Sean Dickson aka Hifi Sean has been fronting The Soup Dragons ever since they burst onto the scene in the mid 80’s scoring a string of independent hits before smashing the hit parade with I’m Free. 30 odd years later the band are back with their original line, new material and touring the nations. Shiiine On sat down with Sean for this exclusive interview!

Hi Sean, how’s life been for you since The Soup Dragons have reformed?

It has been quite a life affirming experience for me personally getting back with guys who I grew up with and spent my teenage years experiencing the highs and the lows of the music industry but always maintaining a tight solid gang. It weirdly still feels like we are 18 again in our heads when we get together.

The same vocabulary rhythms the same social dynamics and the same love for what we did and still do. And me personally this is why I am doing all this again. I am discovering things about myself as that young man reading what I wrote in those lyrics and what I was trying to convey what was happening in my mind and turn them into songs.

There is a lot of teenage angst and confusion and a hell of a lot of catholic guilt. But I know why I am still doing this and I think the other guys do too and we all know it is all for the right reasons. We still love getting together and making a loud noise like we did when we were 17.

The reaction to the bands Raw TV Products album release has been superb. Did this reaction surprise you?

I think it was a very honest collection as I have seen other bands try to hide and fluff their past or create myths to self market themselves in a modern world. But ‘RAW TV’ collection was as personal snapshot of what The Soup Dragons early years meant to us and to so many others from those 5 years leading up to the ‘Lovegod’ album at which point Ross left the band to pursue his art career. I took over a more electronic vision using samplers , drum machines and technology to my song writing which was not alien to me.

I was making electronic music age 14/15 in my bedroom before The Soup Dragons and this was documented by the album ‘Silent Industry’ which was released last year. An album I made that age 14 on cassette and bizarrely now on vinyl. So all this press band wagon jumping nonsense thrown at us made no sense at all as messing with electronics was a trajectory I always dabbled in. I get hit with all the time on social media regarding did you copy this album did you copy that ? Kind of impossible when the album in mention that always comes up came out year later ?

But its good these days you can put the record straight so to speak. It infuriates me that my artistic vision and electronic programming skills are always shadowed by this nonsense. And the ‘There has always been a dance element to our records’ NME quote. Which I NEVER said.

I said there had alway been a dance element to our record ‘collections’. Of course there was ! They cleverly left that word out. We were even on predominately a dance label at that point ‘Big Life’ with fellow label mates like Coldcut , The Orb , De La Soul etc. And we all collected soul and disco records since the band started.

But this all laid down to the classic fact that The Soup Dragons did not move to London and hang out with the right journalists at that point passing bags of ecstasy as payola to make them feel part of our gang and part of theirs. There was a lot of that stuff going on back then. We were strangers from up north so therefore no one really knew our true intentions on the London scene. Only those around us in Glasgow. I once did an interview and the guy said ‘oh you are actually quite intelligent’.

Which kind of summed it up what was happening and how we were being portrayed. While other bands were being all trad rock n roll in London we were in Glasgow playing our new electronic dub influenced club 12” ‘Mother Universe’ at a local rave tin a club for a bag of Gary’s ha ! I saw the new psychedelia as we were always a punk rock psychedelic band in our eyes. We followed that new psychedelia and we followed that new psychedelic technology with samplers and electronic drum sequencers.

I know what came when and the true trajectory. Also for the record who has been working as a DJ last 25 years and travelled the World being one says a lot about my personal mind set to music. So yes this backlash at that point lead to years of me hitting ground zero and depression as being written off as someone who fakes his own art.

Try living with that. It was one of the reasons we decided to hell with this we are off to USA and we had Top 20 hits there and hit the road and travelled coast to coast for many years. Believe me I do not have a single bone in my body that would want to lazily artistically duplicate anything. I would at least like the band to have some artistic credit and artistic merit for being ahead of the indie curve back then with Mother Universe in 1989 and then the albums Lovegod and Hotwired.

Both albums were like nothing anyone was doing in our fields at that time. A lot and I mean a lot of UK music press bollocks were written about us at certain periods. I wish there was social media then like there is now as you could have called this out in real time. There is the thing …..people with intelligence could see right through this and only time shows the true believers.

Have you felt a connection with your audience playing these, in certain circles, lesser known but nonetheless sensational material?

Obviously there are those who know the I’m Free , Divine Thing , Mother Universe period etc more than the earlier years but at the shows the energy for the whole night seems to be regardless of which period the songs are from and just that the vibe of what is happening in real time transcends.

How has the reactions been to the bands live gigs?

The reaction has been fantastic and we have met some many old fans again being back on the road. And big shout out to Dave Watson who used to travel to see us back in the day and now runs our social media pages.

He literally knows way more about the band than we even do ourselves. Our social media was totally lazy and shit on our behalf and he has honestly created a lovely family of true Soups fans again , like what we used to do back in the day with fanzines.

Few weeks ago we played ‘Glas-Goes-Pop’ festival in west end of Glasgow literally round the corner from the street I lived where I wrote all those songs back then. Even that infamous night coming back from some rave to my flat and switching TV on at 4am and the Stones at Hyde Park came on BBC 2 and I hear ‘Im Free’ for the first ever time and sat there and thought ok I got a mad idea ! Few months later in a studio !

Just think if that had never happened ?! I never switched the TV on at that moment ? But that ‘Glas-Goes-Pop’ festival was spiritual as people had tears in their eyes reliving some of those songs , especially Soft As Your Face I saw someone getting so emotional listening to it it choked myself up and I could hardly sing the last chorus !

Do the band have pre gig rituals?

You know something its just the usual a buzzing backstage vibe to get onstage and rock it out like we always have. Like a bunch of kids on red smarties. We can’t wait to just get on there and do our thing.

Are you surprised how the original line up have come back together and playing so naturally again?

I will tell you a beautiful story. First time we played together in a room as the original 4 was the day we went into the studio to record the ‘Love Is Love’ single few years ago. We set up in the studio as a circle so we were all facing each other. And I said let’s play ‘Whole Wide World’. Ross counts in …1,2,3,4 and bam. It was exactly like being transported back to your former self. When it finished we looked at each other literally with tears in our eyes and realised ….ok this is going to work.

Was a really beautiful moment I will never forget.

Are the band all listening to the same music when the band originally formed?

Not really , I mean I was listening to a lot of electronic music and not just guitar based music and Jim had a great northern soul collection , Sushil liked experimental dub vibes and Ross was more into fuzzed up 60’s garage stuff.

But I think we met in the middle when it came to the current indie scene in Glasgow at the time with greats like The Pastels and The Jesus & Mary Chain felt like people we knew who at same time blew our minds.

What are your favourite tracks to play with the band?

I love ‘Whole Wide World’ which we tend to do always first. I think it’s one of the most naive perfect pop songs I wrote back then as it is pure teenage angst and only a teenager could write that. I think I wrote it age 16. “Soft As Your Face’ is another favourite as it sometimes feels like we are playing a cover version as it feels like it has always existed from another time.

Are you looking forward to play Shiiine On 2025?

ONE HUNDRED PERCENT.

And here is a fun fact… I DJ’d at Shiine On about 6 years ago when my single ‘Testify’ as Hifi Sean was released and I promised the guys then that one day ‘The Soup Dragons’ will get back together and play here ….and guess what !

What can fans expect when you play Shiiine On?

A snapshot from every period of the band with all the fan favourites and something for everyone. Even the new songs we released a few years ago.

Are you looking forward to seeing any other bands on the line up?

It is great to see BMX Bandits on the same bill as you know myself and Duglas and Norman from the Teenage Fanclub all grew up together in Bellshill and cut our musical teeth together in those early days.

I was one of the former members of the Bandits and wrote a few songs. The Jesus and Mary Chain were my Sex Pistols in my teenage years. That band blew my mind when ‘Upside Down’ came out and they only lived a few miles up the road from me. The Soups played with them in the early days and I still bloody love Jim & William ..iconic. So really looking forward to seeing them too.

Do The Soup Dragons have any plans to release new music in the future?

Any decent record labels out there want to give us a deal you know where to contact. I think we would be up for it but with a decent label behind us.

Are you reading any books at present?

I just re-read ‘The Psychopath’ by A.M Edwards. In it this killer uses songs to base each murder on. One chapter is using ‘Soft As Your Face’ by The Soups ! I cannot give the story away but let’s just say the song title tells you a LOT. I agreed that if it becomes a movie they can use the song while he makes his killing. I do hope it comes out as a movie.

Finally, what’s currently on your turn table?

Yesterday I re-listened from start to finish the album ‘Happy Ending’ by ‘Hifi Sean and David McAlmont’. If you have never heard our first (of three) albums we made last few years then please do. I still get very emotional listening to that album. It is augmented by a 60 piece Bollywood orchestra and recorded in Bangalore , India. From a production point of view I think it is the closest thing to perfection I think I have ever  produced.

Soup Dragons can be found here

Tickets for Shiiine On 2025 can be purchased here