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Q1 2008featurefeatureQ1 200832“I certainly wasn’t out going to seeBauhaus or the Sex Pistols,” she says,“although I certainly went through theschoolgirl crush thing. I had Adam Ant, JohnTaylor, and Stuart Adamson from Big Countryon my school folder. When I later went on ahiking holiday with Simon Le Bon, I couldn’ttell him that John Taylor was on the folderand not him.”...at ILMC 14UK universities in the late 80s weresuffering from poor levels of investment andfunding, and the entertainment departmentsof the student unions were no exception.“They were screwed up as there was noincentive to make money,” Banks says. “I gotinvolved in the Rag organisation [fund raisingby students in the UK] which had to makemoney as it was all for charity.“I got to know a guy called Neil Richardswho ran it, but there were maybe five or sixof us,” she says. “By my second year it wasme and Neil running it – putting the showson, costing them out, being tight abouteverything and deciding that agents werewankers and the scum of the earth.”Her three years at university were far fromthe pot-smoking, philosophising doss ofpopular myth. Still harbouring dreams ofbecoming an actress after graduating, Banksspent office hours in the laboratory,lunchtimes selling tickets or in the Rag office,and evenings making the sandwiches for theriders and promoting the gigs.We did everything,” she says. “I swept thefloor when everyone left.”As she began to fall deeper into liveBANDS ARE GETTINGME AT A BETTER TIME NOW AS““I’VE BOUGHT A MAPmusic’s rabbit hole, Banks and Richardsbegan managing local support act Jo JoNamoza: they pressed a single, printed T-shirts and booked gigs. They also arrangedshows for Atlantic artist Katell Keineg, whoBanks later represented when she got “aproper job.”“I loved being part of the spectacle –helping to create it,” she says. “It’s not thatdifferent to running the horse shows; I’dprobably be a good wedding planner. It’sabout being logical and thorough andlooking after everybody and making surethey have a good time.”AGENCY BREAKBy the time she graduated in 1989, heraspirations to attend drama school hadCrowded Housebeen replaced by the decision to enter the music industry, although thelast thing Banks wanted was to be an agent. “I couldn’t think ofanything worse,” she says.“I wrote lots of letters and most people didn’t respond. I had aninterview with a few people – I saw [Sony’s] Muff Winwood, [FoodRecord’s] Andy Ross, and [Chrysalis Publishing’s] Stuart Slater who metmy parents at a dinner party, but nobody was giving me a job. Muffsaid I was overqualified. It got quite depressing and my dad, the workethic king of the world, was getting frustrated.”In an extreme bout of selflessness, Banks’ mother had ahysterectomy earlier than necessary, in order that her daughter couldspend an extra three months at home as her carer, but time wasrunning out, both for her dreams and her degree. (“A food sciencedegree becomes irrelevant quite quickly because people are inventingnew baked beans.”)“xx”Marilyn Manson