Mammoth nabbed an exclusive interview with The Trons - an all robot band hailing from Hamilton.

MM: How did you get together and what made you want to start a band?
TT: This old photocopy card vender machine turned up and was going to the dump. And there was this pile of meccano and an old guitar. We just put three and three together.

How would you describe your music?
Junk pop!

You’ve played a few warm-up shows leading up to the Fringe festival. What sort of responses have you got as a fresh new band cutting your teeth on the local music scene?
Yeah.. people were into it! It was crazy. We were going to just bust ourselves up cause we thought we were just a pile of rubbish but turned out people digged it! Was all a bit much really.

Do you attract many groupies?
Just the drummer. The drummer always gets the groupies! Swamp you stupid shit, stop hogging all the girls.

Who are some of your inspirations? Do you look up to some of the pioneers of electronic music, such as the Juno 6 or the Commodore 64?
Definitely the ZX81. Clive Sinclair and 1K of RAM! You gotta have limitations to make good music. We can’t keep away from 3D Monster Maze too.

I’ve heard speculation about your manager (Greg Locke) manipulating your circuit boards. Is this rumour true or are you completely self-aware?
When we are playing we are totally ourselves, the weirdness just happens when we stop. Like… “where did we go??” Greg’s been meddling a bit but he’s actually trying to turn complete control over to us! Not sure about that, we’ll have to see. I think we’ll need a clap’o'meter or boo’o'meter to keep us in check.

What are your ambitions for the future of robotic music?
Just to rock out with the humans and have some fun! You guys are incredible, but we reckon we have something to contribute too. There can never be too much music eh?

See The Trons live:
11am, Fri 13 June: The Trons Live @ Garden Place
12:30pm, Fri 13 June: The Trons Live @ Garden Place
11:30am, Sun 15 June: The Trons Live @ The Meteor
Sat 9pm, 21 June 2008: Night of the Freakin Hamiltrons @ Flow bar

myspace.com/thtrons