(SEAN MOORE -  
AN APPRECIATION)  
  

"Those who speak do not know, and those who know do not speak" - CARLOS CASTENDA, QUOTED BY RICHEY EDWARDS WITH REFRENCE TO SEAN MOORE  

WHAT DO YOU CALL SOMEONE who hangs around with musicians? A drummer! What do you call a drummer with ambition? A roadie! How can you tell when there’s drummer at the door? Because he speeds up and comes in before you’re ready! How can you tell when the drum riser’s level? Because the drummer’s drooling out of both sides of him mouth! What’s the difference between a drummer and a drum machine? You only need to punch the information into a drum machine once! A drummer walks into a shop and orders three plectrums, six guitar strings and two tambourines. The proprietor asks: ‘You’re a drummer, aren’t you?’ The drummer says: ‘Yeah, How did you know?’ The proprietor answers: ‘Because this is a fish and chip shop!’  

…..And so on. And ha bloody ha. Drummers are the mothers-in-law of rock, a laughing stock, the butt of a billion lame jokes, (literally) sitting ducks, and generally portrayed as knuckle-dragging Neanderthals who comprehend just three concepts: ‘fire’, ‘food’, and ‘1-2-3-4’. The alternatives are barley more appealing: ‘the mad bastard’ (Keith Moon) or ‘the loveably character’ (Ringo Starr).  
 Sean Moore fits none of these categories, although perhaps he does have one role model. It was once written that: ‘….of all the Manics, it is Sean who is the band’s Charlie Watts, having been going steady for eight years’. A good comparison, but for reasons far removed from the longevity of his relationship. Nor simply, like Watts, ‘Morro’ is also, at first sight, the least rock ‘n’ roll member of his band, right down to his mastery of the trumpet (a less rock ‘n’ roll instrument it would be difficult to name; one pictures him, cherubic cheeks puffed out and ruddy, like Neighbours’ tuba-tooting Harold Bishop) - and he don’t care. Like the sardonic sticksman of The Rolling Stones, Sean views the entire rock ‘n’ roll circus with a mixture of detached amusement, world-weary boredom and out-and-out cynicism. ‘Everything’s so crap. I feel a lack for anything. If I could isolate myself away from everything, then I would. I’m disillusioned by everything.’  
 Moore’s disdain for the rituals of rock ‘n’ roll is absolute: he finds the tour / promotion treadmill a trial, greeting strangers for whom he has no liking with a fixed smile on his face but with laser-sharp loathing in his eyes; and he once spent an entire Sounds interview silently collecting twenty-pence pieces for the parking meter. His cynical attitude has nothing to do with adolescent petulance, but almost certainly stems from an early resignation to the fact that, no matter how significant his talent and how great his contribution to the Manics, he was never going to be taken entirely seriously.  
 Sean Moore is basically the cat in Hong Kong Phooey, quietly making things happen and taking none of the credit. James is a phenomenal guitarist, yes, but Sean is a great drummer, ‘the group’s musical heart and beat’ (Simon Reynolds in Melody Maker), a muscular metronome with a brain. It is also worth noting here that Sean co-writes all the Manics’ music (how many archetypal comedy drummers can claim that?). Listen to the awesome martial rigour with which he drives ‘Faster’, or the subtlety and grace with which he guides ‘Motorcycle Emptiness’ - to pick two random examples - and it is clear that the silent partner in the Bradfield/Moore partnership (a band strong enough to allow the band to carry two self-confessed musical incompetents) is every bit as crucial as his all-singing, all-riffing cousin.  

‘The best shag in the whole of Wales’ - JAMES ON SEAN  

When Manics fans voted for their ‘Sexiest Man of the Year’ in the music press, James Dean Bradfield and Nicky Wire made the first and second place; Sean was no where to be seen. There is, however, a small  but growing Cult of Sean among the hard-core fanbase, and he does have one fan club on the Internet (at: http://www.geocities.com/sunsetstrip/lounge/9134/geobook.html). He once made the cover of Terrible Beauty Fanzine, but only because it was issue four (it was his turn). Pout once devoted a whole chapter to the Manics reluctant sex cymbal. The tone, however,  is usually a mix of irony and patronising support for the underdog (the words most commonly used are ‘Awww!’ and ‘Bless’). This is not what Sean Moore deserves. When I first met the Manics, it was he whom I sat with in a hotel bar, discussing politics, pop and twentieth-century culture into the early hours, while Richey the Intellectual was busy chatting up the girls. Hall or Nothing’s Caffy St Luce, asked for a few words on Sean, offers simply: ‘Still waters run deep.’ And, yet, to the outside world, he will always be ‘just’ a drummer, and worse that that - a comedy drummer.  
 A lot of it comes down to physiognomy and to the heartless hand of mother nature. Cruelly, as a child, Sean was actually taller than James, yet as an adult he has always been childlike. ‘I’d hesitate to call them angry young men,’ wrote Bob Stanley in Melody Maker in 1989 ‘because I don’t believe the drummer was ever born in 1977.’ In 1998, NME asked Sean if anyone had ever tried to ruffle his hair. ‘Uh, maybe on occasion,’ he reluctantly admitted. Now at 28 and still ageless, a growing lad who takes vitamins first thing every morning, this ‘baby-faced’ PJ Proby lookalike(Bruce Dessau, Vox) found it difficult to get served in bars long into his twenties. His drink of choice, incidentally, is Blackcurrant Hooch…..like a thirteen-year-old on the park swings.  
 I say "childlike" rather than "boyish" because there is something girly about Sean. Actually he has a far more natural androgyny than his lipstick-wearing side-kicks (Smash Hits once printed a picture of him next to one of Helena Bonham Carter, and ‘amusingly’ switched the captions). Even as a child he was often mistaken for a girl and, in 1995, his appearance was still enough to confuse Eunice, a 37-year-old mum interviewed in Young, Pretty & Fucked fanzine. ‘Are they all boys? That one looks like a girl!’  
 This may explain why, when Richey and James experimented with facial hair, Sean really went for it, piercing his eyebrow into the bargain - it was a rebellion against his own boyish/girlishness. Behind his shades (aviator, Lennon, ski), hats (Soviet, UN, bobble) and beards (stubble, goatee, grizzly), and with his radio mike, Sean often seemed to be hiding, craving obscurity. He looks like the member of Metalica that even Metallica fans can’t name.  
 Sean is also a little self conscious about his figure. He once stormed out of a Melody Maker photo session for which he was required to strip naked and be covered in gold spray paint, and, during the Manics’ Glam. era, he often declined the others’ requests to participate in provocative dress. As Nicky Wire remembers: ‘It was always "Come on, Morro, get this fucking blouse on!" and "NO! FUCK OFF!"’  
 Sean’s quest for anonymity has been highly successful. The hand full of facts known about him are pitiful splinters, mere jetsam. He has a sewing fetish and enjoys DIY. He is into Aleister Crowley. He believes the world is controlled by computers (the irony being he is addicted to them). He would rather play Sega than talk in interviews (to this day, Moore carries a notebook with his highest Game Boy scores on it). He is the only member of the Band who can read a map, and consequently the only one who ventures out on sightseeing visits when on tour. At home, he has never seen the Bristol club scene. His idea of going out is riding his Vespa to Weston-Super-Mare, having tea on the beach, and riding home again. He is fanatical about ironing. One persistent rumour insists he has webbed feet.  
 And……well that’s about it. His private life is exactly that. Nicky and Richey have never been to his home (or homes - Sean actually owns two houses: one for him, and one next door for his girlfriend). At home, he is almost as domesticated as his bassist. ‘I’m obsessed with everything being parallel,’ he told NME. ‘Parallel and in its place.’ Nicky, famously, owns three Dyson vacuum cleaners, but Sean owns two. When he can’t sleep on the tour bus, he does the washing up.  
 Sean’s most famous personality trail, diffidence aside, is shopaholism. Where the rest of the Manics’ casual spending - Nicky’s slot machine habit, Richey’s clothes mania, James’s generous drinks rounds - have arisen from boredom (they spend money because it is there), Sean’s spending is never casual. He wields his Gold AMEX like a weapon, and is often seen strolling into venues laden with Our Price and Body Shop bags, and with gadgets, electronic toys and the latest Niacam home cinema. ‘I can honestly say I’ve shopped in every city in every city in the UK’ he boasts. Nicky Wire explains the Moore Method to NME: ‘Sean does this thing where at the start of the tour he says: "Oh, I couldn’t pack last night, so I’ve only got one bag of stuff with me!" Then by the end of the tour he’s got two brand-new suitcases packed with stuff. Every tour!’ On a trip to New York, Sean bought the complete works of Martin Scorsese on Laserdisc; shortly afterwards he went into another shop and bought the entire contents of the Laserdisc department. ‘If the band split up’ Nicky once said jokingly told him, ‘you’d always have the chance of opening up a second-hand Dixons with all the goods you have.’ Sometimes Sean doesn’t really seem to want the goods themselves. He once bought an expensive Mac Powerbook laptop, but he only ever uses it for card games. ‘He’ll but "Comme des Garons"’ verifies Wire, ‘and con himself that’s it’s better quality. It’s secret retail therapy.’  
 Speaking to The Face, Sean explained how the therapy works. ‘I want everything to look like it’s just come out of the wrapper. I love the smell of, say, a Walkman when you first unwrap it. If it gets a scratch on it, that’s it. That’s the way I am. And I’ve always got to get hold of the next best thing. I don’t care about the money.’ However, he does like to splash it around. On the quiet, Sean is a bit of a flash bastard. As Guto from the Super Furry Animals told Iconoclastic Glitter: ‘You’re in a bar with Sean and he’ll buy the entire top shelf, like, just because he can.’  
 Introducing the band onstage, James’s description of ‘Seanus Moorus’ (when it doesn’t involve his glossy blob and a plea for bottles of Pantene) is invariably something like: ‘A genius consumer, a man who’s spending power is so gargantuan you all want to be his girlfriend’. Sean Moore owns thing you didn’t even know existed (a digital video disc Walkman?!). He was one of the first people in Britain to own a Tamagochi. In 1997, playing the "We Love Us" quiz on Radio One’s Mark Radcliffe show, he won an electric foot spa. Almost inevitably, he already had one.  

‘Sean is brutality personified: he pisses everybody off because he doesn’t like anybody or anything’ - JAMES  

 Of course, put any of the above analysis to Moore himself and, with a look suggesting that he has just smelt gas, he will make you feel even smaller than he is. Moore holds his thoughts and feelings close to his chest. If Nicky believes in lashing outward, Richey believes in lashing inward and James believes in catharsis, Sean believes in the old-fashioned British virtue of emotional continence. He keeps it all in. Last time I mat him, I asked Sean - a devoted Liverpool supporter - what it was like playing to 30,000 at Anfield, the home of his heroes. With heavy sarcasm - although one can never be sure - he shrugged: "It was just another gig." (Before the show, a clearly ghost-written statement from Sean had read: ‘As a lifelong Liverpool supporter, I’ve always wanted to appear at Anfield and I hope my performance on the day matches some of those I’ve seen from the team.’) There is just one recorded instance of a Sean Moore emotional outburst. In 1992, shortly after the Manics first hit the Top Twenty, he received a letter from his estranged father wanting to be friends. Sean disappeared to his room and smashed it up with a pool cue. ‘He said it was because of drink,’ said the others, ‘but we think it was because of that letter.’  
 Sean’s reticence can easily be mistaken for hostility. As the Manics super fan Gillian Armstrong once wrote: ‘Sean….seems to have an invisible wall around him, an aura of "Go away".’ This is partly because of his protectiveness and fierce loyalty towards his band-mates, as if adhering to omerta, the Mafia’s code of silence. Not the speak-no-evil chimp doesn’t let the occasional jewel slip between his fingers. He is the rock ‘n’ roll Calvin Coolidge, a man of few words, but who’s rare gnomic utterances reveal a deliciously mordant wit.  
 Shortly after the ‘4 REAL’ incident, I had pointed out that, to keep the hype momentum going, the next time Richey slashed his arm it would need to be live on CNN. Sean, master of pomposity-puncturing soundbite, looked up from his Game Gear and said: ‘We’re going to cut Richey’s head off.’ On another occasion, I asked ‘Where’s Richey? Gone to bed?’ Sean replied: ‘Richey doesn’t go to bed. He goes to the abyss.’ At the time of writing, Sean Moore is possibly the only person in Rock who doesn’t take the Manic Street Preachers entirely seriously.