Gene
Hello My Name is Martin
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Photo by Jim Mitcham
ith an elegant, multi-faceted sound and themes swinging grandly between sweet, sharp, witty, romantic and melancholy, Gene gathered a devoted cult of British rock fans between the mid-90s and early 2000s. Led by Martin Rossiter’ s poetic lyricism
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and sweeping melodies, the band’ s musical foundation was laid by guitarist Steve Mason, bassist Kevin Miles, and drummer Matt James. Gene shed early comparisons to the Smiths en route to crafting a unique musical universe that drew as much from American soul and pop music as influential UK bands like the Faces and the Jam. Despite missing the US Billboard charts, Gene landed 10 songs in the UK Top 40 including the wry debut single“ For the Dead,” titanic“ Olympian,” adrenalized“ Fighting Fit,” and swaggering“ Haunted by You.”
After disbanding in 2004, Gene reunited in 2025 to perform shows in the UK culminating in this year’ s live album Apollo. The group is now readying its first North American shows in 22 years. The tour stops at Chicago’ s Bottom Lounge on November 16. Rossiter spoke with IE from home in Brighton shortly after two sold-out concerts in October at London’ s Roundhouse.
IE: After several reunion shows featuring the vintage Gene catalog, you introduced new material at the Roundhouse. I was lucky to be there. Were you proving something to yourselves or to your audience? Should fans hope for more?
MARTIN ROSSITER: I think we ' re trying to prove something to each other, which matters. I do feel like we ' re having to push the boulder with less force now. It feels like there ' s a little bit of momentum growing. We haven ' t committed to anything. We’ ve just said,“ Let ' s see what happens.”
IE: That suggests that there’ s no plan for an album, but it ' s not out of the question.
MR: That ' s probably the best way of putting it. If we get to the point where we have six or seven songs we ' re happy with, then it becomes more likely.
IE: You once spoke of your internal“ Mick Jagger alarm” that would tell you when it was time for Gene to stop and avoid becoming a nostalgia act.
MR: The only element of all we ' ve done in in this second iteration of the band that ' s made me feel nostalgic is writing the [ new ] songs. It does throw me back to being sat on my bedroom floor at my mum ' s house before I could even afford to move out of home. A couple of months ago, I ceremoniously went to a small bookshop here in Brighton and chose a notebook. That was quite a symbolic moment for me because I used to do that with every album.
IE: Debuting songs in London implied that creative work factors into making Gene’ s reunion satisfying for yourselves. How new is“ Tristan?”
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