Here is the second part of my recent chat with Michael Des Barres. If you missed the first part check it out HERE Yesterday we finished with the bombshell that there is already news about what happens next...
MICHAEL: I have already written the next album which I am calling
Drop the Needle.
JON: That’s good, that works on so many different levels.
MICHAEL: It’s both a double entendre of drug addiction and of course
a return to authenticity – it’s drop the needle, crackle and hiss, taste as
sweet as your first kiss is the chorus.
JON: Is it going to be the same sort of style as the current one?
MICHAEL: Oh yes, it’s going to be even more rockin’. I ain’t getting sensitive here. I am going to
rock as hard as anybody has rocked in the context of the roll. You know, I want
it to roll and I want it to be really, you know, ballsy. I want to play live, you know for the next
year. I want to go out and play this
music.
Well, you’ve also got to keep smart and what I’ve learnt is
that smart means digital media and making people aware of you in a loving and
confident and self-deprecating way. You
know, there is a way of communicating with people to make them fall in love
with you, so they want to hear your music. So it’s not just about throwing
music at people, it’s about gently, but firmly letting people know that you’re
serious and that I’m carrying a flag for a rock and roll army that is under
attack.
JON: I agree totally.
MICHAEL: I mean the kind of music that you love, Jonathan, is the
kind of music I love, and it is disappearing.
That’s why Steve van Zandt is so important. His show, Underground Garage on
Sirius is very, very important because it introduces people to bands that are
playing music that is not auto-tuned -
you know the music that is played in a room and captured in that moment. That’s the music that is going because
producers have become like movie directors, it’s their ball game.
JON: Yes, it’s all auto-tuned and pro-tools
MICHAEL: You know me, I don’t denigrate anybody’s work, you know, whatever it is but it is not rock and roll.
To me, my version of it anyway. But it still gets people off, I think Skrillex is
extraordinary but it is just not my
cup of tea. I want to have a cup of tea
with Jonathan and Corinna and some fuckin’ cake... I don’t want to sit with the
headphones on Ecstasy listening to these infantile couplets, you know
JON: We could talk for hours
and keep this running for months
MICHAEL: Absolutely we could, and we should. And we must update it.
You know, they are making this documentary about me and it’s winding down and
it’s amazing this documentary. It’s had
Steve Jones, John Taylor, Gabriel Byrne, Don Johnson, my first wife when I was
a teenager, Miss Pamela, my current love who I adore, all of Silverhead, you
know every clip of every movie, and extensive interviews with yours truly.
... I
mean Japan with Silverhead. You know all the upcoming stuff will be in the
movie, and then there’s footage of me marrying this couple in Austin ,
Texas which is hilarious when you think about
it – to cut from Live Aid to me marrying these people in a field in Texas .
The movie
is in edit right now. It will be done –
I think it will be completed by the middle of November and then it will be
officially sent out to all the festivals – the aim is to have in South by
Southwest and then Sundance.
And then it’s called My Name is Michael des Barres, You
Should Make a Movie About Me
JON: Sounds fantastic...
MICHAEL: It’s amazing Jonathan.
It’s me from Sidney Poitier to Steve Jones for Christ’s sake.
JON: You can’t get much more multi-cultural than that, can you?
MICHAEL: Not really....I don’t know anybody who’s done that, and at
the same time I never, ever claimed to be Sting or Rod Stewart or any of these
super-Bonoesque rock idols. That’s not my story. You know, my story is one of meta-physical
growth and understanding why I am here. It’s not about being and working you
know, as I say, working with rescue animals and being sober. It’s about love,
it’s about connection and it’s about rock and roll, it’s about expressing
yourself for God’s sake.
JON: Now I have got one last question before I disappear. I had an email a couple of days ago from one
of our readers who said, ‘Next time you speak to Michael ask him, is it true
that you were once offered the job of singer with Queen after Freddie Mercury
died?’
MICHAEL: You know, my answer to him is I can’t answer it, because
it’s so gratuitous and self-serving but I’ll leave it to your imagination. You know, nobody can fill Freddie Mercury’s
shoes. Nobody. Not a soul on this planet. He was the most unique rock and roll singer,
writer and performer and nobody can fill those shoes is my response.
JON: I didn’t know anything about that. I had never known about
that story.
MICHAEL: Well, it’s in Wikipedia and various internet sites but I
don’t answer the question because it just seems so self-serving. The point I’m
making is that nobody can replace Freddie Mercury. That would be like saying, hey why don’t you
replace Edith Piaf. Hey why don’t you do Miles Davis? It’s absurd. It’s like replacing Jesus. Which is what we should all be doing of
course.
JON: I know perfectly well what you mean by saying that.
MICHAEL: Yeah it’s like saying let’s be Buddha.
JON: However, I’m tempted not to print that for fear of pissing off off the moral majority.
MICHAEL: Well my aim in life is to piss of the moral majority because
the moral majority is an oxymoron – more moron than oxy.
And that is about it for today. Life goes on, and tomorrow we will bring you the third and concluding part, followed by what I think is the most peculiar piece of Michael Des Barres memorabilia that I have ever seen, on sunday...
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