BROADCAST Psychadelic liquid wheels, 'Midnight Cowboy' and the theme to the early '80s educational programme 'Picture Box' - all have been invoked by folk desperate enough to find precedents for that unique Broadcast sound, and not without justification. "I remember 'Picture Box',' says keyboard-player Roj. 'As a kid I used to love watching that musical box whirling round as the end credits rolled..." Also revealing is their friendship with Camberwell esperimentalists Stereolab, on whose Duophonic label the Birmingham quintet's first three singles were released... After an unsuccessful bidding war between major labels, the band decide to sign to a (yet to be named) dance indie... If you could claim expenses on being a pop star, what would you claim for? Roj(keyboardist): It would probably be something really boring, like studio equipment. We're too into the music really to enjoy the other aspects of the band. Do you have a secret musical history you'd like to share with us? Roj: Oh dear. I think we all have. Trish (vocals): We've played in shit bands before, but none that anyone would have heard of. James (bassist): I was in an Acid Jazz band. Trish: A couple of us were in a band called Pan Am Flight Bag. Then we gradually got into a Brian Auger groove before joining Broadcast. Let me guess, you do what you wanna do and if anyone else likes it, It's a bonus - yes? Roj: Actually, we write music for other people and if we like it, it's a bonus. Would you, like David Bowie, float yourselves on the stock exchange? Roj: What, as a company? It's not the kind of thing that occurs to us really. Would you rather your music united or divided the generations? Roj: We don't make overtly political music, so it wouldn't really matter. Sex with groupies: yes or no? Roj: We'll tell you when it happens. Chris Evans: hero or zero? Tim (guitarist): I'd have to say the latter. He just represents all the worst aspects of the whole lad thing. Trish: I dont like the way he talks to women. Roj: These days, people try and claim they're being ironic by treating women like shit, but you cant say a supposedly ironic thing again and again, without expecting it to lose its irony. Give us your best conspiracy theory. Roj: Conspiracy theories are propagated by the CIA in a bid to make us think we have less power over our lives than we do. But really, they dont exist. Apart from that one, of course. Would you sack a member of your band if they spoke out in favour of Ecstasy? Trish: We'd probably give them a pay rise. Name the three biggest folk heroes of the moment: James: Einstein and Newton should be two, because the sum total of all our scientific knowledge is based on their theories, both of which, interestingly enough, are mutually exclusive. Tim: We need a third, dont we? I'd like to nominate Hugh Scully. Why? Because he frightens my cat. TIME OUT 19-26 February 1997