The band released four full-length albums throughout the '90s - Raise, Mezcal Head, Ejector Seat Reservation (which wasn't released here in the US), and 99th Dream. Along the way they were widely touted as the potential savior of the British music scene, received critical accolades on both sides of the Atlantic, did a tour with the Smashing Pumpkins, and headlined their own tours around the globe. But the band was constantly having troubles. Despite all the critical praise they were eventually dropped from their labels in both Europe and the US. Among other things, the realities of keeping a band together and the expense of being on the road proved to be too much, and they decided to call it quits as 2000 approached

Since then each of the former members of this band has gone on to a variety of things. But, singer/guitarist/principal creative force behind the group, Adam Franklin, has arguably maintained the highest profile with his other projects, Sophia and Toshack Highway. But something has been percolating over the past year that has turned the spotlight back on Swervedriver, if only briefly.

The result was delivered to stores on Monday, March 14, as the group's fans worldwide were finally given reason to get their swerve on with the release of Juggernaut Rides 89 - 98, the first album the band has produced in nearly a decade - a 33-track anthology of well-worn material, b-sides, rarities, and previously unreleased songs.

QueenSizeMusic.com caught up with Franklin via email to get the lowdown on what could be on the horizon for his former band.

QueenSizeMusic.com: So why release this Swervedriver collection now, and not, say, sooner after the demise of the band? I mean, it's been eight years since the release of 99th Dream. Are there plans to reform the band?

Adam Franklin: You have to understand that the decision to release or re-release Swervedriver material is totally out of the band's control apart from a few tracks and the last album. The fact is that Sanctuary struck up a deal to license the songs from Sony as they have done with a number of Creation bands. They didn't have to contact any band members if they didn't want to, but they were actually a nice bunch of guys. But also this isn't the first time that a compilation album has been mooted - Rykodisc were interested in doing something a few years back, which fell through in the end. Also, Cherry Red in England were keen to do something and that actually went ahead for a while until the man at Sony sent everyone a mysterious email saying "project suspended." I'd like to see all the Swervedriver albums available in record shops everywhere, but there are problems. In the US, Universal (Records) now control A&M releases and they have absolutely no plans to reissue any Swervedriver albums - of course this is the price you pay for selling your corporate soul in the first place so we can't really complain too much! Strange things do happen though like the fact that Sony France instigated a re-release and repackaging of Ejector Seat Reservation a couple of years back, I found out about that online... I found out about that online and bought a copy from Newbury Comics in Boston.

QSM: If the band isn't regrouping will there be an lineup assembled to tour behind this release?

AF: Ah, this old chestnut! I have to say that when the band decided to split after the touring was finished in 1998 at least three (members) of the band were totally over the whole thing - sick to death of it! We hated the scene down where our studio set-up was and touring wasn't much fun for a number of reasons that I don't want to go into. But we thought we'd take a break from it rather than split and see how we felt a little further down the line.

Anyway, of course we never did get back together and so at first it was "are they still together?" and then "will they reform?" and I've even been accused of perpetuating the myth that we might get back together to somehow benefit what I'm doing now - I don't know how that works exactly! Perhaps I should guarantee that Swervedriver will reform as soon as Toshack Highway sales hit a certain plateau - there ya' go, you can't say fairer than that can you?

As I mentioned (in an earlier email) Larry, we had the pleasure of putting up Lou Barlow on our couch after his Maxwell's show (in Hoboken, NJ) on Sunday and I asked him about the Dinosaur reformation, and said "that'll be fun, right?" and he said, "Yeah! It'll be a lot of fun!" As is the case with most bands, it's not the music that's the problem, the music tends to be just fine - it's all the bullshit around the music.

There actually was a band reformation of sorts earlier this year - I wish it could have been in happier circumstances but a friend of ours died just before Christmas and so after the service we all retired to the local pub in North London.

There was myself, Steve, Jimmy and original drummer Paddy along with our roadie Gaz, and then in walked Graham Bonnar the drummer on Raise! Unfortunately, I woke up on his floor at six the next morning...

QSM: How much material did you wade through to glean these 33 tracks? What were the criteria for choosing these songs?

AF: Myself and Jimmy Hartridge just made up a list of songs and compared lists to see which songs were looking like they were gonna make the final cut and then compared it to a list that the Sanctuary guys had drawn up. I think Jimmy would say the criteria [were] to assemble a killer combination of tracks and I think that's what we've done!

CD1 just hits you over the head with three-minute-something blasts and is up there with Buzzcocks' Singles Going Steady in my book - except not all the tracks were singles and none were hits of course! - But I think this album shows the band's strength-in-depth that most of the songs on that first CD were originally just b-sides or album tracks or one-off seven inch only releases. And the only other criteria [were] that there really had to be stuff on there that the serious Swervedriver collector didn't already own which is where CD2 comes in. There's a fine bunch of folks that regularly post messages at swervedriver.com and have done some really cool stuff like compiling live versions of all the albums and stuff and really the previously unreleased tunes and the ones that were only previously available on vinyl are for them. So I think in total there are four never-before-released tracks, another four that have previously only been available on vinyl and maybe another three that were never released in the UK before, so that's not too shabby.

Of course, it's not a perfect list by any means, and there are always gonna be songs that people would have wanted to see on there that aren't. It was difficult for me having a Swervies 'Best Of' that doesn't contain "Girl On A Motorbike," "Hands," or "The Director's Cut Of Yr Life," but what are you gonna do?

QSM: Had it been a long time since you had listened to a lot of this material? What did that inspire in you? Where you surprised by any of your reactions to any of it? How about being surprised by not having the expected reaction you thought you might?

AF: It had been a long time with a lot of the material yeah... and I guess it is quite inspirational listening to a lot of it, "Planes Over The Skyline," "Why Say Yeah," and all that. There's a lot of great songs in there - sometimes the performance isn't all there and certainly in a few cases the production is a little weird. Even with some of the Alan Moulder stuff, which is all recorded perfectly, the actual choices on the mixes were a little off at times - or, rather I should say the production, because I think Alan mixed what he was given amazingly. There's "Duress," for example, where to me the recorded version is almost redundant at this stage as that song mutated so much in the live context, and was rarely played the same way twice, and so there really can't be a definitive version. But some of the playing all round is totally rock'n'roll, especially when Steve George and Jez turn up on the scene - the rhythm section on things like "My Zephyr," and "The Birds" is totally amazing!

QSM: Does seeing how your own songwriting has changed over the years invigorate the process? Or, do you ever hear something you did ten years ago and think you want to pursue that idea a little more completely? Have you done so, and has it met the rigors of your expectations?

AF: I think that happens all the time - developing ideas from years back. We did it at the time with redeveloping "Afterglow" as "Scrawl & Scream" and "When Harry & Maggie" was re-arranged as "93 Million Miles From The Sun." I always loved the Keith Richards quote that songs and melodies are like radio airwaves drifting around the room and sometimes you tune into them and catch them and other times they just drift on by. The biggest contrast on this album is going from the penultimate track to the very last track, "Just Sometimes" into the original demo of "Son Of Mustang Ford."

"Just Sometimes" is an interesting experimental track that has Jimmy playing a pump organ and me playing piano - a classic kind of experimental album track - and then you go straight into the original band demo - a totally full-on assault that we recorded in two hours as if our life depended on it! And actually there's something at the end of this version of Mustang, which did surprise us: It has a three-minute play-out at the end, and the chord sequence later became the verses to a song called "Hands!"

QSM: Considering how many problems the band had with the various labels it was on, I've found your attitude about (being dropped, etc.), from the press I've read, to be fairly positive. I would have thought that the band would have found a wider audience here in the US. Looking back on it, what are some of the things that could have been done differently? Or, was there anything at all that could have been done to find the Swervie audience here?

AF: Perhaps we should never have signed with a major label - but then if we hadn't would as many people have known about us? I mean I'm always amazed by how many people have heard of the band, and that might not have occurred if we had had a slower build but I think that starting out slower gives you a whole different perspective on it.

I remember the first time we played in Seattle and Mudhoney were in our dressing room at Rckcndy trying to get us all high before the show, and then they spotted the big bus out the back and were all like, "Woo! Look at these guys with their big bus," and of course Poster Children who were opening for us were getting around in an RV. I mean personally I wouldn't have swapped that bus for anything because that was our space on the road and you end up off-setting the costs by not having hotel rooms, etcetera.

But I think that in the end somehow some apathy can creep in when you're used to a certain deal. It's not as if we didn't do our fair share of piling into the back of a transit van and crashing on people's floors when we first started out, but there were certain facets of being on a major label in America that didn't sit too comfortably with me personally speaking.

In the end there were probably a ton of things that could have been done differently but I was always more comfortable writing a song and playing the guitar than doing a radio station ID you know? And if you have some control over how your music is put across to people then you're clearly in a better position than those that are not, like Swervedriver... So my words of advice to any band starting out would be tread carefully. I imagine the guys from Mudhoney probably mocked Kurt when he signed to Geffen too, "Woo! Look at you with your bright shiny record contract!"

QSM: That said, are you still working with Toshack Highway? What about Sophia? Is Sophia something you're dedicated to for the long run?

AF: Yes! We've just been mixing the new Toshack Highway, and I've been talking with a number of people about putting it out so I hope that will be soon. It was recorded in Canada last year near Toronto with Ley and Matt from the band Sianspheric playing bass and drums. Then Ley did various bits and pieces, piano, extra guitars, sound effects and production things and then sent the tracks over to me and Charlie Francis who worked on the previous Toshack stuff. We did some more bits and pieces, and mixed it at Charlie's house in Cardiff, Wales. I'll send you a copy! It's sounding really good, there are a couple of tracks that are a little reminiscent of the orange Toshack album, a couple that have more of a Swervie type thing going on and a whole lot more!

And, Sophia is something that I've done off and on for quite a few years now. Me and Steve George first did some shows in Copenhagen and Cologne I think in 1997, and then carried on doing Sophia tours in between the Swervedriver stuff - and the contrast couldn't have been greater! It seemed like we'd go from these raucous rocking shows in the USA and Australia to these quiet considered shows in France and Belgium where we'd be sitting down on stage. Sophia's more of a rock thing again now though - we're even standing up again!

And the last little stint just round Europe before Christmas we had a string quartet with us so there were nine of us on stage, it was fun. Also Jeff and Will, who are really the core of Sophia on drums and piano also did the very first Toshack gigs over here in the US.

QSM: You're living in Jersey City, NJ, which for those that don't live in New York, is just across the Hudson from Lower Manhattan. How long have you been here in the Metro area, and are you planning on living here permanently?

AF: I've been here for just over two years I think - well, I gave up my place in London two years ago but I was coming back and forth since before that - since 2000 or so really. I'm here for the time being and I guess we'll see where we're at in the future. Who knows? It was certainly reinvigorating making the move.

QSM: What's the most pressing thing on Adam Franklin's agenda right now? What, at the center of your heart, are you most dead set on achieving in the next year, five years, or ten years?

AF: Hmmm... Oh God, I hate these questions! I just read in the new Mojo about a book by Sylvie Simmons where she talks about journalists interviewing musicians being just like shrinks, except cheaper and better informed!

There are a number of things but really I'm glad to be getting another album out this year. It's been a long time since the last full-length record, and I want to put out some more - a lot more - and get a band on the road to play this stuff.