gleaming white shirt, blue jeans, slip-ons. His genial, authoritative manner and deep voice are reminiscent of Major Briggs off Twin Peaks.

Earlier, Rob told me about his days as a military pilot. Now, he’s telling me about the band in which he plays saxophone. “Our goal hasn’t changed at all since we were 19,” he explains, calmly and seriously. “Our goal is to move the floor and break the windows.”

You’re tempted to laugh. But then you remember that this guy’s in The Sonics.

It’s hard to overstate how great The Sonics were, or how deep their influence runs. Their story, in a nutshell: inspired by Little Richard, five teenagers formed a garage band, gigged furiously, made two great records and one they hated, then dissolved amid pressure to find proper jobs (or, in Rob’s case, fight in a war). Along the way, they permanently changed rock music. For one thing, they made it sonically aggressive in a way it hadn’t been before, by means of powerhouse drumming, Jerry Roslie’s screamed vocals and Larry Parypa’s distorted minor chords. They also expanded the range of rock’s subject material with songs about evil women, the Devil, mental illness and poison-drinking. In the era of ‘I Wanna Hold Your Hand’, they wrote ‘Psycho’: “Oh baby, you’re driving me crazy / I’m going out of my head / And I wish I was dead.”

The Sonics’ influence was everywhere during the punk era, and persists today. The Fall regularly cover ‘Strychnine’ at gigs. The first song The Horrors played together was ‘The Witch’. James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem intones The Sonics’ name four times during ‘Losing My Edge’, as the song’s tone shifts from ironic to reverential.

Last year, three founding members - Rob Lind, Larry Parypa and Jerry Roslie - reformed the band to play the Cavestomp garage rock festival in New York, with Don Wilhelm of The Daily Flash on bass and Ricky Lynn Johnson of The Wailers on drums. When I meet them, The Sonics are about to play their first-ever UK shows - two Easter Weekend gigs at the Kentish Town Forum.

In conversation, it seems that the guys are only dimly aware of the esteem in which they’re held. They mention hearing echoes of The Sonics in The Ramones, the Sex Pistols, The Clash and various grunge bands, but modesty prevails. Rob mentions being lucky enough to meet Bruce Springsteen, and speaks glowingly of The Hives. When I ask Larry if he feels The Sonics didn’t get the respect they deserved first time round, he balks. Deserved? Who said The Sonics deserved respect?

These days, Larry lives in Seattle, works in insurance and has a family. A dyed-in-the-wool perfectionist, he seems to be the driving force behind the reunion. He reckons that bland production ruined the band’s third album Introducing The Sonics, and relishes the opportunity to reclaim the songs and ‘Sonic-ize’ them. “We’re not good musicians,” he explains. “To me, there’s a right sound, a right aggression and heaviness. That’s what we’re all about - being sinister, trying to be the biggest-sounding band (for five pieces) you’re going to hear. I want my guitar to be as big as this room. I wish it weighed five thousand pounds.”

Rob speaks of the differences between Tacoma and state capital Seattle, which he compares to Liverpool and London. “In Seattle, when The Sonics were playing, there were a number of wonderful groups that were melodic and jazzy, and down in Tacoma there was us and The Wailers… We were much harder and dirtier down there.”

The Sonics honed their hard, dirty sound by playing three sets a night at Tacoma clubs like The Red Carpet (where one night an after-hours jam session yielded ‘Psycho’, which was recorded the next day). “During the first set, people were a little shy and didn’t want to dance,” remembers Rob of the gigs. “We didn’t want people standing there staring at us, so anything that we could think of that was dramatic or powerful or driving or loud, we worked at that, because when The Sonics started playing we wanted the floor to move… Our whole focus was power.”

They’d initially been determined to function as an instrumental band. The whole concept of singers seemed unappealing in the era of saccharine teen-pop idols like Bobby Vinton, Bobby Rydell and Fabian. What changed everything was the British Invasion. The Sonics fell in love with The Beatles, The Stones and particularly The Kinks after hearing local bands cover their songs, and realised that a singer was required to compete. Jerry, the keyboardist, was bullied into having a go. “We had no idea that in that body was the singing talent that was residing there,” admits Rob.

The other Sonics are in awe of Jerry. When he arrives in the lobby halfway through the interview, a respectful hush descends. Eventually Rob breaks it with a joke-y introduction: “This is my grandfather…”

Jerry certainly cuts a frail, wizened figure these days. Over the past four decades he’s worked as an asphalt paving contractor and suffered grave ill-health, undergoing a heart transplant and treatment for kidney cancer. He doesn’t say a lot in the interview, apart from name-checking James Brown and recalling his early lack of confidence as a singer. Nonetheless, he seems infinitely gentle and good-humoured, punctuating his band-mates’ tales with eye-rolls and wry smiles.

‘Madman Jerry Roslie’ - as Larry calls him - definitely looks his age. Rob, meanwhile, sounds his age when I ask him about the music he’s been listening to over the years. A horrifying litany unfurls: The Charlie Daniels Band, Bob Seger, even The Eagles (“awe-inspiring”).

Larry’s tastes have softened too. “I like Alison Krauss, for crying out loud… That’s the only concert I’ve gone to in 30 years.” But he’s curtly dismissive of the notion that the Sonics’ live show might be mellower these days. “You come down tomorrow night and tell us. You tell us.”

Jerry pipes up. “What’s ‘mellow’?”

On Easter Sunday, I get to witness The Sonics’ return from the dead. They look a little nervous as they shuffle onstage, but when Larry first strikes down on his guitar that unmistakable Sonics sound fills the Forum. Naturally, it’s the same guitar he played back in the day.

Initially, the punters seem hesitant - perhaps fearful that the legacy might be tarnished - but they gradually loosen up as The Sonics turn in a tight set of hell-fire originals and Sonic-ized covers. Rob sings a few songs and Donnie some others, but Jerry takes the helm for the biggest and best ones, and proves he can still summon up his inner demon. Rob pays him an onstage tribute that begins: “The word legend is thrown about loosely in this business…”

On the floor, a drunken punter offers a tribute of his own. As the Sonics power through a closing trio of ‘Psycho’, ‘Louie Louie’ and ‘The Witch’, he implores me to mosh, shouting: “This is The Sonics - the only sixties band who didn’t sing about love.”

And by now, of course, the floor is shaking.