Published: Friday, 07 August 2026 22:35 | Written by NI Rocks |
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Faster Pussycat is one of those bands whose name is synonymous with the Sunset Strip scene in L.A.; evidenced by their appearance in the iconic rockumentary “The Decline of Western Civilization Part 2 – The Metal Years” in the same year that their debut album was released in 1987.
Next month, frontman Taime Downe is bringing the band back to the UK for the first time in almost ten years and to Belfast for the first time since 2013. I was very fortunate to be able to have a chat with Taime via Zoom on 29th July. We focus on the tour, the recent history of the band and future plans.
The upcoming European tour stops in The Empire in Belfast on Sunday 13th September.
Faster Pussycat is joined by Blacklist Union and by Lorraine Lewis with Femme Fatale. Lorraine was a guest on the Show on 22nd May and Tony West from Blacklist Union will be on the Show on 14th August.
NI ROCKS – Hi Taime, thanks for taking some time to talk to me. It’s about 4 weeks now until the band comes over to Europe. It’s being billed as “celebrating 40 years” – which kinda sits nicely between the band being formed in 1985 and the debut album in 1987. What can fans expect from the shows?
TAIME - Just songs. (Laughs) We're going to hopefully get there. You know, it's been nine years since we've been over to the UK and Europe; since 2017 and that was like freshly sober too so that was different for me as well. We're just coming over and playing - we have a few new songs we got. We're gonna play some old shit some new shit and hopefully we'll have fun you know. I'm going over there and I wasn't really planning on doing any touring this year and then it came up. A couple of festivals came up and I was like, we're going to go over there, let's do a run. We haven't been over there. We were supposed to go over in 2020 and, you know, it all happened that year. So the world ended for a while. But we're just coming over and we didn't know what we were doing really. The agent was like, yeah, you know, they want you over there. So, we started putting the stuff together. They were doing it. And they came up with - what do you think of Blacklist Union and Lorraine? And Tony (West from Blacklist Union) is a good friend of mine and I've known Lorraine for ever, since we were 20 or 21, something like that.
NI ROCKS - I was gonna come on to that.
TAIME - Yeah, we both moved to LA around the same time. And then Tony, his band and his buddy Brian, his guitar player, is a good friend of mine. He's another Seattle boy. So I was like, well, this is cool. That was a kind of a little pleasant surprise. And then we just kind of been getting shit together. That's all we've been doing for the last month or so is just preparing, getting stuff lined up over there for travel and all that stuff. So looking forward to it.
NI ROCKS - You mentioned it was 2017 that you were last in the UK. The last time you were in Belfast was 2013 on one of the previous tours. Do you remember much about that last Belfast show or UK tour generally?
TAIME - I remember flying in and it was really cool. I just wanted to be on a motorcycle and be able to ride through some of it. But yeah, I remember the gig was weird. We were in some like weird little place, it wasn't even like a venue. It was really strange. It was fun to go there because I'm part Irish and I had never been to Ireland ever. And that was my only time, but we were in and out of there so quick. We didn't get to spend any time in the town or go anywhere. And the venue that the gig was at was just like a bit weird bar.
NI ROCKS - Yeah, it was upstairs in Voodoo, which is quite a small place.
TAIME - Yeah, it wasn't like a venue. We still had fun; don't get me wrong. It was fun, but it wasn't like. Yeah, that's what I remember. The gig was a little weird and we didn't get to really do anything. I still have a pillbox I use. I used to use it for other things. Now I use it for what it’s actually for, but it's my Belfast pillbox.
NI ROCKS – How do you think the UK and European crowds compare to those at home in the US? Some bands we spoke to have said that fans in the UK or Europe are more responsive, more engaging. Do you think that's the case?
TAIME - Well, I'm looking forward to it. It's been nine years. I'm fuckin 61 now. I can't remember that far back. But I'm looking forward to it. We used to go over quite a bit; every couple of years. And now it's been, you know, it was it was a while from that, the pandemic. And then, you know, it was three years there. And before that it was like, yeah, 2012, 2013 or whatever it was before that was five years there. And this time it's been nine years. Luckily I'm still walking, I don't need a walker or a wheelchair or anything like that. Danny might, but we'll see. He's good.
NI ROCKS – You mentioned Lorraine Lewis. I did an interview with Lorraine a few weeks ago and she mentioned that she had first met you back when you were working in Retail Slut days in LA. There is quite a bit of history there in terms of Femme Fatale. Was that an obvious choice in terms of getting Lorraine on board?
TAIME - I didn't know she was doing it first. They were talking Blacklist Union and Lorraine came into the picture because Lorraine and Tony are dating. So they're a kind of a new couple. And I was like, oh, cool. I like both people. I've been dealing with my own shit so with this whole tour, I'm just like, just put something together that I like and bring it to me. And then they brought me those guys. I thought perfect. They're both friends of mine. So that's I want. I want this tour to be just fun for me. I've had a pretty brutal year and a half - and I had some good things too. But it's like having those guys over there too, it'll be fun because Tony's been one of my friends since all this shit happened. He's always calling and checking in on me and making sure my head space is good and shit. And that has meant a lot to me over the last year or so. Having that; that itself was a pleasant surprise for me - having Tony and Brian and then Lorraine into the picture. She is so sweet. I don't really know anybody nicer. So just having that on the road with me over there in the UK and Europe is going to be pleasant.
NI ROCKS – It’s a great lineup. Lorraine also mentioned that you and Tony (West from Blacklist Union) were good friends so it was obviously a good choice to get the three of you together as a touring set-up.
TAIME - Yeah, it's just fun. It's fun going out with friends. I mean, last time we went over there, we went over there with The Answer and Mr. Big. We were friends a little bit with the Mr. Big guys, a little bit. The Answer, we didn't know them at all. And it was a lot of fun, but it's fun going over there with somebody you actually know; which we really haven't done. Most of the time we've played over there, we've had different bands from out there playing with us, touring with us and stuff. And it ended up being fun because you didn’t know them, but by the end of the tour, you're all buddy buddy and hugging. It's like going to camp when you're a kid, you know what I mean? So that's fun too. But having the year I had, just be able to go over there with some friends, it's going to be a lot less chaotic. And, you know, I'm a lot older now, too. I don't drink and, you know, all that, all that shit. So it's a little bit more peaceful. Just get to business and do some rock and roll.
NI ROCKS – We mentioned earlier that the band’s debut self-titled album celebrates 40 years since its release in 2027. There were some re-issues between 2013 and 2019; but are there any plans for a 40th anniversary re-issue or anything like that?
TAIME - I don't know. There are no plans yet. I'm still working on tunes. So it's like we'll see. I don't know. We'll see what pops up. After the fall, after this run, we'll see what comes up for the new year. I'm still working on some new tracks. So, who knows. 40 years! Who would have thought? I didn't think.
NI ROCKS - It's hard to believe.
TAIME - 40 years. I know! I'm just like, did some shit recently with Slash and Duff at Jennifer's thing. It's like we've been around forever. He just turned 60. I'm 61. It's just like we're all fuckin’ almost senior citizens. So it's like, okay, it is what it is.
NI ROCKS - I'm not too far. I'm 57, so I'm not too far behind.
TAIME - Yeah, at least we're still here. You know what I mean? When you say what should fans expect. They get to see me standing upright! Well, who knows? It's a month. A lot of things could happen in a month at our age (Laughs).
NI ROCKS – I thought we’d play something from that first album now. And again, do you want to pick a track? You can pick one of the well-known ones or one of the last well-played ones. What do you want to play?
TAIME - We're going to be opening. I don't know if you have “Motorbike”, but we're going to be opening up with that, but we're going to be playing the good shit. We're going to play “Where There’s A Whip There’s A Way”.
NI ROCKS – Actually, I wanted to talk about “Motorbike” later, so I'll play something from the first album first, if that's okay.
TAIME - Sure. Fuck I don't care. “Cathouse” if you want.
NI ROCKS – You talked about the band releasing a couple of singles through Golden Robot Records in 2023 and 2025 and there was an earlier release in 2021 on your own label Little Dove Records. That obviously led to a lot of people talking about - is there going to be a new album at some stage. Is there anything that you can tell us? You mentioned that you were working on some tracks.
TAIME - We're working on some stuff right now. I've just been kind of in the mode even for a while. You know, we started working on this stuff, or I started working on this stuff 10 years ago. It's just, we kept going on the road and then I'd come back and go, where the fuck did we leave off? Tracks would get lost or whatever; I'm still finding stuff and that's cool. And when the pandemic hit we went into the studio the day everything got closed because we were gonna go track some new stuff. Anyway that happened the day we went in the studio. I think Chad (Stewart) got COVID that day then too. So that's when we started doing it and I've just been in the mode, the mindset of just doing a track at a time. There wasn't that go into a studio and working out a bunch of songs with the guys thing. We’re old and lazy and we're all set and I'm the only one working on the shit. So it's like getting Sam (Bam Koltun) over here, though, you know, he's out doing Godsmack right now. But then he gets back before we go over there. We’ve got his replacement that's filled in for him a couple times before but this kid Chris (Borell) that's really good - if he could play Sam Bam's parts note for note that takes some fucking skills. So Chris is there and Ace (Von Johnson) - ABJ - is coming up. So our other guitar player Kieran (Robertson) who's from Scotland and he also plays with Geoff Tate and stuff, he can't leave the country here otherwise he can't get back in! He did some stupid shit and got married to the wrong person and it just turned into….things kids do when they're stupid. ABJ's our old guitar player who was with us the last time we went over there. He's going to fill in for Kieran. So we got two new guitar players for this run. But they all know what they do. They've all done what they've done for us before in the same role. So going over there is going to be smooth and nice because Ace was just with us on the on the cruise. And like I said before, Chris filled in for Sam Bam on a couple shows we had last year.
NI ROCKS – The latest single releases all came out on 7” vinyl. I love it that that format is making a come-back. Obviously you had your own label (on the first release), but were you involved in any of the decisions around the later two singles onto 7” vinyl as well?
TAIME - Oh yeah, because we started the first one during the pandemic before I did anything with Golden Robot. And I met Mark and we got along really good. So it's like, well, let's put the next one out. And that was for “Like a Ghost”. And we did that. But we did the first one ourself, which is because we didn't really have a label. We just wanted to do something because the pandemic was there. And let's do a vinyl. And I just kind of researched it in terms of let's do 7” vinyl. I'm like asking certain friends I know that deal with vinyl. Who do I talk to? Where do I start? I just kind of went with my friends, where I went from point A to point B. Okay. Who, who to fuckin’ master it? Who to press it? Who to, you know, and then we, we did all that on our own and it did killer. It was great. And then when we, and I just wanted to keep doing that and we did “Like a Ghost” and we just did “Motorbike” last year and we got another song called “Pretty Ugly” that I was trying to get done before, but I had just been dealing with some other personal stuff. Actually the song's done. It's just, there was a mix that needed to be tweaked before it's mastered. I got to figure out what I'm going to do with the B side. I got a couple of other tracks that are partially done. They're not done. So I don't know if I'm going to finish them before I leave or we'll finish one of them when I get back and get something to probably come out early in like January or something next year.
NI ROCKS – Okay. I was wanting to talk about the three singles and play them actually, but I thought we'd go through them and maybe talk about each of the tracks and get you to tell us something about them. The first single in 2021 was a track you wrote called “Nola” and it features a cover of “Pirate Love” by Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers on the other side. What can you tell us about “Nola”?
TAIME - Nola was written, that was like I said, that one was written like right after Katrina. It was written for the earlier “The Power & the Glory Hole” record and it just wasn't done yet by the time we were mixing that record, the songs for that one. It wasn't done. There was a lot of chaos going on. It was fun. So then I was going through old shit and I just liked the track and I played it with Sam and Sam loved it; so we just redid it. We reworked it a little bit. We did the whole tracks completely. We did everything. But most of the vocals were, you know, done. I just retracked them and we put them out and we had done the same with “Pirate Love”. We had done a couple of different versions of that over the years. It was going to go on something and it came out the perfect time. It was the anniversary of his death. So it kind of worked out perfectly for that as well as, plus we thought it turned out pretty cool. But that was an old song written about Hurricane Katrina and shit back then.
NI ROCKS – It’s a great track. The second single in 2023 was “Like a Ghost” which I’ve noticed has been included in some of your recent setlists. It again had “Pirate Love” on the b-side. What's the story with “Like a Ghost”?
TAIME - That was the first one we did. That's when we did the first shit with Golden Robot too. And that and that song itself, “Like a Ghost”, was the first song I ever wrote sober. Not like I was drunk writing the other songs or I or that I was an alcoholic, but the main reason I got sober and all that shit too was mainly smoking. I quit smoking and I quit drinking and I quit drugs just all because they all go together for me. They did with me anyway. So, it was the first time since I have been doing a lot of the shit in my adult adulthood, sitting here working on tunes where I didn't have a shot or a beer and a pack of smokes and a trail of ashes all over my shit. It was sober, really sober and smoke free and all that. Which is weird, but because you used to get a little buzz and write some riffs and do that shit by the end of the night. Then the next day he was like, what the hell is that? You know what I mean?
NI ROCKS – The latest single, you’ve mentioned was “Motorbike”, which has been your show opener recently. It also included a cover of the INXS track “Don’t Change”.
TAIME - That's the song we did the first time we went to Australia. “Don't Change” was fun to record too and we had got Ronnie Simmons, he was playing with us for a minute; he's from Australia he was in a band The Art that came over with us before when we came over and we got him to do some tracks on it too.
NI ROCKS – Okay. What about “Motorbike”? What's the story there?
TAIME - That's just my life (laughs), riding motorcycles and that's just, just a fuckin’ rocking tune. I ride with Gilby and we have a whole clan of us rock and rollers that ride out here in LA and shit. And we recorded my buddy's old panhead at the beginning of it. And he was all excited about it. He’s like the song's okay, but my motorcycle sounds awesome. Yeah, that's just that's just our latest song. It is what it is. I do what I do.
NI ROCKS – Will that be the show opener then for the tour.
TAIME – Probably. “Motorbike” is a good one to open. That one and “Whip”. We might rotate. I'm not sure, but just with having Chris and Ace, I got to be a little bit more structured because they're not always in the picture. With Kieran and Sam, we can switch everything up and change everything around. They know where to grab everything, you know, in terms of what guitar is ready for this. We're going to have a different tech out there and different everything. So probably, yeah, “Motorbike” will probably be the opener realistically.
NI ROCKS – I’ll play a couple of those tracks now.
NI ROCKS – Talking about vinyl releases earlier brings me on to the subject of merchandise. There is some great stuff on the band’s website under the Pussy Power Tarding Company brand. I presume that you’ll be bringing a load of t-shirts etc for fans?
TAIME - We're going to bring a couple. There's only so much room we can have for everything because I think, you know, Blacklist and Lorraine will probably be bringing some stuff too as well. But, we're getting stuff done right now. We'll have two different shirts and we'll have a hoodie and a baseball cap and there'll be some posters. Yeah, I'm gonna try to smuggle some vinyl in. So we're gonna pick and bring some, I don't know how much we're gonna bring. The thing with vinyl too, it's all heavy. So it's okay, I can bring these two pair of pants or I can bring this little box of vinyl. But yeah, no, we're gonna bring some, probably some of the… I don't have any of the “Like a Ghost” vinyl because those ones were done in Australia. And then we did the “Motorbike” ones through LA and then through the Czech Republic and then sent some to Mark over at Golden Robot and others came here. So I have those. So I'm going to probably bring those. And “Nola”, I don't think we have any of the regular pressings left. So yeah, we'll bring a couple of boxes “Motorbike” over with us.
NI ROCKS – I’ll try to pick one of those up! It’s now 20 years since the release of the last album; “The Power & The Glory Hole” in 2006. It did get a re-release in 2013. I presume there are no plans for another re-release?
TAIME - I don't know. I've been thinking about it because I'm thinking about having it remastered and re-released with new art and stuff too. It's been a bit. And put that on vinyl as well. Just me trying to find it. I don't even have any more copies of it anymore (laughs). It's out of print right now.
NI ROCKS – That album featured Chad on drums and Danny on bass and they’re still with you. Sam and Kieran as you’ve mentioned have been in and out, but it must be nice to have that continuity in the line-up?
TAIME - Yeah they're my brothers you know. Like I say Faster has always been my family and I still talk to Greg (Steele) all the time too. Greg and (Brent) Muscat and Eric (Stacy) I get along with all them but I talk to Greg all the time. We deal with a lot of the old Faster business. We took him on the boat with us this last time we were on the boat, last spring.
NI ROCKS – Outside of Faster Pussycat you’ve managed clubs and been part of The Newlydeads in the past. Are you involved in any other projects at the minute? What keeps you busy when not touring with Faster Pussycat?
TAIME - No, not these days. I’ve just been riding my motorcycle, hanging out with my dog and just hanging out with my friends and you know just doing mellow shit. Like I said, working on some music, I'm trying to get back into that after what happened. It's just been kind of tough to go there. And now I'm trying to get in that mode. I got some really close friends and I've just been kind of leaning on them to help me through shit. And Fred Coury, old drummer from Cinderella, he's like, of my best friends on the planet I talk to him like every day at least a couple times a day and he's just been completely, just a lifesaver for me.
NI ROCKS – It’s good to have that around you.
TAIME – It is and that's what I've been doing I just been trying to re do with my life and just make my days peaceful and not stress out about shit. I'm 61 I've been playing rock and roll for you know since I was fuckin’ 18, 17 years old. And it's just being able to do that for, you know, my whole life is pretty cool. So I'm like, just trying to enjoy my day, you know what I mean? And not let shit stress out. I'm gonna work on some new tunes. I'm surrounding myself with good people and just gonna play some rock and roll shows in Europe. So that'd be cool. And then maybe some different shit next year, twenty-seven, so.
NI ROCKS - When did you stop doing the club thing? You used to manage a few clubs; when did you stop doing all that?
TAIME - Well, I stopped doing them probably 2005, maybe 20 years ago. And then the last, like I said, the last 10 years, almost 10, I've been sober. So I didn't even want to fuckin’ go in a bar. Especially at the beginning. I don't mind it now. It doesn't bother me now. But right when I quit, you know, I mean, the last thing I want to do is club guy, because that was me. That was me chain smoking and fuckin’ drinking and doing cocaine in the bathrooms and thinking, yeah, did that, been there, done that. But yeah, I'm 61. Club goers should not be 61. I don't give a fuck what anybody says. The clubs are for the kids. You know what I mean? They're for the kids. They're for fucking in the bathrooms and getting wasted and thrown out. And it's just the shit you do when you're in your 20s and 30s and whatever.
NI ROCKS - No, that's right.
TAIME - Well, that's my thought on that.
NI ROCKS – That’s all the questions that I have for you. Thanks for taking the time to speak to me. We look forward to seeing you over in Europe in a few weeks and specifically at The Empire in Belfast on Sunday 13th September.
