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Fu Manchu
 You don't need to know Fu Manchu by their music. That genuinely funky logo and those album sleeves - with pent up hot rods and vans - always tell the story on their own. Yeah, you know the band I am talking about.
Long into their second decade, Fu Manchu have been happily slogging along at a pace convenient to them but now, with their Century Media debut 'We Must Obey', it looks like that is all about to change. I decided to catch up with guitarist and vocalist Scott Hill to see if the band have yet entered the stratosphere and exactly why there is no car on their album cover this time round...
"Well, you know, this is the first one [without one]," laughs Hill, "there are no actual cars on the front but there is a car song, so we are still keeping up the tradition."
Okay, so it seems you can take the car out of the band but you can't end up taking the band out of the car. And so with the change of direction, in the form of the cover's sleeve, also comes a slight change in terms of the band's music. Fu Manchu are "Back to being fuzzy," Hill keenly points out - which is something that a lot of older fans are sure to be happy about.
When one attempts to go back into the band's history, it seems strange to see that Fu Manchu have put out ten odd albums on several different record label - and that's not counting their slew of EPs and singles, either. I wonder if the band has any thoughts about maybe releasing any of their older material...
"Well, actually, we are trying to re-release the first two records," confirms the frontman. "We have been talking to the guy that owns that label [Bong Load Custom] about possibly putting out both of them on the one CD but with different artwork. The other albums are on [record label] Mammoth - and they still own the releases - so yeah, we are just looking at the first two [CDs] at the moment."
It might seem hard for a band to build up their profile, I mention, what with constant changes from one label to another label, and Hill agrees with me to an extent.
"Well, we have been around since 1990, which is like 17 years now, but we really only started putting out records since '95 and we put out our first two records on this really small label called Bong Load Records and then we signed to Mammoth and that was a bigger independent label. We were with Mammoth for five or six records before they closed up shop and then we signed one live record with SPV [a German metal label and distributor]."
Which brings us to the band's brand new album, released on a brand new label - and none other than Century Media. With Century Media being one of the larger metal independents and Fu Manchu's music not being exactly the most marketable - let's face it, stoner rock is never going to sell millions of records - this seems like an unusual relationship. Hill, however, seems pretty excited about the prospect, nonetheless.
"They seem to be in it for the long haul. They're really familiar with the band and know a lot about us. It definitely helps that everyone at the label is into the band. They are definitely looking at the long term and not just looking at it for a quick hit."
This is all very true, with Fu Manchu traditionally being more of a 'cult' band, rather than a novelty act or a trend of the moment, so to speak. So, would the band tend to agree with this assessment?
"We don't sell millions of records," confirms the frontman, "but the amount we do sell is good because we don't have to spend $200,000 in the studio. We do everything pretty cheap. And the records we do might sell - I mean, we might sell 100,000 records or whatever - but at the end of the day, a band like us doesn't need to sell a couple of million records to make much back."
One can't argue with an attitude like Hill's, after all, it's probably a factor in the group's long-lasting success as a band.
'We Must Obey' is out now through Century Media
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