EdinburghGuide.com How long have you been playing music?
Johnny Dredd About 12 years. As a kid I would steal into peoples' rooms and play their guitars whenever I knew noone was around, but I didn't get one until I left home.

EdinburghGuide.com What kind of music do you play?
Johnny Dredd Folk Junk. Wow! How to put the next wave into words: pop, folk, reggae, flamenco all base their tunes on a simple three chord matrix, I take that and an acoustic guitar out busking on the street and shout things that people aren't entirely comfortable with. I havn't been hit yet, but there are people holding their breath for it.

EdinburghGuide.com How do you find the music scene in Edinburgh? Is it easy or tough? Is it barren or fertile?
Johnny Dredd The scene in Edinburgh is unique - people travelling through are always commenting on the levels of co-operation. It is not just the quality, it's the togetherness. There's no bitching or jealousy; if someone finds a gig that suits someone else, then they give it away because it would be better that way. It is difficult to talk about quality because I'm part of it, but I think it is magic. The Jason Pillays, Dan Mutch, Graeme Mearns, Polly Phillips, Roz McGlone, Holly Tomas, the unique Freeloading Frank, Amy Duncan these are people, I happily sit and dribble over and that is only a few of them. I consider myself really lucky to be here at this time to be a part of what is going on.

EdinburghGuide.com What's the hardest part of what you do?
Johnny Dredd Being original.

EdinburghGuide.com What's the best part of what you do?
Johnny Dredd Flirt.

EdinburghGuide.com Have you got groupies yet?
Johnny Dredd This is so difficult to talk about: they will read this. They exist. They are all sexes and ages. I guess there are about 20 of them. There is one really scary bloke of about 40 who keeps kissing my hands. Also, a couple of months back this 14-year-old was going round her school telling everybody that she had shagged me. This was teen bullshit and luckily everyone, especially Hazel, understood it to be that. It could have been really upsetting if it had got out of hand, apart from the Gary Glitter angle. In the main it means, people buy me drinks when I'm good and tell me I'm shit when I'm bad.

EdinburghGuide.com What have been your biggest breaks?
Johnny Dredd Difficult to say I'm exercising a plan that involves a lot of leg work. I have on three occasions had alcoholics saying "You stick with me lad, I'll make you a star." They are always Forty, shaking drunk and boring, unable to listen and I wouldn't trust any of them to run me a bath let alone my professional career.

A couple of weeks ago this guy asked me to do two bits of music for television. He lands in the usual bracket of 40 and pissed, but he went a bit further and he managed to not really piss me off, we are waiting for the projects to get greenlighted. If they do then I could have my big break. If they don't, then I will continue business as usual.

EdinburghGuide.com How much do you use the net?
Johnny Dredd Not as much as I will, I have internet access @ work, but not at home. By the end of the summer, I intend to be musicly online, but that will require an investment of about £2000 and I also want a holiday, so we will have to see how to work it out.

EdinburghGuide.com Do you listen to other bands on the web?
Johnny Dredd Not often: again it is my hard drive I'm choking up with stuff so I tend to shy away from heavy files. Also, the guy who looks after the computer is anal in the extreme and my downloading of any exe file freaks him out.

EdinburghGuide.com What do you think of the revolution that's taking place in musical distribution using MP3s?
Johnny Dredd The technology has a way to go, but it won't be long, before it is totally fixed. My plan is to promote and sell over the web. The theory is the same as the trad market: get youself noticed and people will look. Now that looking involves the home terminal, whether you are Johnny Dredd or the Beatles, and all you need is a modem and a search engine.

I think the net is going to violently split the commercial from the art - it will be good. I'd also say that what is happening on the web is an evolution not a revolution: the evil corporate companies are not going to be knocked out by it and rest assured they are investing millions in the best web designers and online sales packages. People will shop on their sites because the sites are easy to use, whereas college bands' sites will more-than-likely be difficult to use and therefore get less interest.

EdinburghGuide.com What Edinburgh acts should we look out for in the future?
Johnny Dredd I look round that room at The Caz and know that only 5% of us are going to make anything of it. I have my personal prejudice, I gave it earlier on in this interview, but in truth I don't have a fucking scooby and I defy anyone else to have a better idea.

Johnny Dredd's Edinburgh open mic circuit>>