Gary James' Interview With Mick Jones Of
Foreigner
They've sold over 80 million records worldwide, with sixteen Top 30 hits to their credit. We're talking about songs like "Double Vision", "Hot Blooded", "Urgent", "Cold As Ice", "Head Games", "Feels Like The First Time", "I Want To Know What Love Is", "Juke Box Hero" and "Dirty White Boy". They've also scored nine Top 10 hits, the same as Fleetwood Mac and more than Journey. They're consistently in the Top 20 at Classic Rock Radio, receiving more air play than Bon Jovi, Eric Clapton, Fleetwood Mac, U2, Bruce Springsteen, The Who and Bad Company. Their catalog of hits, as researched by Business Insider, makes them one of the best selling music artists of all time, ahead of Britney Spears, Bob Dylan, Phil Collins, Prince, Queen, Bon Jovi and Def Leppard. The band is second only to Led Zeppelin in worldwide sales of all artists distributed by Atlantic Records. In fact, their fourth album stayed at number one on the Billboard chart longer than any other album by any other artist in Atlantic Records' seventy year history. In the all-time top Billboard 200 album charts, their fourth album comes in at number 46, ahead of The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", Pink Floyd's "The Wall" and U2's "Joshua Tree". In the all-time top Billboard 200 artists chart, they came in at number 62, ahead of Simon And Garfunkel, Heart and The Who. In the all-time top Billboard Hot 100 artists chart, they rank number 56, ahead of the Eagles, Queen, Fleetwood Mac and Bruce Springsteen. In Billboard's Greatest Of All Time rankings, song, album and artist charts, they pulled ahead of Taylor Swift, Kid Rock, Kate Perry and Kanye West. They've received over 500 million YouTube views and are one of the most viewed YouTube artists with anywhere between 700,000 and 900,000 weekly viewings of their songs. Their streams approach ten million per week. Their leader and founder, Mick Jones was inducted into the Songwriters Hall Of Fame in 2013.
By now, you know the group we are talking about is Foreigner. On the eve of "Foreigner - Double Vision: Then And Now", a CD/DVD and Blu-ray release, we spoke to Mick Jones.
Q - Mick, you've got this CD/DVD/Blu-ray release coming out shortly. What else is on the drawing board for Foreigner?
A - Well, there's quite a lot going on. We're on vacation at the moment. We'll be preparing for a couple of events at the beginning of next year (2020). So, we're gradually going to be working on that. We're dong a residency in Las Vegas. That seems to be the latest thing. (laughs)
Q - That's easier on you. You get to sleep in the same bed every night.
A - Definitely, oh yeah. We're also doing a classical concert in Nashville with The Nashville Symphony Concert Orchestra I guess. And then we've got basically a European tour we're doing. A co-headliner with Whitesnake over there. Come back to the States in late June (2020) and do a forty show shed tour with Kansas. That is followed by two or three weeks in the hospital. (laughs) No.
Q - But, other than that, you're not too busy.
A - Yeah, right. (laughs)
Q - When you were growing up, the person who influenced you was Elvis. Where did you see him? He didn't tour England.
A - I actually never saw Elvis (in concert).
Q - Somebody got their facts wrong.
A - They did.
Q - That's why I do these interviews.
A - Exactly. (laughs) It was actually Buddy Holly.
Q - You saw him in person there? He did tour England.
A - I didn't see him. I saw him on TV, as did many of my contemporaries. Everybody was struck dumb. For some reason, this goofy guy (laughs) kind of had such an effect.
Q - With great songs.
A - He had great songs.
Q - When you put Foreigner together, did you have some kind of an idea of what kind of sound you were looking for? And how did you know that would go over with the public, or did that not cross your mind?
A - It crossed my mind, very much so. All I could do really was to dig down into my experiences that I had, the kind of music I'd been playing. The spell I did with Spooky Tooth left me with a lot of ideas. The band itself was a great band. They had great songs. They had really good songs. They were kind of powerful and bluesy. They had a lot of different elements that I really identified with. Obviously a lot of bands were coming out of England in those years. So, I guess my influence was very much in the R&B area. Marvin Gaye was a huge influence on me from a writing perspective.
Q - You were in a group with Sylvia Varten. Now, she opened for The Beatles in Paris. You would stand on the side of the stage, watching The Beatles, and cry.
A - Yeah.
Q - What were you crying about? Shouldn't you have been smiling or clapping your hands? Why were you crying?
A - (laughs) I don't know. I don't know whether it was what they call a white light experience. I was a huge fan of The Beatles. I was playing in Paris. I had sort of ended up in Paris after a couple of months over there. So, I was playing on this show with The Beatles. I couldn't believe it. I just could not believe that I was on the stage, playing alongside The Beatles. About the third night in, as the first act would come off, we'd come on and the curtain would come up and down. So, after we finished, the curtain would come down. We'd be leaving the stage and The Beatles would be coming to the stage. My guitar got snagged on this huge, heavy curtain that was coming down. I started cursing, in English obviously. (laughs) John Lennon was coming right by me and he heard me and said, "Are you English?" And I said, "Yeah." He said, "Oh, come have a drink with the boys afterwards." (laughs) I said, "What? Come and have a drink in The Beatles' dressing room?!" (laughs) I was just blown away by the whole thing. The songs used to kill me.
Q - And did you go back to the dressing room then?
A - Oh, yeah. And from then on, for the whole ten days, I went out with them every night.
Q - When Foreigner was on the road, did you guys go out to the hot spots in a city after you played a concert there? If you were in Los Angeles, did you go to The Whiskey A Go Go or The Roxy or The Rainbow? We never did see pictures of the group entering or exiting a nightclub.
A - Oh, yeah. I used to love going out. Are you talking about being recognizable?
Q - Having photographers waiting outside of an entrance to one of these clubs, waiting to snap a photo of the band. We never did see a photo of Foreigner in Circus, Creem, Hit Parader or Rock Scene magazine.
A - I used to love going out jamming, sitting in with a local band sometimes. But, we weren't really exposed to the teeny bop magazines. We didn't have that kind of image. We were more about the music.
Q - How big of a role did Bud Prager play in Foreigner's success?
A - Quite an important role. I had spent some time in a band with Leslie West, The Leslie West Band at the time. Bud was managing the band. I was quite a feat, not just playing with Leslie, if he ever showed up. We were sitting in a hotel in Florida somewhere and Leslie had just appropriated the guitar of the lead guitarist in the support band, and flew to New York and sold it for whatever drug du jour was available. It was a bad time and I've talked to Leslie about it. He was a big influence on me as a guitar player. He had amazing feel for a guy from Queens. (laughs) He sounded like he was born on the bayou or something. But it was an impossible situation really at the time. I got pretty pissed and angry. I said to Bud, "What are you doing, man? What kind of manager are you? You're having this stuff go on. You're putting up with this shit every night of every day. Why don't you get out of your comfortable apartment in New York City while we're thrashing about the country, and do something?" (laughs) I got really heavy with him. He sort of looked at me and said, "Well, I'll do that if you do that." I said, "What do you mean?" "You put something together and I'll put something together with you." And that's basically what he did. He helped financially. He gave us a budget so that we could live to survive.
Q - Have you ever seen a Foreigner tribute group?
A - Yeah.
Q - Did you like them?
A - One or two aren't bad actually. There's more of them than I thought. I've seen them from time to time.
Q - I'm happy to hear you like them. Not all groups appreciate tribute acts. I say it helps promote the real thing.
A - I think it does. Plus, musicians have to work. It's very, very tough starting a band, whichever way you do it. Some of these bands get recognized by their talent too. It's just they're not professional. They play on weekends. Some of them are really gifted guys.
Q - You were working as an A&R guy in New York City for a time.
A - A very short time. I was only involved with it for six months. The guy I was working with was really kind of a dishonest guy, to put it mildly. So, that was short-lived. It was an experience, let me say that. It was just to get me through, really. I was a little high and dry in New York City. I needed something to support myself.
Q - I believe it was back in 1979 with Roling Stone had an article calling groups like Journey, Styx and Foreigner "Faceless groups." Were you mad about that or did you laugh it off?
A - I pretty much laughed it off. It didn't really bother me that much. It's absurd how they lump you in to sort of categories. Once or twice maybe it's gotten to me. Maybe. It's like everything. It's like The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame. We won't get into that though. (laughs)
Q - Are you saying Foreigner is not in The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame and you don't want to talk about it?
A - No. I'm fine to talk about it.
Q - I interviewed Bill Aucoin, the manager of KISS, and he didn't think KISS would ever be nominated and inducted into The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, and they were. Same thing with Yes. They didn't think they would make it in, but they did. Let's get the word out that Foreigner deserves to nominated and inducted into the Cleveland Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.
A - There you go! That's what I like to hear. I'd appreciate that. That's really cool.
Q - I know it's Media Day for Mick Jones and you have to go on to the next interview.
A - You asked some really interesting questions.
Q - Thank you very much. It's hard to follow Dan Rather. (Dan Rather interviewed both Mick Jones and Lou Gramm for AXS TV network)
A - (laughs) It's hard to meet Dan Rather. He's a great guy, but he's such an intimidating presence. He's quite something. He's a very, very nice guy.
Q - He seems to enjoy talking to guys like you.
A - I'll tell you what, he's very good at opening you up. He's crafty. He leads you into different things. He's a real professional on that.
Official Website: www.ForeignerOnLine.com
© Gary James. All rights reserved.
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