ZOMG, have y'all ever used Google Chrome's instant web page translation feature?? You know, the thing that instantly translates a website that's in a foreign language into English for you with one click? Who knew it was a font of hilarity?? (OK, I reckon I coulda guessed as much if I'd thought about it for, like, a second. But I haven't finished my coffee yet, so it's impressive that I'm even upright, much less typing on a computer thingy and/or reading French articles. Cut me some slack, Jack.)
So I just clicked on a link from French Vogue on Twitter to an article about Ian Hunter of the awse '70s group Mott the Hoople. When the Google Translate Bar popped up & asked me if I'd like it to translate the article from French into English, I was like, "Sure, Google Chrome! Make that croissant a biscuit!" Here, the gorgeous result, including "The Rock 'n' Roll," "some Lester Bangs," and Hunter's bold proclamation that "[t]he wind of Connecticut is fine with me."
I'ma get me some Lester Bangs next time I hit the salon.
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IAN HUNTER, LIVING MEMORY OF THE ROCK
Minor group in the eyes of history, but major in the heart of his fans (including some Lester Bangs), Mott the Hoople has largely contributed to the emergence of glam and hard rock original English (together with the Bowie friend, inspirer of their biggest hit "All the Young Dudes") before disappearing into the limbo of the insignificant and rock candy. Apart from a handful of great records with Mick Ronson, leader Ian Hunter also blessed the seed of a valuable item: USA 1972 , only book to tell the American tour of a British group from the inside, day by day near real-time, first published in French by Editions Rue Fromentin. Besides the galleys and joys typical group stuck on the wrong side of the border to success, the book compact an incredible number of stories featuring Keith Moon of The Who, Zappa, Kim Fowley and the Spiders from all Maris Bowie. Named best book ever written on the rock "by Q Magazine, USA 1972 is a must read, if only for the perpetually cynical humor and brilliance of its author. Maintenance.
You do not usually kind to this little book you have written in the early 70s. What does it feel to know that he appeared in France almost 40 years later?
In fact, I really do not understand why a small publishing house in 2010 loses his time to translate this text and publish it again. A few years ago, a book on Mott the Hoople appeared and I had to replay a part to respond to interviews. I thought it was pretty good. It reads quickly. As a newspaper every day, you can leave it in a corner and again a month later. It's perfect when you fly.
The book is still quite a reputation. Q Magazine has crowned greatest book ever written on the rock 'n' roll.
It's hard for me to agree or disagree. I wrote so long ago. And according to me it does not mean rock'n'roll'm writing about my life in 1972. Or rather a moment of my life a little special, in 1972.
The book has qualities that exceed the time that it evokes. You do however have never written another.
It happened like this: I have written, it was published, and I realized that I never earn money with it. It was published, republished, re-reissued. If I told you how much money it brought me, you would not believe me. I preferred to stick to the songs.
When you wrote, you thought you really earn money?
Oh no, not in writing it. The idea did not even get it published. In fact, I had just gotten married. And it was going to turn the United States. The only way not to get bored when they toured the United States is to have fun with the girls. There, it was impossible, because I decided to be faithful to my wife. Also, I have a very bad memory. So I decided to write this paper to kill time, and try not to forget, for once, what happened to us. To leave a trace. It was a fucking test the first day ... And then I got hooked, and it became a habit. When I was 20 minutes ahead of me in a waiting room, an airplane or backstage , I started to scribble in my notebook. When I returned to London, I read the book to Charlie Gillen, a writer friend. He edited the book, then proposed to his publisher at the time, Panther Books.
So the tour with Mott the Hoople you remember best? Looking back in history, we know that this was an important moment in your career.
It was a turning point. Really the beginning of our career in America. Sometimes we played in the first part, sometimes it was sandwiched between six other groups, sometimes we were headlining. It was pretty fun. Much more fun in any case where you're touring all the time headlining and where your newspaper is horribly repetitive. You get into a car, you play, you return to the hotel, you take the plane. When you begin, you go from plane to van, sometimes you're doing escort in a box by an organizer rotten drunk more than you. And there is more danger. The issues are more varied. The day I almost met Elvis at Graceland returning breaking was also a memorable one. Or at least, an ideal conclusion. I think one reason for the success - on - the book was released, is that the British bands who toured the U.S. at the time was finally limited. It remained a curiosity. The first to have bought the book, all these little groups who dreamed of starting too. At the time, America was far more remote in every sense of the term. And over the years, it became the book of another era. These are musicians who always buy it, but to know what it was like to tour the USA in the heyday.
In the book, you're very hard with England and dusty gray, you never cease to look in somewhat amazed with modern America and hyper consumerism. Forty years, much of which passed the U.S. later, is that your opinion is always the same?
No, but it was the England that has changed. You should know that at the time, hotels did not exist: it would repurchase. Being in a hotel where the customer is king, where everyone smiles, it was really weird . When you were doing a concert in England, it often happened that you did not even have the right to make a balance, because the room was not open yet! In the U.S., everything was very professional. Delivery systems were better, even if it was nothing compared to what exists today. It was a kind of paradise for the rock musician on tour.
Why have you moved there?
For the same reason that the guys from Led Zeppelin because of the Taxes Act 75. They wanted to take me almost everything.Honestly, I'm not the kind of voracious. The first time I touched a check with Mott the Hoople, I found it almost immoral. But at the time, I thought it would not last more than a year or two. I was sure I would go back to work at the plant at one time or another.So I started paying my 40% tax with pleasure. When they went to 89%, I found it unbearable. So I left. Without regret, because everything I loved movies and records, came from the United States. Although the mid-70s, it was all over.
In the book, you express elsewhere lot of nostalgia for what you consider your own golden age: the years 40 and 50. As if being a rock band in the 70s, it was already too late.
You know, when I joined Mott the Hoople, I was already 29 years. The 60s, I did not participate. The Who, The Kinks, The Beatles, I saw them go far. And the music of my youth is that of the 50s. We will never better than Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard. What we have lacked in the '70s, it was naivety, the innocence of infancy. In 72, the record companies and managers had any shady bitch. He already had a lawyer to decipher a contract. And we knew that this was done deliberately to confuse us. Of course, it became much worse afterwards. But you know the saying, "It was better before." Today, no one except Lady Gaga can make money within the rules of the game should behave in a vicious snake, even when you're just asongwriter . And I can tell you that I was scammed countless times. But it was less severe before. The contracts were simpler.The amounts were less delusional.
You take more pleasure in playing shows and record music?
Of course, otherwise I would have stopped long ago. This is not about the money that I still believe me. But business disgusts me. And I never stopped listening to the disc.
Never?
No. The old stuff, I've listened too. And new, I do not understand. I'm sure there are still good bands, but the radio here ( in the U.S., ndr ) are so horrible that I am discouraged in advance. The wind of Connecticut is fine with me.
Already in the 70s, you do not already seemed fascinated by the other groups.
We are all languages of a bitch. Look at Keith Richards: Language is the biggest whore I know. That means we're still idealistic, still looking for the thing that will dazzle us, we change lives. I remember once leaving a concert by The Who, have been blown so that I could not align two words during the three hours that followed. When you have lived this stuff and that was typed after the 80, you become very skeptical about the future of pop music. I like the Foo Fighters, I like Dave Grohl. When I hear on the radio in my car, it always makes me happy.
One last question: in the book, you spend your time buying guitars. You had to bring in more than a hundred, right?
I know Pete, our bass player at the time, has more than 500 guitars in his home. Mick has a few tens of Les Paul, he spends his time tinkering. Me, I kept three. Over twenty sound, but that does not count. But I'll tell you a secret at the time, electric guitars cost a fortune in England. United States, they cost nearly nothing in comparison. We did not have much money, so we brought up the tour, and they were sold. It was almost in the black market, even if they paid taxes at customs. It was a good way to put the butter in the spinach.
Watch the clip vintage "All the Young Dudes"
Watch a documentary on Mott the Hoople:
Watch an interview with Ian Hunter on the set of Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson in 2007
Olivier Lamm
Tony Cenicola/The New York Times
