The Complete, Unexpurgated, Fully Illustrated DAVE EDMUNDS Story From A TO Z

"Everybody say yeah!"—Ray Charles

CREEM: So are you happy with the new record?

DAVE EDMUNDS: Yeah. I think it's better than the last one and better than Get It. CREEM: So this is a Dave Edmunds and Rockpile tour?

DAVE: No. We're trying to shake off all that. On the contract it's supposed to be Rockpile featuring Dave Edmunds and Nick Lowe. But usually the promoters do what they think's best.

CREEM: So are you still subscribing to the theory that three minutes is best for a pop song?

DAVE: Oh, yeah. Always have been. CREEM: What do you think of groups like Kansas, Yes and all that?

DAVE: Not much, I'm afraid. I've never gone for 'em. You mean, Genesis and all that? Never been taken with it at all. CREEM: So you think music should have a sense of humor?

DAVE: Ummmm, yeah.

CREEM: You don't subscribe to the "Rock As Art" school?

DAVE: No.

CREEM: You've been associated with the New Wave. How do you feel about that? DAVE: In a way, there's two reasons for that. One is that I like the simple, three-minute rock 'n' roll stuff, and now a lot of kids got pissed off about Yes and Genesis and all that and started playing music that is pretty similar [to simple, threeminute rock], and it sort'of came back in style. The other thing is the association with Nick and his association with Stiff Records and so on. There's a link there, also. Actually, I think it's quite funny. It doesn't bother me at all.

CREEM: Funny?

DAVE: Very interesting.

CREEM: So do you have any favorites in the New Wave?

DAVE: I like the Knack. "My Sharona," that's great. That's a classic, a classic record. CREEM: Have you heard about the "Knuke the Knack" t-shirts?

DAVE: No.

CREEM: Well, I like the Knack too, but there's this guy out in California who's a Clash partisan who's put together this "Knuke the Knack" kit with t-shirts and stuff.

DAVE: Nope. Didn't see that. Just got back from California.

CREEM: You're sort of an Americaphile, a fan of American pop culture, it seems. Anything new you've discovered this trip? DAVE: No. I don't think so. The rock 'n' roll America invented is what I'm a big fan of. And which America promptly forgot. I don't think anyone knows who Eddie Cochran was over here these days.

CREEM: Do you listen much to what Jerry Lee Lewis is doing these days? I know you're a fan.

DAVE: Yeah. The new album is great. CREEM: So you think Jerry Lee has still got it and it's possible to be a rocker at 44 or whatever?

™ The rock Vi'roll America invented is what I'm a big fan

DAVE: Yeah. Having listened to his album, definitely. I hope I'm gonna do it when I'm 44.

CREEM: Do you see that?

DAVE: I think so. Yeah. If someone had asked me ten years ago what I would be doing at 36. I wouldn't have said "Oh, the same thing. Back on the road, playing rock 'n' roll songs, doing my fifth tour of America." I would've thought that was crazy... There's nothing else I can do anyways. That's it.

CREEM: You could always produce records.

DAVE: That's no fun.

CREEM: After this tour are you going to retire to Rockfield Studios [home base of Edmunds and Rockpile] and hide out like you did before?

DAVE: No. Not a good idea.

CREEM: So you're enjoying this?

DAVE: Yeah.

CREEM: How's your guitar playing? I know you had put it away for awhile.

DAVE: Yeah. I did. Brushed off a few cobwebs, but...

CREEM: Feel like you got it back?

DAVE: Yeah. 'Not going to do "Sabre Dance" [early Edmunds hit with group Love Sculpture featuring frenetic blues guitar], though we've thought of doing that.

Just for one night. Do "Sabre Dance" and then drop it again.

CREEM: There are none of your songs on this new album. Had you given up songwriting?

DAVE: No. That wasn't done deliberately. It's just the songs I wanted to do happened to be by other people, though most of 'em are original. Billy, our guitarist, wrote three of the tracks.

CREEM: Do you prefer recording or performing live?

DAVE: I don't know. Making a record which comes off as you expected is pretty much as good as a good gig.

CREEM: Do you record live or in one or two takes?

DAVE: None of 'em take very long; Everybody comes in with bits of songs and everybody chucks in a few ideas. It's all pretty loose.

CREEM: As a fan, what do you think of Chuck Berry going to jail?

DAVE: It's strange. Tax evasion isn't exactly a serious thing... I think he should've gotten an award. It's funny; he started off celebrating the American way of life in all his songs, and then he got dumped in jail twice for very minor offenses. No wonder he's bitter.

CREEM: Would you ever consider moving here to the States?

DAVE: I did at one time, but then Margaret Thatcher moved the taxes down from 83 percent to 60 percent, the top taxes. I thought at one time I'd like it here. After my first visit to California I thought "That's it!", but upon closer examination I found that all was not as I thought. Nahhh. I like London. I think it's the best place to be in the music business.

CREEM: You don't think you'd be closer to your musical roots here?

DAVE: Nahhh. The roots have been pretty much buried here anyway. It's not as if I'm going to find out anything I don't know already.

CREEM: Do you think that you and Nick and Elvis Costello are a New Wave, a wave of the future?

DAVE: Elvis Costello certainly is.

CREEM: Can you retake radio and the marketplace from Yes and all the giant groups?

DAVE: It would be very naive of me to say yes, because these guys are very big. Even if they go out of fashion a little bit, it would be very hard to replace them. They're still gonna sell lots of records, even if they are a little out of fashion. And it's pretty hard not to hear "Stairway To Heaven" once a week at least anyway.

CREEM: Do you seek to be a superstar? DAVE: No. I want to get hits, but I don't want that kind of mega-stardom. I just want hits to get it over. You can't keep doing it without hits. That's why I've been very lucky getting a hit every two years. Very strange way of doing it, but it's sort of kept me afloat.

CREEM: I know Nick Lowe said he liked the Village People, do you?

U

don't think anyone knows who Eddie Cochran was over here these days.

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DAVE: Yeah. I do actually. I think they're really good. I think it was a great idea. CREEM: So do I. You know they lost their lead singer?

DAVE: No.

CREEM: Yeah. He's going to do a solo act in Las Vegas.

DAVE: Hahaha.

CREEM: Do you like any other disco? DAVE: Not much. There's always the odd person. It's too digital for me, like machines making music.

CREEM: Do you think what you re doing will endure?

DAVE: Well, it has. It's gone from rock 'n' roll to blues to soul to power pop to punk to new wave, and it's all basically rock 'n' roll. CREEM: Do you think of yourself as a revivalist?

DAVE: No. Not like Sha Na Na or something. I think that's pretty boring. CREEM: Well, I don't think I can pluck any more gems from you, so I guess I'll let you off the hook so you can take a nap. DAVE: Hahaha.

PULL-OUT

Special Death to Roller Disco Pull-Out Color Supplement!

After the Rockpile show at the Palladium here in New York on 14th Street, we (CREEM, not Dave) went to a nearby bar. It's all white except for the naturalwood finish bar and the Art on the walls, which (the Art) is mostly black and white. They call the place Mickey's because it's owned by Mickey Ruskin, famed ex-owner of Max's Kansas City and the defunct Lower Manhattan Ocean Club and sometime wet nurse (free drinks) to artists and "artists," but the real name is Kipling's Last Resort. We sat near the door.

First one guy came in on roller skates. Then, after a while, another guy came in on roller skates. And then a girl came in on roller skates. Soon another girl came in on roller skates and another guy and another girl, a guy, a girl, a guy, a guy, a girl, a girl, a girl, and so on. Within an hour there were about 25 people in the place who were wearing roller skates instead of shoes. Some of them danced around the jukebox. And when I say "around," I mean way around. You can sure travel on them babies! One of them wore a Robert Gordon t-shirt which said "Rock Billy Boogie" on the front in shocking pink letters. In fact, the music they were dancing to on their roller skates was, oddly enough, more Robert Gordon-like than disco: lots of late Fifties and early Sixties stuff.

The last guy we saw come in wearing roller skates instead of shoes was definitely the King of the Local Roller Skaters. This fella rolled through the door dancing! He was fast, too. And he was rolling everywhere without regard for life or limb. He was that committed! Like in the Fifties rock movies, a girl started dancing with him on her roller skates because she was so turned on to his rolling animal magnetism. He was a rolling panther! He was rolling and musky sexual smells were rolling off him to create a sort of double-whammy that the girls can't take. Mmmmmm—on wheels! Then, again just like in the movies, a 90-pound weakling tried to horn in on the King and his new girl. But the King shut him down! In another part of the room, there appeared to be a bar fight brewing, a rolling bar fight, no less, between the "Rock Billy Boogie'guy and someone less cool on wheels. We figured out that the key to roller bar fights is to get in the first shove—and make it a good one! Your opponent may recover from the blow (shove, actually), but by the time he does, he'll be six blocks away and not much of an immediate threat.

And what about all of this roller skating?

Why not just kill 'em?

STOP PULLING OUT