There are times when you truly appreciate Foreigner. For instance, like when Madonna’s “Like A Virgin” comes on the air. A navel she may have, deeper than Frank Marino, wrigglier than Paul Stanley’s ass with an MX enema. But she doesn’t have the best paean to first adolescent dabblings, uh-uh. “Feels Like The First Time,” that’s the one. A Foreigner song! There are other times, of course, when you take Foreigner completely for granted—you might hum one of their inoffensive rock ditties as you go about the housework, but you rarely stop to think. That this is the group whose six album career has been the AOR equivalent of how many people can you stuff in a phone box; how many hits can you put on one LP? Foreigner make Michael Jackson look like a beginner.

Couldn’t see any Jackson albums in the small record collection in the lovely London flat, Mick Jones and family’s home-from-home when they’re not in New York City—just a copy of Urban Chipmunk, some glossy avant-garde magazines, gorgeous art-deco and a pair of ankle weights. I’ll leave you and your analyst to piece it together. Because what I found in Mr. Cold As Ice, Mr. Double Vision, Mr. (ah, brilliant) Feels Like The First Time was a man as calm and nice as the great god Valium itself—as collected as stamps, as controlled as the British press (and far more intelligent), so quiet and careful he makes Prince look like a blabbermouth. Generally self-deprecating and non-controversial. This is not, I found to my chagrin, the sort of bloke you can get to slag off Motley Crue. Though he did seem a mite intrigued at the prospect of Lou Gramm wearing a studded crotchpiece and Rick Wills and Dennis Elliott wearing matching bottomless leather pants.

“I think we’ve got an image,” Mick pours the tea, ‘‘if anything,” he adds milk (the reversing of the usual tea-milkpouring process being the only Americanization I could note in a man who’s lived in the States for years and hobnobbed with Yanks in his band—although the balance’s changed from an even threethree to three-one in favor of the Brits— he’s still got his English accent) ‘‘of a band that delivers good albums and songs. At least, a certain amount of people buy them.” The slightly nervous chuckle that pops up too often to mention.

‘‘We’re just a bunch of honest guys trying to make an honest buck doing what we want to do...”

Flashback. Born in England, Mick Jones discovered rock ’n’ roll when he heard “Peggy Sue.” (“That’s giving the age away a little bit!”) With a little plastic ukelele his father—a personnel manager in a large company—bought him, young Mikey would stand in front of the mirror and impersonate Hank B. Marvin of the Shadows. Complete with little dance. When he was 14 he put a band together “for playing the church hall.” It was named after the Paul Newman film, The Hustler. “I didn’t even know what the word meant. I was always innocent.” (Looks it even now in his whiter-thanWham jumpsuit. But I digress.)

From that heady Hustler moment on, he realized “I wanted to be on the stage. My parents had other ideas. They wanted something sensible to fall back on.” Foreigner? No, real estate brokerage. But the lure of rock was strong.

“I don’t think it was women and drugs.

I mean there wasn’t that many drugs around at that time when I was a kid. I guess it was the dream of just doing something that somebody would recognize, not run-of-the-mill. I was always a bit of a dreamer as a kid and I just couldn’t see myself doing anything else, really. Music was all that existed then for me. And as a kid, from watching films or something on TV, I always dreamed of coming to America. You just have to have somewhere else to head for. I just enjoyed being different, getting up onstage, though I think my ambition was to get more into music than actually be a rock star or whatever. I was a real music aficionado.”

His first pro job was 24th guitar player for Nero & The Gladiators, a Tornadostype band that led him over the seas to France where he backed the Frog Tom Jones, Johnny Halliday. Don’t laugh. Jimmy Page, Stevie Marriott and Peter Frampton did the same thing. Then he went back home, hooked up with Spooky Tooth and followed them to the States. When the band broke up, Mick got a record company A&R job (it’s been said that’s where he acquired his dress sense;

I merely report this stuff). He did a demo of his songs before recruiting ex-King Crimson (and now ex-Foreigner) Ian McDonald, the also-departed Al Greenwood, singer Lou Gramm, ex-Black Sheep, veteran studio drummer Dennis Elliott, and Ed Gagliardi, since replaced by Rick Wills—people who didn’t object to his tunes and who shared his goal “semi-commercial; it was either that or go completely avant-garde.”

The debut album went quadruple platinum. The follow-up topped that at five million. Last I looked every person in the universe has at least 10 copies of every Foreigner record ever made. And he still hasn’t been out with Britt Ekland! Nor, for that matter, praised to the high heavens Eddie VH-style! Does he have any secret longings to be the rock star type or a musician’s musician?

“No,” says the super-bronzed face, quietly. “I’m quite happy to be in the middle actually. If I wanted to hire a press agent and really go for it, I could, I think, play the part very well!”

Which one?

“Both, of course! But one by one. The Rockstar Image: I don’t want to be that way particularly. I enjoy the occasional thing here and there, a bit of gossip or someone coming up and saying they want my autograph, but I don’t go out of my way to get it. The group is not that way. I guess if I had my way I’d like to be remembered as somebody that can play guitar and play a few different things on it and who can write songs. I don’t put all my eggs in one basket. I’m not one to methodically sit down and practice the guitar. Probably a lot of people would say that’s very obvious! I think if I’ve got any talent, it lies in the combination of my playing instruments and writing.”

“I don’t feel like I’m part of a dinosaur.” —Mick Jones

Can he sing? “Not really. My mother always used to say, ‘you should practice a bit more!’ I haven’t got a strong voice, but I may have a go at something, I don’t know when.”

Probably this year. When threatened, he reveals a project on the side; Nile Rodgers is involved. Ammunition for people who claim that Foreigner’s a formula band, that these four cads are playing down to rake in the bucks, that they could do better if they tried.

“It depends what people mean by better. I’m quite proud of writing music that is popular, as opposed to ‘pop music.’ I’m very proud of being able to be successful, inasmuch as a lot of people like the music we make with this band. And I don’t think we’re selling out while we’re doing it. I don’t think I’m underplaying it. Obviously it’s within a certain area; we’re not going to come out with Concrete Music or something. This band is not the right vehicle for that; this band is a particular thing. Maybe if I did a few other things they’d be satisfied, they’d think OK, there is more to him than that. But then they don’t know what goes into this thing. There’s a tremendous amount that goes into an album, much more I think than people imagine—maybe 50 or 60 songs or ideas you go in with it. There is,” he gently protests, “a little art involved in it.”

Certainly a lot of time. Foreigner take a couple of years between studio albums. Three years before 4 and this one. It got longer when Mick took time off to sort out his personal life—and his producer. They use different producers on each album, but this one has the distinction of two different producers for one record. Trevor Horn started out, and when that didn’t work, Alex Sadkin of Thompson Twins fame took up the baton. “Everything kind of fell apart and we had to sort of regroup,” says Mick. “We decided to start again.”

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 41

So they weren’t sitting around on their yachts doing crosswords? “Enjoying our luxury homes and everything? No. This,” he looks around the well-appointed room, “is all a front! I think we have the distinction of being one of the bands who puts just about everything back into the album. I think we’re now the yardstick of the business. ‘Oh, how long does it take? As long as Foreigner’s? How much did it cost? As much as Foreigner’s?’ I think they use it as a gauge for over-the-top.”

Anyway, this thing he said about going completely avant-garde. Could he if he tried? “Yes, I think I could. There are some things on this album which—they’re not avant-garde particularly, but there are some things we’ve done which are a little different and adventurous.”

For instance?

“Well, to come out with a funky track like ‘Urgent’ with a sax solo is a little different, I thought at the time.” What about this one? “Going with a gospel choir, going with a ballad for the first single. I think ‘Stranger In My Own House’ is an interesting heavy approach. It’s not just particularly straight. I like that.”

So do I, I must say. One of the few stompers remaining in their new repertoire, the female in the lyrics comes off as the tough one. Makes a change from backing women into bathrooms and their more usual macho strut stuff.

“If anything, I felt that we’d been a bit too serious before, on albums— sometimes not meaning to be, but we’ve been accused of taking ourselves seriously. Some of the tonguein-cheek things we’ve done before hit the wrong chord, you know. But this one I’m quite happy with, a nice satirical little song.” Nice satirical little album title too, Agent Provocateur, from a group that’s been called many things but never provocative. “Exactly that,” chuckles Mick, politely.

But aren’t they getting softer? Wimping out? Piling on the ballads? “There’s a couple of hard ones there to remind myself,” Mick protests. “If you were to ask me what was different from the last album”—good question!—"we may have refined some of the slower, midtempo songs, some of the slow emotional things are more emotional than we’ve done before, a little more dramatic perhaps, and we’ve probably gone a little harder in the rock area. I’m always conscious of not repeating myself, or not repeating ourselves, inasmuch as like a formula. I think there’s a definite difference in approach, melodically, over the last few.”

Certainly been no difference in sales figures. Does he ever wake up in a sweat at night wondering if he’s lost the mega-platinum touch?

“Yes, definitely. Especially this time with the amount of time in between. It’s just nice to see that we weren’t forgotten. I felt that we had sort of achieved a certain status with the last album—perhaps we’d reached a position where we felt we’d been accepted, as it were; not just accepted as a supergroup or whatever, but as a band that delivers each time.”

What was the last record he bought, then? Long silence. “Ah, the Thompson Twins. That was because I’d met them through Alex Sadkin, the producer. I’d always liked their singles. To tell the truth, I don’t listen to albums very much, I don’t really have time.” Though for Urban Chipmunk there’s always time! “I just listen to the radio, and I do most of my listening driving.”

And so we chatted on, tea was poured, more was said that you won’t get to read, except this final question. Does it seem like Foreigner’s been going for eternities?

“I keep reminding myself, I kept saying it’s only been six years—then I think actually no, it’s quite a bit longer than that. I put the band together in 1976. I think because of the fact we’ve had a relatively few amount of albums that it still does feel good. I don’t feel like I’m part of a dinosaur. Well,” the nice smile again, “some mornings I do...”