Fact #135458

EYEWITNESS ACCOUNTS OF RICHEY EDWARDS CARVING 4 REAL INTO HIS ARM
compiled by Johnny Black

Ed Sirrs (photographer, NME) : The early 90s was a very dull time for photographers in England. It was all baggy bands and shoe-gazers, very dreary, so the Manics were quite refreshing. Manic Street Preachers weren’t exactly the NME’s favourite band at the time, but their PR company, Hall Or Nothing worked hard and convinced Steve Lamacq, the reviews editor, to make them the lead review for the next issue.

Steve Lamacq (feature in The Guardian, Sep 29, 2000) : If you're unfamiliar with the incident, these are the bare bones: the Manics were an aspiring, ambitious rock'n'roll four-piece from Wales. I was the NME journalist sent to review them. After a post-gig interview in which we discussed both their methods and their merits, guitarist Richey Edwards invited me backstage for a final word. Edwards, while still talking, then cut "4 REAL" into his arm with a razorblade.

Ed and myself got a lift to Norwich with Philip (publicist Philip Hall), and we booked into a slightly chintzy hotel on the outskirts of town. With the exception of James - then the shyest band member - they were, if not chatty, amiable enough.

Ed Sirrs : Steve and I went up to Norwich and the Arts Centre was an old Church Hall, used for youth activities. I remember it had a stone floor with tombstones built into it, which now seems a bit ominous. The place was virtually empty. I felt very conspicuous as I took my shots. There was a couple of lonely looking pogo dancers and, even though there was hardly anybody in the hall, they were getting some heckling.

Steve Lamacq (feature in The Guardian, Sep 29, 2000) : Nottingham Forest were playing and bassist Nicky Wire and singer James Dean Bradfield spent their pre-gig downtime in the hotel bar watching the match on TV. James was wearing a ludicrously long shiny mac. During the 15-minute drive to the venue, he sat at the back of the bus and refused to be drawn into conversation. I remember thinking: "Well, this is a good start. He hates me and I don't like his coat."

The gig was good, but sorely under-attended. The review describes the set as "a haze of wanton energy and sketchy punk outbursts. Starting with You Love Us, they snap at the heels of an audience split between curiosity and approval: the parochial atmosphere of the gig exaggerated by two people pogoing at the front." After 33 minutes, the band walked off and the pogoers shouted after them: "Plastic punks!" There was no encore, but then again, I don't remember them ever doing an encore when they first started. Instead, after it had cleared of people, we sat in the hall and talked about their songs, and their vision for the band. Again from the original NME piece: "After 30 minutes of friendly enough discussion and vitriol, we wind things up, for the most part agreeing to disagree. It was a good, if cliched confrontation (maybe leaving both sides a little unsettled)."

Ed Sirrs : They didn’t play well that night, and certainly didn’t win over the audience. At the end of the set, I went off to the bar to have a pint, and Steve went off with Richey to talk.

Steve Lamacq : Richey said, ‘You got a minute? Come backstage. There’s one last thing I’d like to say.’ So I went backstage and I said, ‘I don’t think people think you are for real.’ And he got a razor blade and wrote ‘4 REAL’ on his arm while I’m just standing there watching him. We carried on talking for another three or four minutes and, by that time, he was dripping blood all over the carpet.

Richey Edwards : I didn't know what I could possibly say to him to make him understand. Other bands hit journalists and it's very macho. I would never want to do that.

Steve Lamacq (feature in The Guardian, Sep 29, 2000) : As Richey began to carve his arm open, I was as shocked as anybody was. But people always ask me: why didn't you stop him? And there are two reasons, I think. One is that it happened so quickly. The cuts were deliberate but fast (and got faster and lighter as he neared the end). The second is: do you think he wanted me to stop him?

Steve Lamacq : He was so calm, absolutely calm, and didn't look in any pain whatsoever. One of the things that was so strange and frightening about it was that he was so calm. You didn't even feel like he was making a point. He could almost have been writing it in biro."

Steve Lamacq (feature in The Guardian, Sep 29, 2000) : I don't know exactly how long we talked for after the deed was done, but it was probably about three or four minutes. Apart from the odd moment when Richey had looked down to inspect his work, we'd been staring fixedly at each other throughout (Nicky Wire has said in the past that Richey was laughing as he did it, but trust me, he wasn't). By the end, the conversation was going around in circles and Richey's arm was beginning to look un comfortably gory. The blood from the first cut had started to trickle down his arm the moment he'd finished it (until I saw the photos the next day, I didn't know what he'd written because it was obscured by the blood). "We'd better do something about that... you're going to mess their carpet up."

Richey looked down at his arm, then up again, and agreed. At least he gave a faint nod. And that was it. I went to search for Philip, finding him back in the main hall. Trying not to set alarm bells ringing, I tugged at Hall's arm and muttered conspiratorially: "I think you should go and see Richey. He's a bit shaken up." Hall, a quizzical expression crossing his face, excused himself and sauntered backstage. Two minutes later he re-emerged at double-speed and darted off to find a phone or locate the nearest hospital.

Ed Sirrs : I hadn’t got a third of the way through my pint when suddenly Steve re-eappeared looken even more pale faced and ashen than usual. He said, “Quick. Richey’s cut his arm!” So we rushed out to the foyer, which was where Richey had been taken by then. He’d already had some kind of loose bandage or dressing applied to the cuts.

I have children myself, so I felt sorry for him, and went a bit fatherly, but he seemed completely unconcerned. I have been criticised for taking advantage of his distress, but the reality is that he volunteered to have the pictures taken.

In effect, he hijacked the situation, salvaged something from a lousy gig to give his band some credibility. They knew they’d never get another major NME review after such a dire gig, so he had to do something.

Richey Edwards : I never shout at anybody, so if I cut myself or stub a cigarette out on my arm, to me it's a release. If somebody pushes me or punches me when I'm out in Cardiff, that hurts me more than having a couple of stitches in my arm. That's someone taking their frustration out on me. If I have a fair deal of contempt for humanity it's because it's never honest with itself. I'm weak. All my life I've felt weak compared to other people. If they want to crush me then they can. But I know I can do things that other people can't.

Steve Lamacq (feature in The Guardian, Sep 29, 2000) : No one spoke much on the journey back to London. We listened to a compilation tape I'd made up, and then I dozed off in the back seat. When I got back to Brixton, my girlfriend awoke briefly and asked how it went. "Oh, the gig wasn't bad. Not many people there. Then we did the interview and Richey cut his arm open with a razorblade." "Oh, right," she said. Then fell asleep again.

It wasn't until the following morning that the incident started to sink in. The rest of the day was spent explaining what had happened. First to NME editor Danny Kelly, and then to the rest of the staff as they filtered in to work. Ed arrived with the photos around noon and the debate over whether we should print them started in earnest.

Ed Sirrs : Usually, when a photographer goes in to a newspaper, nobody takes a blind bit of notice, but when I took those pictures in to NME the next day, everybody crowded round to see them. A big argument developed about the morality of whether we should run them. You know, if just one kid cuts himself as a result, it would be our fault … that sort of thing. A lot of people didn’t want to run them. So much for cutting edge journalism.

Steve Lamacq (feature in The Guardian, Sep 29, 2000) : The arguments raged, as people took it in turns to examine the slides. Would the pictures prompt fans to copy him? Was it the best rock'n'roll statement of the year?

Ed Sirrs : In the end, they went to the lawyers, whose advice was to run a shot in black and white on page three, and then use a smaller colour shot much later on in the magazine. And that’s what happened.

Steve Lamacq (feature in The Guardian, Sep 29, 2000) : Feeling like a bit of a spare part, I wandered back to the Live Desk. There were two telephone calls that day that put the incident into perspective. The first was from a press officer, who hinted that Richey had done this sort of thing before; that he had a history of self-mutilation. The second was from Richey. By a twist of fate, I wasn't there when he called. I was in our regular haunt, the Stamford Arms, explaining what had happened to a couple of my Live Desk team (I think, without wanting to sound too melodramatic, I may have been in a state of delayed shock. Sam Steele, then an NME freelance but now at Radio 1, claims I was white as a sheet). I subsequently lost the ansaphone tape with his message on it, but the gist was: "I'm sorry if I upset you in any way but I was just trying to make my point."

Richie Edwards : I just cut myself to show that we are no gimmick, that we are pissed off, that we're for real.

Ed Sirrs : Actually, Richey achieved what he wanted. A week later the band was signed by Sony. People think I must have got rich off that picture, but there’s not really a lot of money in it. I understand that the record company also used those shots as part of the campaign for Manic Street Preachers in America, but I never saw a penny for that. It does still get used though, sometimes in polls of great pictures, sometimes in retrospectives about the Manics, and sometimes in general features about self-mutiliation.