Ufo - Interview

  by Lisa Torem

published: 23 / 4 / 2011

intro

Lisa Torem speaks to Andy Parker, the drummer with veteran hard rock band UFO, about his decision to rejoin the band after a ten year absence in 2005, his recent move to America from England, and the group's current busy touring schedule

The British hard rock band UFO formed in 1969. The original line-up consisted of vocalist Phil Moggs, guitarist Mick Bolton, bassist Pete Way and drummer Andy Parker. Their name was coined after a popular London music venue of the time. The Eddie Cochran tune, ‘C’mon Everybody’, which appeared on their debut album ‘UFO 1’ (1970), garnered enthusiastic fans from Japan. In the 1970s UFO achieved international success after recruiting German guitarist Michael Schenker, who had previously been in the Scorpions. They debuted with Chrysalis Records on their third album, ‘Phenomenon’ in 1974. The singles from it, ‘Doctor, Doctor’ and ‘Rock Bottom’, drew a steady audience. Their next albums, ‘Force It’ (1975) and ‘No Heavy Petting’(1976), increased their popularity with both American and British audiences. 1977’s ‘Lights Out’ which included ‘Too Hot to Handle’ and the single of the same name, plus the uniquely long, but striking ‘Love to Love’, won further critical acclaim. Becoming increasingly more prolific, the band followed up with 1978’s ‘Obsession’ and the 1979 live album, ‘Strangers in the Night’. In 1978, Schenker left for the first time, due to alcohol abuse and resulting tensions with Mogg. A series of line-up changes followed which resulted in the band experiencing a flux of professional highs and lows. Eventually, guitarist Paul Chapman would be replaced in 2002 by the more blues-inspired Vinnie Moore. Bassist Pete Way, who formed the band Waysted, also created instability within the band by leaving it in 1982, before rejoining permanently in 1992. Drummer Andy Parker left the band twice; once for personal reasons in 1983 involving custody issues with his daughter and the second time in 1995 to work with his family’s business. Parker rejoined the band in 2005 after being asked to perform at the Piorno Rock Fest in Granada, Spain. He participated in the recordings, ‘The Monkey Puzzle’ (2006) and ‘The Visitor’ (2009). Perhaps this drummer, who early on discovered the joy of banging pots and pans in his mother’s kitchen, was always destined to return to the band which he helped form, even though his vast collection of wind-up toys, firearms and construction tools might have kept him reasonably occupied. Currently living in a century-old dwelling, with his wife, in a small town in Texas, Parker has had the opportunity to gain a new perspective on life in general and his own musical journey. While keeping in close contact with his fans, renovating his home, and getting ready for an American tour, the frank drummer shared tales of woe and joy. In essence maybe we’re all just one phone call away from rediscovering our initial passions. PB: Hi Andy, how are your dogs doing? (Andy has two Australian sheepdogs). They’re adorable. AP: Thank you. It’s a sad thing. I lost my beloved dog last Labour Day. She had some kind of canine cancer. It took her so quickly. I hardly realized she was sick until the last minute. It was so devastating, and also for our other dog because she’d never known life without her. It’s like losing a member of your family. We decided we didn’t want her to be miserable; we didn’t want to do that to dear old puppy. She had lost her best buddy. So, we found two more. (Laughs). I sometimes wonder the sanity of that decision. They’re tearing everything apart. They’re just babies and it takes them time to understand things they’re not supposed to mess with. They’re such smart little dogs. They learn very quickly. So, we’re good. We have a nice, big back yard, so that’s okay. PB: I saw their photo on your website. I’ve noticed you spend a lot of time updating your fans on your professional and personal life. Communication is really important to you. AP: Yeah. I think so. People need to know, don’t they, what you’re thinking and what’s going on? PB: And what makes you human. AP: Yeah, exactly, it’s interesting. People like to know, outside of the music, what you like to do with your life. And I do check the website regularly, and I do like to update people. As I say, my website is not always about the band. In my little bio, it does mention the band a lot, but there’s a lot of stuff I did when I wasn’t in the band. I think people like to hear that stuff, because the latest thing is my kid getting married. We just got the link to the professional photos. What we’ve got so far is just stuff that’s taken by friends and family. I don’t put too much on there because it’s my website. (Laughs). There are some really beautiful professional pictures and, once my daughter’s been through them, I’ll see if I can put a couple of them up. It’s kind of weird. It’s the kind of stuff in your life. My daughter will always be my little girl, but, for once, she’s someone else’s’ responsibility. She’s a married woman. I adore him. He’s a great kid and he’s really happy. PB: Andy, you began playing drums at seven, didn’t you? AP: Earlier. According to my mother, I banged on everything in sight; pots, pans, buckets (Laughs). I don’t know why. Maybe I was a drummer in my former life. My mother always had to sing. She was a church goer. Coming out of the post-war-babies kind of thing, my parents struggled for a while, but when they had the money they gave my sister and I piano lessons. My sister’s extremely gifted as a pianist. I wasn’t, so I soon got fed up with that. (Laughs). Standing in the shadow of your older sister is not the best place to be. I remember when it came time I wanted to do drum lessons. It was, “No, you didn’t pursue your piano lessons, so I’m not paying for drum lessons.” So I never had drum lessons. Other than that, they really did support me. Yeah, but it’s funny how you gravitate towards things. My brothers, one of them, plays the trumpet a bit. I have a nephew who’s a drummer. He’s quite a good drummer. He teaches and plays. He’s in New Zealand. He’s been playing since he’s been about seven or eight too. He’s quite highly respected in New Zealand, so he’s probably the nearest in the family that’s a musician. PB: You’ve been very inspired by John Bonham and his son, Jason, played with UFO during your absence. AP: I’m still a huge fan of his dad. For me, he’s still number one. He just opened the door to me that I’d never seen before. It’s just a way of looking at things and just his way of playing. He just had this incredible, giant sound. And, a lot of the time it was what he didn’t play that made so much sense to me. The gaps that he left – and just his way of looking at playing between his left hand and his… I just fell in love with him when I heard ‘Good Times, Bad Times’. Oh, my God, who is this guy? How does he do that? And I just became a huge Zeppelin fan. And I’m really hoping to get to meet Jason. I think it’s in Oslo or something, and we’re doing a festival on the same day, so I’m hoping I’ll get to meet him. I’ve heard lots of stories about him because he left before I came back in 2005. He was the last drummer, and, of course, he’s got all the “on the bus” stories. And, from what I hear, he has a great sense of humour. I’m looking forward to meeting him. PB: Let’s talk about the song, ‘Lights Out’ because you mentioned how the war had influenced your childhood. I read that that song was about the bombings in World War Two and how it affected the UK. Would you consider that a protest song or a patriotic song or essentially a visual song with a strong back beat? AP: I thought it was actually more about riots. PB: About riots? AP: Yeah, I think there were some riots going on in England at the time. I mean, you’re talking to the wrong guy, really. (Laughs). I came out with the drum pattern, but Phil came out with the lyrics. PB: Okay. AP: I don’t think it’s about World War II, because Phil isn’t quite that old. (Laughs). PB: Yes, I know. I thought maybe it was a historical song. AP: He’s older than me, but he’s not quite that old. PB: I believe I read something about those lyrics being about the bombing of London… AP: I don’t think they were charging people with batons during the bombing of London. I never equated it with World War II, but I thought it was more about riots. Quite often Phil will have read something and write a song about something that he’s read. There is a song called ‘Diesel in the Dust’ – there was a town in America somewhere. There was a town bully, and the whole town conspired to get rid of him, and he just disappeared one day and no one spoke about where he’d gone. He’s trapped in the side of the road, and over turned, and thus diesel in the dust. He just gets these ideas, which I find really fascinating. It’s a little convoluted. You won’t always come up with the thought behind it, but then that’s part of his charm. PB: It’s interesting to me that you left the band twice, yet came back again, after being called up by the other band members. I mean, most people don’t return to a job two more times, or to a relationship that has ended twice more, so it’s an unusual turn of events. But, looking back, Andy, do you think you would have made those calls first? AP: No, definitely not. It was not planned at all. I had this whole other scenario of my life, almost twelve years, back in England, working with my family. It was kind of I’ve been there, done that. My wife had a very stressful job. She was working for GFK, the big pharmaceutical company, and we just kind of became slaves to our jobs. I was working maybe 60 or more hours a week and barely getting the weekends off. I had to work Saturdays, and we were making good money, but England is such an expensive place to live. It came to the point where I was thinking, “There’s just got to be more to life than this. This is just eating me up. I can’t do this anymore. “ And I had pretty much fulfilled my obligations to my kid. She graduated college. And we decided to move to America. I had had enough of England. As much as I love England, and I’ll always be British, there comes a time, when you say, it just isn’t working for us. So, we said, “Where do we go?” And my wife has family in Dallas. But, she couldn’t stand Dallas. She didn’t want to go to Dallas. It’s too noisy and she has a friend who is a property developer, and she got to talking to him and he was working in this little town called Granbury. It’s a little town about an hour and a half from Dallas, about forty-five minutes from Fort Worth. We lived in a little town in England. We’re kind of small-town people. So she actually went on-line and we bought two houses there. We never came there, just bought them over the internet, as you do these days (Laughs). Isn’t it crazy? We rented it out, because property is cheap in Texas and you can do that. So we did that, and when we decided to move back we fixed this one house we had in the historic district. We said, “We’ll buy houses and fix them.” At the time I was out of the band. I was a licensed contractor. My whole family were in the building business when I was a kid. So, I was just planning on coming back to this house and living in the historic district and we wanted to buy houses, maybe rent them, maybe flip them, whatever. And that was the plan. The band was fine. Jason was playing. I had no thoughts to go back. And, then, out of the blue, I think it was August of 2005. They call it a bank holiday, it’s a long holiday in England. And, it was a sunny day, and the phone rang, and it was Paul Raymond. And, I said, “Hello, man. I haven’t heard from you in ages.” “Jason is leaving and we’ve got this show we have to do in November in Spain and we were wondering if you’d be interested.” I said, “It’s strange that you’ve just called me because I’m getting ready to quit my job and I’m getting ready to move back to the States.” So, I did the show. It was good and it was different, with Vinnie playing guitar (Vinnie Moore, lead guitarist). There was no tension there, anymore. It was actually fun. I’d gone back with them in 1994 for ‘Walk on Water’ and they’d asked me to tour, but I could just feel this underlying tension between, I’d been there before, with Phil and Michael. I just felt like it was doomed to failure. And, unfortunately, I was right. They had a lot of problems on that tour with Michael Schenker. To me, at that point, it just wasn’t worth giving up what I had. I didn’t actually feel it was going to last. But, once I saw that show, in Spain, with those guys, with Vinnie, it was just like, “Man, this feels right, again. This is a lot of fun.” . Vinnie is such a great player and he’s such a solid guy. And, they said, “Are you interested in staying?” and I said, “Absolutely”, and I’ve been there ever since. I mean, what’s the point of doing it if it’s not fun? Why would you play music if you’re not happy playing music? That’s always been my thing, if something in my personal life – if it got to the point that I needed to be doing something else, and, if it’s not fun to do, and you don’t feel right doing it. Life’s too short. I’m having a ball, now.This is great. We don’t tour as hard and fast as we used to, but that’s kind of good. We’re not the kids we used to be, and times have changed. There’s not the amount of audience for us, out there, as there was. But we still have our hardcore fans. They are just the best people in the world. They’ve followed us our entire career. They come with their kids and stuff and it’s just great. I’m having a whale of a time. And I hope it will continue for many years. PB: You’re touring with bassist Barry Sparks(who has played with neo-classical guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen) right now. AP: Yes, Barry is doing this next leg. We got off a week today. We’re starting off in Delaware because that’s usually where we rehearse before we go. Barry’s doing the next three weeks. We do a three-week run from the east coast through to the mid-west and we’ll be finishing in Ohio, and Barry will be on that one definitely. And then we’ve got some stuff in Europe, in the summer, some festivals, some shows in Germany. And Barry is doing that one, and then come August time he’s committed to playing with the Bees, again, in Japan. That kind of gig comes around every so often. So I’m not sure if he’ll be playing later in the year, on the second leg, which is in September, October time. Maybe we’ll get Rob De Luca again, because I love Rob and he’s a great bass player. PB: What do you look for in a bass player? AP: We’re looking for someone who can stand up (Laughs). Unfortunately we’ve had this ongoing problem with Pete Way. We just keep hoping that Pete will pull himself together. It’s certainly not a personality clash; we’ve known the guy for so long. There just comes a time when you have to say, “Man, you’re not cutting it.” And, unfortunately, for Pete, he still feels he can continue that lifestyle that he has had all along. He had this terrible liver condition that he’s supposed to be getting treated for. And, that was the initial start of when he took a hiatus from the band because he really needed to get himself well, and he started out with the best plan in the world, but will power is not one of his strong points. He’s just very, very easily swayed. And, unfortunately, because he won’t curb his lifestyle, they won’t give him the treatment in England. We’ve got social medicine, which is great, but they’re not going to give the treatment, to someone, who is drinking and taking drugs. The guy is smoking 60 cigarettes a day. It just doesn’t work like that. So, A/ he isn’t getting treated, and B/he’s just continuing his old self and, I’m sorry, but the time has come in UFO’s career that it’s really affecting his performance, and, as much as we love him, I think people deserve to see something a little bit better. Until he sorts himself out, I’m afraid he’s sitting on the bench. We really hope he will. We haven’t actually replaced him. And it’s interesting to play with different bass players because throughout my whole career with UFO I’ve basically played with Pete. I do miss him, I have to say. I miss his presence because he’s such a larger-than-life character. And I know the fans miss him too, but I’ve seen enough comments on the guest list, and, at first, it was, why haven’t you got Pete, and then now comments are that people have seen Pete, maybe with his band Waysted and are going, “The guy’s just messed up.” And I think they realize why we can’t really have him in UFO. PB: You played with Waysted for a while. AP: I did. I was going through a lot of problems at that time. I was fighting with my first wife over the custody of my kid. So, that was tough. PB: The band has certainly had its line-up changes, but Phil was there since the beginning and has kept up his voice so well for all these years. How does he keep that up? AP: I actually think his voice sounds better these days. He’s kind of got more gravitas to his voice. He stays in pretty good shape. I don’t know how he stays so thin. We’re not sure about that. The guy can drink beer, but he never seems to put on any weight. I don’t have that luxury. It’s a little annoying, but he works out a lot when he is home and stays fit. I think he sounds great and he still gets out there and does it. We all feel it a little more than we used to. And, Paul Raymond, I mean, it’s amazing how much energy for a bunch of old guys that this band can still do. PB: ‘Strangers in the Night’ was one of UFO’s most acclaimed albums, but I wanted to know why did you decide to record it live in Chicago? AP: Well, it wasn’t actually all in Chicago. It was all in the Midwest. Chicago, back then and still, is our biggest market, always has been, absolutely. It is the biggest UFO town in America. PB: Why do you think that is? AP: I don’t know. You just get that with bands. Some bands are huge in New York, some in LA. It just worked out that way. It wasn’t like we spent any more time playing Chicago. We spent three nights at the Ampith Theatre, there. It just turned out that way, so, of course, it was probably the best audience to record a live concert. 80 % of the album was recorded in Chicago. PB: At one point in UFO’s career, George Martin produced the album ‘No Place to Run’ The album didn’t receive the acclaim that perhaps you thought it might, even with Martin at the helm.What happened? AP: That was the first album post-Michael. The last studio album with Michael was ‘Obsession’ and we’d done a live album. It was already decided that he would leave and Paul came back, when Michael had disappeared for that short period. George had opened a studio in Montserrat. We were at Air London, which was right in the middle of London, at Oxford Circus. I think, at the time, he was having trouble convincing bands to go there, even though it was a wonderful place and, to sweeten the deal, he said, “If you use my studio, I’ll produce your album.” Who can turn that down? The legendary George Martin, to produce an album, it was kind of a no-brainer. The deal was with that, and with the subsequent albums, ‘No Place to Run’, ‘The Wild, The Willing and the Innocent’, ‘Mechanix’and ‘Making Contact’ and, then, it all fell apart. Those four albums never did get the backing that they should have done. I think it was just a matter of timing. The music scene had seen a change. Punk had come come in, and we weren’t flavour of the month for the record company anymore. They’d moved on to a band called the Babys (British pop/rock group formed in the 70s) and, in fact, that was already happening, when we did ‘Obsession’ - There’s a song which Phil wrote called ‘The Babys’ because Phil was so disgusted with the way Chrysalis was pushing the Babys. And, just leaving us sitting on the shelf. It wasn’t the kind of thing we’d been used to. It wasn’t like we always wanted to be top dog with them, but they’d always been very supportive. I think there’s some great stuff on those albums, and they just didn’t get the help they needed. I think a lot of the fans were miffed that Michael had gone. There were some huge Schenker fans and there still is. We still get that now. I mean, my God, the guy has been in and out of the band for the last forty years. He’s not been with the band for seven years now or something. We still get people moaning that he’s not in it. But, it’s a shame, isn’t it? Even George Martin can’t pull a rabbit out of a hat if the record company isn’t behind it. We feel there’s a lot of really good material in those albums that didn’t get the exposure they deserved. PB: The current line-up seems to be so successful though. Vinnie Moore has added his signature slide guitar and blues influence. What are your favorite cuts since Vinnie has come on board? AP: I’ve just done the last two, obviously. ‘You Are Here’ was his first one, with Jason on drums. He did the ‘Showtime Live/DVD’. And, I came in for ‘Monkey Puzzle’ and ‘Visitor’. And for me it’s just like Christmas, because I didn’t expect to be back in the band. As far as making albums again, I thought that part of my life was over. So this is just fantastic for me. As far as tracks, go, there’s some good stuff. It’s kind of going back to a “bluesy” sound with Vinnie playing a little slide, which I’m so comfortable with, because it’s kind of where we started, where UFO was born, out of those blues. I think, my favourite track on ‘The Visitor’ is a track called‘Living Proof.’ It’s just a great track, because when Vinnie played us a demo, very funky, it was like James Brown. What do I do with that? When, it came out, it was kind of like James Brown meets John Bonham. ‘Saving Me’ has been the opening track, for the last couple of years, for our stage show. ‘Monkey Puzzle; has some great stuff, too. ‘Hard Being Me’ is a great song, which might be coming back on this next tour. ‘Kingston Town’ – PB: That is a song with powerful lyrics. AP: Yeah, exactly. I just love every one of them, because I actually got to be on them. PB: Andy, let’s pretend you’re back on a construction crew. If you were in charge of building a house, which jobs would you assign to the other band members? You have access to a power saw or anything else that you need. AP: (Laughs) Oh, I don’t know. Actually Vinnie’s very handy. I wouldn’t put him on drywall, because he hates drywall. PB: He doesn’t like to get his hands sticky? AP: He’s just terrible at it. He just redid his basement. He’s got a studio basement in his house and he just built some walls and did it. And he didn’t do the drywall muddying because he’s just terrible at it. I could put Vinnie on walls because he could use a power saw and a hammer. Phil? Phil is kind of handy. He usually ends up paying someone to do it when he screws up, but actually he’s good at carpets. When I first met him he was a carpet layer. Paul, I’m not sure, I think Paul should be making the tea. (Laughs). PB: That’s useful. AP: Well, because I’m not sure what Paul can do, handy wise. Barry’s a great cabinet maker, so he can build the kitchen cabinets, so there you go. PB: This already sounds like an extraordinary crew. AP: But we all need tea. I’m not sure, but I’ve never heard Paul talk about DIY. But I know Paul makes a good cup of tea. I know that for a fact. We’ve got a pretty strong team here, as far as house-building, goes. PB: Besides renovating houses, you’ve been out on the shooting range. AP: Yes, moving to Texas, you’re almost forced to. PB: It’s such a cultural far-cry from the UK, though, isn’t it? AP: In the UK there’s really no gun culture, unless you go up into the country. We know people who like to shoot pigeons up there. It just wasn’t a thing that I did. In fact, when I came here, I didn’t really think about it, but then in 2007 I had a bad year. In 2007 I lost my mother at the beginning of the year. I broke my ankle and missed a tour. My mother-in-law - she lives in Dallas - decided she would bestow upon me the firearms which had belonged to my wife’s father. He was ex-military and he was one of those survivalist guys. If the world goes to hell in a hand basket, he was going to be prepared. She gave me probably four long guns and maybe five pistols, or something like that, and a whole bunch of ammunition. Thousands of rounds of ammunition. I was kind of gob-smacked. I didn’t know what to do, so I drove very carefully back to Dallas and I was kind of freaking out, what if I get pulled over, not knowing how things worked here, and immediately went out and bought a gun safe, and they stayed there for two years. I said, man, just lock this stuff up. I’ve always been into mechanical things since I’ve been a kid. I’ve built motorcycles out of bits, and bicycles and cars. Guns, not for what they do, but what they are, are pieces of mechanics. And, I used to look at them from time to time, and I said to my wife, “This is crazy. We don’t know how to use them, or anything about the safety, I think we should take some lessons.” There’s a range about twenty minutes from my house. We’re pretty much novices and we’d like to get some lessons. We met this chap – his name was George Hopkins. He was a twenty-year veteran - and he’d served time in England. So, we hit it off. I was kind of nervous. He made it fun. My wife asked the question, “Do we need to register these firearms?” and he said, “In Texas we register sex offenders, but we do not register guns. I want you to put your hand over your heart and say, ‘Thank God for Texas.’” I used to play a lot of darts when I was kid. It’s kind of like darts on steroids. I now have this wish list of guns. The good news is they have now opened a range about five minutes from my house. It’s just a pastime and a hobby, and, unfortunately, I have a collecting gene. I’m up to about 15 firearms, now. I have over three and a half-thousand wind-up toys in my attic. I started in the 70s when I was on the road with UFO. In the afternoons, I’d go to the local toy shop. It just became an obsession. Boxes and boxes. And we’ve moved them from California, to England, and from England to here. Things do become a bit obsessive with me. Wind-up toys, I’ve got three of everything, and now, guns, which, unfortunately, are a little more expensive. PB: Do you collect drum sticks? AP: No, I end up giving most of them away. PB: I always hope to get a drum stick thrown my way, but it never happens. AP: We got sued back in the day once by some guy; we took his eye out, which I didn’t actually, because I didn’t mean to throw them out. I do like to take them out sometime and give them to the people at the front gently. I’ve got storage lockers full of drums, cymbals… I can’t seem to part with things, you know. People buy and sell. Unfortunately I don’t have the selling bit down (Laughs). I’ve just got the buying part. God forbid, if anything would happen to me, I’ve got just so much stuff. My workshop is from floor to ceiling, with everything you could possibly imagine. I actually have my drum kit from the late 60s. PB: You’ve never given anything to a museum? AP: No, my house is a museum (Laughs). PB: Have you thought about writing your memoirs? AP: My wife keeps on me about that. I should really because every once in a while you get a brain bubble and you remember something. I have to say a lot of that stuff is pretty murky. We weren’t called crazy for nothing. PB: Thank you.

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