Fact #140165

RICK, THAT'S A SPLENDID BEARD YOU'RE SPORTING...
I bought it at Spencer and, uh, what's the place?

MARKS AND SPENCER.
Marks and Spencer. I bought some underwear and a beard.

WHY HAVE YOU GOT A KEY ATTATCHED TO YOUR BEARD, I'VE GOT TO ASK.
Well , if I don't this needs more weight and it curls up under my nose.

SO IT'S PRAGMATIC, IT'S NOT YOUR HOTEL ROOM KEY OR SOMETHING?
Uh, no it's actually the key to my daughter’s heart.

AAH. THATS LOVELY. SHAME SHE COULDN'T BE HERE TONIGHT.
Yes.

THE NEW ALBUM IS JUST FANTASTIC, I WAS A CHEAP TRICK FAN FROM THE START, TO ME THOUGH THERE WAS A PERIOD IN THE MIDDLE WHERE YOU LOST THE PLOT A BIT. WHAT WENT WRONG THERE?
If things wouldn't of gone wrong we wouldn't be here right now, so I look at something as more of a positive than a negative. What we actually did in this past year and a half or so we cleaned house we cleaned house, we changed management, produced our own record, changed record labels, got our own record label, changed publishing companies. We're coming to Europe, whether you want us to or not we're coming.

SO WHAT HELD YOU BACK BEFORE, WAS IT JUST THE BUSINESS SIDE OF THINGS OR WAS THERE A LACK OF CREATIVE INSPIRATION AS WELL?
Probably it was the people around us, they were giving us the wrong information. They weren't giving us grief, or the right kind of grief. They weren't enough on our side. I think everyone was out for themselves and here we were, we were just musical slaves. So we decided to clean house and we did that and we've had probably one of the best years we've ever had. Doesn't mean there isn't a lot of hard work we still have to do, but we're from the midwest of the United States so hard work doesn't scare us.

YOU KNOW ABOUT HARD WORK. TO DWELL SLIGHTLY ON THE PAST A LITTLE BIT LONGER. THERE WAS A FOUR CD SET THAT CAME OUT FROM SONY NOT LONG AGO, WERE YOU INVOLVED IN THE COMPILING OF THAT?
That actually came out last year. It was called "Sex, America, Cheap Trick". It was four CDs. Pretty much a compilation of all kinds of things, 30 unreleased tracks, different mixes, about 35 other tracks and actually Bun E Carlos did most of the work on that. He went through reels and reels of tape and found some things that were missing from our repertoire but now they're in and actually we're probably gonna do the same thing next year and the year after.

AND THE LABEL THAT YOU'VE SIGNED TO NOW IS CALLED RED ANT. THAT’S A NEW LABEL TO ME IS THAT LARGE IN AMERICA OR WHAT?
It's fairly new. I mean the people at the company are trained professionals, like trained seals you know?

(LAUGHING) WHERE DID THEY GET THAT IDEA FROM?
Well, I think it was a lot of people from different companies, tired of the companies they were from. I'm sure there are things that need repairing. We're in this business because we want to be, let’s try to do as many things right and be creative and have some fun with it, and once again it's going to be hard work but so what? I don't want anyone who works with us to be lazy and I love it and sometimes they crack a whip on us, I think It's good.

THERE’S A SONG ON THE ALBUM CALLED SHELTER WHICH SEEMS TO ME TO BE A VERY EMOTIONALLY POWERFUL SONG AND CHEAP TRICK IS A BAND I'VE ALWAYS LOVED FOR SLICK ROCK AND ROLL AND IT SEEMS TO BE UNUSUALTO ME FOR YOU.
The fact that we have any emotion at all? Lets see... er...

(LAUGHING) AFTER ALL THESE YEARS IN THE ROCK AND ROLL BUSINESS IS THERE ANYTHING LEFT?
We still have our fingers and our toes and parts of our brains still intact. Shelter was a song that was written ... a friend of mine wrote kind of the basis for the song and I took it and turned it into a Cheap Trick song and got Robin and Tom involved and we added a bridge to it and added a cello player, flew in a cello player to New York where we were doing the record. We'd used him ...a guy from the Rockford Illinois Symphony Orchestra. He's a professor at a college there. We couldn't beat the demo so we flew him out to New York to do the real record.

In the last year and a half my mother and father both died and Robin's father died the day he sang the vocals, not that we want that to be the inspiration. You can listen to it without knowing any of that stuff. It's just an emotional song about ... I don’t know maybe a postcard that never got sent.

YOUR DRUMMER BUN E CARLOS ISN'T HERE WITH US NOW BUT IS IT TRUE THAT HE HAD A BROKEN ARM THE NIGHT CHEAP TRICK AUDITIONED FOR COLUMBIA RECORDS?
Well ... kind of what had happened was Columbia records was coming to see us and the night before Columbia was showing up Bun E broke his arm and so he's left handed, he plays a right handed kit but he's left handed. Luckily he only broke his right arm when the people from Columbia records came out to see us. We actually had a second drummer.

WITH AN EXTRAORDINARY NAME...
Hammerin' Hank. Hammerin' Hank, he was a in a band ...kind of a jazz-fusion band called Good God from Philadelphia. That was in 1976, that was 21 years ago when we auditioned, luckily we passed the audition.

WHAT ARE THE OTHER CHEAP TRICK INLUENCES? THE BEATLES ARE THE OBVIOUS ONE BUT APPART FROM THAT WHAT WERE THE OTHER THINGS THAT WERE EXCITING TO YOU MUSICALLY?
Well, I always tell people, I love the Beatles of course but, you know, I didn't like everything they did and I don’t think they liked everything we did, but you know I like the Stones, the Who, the Yardbirds and some other more obscure English bands like the Move, and I liked the band Patto.

THAT’S A BAND I WOULDN'T HAVE PREDICTED, PATTO, THEY'RE KIND OF JAZZ ROCKY.
Yeah, They're great though. I think they're such an under-rated band. Patto, the Sensational Alex Harvey band, Alex Chilton, the Small Faces - like the early stuff I still love to this day, still one of my favourite records to this day is the very first Small Faces record, Whatcha Gonna Do ‘Bout It.

WHAT IS IT YOU LOOK FOR GENERALLY IN SOMEONE ELSE’S RECORD? CAN YOU NARROW IT DOWN AND SAY THERE’S A PARTICULAR ESSENCE THAT YOU LOOK FOR IN THE RECORDS THAT YOU LOVE?
No, I mean, the essence of the record, it looks for me, I don’t look for it, 'cause it'll come and rear its head and start spitting out good music and good lyrics for me. Its like, I can't beat that.

YOU'RE NOTORIOUS FOR HAVING A TITANIC COLLECTION OF GUITARS, HOW MANY HAVE YOU GOT NOW?
I have around 200 now, I've owned around 2000 through the years. I've traded 'em, given 'em away, sold 'em, smashed 'em, lost'em. But my collection's about 200. You know, actually Paul McCartney's got one guitar that was mine. It's a left-handed Les Paul standard, they only made three of them and he ended up getting that from me. He never paid me enough money, I'm still kind of mad at him.

HE'S VERY MEAN.
I actually didn't hand it to him. I'm actually happy he's playing it, here’s a left handed thing and it needed to be with a left-handed player.

THERE WAS A BIZARRE STORY IN MOJO A COUPLE OF MONTHS AGO THAT YOU HAD ACQUIRED A GUITAR THAT WAS BELIEVED TO BE A CLASSIC AND TURNED OUT TO BE A FAKE. WAS THAT A TRUE STORY?
Well... to put it this way, there was somebody who did a project. Taking a Flying V and spinning it round. Meantime there was somebody in the United States who made me a version of it. It's done with all the original parts so I think it was a good idea. A couple of people made fun about the fact that it wasn't the real thing, but it was better than the real thing .

THE THUNDERBOLT OR SOMETHING?
Yeah, the Thunderbolt and I actually had the original prototype that was made, not for me, but I acquired it.

I'VE ONLY GOT THE ONE GUITAR SO I'M DEAD JEALOUS OF ANY OF THEM.
Someone was playing a joke on someone but guess what, I won because I got 3 great guitars.

I JUST REMEMBER THAT SCENE IN SPINALTAP WITH THE HUGE GUITAR COLLECTION. IS THERE ANY SPINALTAP IN CHEAP TRICK?
We are Spinal Tap. Talking about Spinal Tap and then you go back to The Rutles and stuff. The drummer from The Rutles was in Patto. John Halsey I think it is.

FINE DRUMMER. I THINK THERE'S A LITTLE SPINAL TAP IN EVERY ROCK BAND. I GATHER THERES A TRIBUTE ALBUM COMING OUT.
That’s what I heard.

YOU'RE NOT INVOLVED IN IT AT ALL.
We just had to be in the band Cheap Trick for the whole time. I've got past that one and I had to write most of the songs and I did that one too.

YOU’RE NOT INVOLVED IN THE SELECTION OF THE ARTISTS OR ANYTHING LIKE THAT?
No, I just think if someone’s doing a tribute … you don’t ask for a tribute.

YOU MAY NOT.
We do not. I just think that’s fantastic I like it when bands try to do it kind of like us or completely different. Some of the stuff I've heard is kind of like our versions other stuff is different and more obtuse and cooler in their way to do it. I just think it’s great that anyone would wanna do our stuff. We had Joey Ramone, we had Everclear doing Southern Girls a really cool version. We had The Posies on there, some guys from Redd Kross and Hole and a band called Cockpit and Chainsaw Kittens and Concrete Blonde and I'm sure I've left out a bunch of 'em but there’s all kinds of different people on there, it's cool.

YOU'RE COMING BACK TO TOUR THE UK IN SEPTEMBER, IS THAT RIGHT?
In September, November, parts of October … we're not sure. We're trying to get it set up now. We're coming here whether you want us to or not.

TELL ME ABOUT YEAH,YEAH FROM THE ALBUM.
Yeah,Yeah,Yeah,Yeah. This one was actually inspired by the riff in Cold Turkey - which we kind of copied - on the Double Fantasy records and then I copied Earl Slick who copied me. Long story but then when we did this song we took almost all of those out so the idea of where we started and where we finished were two different things, when you see us play live in England even though the song’s called ‘Yeah Yeah’, remember you're gonna have to sing along and you're gonna have to go ‘Yeah yeah yeah yeah’ four times in a row. It's like a background harmony, like a guitar part almost.

YOU MENTIONED EARLIER THAT YOU’RE A HUGE SMALL FACES FAN...
Totally a Small Faces fan, plus I don't know if you know this, but we actually did a version of Watcha Gonna Do 'Bout It.

EVERYONE SHOULD…
Still can't do it the justice the Small Faces did. We did it pretty good but ...that first album was just a great, great album. You can't tell the influences too much on the stuff we did but you can here, Led Zeppelin all over that thing. You hear great drum technique and sound, the keyboard sounded tremendous and the guitars sounded loud and Marriott just sings great. Some of the stuff is a bit dated but for the most part...I've said for 15 to 20 years that I wished some day we could make a record that sounds as good as their first one.

WHERE DID YOU HEAR THE SMALL FACES, BECAUSE THEY WERE NOT VERY BIG IN AMERICA?
I'm not exactly sure how I first heard about them but I ended up getting the first English album which was a shiny cover. I knew in England that’s what you had but we didn't have them in Amarica .The first album didn't come out in the United States so it's the only record I bought where I bought two copies. You know, I never got autographs. I got an autograph from Sting for my daughter and I got an autograph of a dj when I was in junior high school but I got all the Small Faces. I got Steve Marriott when he was playing in Humble Pie on their first tour of the United States. I got his autograph then but then I got the other guys when they were at another point, that’s a cherished possession of mine but I can’t find it. I dont know where it is. It's lost in my record collection or somewhere. I'm gonna go find it, as soon as I'm done with the show here I'm gonna go and find it.

I'M INTRIGUED BY WHAT YOU SAID ABOUT THE SHINY RECORD COVER BECAUSE I CAN REMEMBER BUYING AMARICAN IMPORTS IN THE SIXTIES AND GOING "HEY, THE COVERS ARE ALL MATT", AND I LIKED THEM BETTER. DID YOU LIKE OURS BETTER?
I liked 'em better because I remember buying, besides the Small Faces, I remember buying the first Jimi Hendrix stuff, the Hendrix one where he had all the naked women on and we didn't have that in the US .

THEY'VE JUST RE-ISSUED THAT AND IT DOESN'T HAVE THE NAKED WOMEN ON IT.
Well, all those women, I hope they still look as good as they did on that photo.

I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU EVER HAD THE CHANCE TO SEE THE SMALL FACES LIVE.
No, but I saw the Faces with Rod Stewart. I saw Humble Pie, actually Steve Marriott came to a couple of shows of ours, here in England not long before he died, plus we were in the same hotel as Steve one right when he was auditioning for the Rolling Stones. We were in Los Angeles at the same time and he was raising a ruckus at the same hotel. We were staying at the Sunset Marquis and he was making noise, and security came and told him to shut up and he told them to shut up and we ended hanging out with him all night, and he was telling us all these fun stories and it was very entertaining.