Will Sergeant isn’t the kind of guy to wax poetic about destiny. Which makes it all the more satisfying that he stumbled his way into one of the most mythologized bands of the post-punk era and lived to casually shrug about it. “I’m just a geezer,” he says. “I just happened to be in this situation because I’ve got an imagination.”
That modesty might sound like false humility if you hadn’t read Bunnyman, his no-frills, darkly funny, wildly compelling memoir of Echo & the Bunnymen’s earliest days—starting with Will growing up in post-war Liverpool, obsessed with spy novels, cold war paranoia, and John Le Carré’s grubby brand of betrayal. “I liked the side of spying where they shit on their friends,” he says. “Not jumping around in fancy cars with ejector seats.”
If it sounds like an odd foundation for a band whose best-known songs sound like goth dreams melted in melancholy grandeur, well, that’s the point. The Bunnymen’s sound was never about genre—it was about texture. “We didn't want to go down the obvious route,” Sergeant says. “We didn't want the cheesy pop stuff. But we liked a bit of danceability, a bit of discord. That’s what made it interesting.”
The autobiography—Bunnyman is just part one of a planned trilogy—covers Sergeant’s youth and the band’s first year, back when Echo was a drum machine and Mac hadn’t even sung for them yet. In fact, no one in the band had heard Ian McCulloch sing before their first show. “Someone said he could sing,” Will shrugs. “So that’ll do.” Thank god they were right.
The real magic, though, was in the accidents. The iconic guitar intro to “The Killing Moon”? Just Will checking his tuning while the tape happened to be rolling. They went out for a curry. The producer heard it, bounced it onto tape, and made it the opening to their most haunting track. “I didn’t even consciously think of it as an intro,” he says. “To this day, I’m still not sure I’m playing it the same way live.”
Sergeant is a fan first, still buying records, still going down musical rabbit holes. “I bought an album today,” he says. “Always buying records. I love discordant stuff. The Residents. Things other people find unpalatable.” That taste, he says, is the compass. “A combination of notes can be seen as crap or brilliant. It’s all about taste. But if it sounds like some cheesy pop thing—I’ll reject it.”
He’s also very aware of the absurdity of mythologizing. “A lot of bands try and make out like they’re something other than normal,” he says. “They’re not. We weren’t goths. If anything, it was European. We were all just mates. That’s how scenes happen—your friends start bands too.”
That whole scene—Teardrop Explodes, Wah!, and others—gets lovingly de-mythologized in Bunnyman. Ten gigs in and they were signed to Sire Records, home of Talking Heads and the Ramones. “That was a massive deal,” Will says. “But then they spent all the money on the Undertones, so we got moved to another Warner’s label.” It sounds like a disaster, but he shrugs that off too. “Just another chance thing. Loads of that stuff happened. Luck. Accidents. That’s what this is.”
Even the writing of the book was an accident. “I did some liner notes for reissues, realized I could do it,” he says. “It’s just talking. I’m not Shakespeare.” The idea to anchor each chapter to a piece of music—Telstar, Tequila, Joe Meek oddities—was his way of grounding the era. “It’s history. The background soundtrack of what was going on. Sputnik. Cold war satellites. Strikes. Power cuts. People sitting around playing board games by candlelight.”
The difference between the UK and the US? “No one was dropping bombs on your mum and dad,” he says, dry as ever.
As for the future? A tour’s coming, and yes, another Bunnymen album... eventually. He’s not in a rush. “I wasn’t that keen on re-recording the old stuff for BMG,” he admits. “But we’ll do another one eventually. The pandemic slowed everything down. And I haven’t played any Bunnymen songs since 2019.”
Not that he seems particularly worried. “It’s ingrained,” he says. “Pick up the guitar, it just knows where to go.” Like he said—it’s not destiny. It’s just imagination, a bit of taste, and the occasional happy accident.
Watch the interview above and then check out the videos below.
