Manchester Evening News 2001.06.01
by Kevin Bourke
Ian Hunter, in the 1974 Mott The Hoople classic All The Way From Memphis, said 'It's a mighty long way down rock'n'roll.' and after more than three decades in the business, that's something he knows first hand.
Having influenced everyone from The Clash (true rock fact: Mick Jones used to run the Mott The Hoople fan club), REM, Oasis and Blur to Kiss, Def Leppard and Motley Crue, and gained a justified reputation for uniquely riotous live shows (they were responsible for rock shows being banned from the Royal Albert Hall), Mott The Hoople called it a day later that same year.
But Hunter (who wrote one of the first and best rock books with Dairy Of A Rock And Roll Star) still keeps the faith, releasing a steady stream of albums, such as All American Alien Boy and his latest, called Rant, that remain of the highest caliber and yet are quite prepared to change musical direction, regardless of any commercial considerations.
Hunter is now resident in New England in the States but remains as committed to artistic integrity and honesty as ever. It comes as little surprise, then, that the current corporate playground that calls itself music holds little attraction for the man who started out as bassist for Freddie 'Fingers' Lee and Screaming Lord Sutch. After that he was hired on the spot by legendary producer Guy Stevens to join the newly-named Mott The Hoople after Stevens decided that Hunter's curly locks and omnipresent shades were just what the band needed to give them a real bit of rock 'n' roll image.
'I used to be keen and enthusiastic but, as this business has changed, I've changed as well,' he says. 'I recognize record company people a mile away and I try to avoid them. They have no knowledge of what they are doing. When I was coming up it was so much better because people were into it. The kids were maniacs and they weren't coming out of business schools.
'Today, the emphasis has gone from music to accountancy It's the same in arts or sports or everything. Radio doesn't play music to excite people, they just try to play music not to offend people so they won't switch off and that's just pathetic!
'The way it is now, Mott The Hoople would never have been signed or we'd most certainly have died an awful death. I mean, we were desperate. I'd worked in factories all my life and I knew what was going to happen if I didn't get something off the ground.
'When we got the chance to record with Island back then, then was a considerable amount of desperation involved, because poor then was poor, it wasn't phones or TVs, it was nothing! So it was a great motivator, but I do think it's great with these new web labels.
'Guy Stevens, our producer on those first few albums (before another admirer of Mott's, one David Bowie, discovered the band were on the verge of breaking up and offered them a demo of his song All The Young Dudes to record) was way up there in the lunatic echelons, and I've known a few lunatics! He was through the roof,' Hunter remembers. 'His thing didn't have much to do with music, it was more about motivating you out of your brain. He felt that if people played like that, it would transcend actual sound.
'His sole contribution to the sound was maybe pouring a few beers into the faders, or setting fire to something. He would sit there and start revving up and you'd rev up with him and then all of a sudden you'd start to play and it was like The Charge Of The Light Brigade!
'It was a strange way of doing it and people still talk about those old records, whether it was Mott or The Clash, so it must have had its attractiveness to some!'
Ian Hunter plays at Manchester University Union, Oxford Road, on Tuesday, June 5. 7pm.