Press: Stereophonics @ WelshBands

STUART CABLE - STEREOPHONICS (N.M.E.)

Were you ever on the dole? If so, for how long?
"Yes, for two years."

Would you/Stereophonics have survived without it?
"It wasn't that important. It was just a bit of a bind, having no money. Though the dole gave us something to survive on, and time."

What would you be doing now, if you'd been forced to get a job when you left school/university?
"Still fitting new PVC windows in doors, probably."

Do you see any difference between the current Labour government and previous Tory one?
"It's early days at the moment. I think Blair's got some good policies, it's just a matter of whether or not he puts his money where his mouth is."

What should Labour be doing to help Young people?
"Back to the same thing. Blair's got some good policies but whether he actually puts that into practice is a different thing."

Are you surprised they have no new policies/ideas about drugs?
"I think that if there's going to be any policy against drugs, it's got to be a good one. It's going to take a lot of money and time and effort if they really want to clean the country up and not have drugs in Britain at all, which is a Utopia that's never going to happen. If they were to legalise anything, it couldn't be hard drugs. I totally disagree with heroin, I think it's a fool's drug. But cannabis is freely smoked in most countries anyway."

Should pop stars be going to Number 10?
"We were having this discussion the other day about what Chumbawamba did at the Brit Awards. They were saying that Prescott was going there trying to make Labour seem all hip and cool and that's why they did it, but good for him, in a way. They're the first government who have actually made an effort to do that. When I was a kid growing up under Thatcher's reign, that would never happen. They were terrible, terrible times."