CRUEL FOR RATS: THE STRANGLERS’ SOCIOPATHIC SOUND SERVICE

Hugh Cornwell is looking at me with a somewhat proprietary gleam in his eye. 'You were at our first American gig in Philadelphia, weren't you? I remember. You said I was sexist.' 'No, she said you were sexy,' mistakenly corrects Jean-Jacques Burnel, sidling up to join Cornwell and myself under a very small umbrella. Three-quarters of the Stranglers are waiting for a taxi outside Irving Plaza, where they've just completed a sound check for the second night's gig.

Burnel moves in closer. He doesn't miss a chance to come on, and what's worse, this often-in-trouble chap is too damn irresistible. Big brown soulful eyes. Soft pouty.lips. Butter wouldn't melt in 'em, etc. 'So what are you doing here?' he asks. Working, 1 respond. 'Why?' 'Because I'm getting paid to do it,' I hand back, grinning defiantly. The victory is short-lived^ 'Oh, continues J. J., *'I thought your type did that sort of thing on the street. What's your price?" 'You couldn't afford it,' sez I, growing profoundly nervous at Bumel's shift into heavy breathing range. We attempt a laugh when the cab finally comes. Hey-la, the Stranglers are back.

Well, what's a reasonably normal, non-masochistic female doing mucking about with the Stranglers anyway? You may well ask. It's a question I've been pondering ever since Rattus Norvegicus was released in 1977 and 'Sometimes' turned out to be the kind of tune you had to play on days when one or another casualty of life made for a murderous mood. That it may have been written about a man's physical violence toward a woman wasn't irrelevant, or acceptable—but it was understandable.

'That's what it's about, being pissed off with someone and resorting to physical contact,' agrees Hugh Cornwell, winding down over a Chinese meal before the Stranglers' Saturday night show at Irving Plaza. 'But it's not advocating that that should happen all the time. It's just a journalistic description of a certain incident that did happen. Our musical themes have always related directly to what we've experienced ourselves. If they didn't, they wouldn't be valid. '

Cornwell and Stranglers' drummer, Jet Black, a huge bear of a man, repeatedly bring up cases of the band's intentions being assumed and/or exaggerated. And the rumors concerning the band's supposed viciousness, traveling over from England, Europe or the Far East, have been legion, sufficient to have given the Stranglers a mythology among those who come to see them, and possibly to have kept them out of America for over two years, owing to the lack of a domestic label.

We are doing a great social service to every country we visit. —Hugh Cornwell

It's with a newly completed album in hand, the issuing by IRS of The Stranglers, an anthology of recent British material, and a bit more balanced attitude that the Stranglers have been conducting their, most in-depth American tour. Quite a contrast, says the somber-looking Cornwell, to their first U.S. appearances, including the aforementioned Philly Hot Club date, a grimy, grungy, sweaty hard-core nasty punk affair.

'Well, we hated America before we even got here last time because we'd had American culture rammed down our throats since we were small. And we felt a bit repressed about it and a bit resentful of it. So we came with an attitude last time. And when we did get here, we realized that some of these people were all right. Then we had a lot of problems with our management and American label, so it'_s been a long time since we had the opportunity to come over and play and release a record

'The audiences are different this time, because now all that rubbish about punk and new wave has died off. People don't come and see us expecting sorrtething— they come with an open mind.' Adds Jet, itemizing several small midwestern and southern venues the band was booked into, 'we shall be extremely surprised if we encounter anybody that's ever heard of us. '

The Stranglers were in fact one of the first new music ensembles to travel here from Britain, beating the Sex Pistols and Clash by over a year. While their sinister demeanor was in keeping with the aggressive postures of punk's early years, their moody keyboard-rhythmic sound cut across any boundaries separating old rock and new music followers, and at least in New York, they were occasionally aired on the radio. In Britain, the group occupied the charts as frequently as they were banned by up-in-arms town councils, and almost from the outset, incurred the considerable wrath of the press, who branded them as poseurs.

Insists Jet, 'the kids that come always enjoy themselves, and we enjoy ourselves, but we take a lot of shit from the media.' Hugh: 'Well, we were the first British band, basically. We were around in '74. They were so cynical, they thought that we were in some hippie band and had all suddenly cut our hair. That's what they immediately assumed. The idea that none of us could have been fresh to a band before was just mind-boggling.' While the Stranglers, excepting possibly the boyish Burnel, will never look forward to 30 again, Cornwell, at least, had been teaching college before organizing the band. And whether to the Stranglers' credit or cleverness, none of the British newsweeklies, with all their sleuthing, has to my knowledge unearthed a candid of the guys in paisley caftans.

Though the band adamantly refuses to admit to fostering any sort of group image—they insist the 'Meninblack Tour' logo is purely coincidental with the song of the same name—Cornwell and Black laugh uproariously when told about a hastily abandoned idea to promote their first U.S. album by mailing out dead rats. The Pied Piper of Punk—that wouldn't hurt.

'We get strange people in England coming up to us,' says Hugh. 'I've been in London at the Nashville, and some guy came over and said, 'at your new gig, you gonna cut up that chicken and eat it like you did the last time I seen ya?' 1 said, 'I think you're confusing us with another band.' He says, 'no, the Stranglers, man, 1 was there, I saw you do it,' and no matter what you say, this guy's convinced.' Cornwell skewers another shrimp, well-cooked mind you, and pours a round of tea, including one for Burnel, who's at the far end of the table sweet-talking a spandex-trousered Bostonion who played guessing games with the group before announcing that she, too, was there for an interview.

We only eat female Journalists for breakfast. —Hugh Cornwell

For whatever reason they choose to state, the Stranglers have been on their best behavior in America, though they'd fiercely take issue with the opinion of an English friend who insisted to me that this is the last market which hasn't written them off. Excepting Burnel, who was fighting flu, the band had spent two hours signing autographs and chatting with fans in Bleecker Bob's record store. Their followers included a pair of leather-and-chained girls from Montreal, three teenage fanzine reporters and about a half-dozen young boys, whom Hugh invited to the soundcheck. While they called home for permission, Cornwell mentioned that he'd like to have had the Stranglers play a school for those kids too young to stay out past 2 a.m. in the clubs.

The little boys were catered to and treated well, but when it came to dealing with the thousand or so folks packed into Irving Plaza, the Stranglers' myth triumphed over reality. It was Friday night, but it sure wasn't date night—more like a potential rape and pillage scene. Five years of going to the seediest nouveau music venues, and this is the first time I get groped by a smirking, bratty bunch swigging Buds. Of course, Burnel warrants, I loved every second of it and insists I return for the next night's festivities. Cornwell and Black agree in describing the massively male turnout, and are amused, if puzzled.

'There were lots of guys, weren't there?' mused Hugh. 'We heard that the gay macho boys approve of us.' Jet: 'They've got us all wrong as well.' Hugh: 'I think it's great. We've always tried to defy categories for our music. We've also defied the imagemakers. We just want to be honest and ourselves, so we've gone out of the way to maintain our own personalities and everyone can't handle this, so they've ended up making up their own things about us, which is fair enough. Let people create their own entertainment.

'Throughout our career, we've always had the nuttiest people being attracted to us, we always get the nutters, the completely abnormal types, the sociopaths.' Jet: 'Well, they create bigger images than the average person and since everyone's creating images of what they think we are, the nutty people create nutty images.' Hugh: 'And I think it's rather neat, because the 95% normal majority of people are catered for, so it's nice to know that we are providing something for the others. In fact,' he declares dryly, 'we are doing a great social service to every country we visit. It's not appreciated. We should receive an arts council grantfor the work we do.'

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While we're a long ways off from an announcer intoning on the tube, 'it's 10 p.m., have your hostile children played their Stranglers today?', Cornwell grows very serious when it comes to extending the Stranglers'aesthetic viewpoint outside the realms of purely personal repartee. Their latest compositions, like 'Nuclear Device' on The Stranglers, focus upon international incidents, specifically, the possibility of a

dictatorial Australian leader of Queensland State, who attempted to use the Stranglers as an excuse to shut a concert hall, manufacturing nuclear equipment from his local uranium and taking-over. If Cornwell and Black are representative of the entire bunch, the Stranglers are a well-read* highly politicized bunch, who choose to advocate controversial causes and remain opinionated, whatever the risk to their careers.

For example, when Hugh Cornwell was arrested and imprisoned for possession of drugs in London, he wrote about his court and prison experiences in a booklet called 'Inside Information.' Describing the behavior of the judges, the guards and the prisoners was nothing if not a serious undertaking, in keeping with his belief that the best an artist can do is use his position to spread information, and possibly effect change. He concluded the pamphlet by simply ptating, 'I just hope someone gets a chance to read this.'

Ultimately, I don't totally agree with all of Cornwell and Black's denials of imagemongering, and would cheerfully pop Jean-Jacques one in his pliant kisser for his

xcomment a few years back that older women are useless, because their bodies fall apart. 'Some of 'em are,' laughs Jet, suspecting the motives of the questioner Burnel had responded to, and making things worse. But to, be banned for years by British council boards, some of whom continue to deny the Stranglers venues, to be stuck without a U.S. label for their newest album, and still be referred to press-wise as a bunch of has-beens, seems to be a case of maligning for its own sake. 'Yqu must have been expecting to meet four nutters. Did we hit you yet?' queries Jet. Hugh declares, 'we only eat female journalists for breakfast, isn't that right, Jean?' 'Late breakfasts,' leers the heartthrob.

It appears altogether the right time to leave the Stranglers to their chow mein noodles and their own devices.