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Graham recalls the stories behind some of the many hundreds of music interviews he has done with artists like Henry Rollins, Rod Stewart, Quincy Jones and Mick Jagger.
And many lesser talents.
Not always pleasant.
McCartney, Michael Jackson and me: Oh, get a room!
Mostly when I travel I don’t much care about the room I stay in other than hoping for a decent bed and a functioning shower. If you are doing your travel right, you never spend any time in the room anyway. But in Liverpool I set some kind of world record for transience. I’d barely been in the room a minute when the phone rang and I got the message I had to leave. So... more >>
Added: 7 Jul 10 
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Rod Stewart: Singer, believe it or not
When Rod Stewart came to New Zealand in 1992 he wasn't doing any interviews. He was sick of questions about his then-wife Rachel Hunter. And so the shutters went up. I spoke with him. It was easy. I simply let it be known I couldn't give a toss about his wife, I wanted to talk to him as a singer and songwriter (an aspect of Rod which is too often overlooked), and about old soul music.... more >>
Added: 5 Jul 10
Bon Jovi: Having a bar of it
My knowledge of Bon Jovi has always been limited, and even more so back in the early Nineties when all I could conjure up for a pub quiz would have been "New Jersey, the cover of their Slippery When Wet album, big hair and " . . . Actually that would be about it. Except for their song I'll Sleep When I'm Dead which -- for a rather too long period of prolonged... more >>
Added: 24 Jun 10
Quincy Jones: The professional in the pissoir.
So there I was at the urinal when Quincy Jones walks and says, "Hi Graham". It was awkward to shake his hand so I just nodded and asked him if he was enjoying his evening. Now Quincy -- who famously said "You can't shine shit", but that was before boy bands and Dido -- didn't get where he is by being rude, so said he was having a fine time. He was lying. I can't remember why the... more >>
Added: 21 Jun 10 1 Comment
Mick Jones of the Clash: Career Opportunities
Years later someone brought it to my attention: in Marcus Gray's book about the Clash, Last Gang in Town, there is mention of -- and a quote from -- my December 93 interview with Mick Jones. By the time I got to Mick the Clash was well behind him and he was in Melbourne with his band Big Audio Dynamite II opening for U2. It was a good interview and I was on top form. I had self-medicated... more >>
Added: 16 Jun 10
The Quireboys: White trash rhythm'n'booze
The press didn't rate them at the time, they had a solid and loyal following of largely uncool fans, and they themselves seemed to take it all as a joke. It was only rock'n'roll, but they liked it. My friends either didn't know of them and didn't care to, or did and hated them. I liked 'em. They were the Quireboys and we met in a London rehearsal studio in the early Nineties. ... more >>
Added: 14 Jun 10 1 Comment
Gladys Knight: Talent with talons
Press conferences are a waste of time and no sensible journalist entertains them. Ask your best question and everyone else gets the great answer. And if you are a print journalist those lazy slime from television go to air that night with it and you can wait a day to see it in the paper. And then your mates think you copied it from Holmes. I long ago gave up going to press... more >>
Added: 8 Jun 10
Kurt Cobain: Gun, head and Smithereens.
As with most people of a " certain age" I can remember where I was when I heard John F Kennedy had been shot ( I was in bed), and when I was told another Kennedy had gone the way of the gun (in bed again, there's a pattern emerging). Of course I also remember John Lennon's murder (came in with the kids from soccer and it was on television) and, oddly enough given he didn't mean that... more >>
Added: 24 May 10
Ocean Colour Scene: Here in my Heart
It was one of the saddest days I can recall, and yet it had started out so well in Birmingham, a place where I had been drawn to interview the Britpop band Ocean Colour Scene in their hometown. It was 1998 I think. OCS never really made an impact in New Zealand, which was a pity because the night I saw them they were spectacularly good, playing a hard rocking and passionate show to a... more >>
Added: 16 May 10
Mick Jagger and me: Passing ships
It's a little known fact, but Mick Jagger and I are real tight. And that's not just me saying that. The last time I saw Jagger -- whom I call Mick, of course -- he shook my hand and said, "Graham, we're real tight." Of course there's a back-story here. Let me put this in the greater context. It was November 88 and Mick was in town with his own band. He and Keith had fallen out or... more >>
Added: 15 May 10 1 Comment
Clarence 'Gatemouth' Brown and Billy Joel: Bad cop, good guy
It was bluesman Clarence 'Gatemouth' Brown who taught me a valuable lesson very early on: it was possible to like a man's music and not like the man who made it. Billy Joel confirmed the opposite: I liked him very much but have never felt an ounce of emotion for his music. But first, let me tell you about a big bag of dope. When Brown -- a multi-instrumentalist bluesman from Texas... more >>
Added: 9 May 10
Nikki Sixx: A very dim light (1991)
To tell truth, out of the many hundreds -- indeed thousands -- of musicians I have interviewed very few have been downright stupid. Sure some fumbled for words, others said slightly silly things, and most just blathered on about The Album or whatever. But that's fine. We shouldn't ask anything of musicians other than they make great music. I never thought Motley Crue did. They... more >>
Added: 3 May 10
The Cranberries: Even the faithful departed
At the time, flying from London to Tokyo to interview the Cranberries seemed like a good idea. It was May '96 and they would be coming to New Zealand for a show shortly afterwards. My job -- at least in the mind of the record company and promoter who were footing the bill -- would be for me to interview the band, see the show, get excited, and have the article out so ticket sales would get a... more >>
Added: 23 Apr 10
Jethro Tull, Al Stewart: Hanging on the telephone.
Rock journalists in this country need little reminding that we live a long way from the action. But the reminders come every time a record company or promoter says that deathless phrase, "We've got you a phoner". The phone interview has largely killed any last flicker of spontaneity that rock might have had left. These are set pieces of carefully controlled theatre in which... more >>
Added: 18 Apr 10
Roger McGuinn: The Byrd who can't fly from his past
The backstage meet'n'greet is usually an uncomfortable if not dire affair. Record company types, tour managers, promoter's flunkies and various levels of B-grade guests -- such a myself -- mill around waiting for that quick handshake with someone whose music you might like, and whom you'd probably not want to invite home for dinner. I avoid the meet'n'greet for the most part, long prior... more >>
Added: 12 Apr 10
Henry Rollins: The power and the passion
There are some musicians you don't want to meet. For me Neil Young is the never-again category for rudeness, and Henry Rollins just as matter of personal safety. He was a nice guy actually, but he almost broke my hand. Deliberately. It was on his first tour to New Zealand and he was in his ranting-poet mode rather than fronting some noisecore band. I was asked if I wanted to... more >>
Added: 21 Mar 10
Sammy Price: Nice'n'nasty
Sammy Price, who had been the house pianist on Decca sessions in the Forties (and played with the likes of Sister Rosetta Tharpe) among many other things, told me a very funny story which I remember to this day. He'd been in Chicago and after a recording session the manager of the European record company wouldn't pay him. No money, Sammy, forget it. So Sammy said he went out and got... more >>
Added: 15 Mar 10
Duran Duran: Spoiled, rude and stupid
Maybe it’s because he’s wearing what look to be his pyjamas – great big cottony, flowy things covered in only-safe-at-night checks – that John Taylor of Duran Duran looks extremely tired and bored. Good-looking in a cheekbones and quiffed hair way, you understand. But bored witless nonetheless. It's early 1993 and he’s standing behind the cafeteria bar in... more >>
Added: 8 Mar 10
Krist Novoselic: Fast track to nowhere
Some people just aren't that smart. At least that's what I thought about Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic when he tossed his bass high in the air at an MTV awards show and failed to catch it on its way back down. It hit him on the nose (see clip below) and he was felled in a pool of blood. Rock'n'roll, huh? I met some people who were in the green room backstage at those awards and they... more >>
Added: 28 Feb 10
Howard Devoto of Magazine: The floorboards creak . . .
Back at the dawn of time -- for two periods in 1980 and 1981 to be precise -- I had a programme on Radio Pacific on Saturday evening, sandwiched between the Rugger Buggers sports show and, of all people, Hollywood gossip David Hartnell. It was all free-format music (not a term used in radio these days, it means you could play what you liked) and so I had great fun. The second period... more >>
Added: 26 Feb 10
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