BBC Southampton's Indy Almroth-Wright headed backstage for a chat with frontman Ginger and guitarist CJ before their gig at Portsmouth's Pyramids.

You're over half way through the tour, how's it going?
Ginger: We're suffering from tour finger. It's from playing the guitar, you get a finger that starts that long and then it gets to about that long [CJ and Ginger show me their battered fingers].
CJ: You have to Superglue them.
Ginger: The tour's fantastic, the first of it's kind. We always have loads of dramas and mishaps, and considering it's The Wildhearts and Amen you'd think that tradition would stand with all the chaos, but there's been absolutely none. It's been very professional really good fun, all the guys and girls in the bands are getting on and it's a new one on us!

CJ - rockin' at The Pyramids

How's the new material going down with the fans?
Ginger: Great! Considering that they haven't heard any of it, we haven't finished the album so they haven't had anything to download - they're loving it, singing along. It's great when you see a couple of thousand kids singing along to a song you haven't even released yet.

Isn't it great that rock music's at the front of things again?
CJ: It's selling well, rock music's doing really well at the moment. A lot of it's because the manufactured boy and girl band bubble's burst and kids are discovering rock music again, which is great.
Ginger: And also live rock music, getting away from the expensive videos doing all the work. That means bands are going to have to learn to play better.

How do you keep an eye on your success? Do you watch the charts or go by ticket sales at gigs?
CJ: It's taken a couple of years for us to get the band where we want it to be and we're on a road to somewhere at the moment. But as for being successful, we're not successful yet. We have a fanbase in the UK and a fanbase in Japan and that's it - the world is much bigger than those two countries and we're actively trying to get to the rest of the world. So ask us again in a years time!

Jon - havin' it!

You've been going for 11 years now.. What's your secret?
Ginger: We're stupid! We're just too thick to split up! Because we've never really had what we would consider to be a relative success. CJ nailed it when he said that we have unfinished business, we've still got stuff to do. All the bands that have fallen by the wayside have all peaked and then started going down and we're still kind of on the ascent. So until we do something worthwhile we're still going to be here. So buy our records or you'll never going to get rid of us!

Do you think the break you had from each other was a good thing to get you fired up again?
Ginger: In theory, but it didn't really sort out all the problems because our bass player (Danny) is in rehab.

Have you heard from him?
Ginger: Not really, to be really honest we don't want to hear from him for a while, we want him to go the whole way and get himself well. It's a long and painful thing that he's going to have to do and you don't want constant contact because he's going through a lot of different phases in his bid to get clean. We don't know how he's doing but we hope he's doing really well.
CJ: It's not something that can be cured in weeks, it is going to take a long time and we have to carry on, we can't just stop.
Ginger: I guess being apart really did sort us out because normally we would have let this affect the whole band and probably called it a day. Now because we've got something to prove to ourselves, one guy having problems with substance abuse is not going to finish this band.

Stidi

How's Jon settling into the band?
Ginger: He's landed! We've slotted in with him!
CJ: He's brought stability and calm to the band! (laughs) on the other side of the coin he's brought a craziness and a madness that money just can't buy! He's not all there!

You've got a new single So Into You which is coming out shortly and an album on the way, how's it coming along?
CJ: Very, very well. The album still needs a bit of work. We've got another couple of weeks to go on it. It's basically completed, it's going to be mixed soon and it should be out the end of August, September time.
Ginger: The thought of coming off tour and finishing the album is as scary, as being halfway through an album and then going on tour. Usually you need to take some time to get match fit before you go on tour, not straight from the studio where there's food and beer. We always just dive into things!
CJ: This album will also come out in America, we haven't actually had a release in America yet so it'll be interesting to see how it does.

What's been the bands greatest achievement?
Ginger: Not being dead!
CJ: Managing to carry on when there's been big spokes in our wheels, we can still carry on.

What are your plans for the summer?
CJ: We're doing some festivals, I know we've got one with Alice Cooper in Guildford and we're doing one with Twisted Sister in Spain and we might be doing some in Japan.