With a career that has spanned five decades, Hugh Cornwell remains one of the defining voices and songwriters to emerge from the punk era. As the 50th anniversary of The Stranglers’ debut album ‘Rattus Norvegicus’ approaches, Cornwell is looking back as much as he is looking forward, with plans to celebrate the milestone live while continuing to explore new territory in his solo career. Next year, as he exclusively reveals will also see the release of his latest solo album, ‘Succubus’ — a title he reveals here exclusively for the first time. We caught up with Hugh at Forest Fest to talk about the enduring legacy of the Stranglers, the genius of Dave Greenfield, the forthcoming ‘Nosferatu’ live film, and what it means to revisit fifty years of The Stranglers. Coming out of the winderness; Eamon O’Neill.
Hi Hugh, how are you doing?
Hello, nice to see you.
The last time we spoke you were preparing to do your 'Nosferatu' shows.
We're about to go out and do some more shows of that in the UK, just in England. One of them is in a cave, and we're going to film it. We're going to film the show, so there'll be a live film of 'Nosferatu'.
A cave is very appropriate because it's a strange album, isn't it?
Very strange. I never thought I'd be playing it all live, but thanks to the efforts of Windsor and Pat, very able musicians, we've managed to do it.
It must be nice for you to be able to mix it up like that because obviously at a festival like this today, people expect the hits, don't they?
Oh, we won't be playing any 'Nosferatu' today. We could do, but no, we're sticking to something else. I mean, I've got the old ten Stranglers albums in the back catalogue, and then I've got about ten of my own solo records, and then to add 'Nosferatu' as well, as another one I can dip into, it's great. And the more you've got, the more variety. I enjoy variety. If everything sounds the same in a set, you think; "well, hang on, they played this earlier, didn't they?"
I wanted to chat to you about a few of those classic tracks. Now, 'Peaches' is a song that, it's such a cliché that you couldn't get away with it today, but you couldn't get away with it then either. Apparently, it was banned. Right?
Yeah, you could never get away with it. It's tongue in cheek, it's an observation of life. I mean, everyone will agree with this; reportage of live events has got to be truthful, and it's got to show what's actually going on, so if I can't write a song about peaches, which is about guys on building sites who wolf whistle girls walking past? That is the truth. That's what happens. Now you can't document that. There's something very odd going on with society, but anyway, that's another discussion.
I think the key to that song is your vocal delivery.
The whole thing is based on that bass riff, which continues and continues and continues, so I had complete carte blanche to do whatever I wanted, so I just let rip.
On the other side of that, you've got a song like 'No More Heroes', which touched on something much deeper.
Well, that was written at a time in my life when suddenly Elvis Presley and Groucho Marx, two of my heroes, died in the same week within a few days of each other, and so it really came like a sledgehammer to me. My cultural reference points were being taken away from me, being pulled away from me. It's an ideal time to be talking about this because next year is the 50th anniversary of the release of the Stranglers' first album, 'Rattus Norvegicus', which was April the 17th, I think, or 27th, I'm not sure which. And I'm releasing an album called 'Succubus', not in April, but next year. And so it's the fifty-year anniversary of when 'Peaches' was released, which is quite remarkable, really. So that makes sense that we're talking about this now.
Are you going to celebrate it? I know some of these things be out of your hands like the deluxe edition albums, but have you thought about playing the album in full or anything like that?
Well, I'm going to celebrate it live. I mean, if people want me to do a whole Stranglers thing, which I've resisted doing over the years because the Stranglers are out there; they can do all the old catalogue and I like to play my new stuff as well, but but to celebrate the fifty years, if a promoter is excited enough to want me to play a whole Stranglers set then I will because it's the fiftieth. If there's no other time when it makes sense to do it for me, it's then, and then then people will get the voice and the guitar of the Stranglers, which they haven't really had before.
Mentioning promoters, do you get pressure to reunite with old band?
They say you've got to do a fifty / fifty; you know, fifty percent Stranglers and fifty percent solo. Sometimes I can get away with seventy-five / twenty-five, but no one said; "we don't want you to do any Stranglers songs!" But I don't hold that against them because they're great, you know. Of course, they don't say; "No, we don't want any. We definitely don't want you to play any old Stranglers songs", I mean, that would be so funny if someone said that. I'd laugh. I think. I'd think they were joking.
Going back to 'No More Heroes', it has that really unusual start with the bass.
That's just JJ [Burnell]. It wasn't written [the intro] when we wrote the song, and then one day when we were going to play it John was obviously feeling frustrated, and he did that, and; "yeah that's great. Let's do that!"
There's such a unique sound from the keys, and even the keyboard modulation in the solo.
Yeah. Well, Dave [Greenfield] had a great contribution to the band, and obviously his huge contribution was, without Dave we wouldn't have had 'Golden Brown', that classic song, because it's his music, and he should be remembered for that, if for nothing else,
Even the the timing of 'Golden Brown' is unique.
It ends up at 11/ 8 eight, or is it 14/8? [Thinks] I always struggle with it. It's three bars of 3/4, and then one of 4/4, so that's 13/8. Sorry, apologies to music lovers.
We've spoken before about your amazing guitar solo in that song.
Yeah, I had this weird guitar that Hofner had given me. It was a prototype, and it had an amazing neck in the sense that it had two whole octaves, and it was completely in tune at the top of the second octave. There's no other guitar I've ever played that you get two whole octaves. A [Fender] Telecaster goes up about one and three quarter octaves. And so because the frets were so close together, it was very easy to come up with that solo.
It's an unusual scale as well; have you got any theoretical knowledge?
That's what came out when I was fiddling with it. No, no, I've got no musical knowledge at all. I used to fall asleep during our music lessons at school. "One day you will stop falling asleep!" - Doctor Prince. "One day you will regret falling asleep during my music classes!", that's what he used to say.
So what's coming up next for you then?
Well, we've got a few more 'Nosferatu' shows in August around the UK. There are about five of them, one of which is going to be filmed, and so we'll have a live 'Nosferatu' film next year when it's all edited. That's in a cave in Derbyshire, which is nice. Then in the autumn I'm doing a big acoustic tour, just me and my guitar on stage, no band. I haven't done that for ten years, and it'll probably be the last one I do because it's a lot of effort, a lot of mental effort to get that done. So I'm doing that in November and finishing off the new album, and I think we're going to Australia at the end of the year.
So you're very busy, as always!
Well, I try to. otherwise, I get bored. If I'm not fully occupied, I start thinking about things, and then I get depressed, so I'd rather not have time to even think about it.
Hello, nice to see you.
The last time we spoke you were preparing to do your 'Nosferatu' shows.
We're about to go out and do some more shows of that in the UK, just in England. One of them is in a cave, and we're going to film it. We're going to film the show, so there'll be a live film of 'Nosferatu'.
A cave is very appropriate because it's a strange album, isn't it?
Very strange. I never thought I'd be playing it all live, but thanks to the efforts of Windsor and Pat, very able musicians, we've managed to do it.
It must be nice for you to be able to mix it up like that because obviously at a festival like this today, people expect the hits, don't they?
Oh, we won't be playing any 'Nosferatu' today. We could do, but no, we're sticking to something else. I mean, I've got the old ten Stranglers albums in the back catalogue, and then I've got about ten of my own solo records, and then to add 'Nosferatu' as well, as another one I can dip into, it's great. And the more you've got, the more variety. I enjoy variety. If everything sounds the same in a set, you think; "well, hang on, they played this earlier, didn't they?"
I wanted to chat to you about a few of those classic tracks. Now, 'Peaches' is a song that, it's such a cliché that you couldn't get away with it today, but you couldn't get away with it then either. Apparently, it was banned. Right?
Yeah, you could never get away with it. It's tongue in cheek, it's an observation of life. I mean, everyone will agree with this; reportage of live events has got to be truthful, and it's got to show what's actually going on, so if I can't write a song about peaches, which is about guys on building sites who wolf whistle girls walking past? That is the truth. That's what happens. Now you can't document that. There's something very odd going on with society, but anyway, that's another discussion.
I think the key to that song is your vocal delivery.
The whole thing is based on that bass riff, which continues and continues and continues, so I had complete carte blanche to do whatever I wanted, so I just let rip.
On the other side of that, you've got a song like 'No More Heroes', which touched on something much deeper.
Well, that was written at a time in my life when suddenly Elvis Presley and Groucho Marx, two of my heroes, died in the same week within a few days of each other, and so it really came like a sledgehammer to me. My cultural reference points were being taken away from me, being pulled away from me. It's an ideal time to be talking about this because next year is the 50th anniversary of the release of the Stranglers' first album, 'Rattus Norvegicus', which was April the 17th, I think, or 27th, I'm not sure which. And I'm releasing an album called 'Succubus', not in April, but next year. And so it's the fifty-year anniversary of when 'Peaches' was released, which is quite remarkable, really. So that makes sense that we're talking about this now.
Are you going to celebrate it? I know some of these things be out of your hands like the deluxe edition albums, but have you thought about playing the album in full or anything like that?
Well, I'm going to celebrate it live. I mean, if people want me to do a whole Stranglers thing, which I've resisted doing over the years because the Stranglers are out there; they can do all the old catalogue and I like to play my new stuff as well, but but to celebrate the fifty years, if a promoter is excited enough to want me to play a whole Stranglers set then I will because it's the fiftieth. If there's no other time when it makes sense to do it for me, it's then, and then then people will get the voice and the guitar of the Stranglers, which they haven't really had before.
Mentioning promoters, do you get pressure to reunite with old band?
They say you've got to do a fifty / fifty; you know, fifty percent Stranglers and fifty percent solo. Sometimes I can get away with seventy-five / twenty-five, but no one said; "we don't want you to do any Stranglers songs!" But I don't hold that against them because they're great, you know. Of course, they don't say; "No, we don't want any. We definitely don't want you to play any old Stranglers songs", I mean, that would be so funny if someone said that. I'd laugh. I think. I'd think they were joking.
Going back to 'No More Heroes', it has that really unusual start with the bass.
That's just JJ [Burnell]. It wasn't written [the intro] when we wrote the song, and then one day when we were going to play it John was obviously feeling frustrated, and he did that, and; "yeah that's great. Let's do that!"
There's such a unique sound from the keys, and even the keyboard modulation in the solo.
Yeah. Well, Dave [Greenfield] had a great contribution to the band, and obviously his huge contribution was, without Dave we wouldn't have had 'Golden Brown', that classic song, because it's his music, and he should be remembered for that, if for nothing else,
Even the the timing of 'Golden Brown' is unique.
It ends up at 11/ 8 eight, or is it 14/8? [Thinks] I always struggle with it. It's three bars of 3/4, and then one of 4/4, so that's 13/8. Sorry, apologies to music lovers.
We've spoken before about your amazing guitar solo in that song.
Yeah, I had this weird guitar that Hofner had given me. It was a prototype, and it had an amazing neck in the sense that it had two whole octaves, and it was completely in tune at the top of the second octave. There's no other guitar I've ever played that you get two whole octaves. A [Fender] Telecaster goes up about one and three quarter octaves. And so because the frets were so close together, it was very easy to come up with that solo.
It's an unusual scale as well; have you got any theoretical knowledge?
That's what came out when I was fiddling with it. No, no, I've got no musical knowledge at all. I used to fall asleep during our music lessons at school. "One day you will stop falling asleep!" - Doctor Prince. "One day you will regret falling asleep during my music classes!", that's what he used to say.
So what's coming up next for you then?
Well, we've got a few more 'Nosferatu' shows in August around the UK. There are about five of them, one of which is going to be filmed, and so we'll have a live 'Nosferatu' film next year when it's all edited. That's in a cave in Derbyshire, which is nice. Then in the autumn I'm doing a big acoustic tour, just me and my guitar on stage, no band. I haven't done that for ten years, and it'll probably be the last one I do because it's a lot of effort, a lot of mental effort to get that done. So I'm doing that in November and finishing off the new album, and I think we're going to Australia at the end of the year.
So you're very busy, as always!
Well, I try to. otherwise, I get bored. If I'm not fully occupied, I start thinking about things, and then I get depressed, so I'd rather not have time to even think about it.
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