44 PLANET ROCK
SPIKE
The Quireboys
vocalist once broke
his hand knocking
out Schenker,
backstage in
Newcastle. “We’re
friends now, I think,”
says Spike.couldn’t find Bernie. They looked like rock stars,
they were very charismatic and very good-looking.
Phil [Mogg] was a bit distant at first, but Andy
[Parker] was really outgoing and Pete [Way] was a
very sweet person. At 16 I was very good at copying
music, so Pete took me into the bathroom and
showed me their set list, and somehow I managed to
learn the whole hour-long set in one evening and
perform on-stage with them that same night. I played
two shows with them before Bernie turned up, and
they were obviously very impressed with my playing.
What offer did UFO make to lure you to
London?
I can’t really remember. But about one month after
the tour they contacted me and asked me to join.
I’d always said to the Scorpions, “If any band from
England asks me to join, no matter who it is, I’m doing
it.” No one in Germany understood what I was doing,
and the scene was lame. I said to Scorpions, “Sorry
guys, I told you I would do this,” and I left. It wasn’t so
much about UFO, it was about the opportunity to
play in England. I was full of energy and ideas and
I wasn’t afraid of anything.J
UST 17-YEARS-OLD when he relocated to
London, Schenker’s songwriting and
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who’d freshly inked a major label deal
with Chrysalis. Jettisoning their original
bluesy, ‘space rock’ sound, the Londoners
were reborn as a stylish hard rock band,
gaining a whole new audience with the
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tor and Rock Bottom. Phil Mogg and
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never men to adhere to Basil
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maxim, christened their new recruit,
The Blonde Bomber.
The British music press were
fascinated, charmed and bemused
in equal measure by the teenage
guitar hero, and as his bandmates
mischievously fed stories of his
idiosyncratic behaviour to their
mates in the ‘inkies’, Schenker
acquired a second unwanted nickĥ
name, ‘Mad Mickey’. The union of
the brash Londoners and their
talismanic guitarist was always desĥ
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years, but not before Schenker’s precocious
ability had earned an invite from Lemmy to
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and inspired the likes of Steve Harris and
Kirk Hammett to form bands. He’d be back...
What did the guys in UFO do to help you
settle in London?
They were good about making me feel welcome.
I lived with Phil at first, in his place in Tottenham. ThenI moved into a house in Palmers Green with my
girlfriend Gabi, with a very nice Greek family. I think
our rent was £16 a month. I met Gabi when we were
both 16, and we’d already lived together in Germany,
so we had one another for company. I’d only been in
that house for maybe four weeks when my landlady
told me there was a phone call for me, and this guy
said, “Hey Michael, would you be interested in
auditioning for The Rolling Stones?” I went, “Pardon
me?” I didn’t know what to say, so I just said, “I’ll call
you back!”, without asking for a number or anything. I
called Rudolf and said, “You won’t believe what just
happened! What should I do?” He said, “It’s your life,
you have to decide.” I decided there was no way I
could do it. I remembered seeing a photo of the
Stones in a German magazine, looking for lice in
each other’s hair, and I thought, “I’m not joining a
band like that!” I barely spoke English, I’d already
moved to a new country to join a new band, and that
was a big enough step, I felt.
What do you recall about the making of the
Phenomenon album?
Most of the songs on the album started as
my instrumentals. Phil would hear me play,
and go, “Wow, this sounds great, but can
you take out the lead guitars and just leave
the chords so that I can write melodies for
the vocals around them?” There were a lot
of jokes in English that I didn’t understand- Andy Parker used to say, “Michael, if
you knew what we were saying, you
wouldn’t want to be in the band any-
more!” – but that actually helped,
because I couldn’t chat, so we had to
focus solely on the music, and let the
music do the talking.
UFO had a reputation as a band
who liked a drink and liked a
party: was that an atmosphere in
which you felt comfortable?
I enjoyed a beer, and we often loosened up for
rehearsals with a pint or two, but I never really drank
at home, or I didn’t drink much before gigs, because
I knew I wouldn’t be able to perform. I mainly drank to
ease my stage fright. I was very shy and sensitive and
easily intimidated when I was straight, so alcohol
helped. My favourite thing was going to see bands
with Gabi. We’d go to the Marquee and then the
Speakeasy and come home at four or five in the
morning. We were young and living in this amazing
new city, and it was exciting to go out and discover all
these brilliant guitarists playing all over London.
You once told me that when 1977’s Lights
Out album became a hit, you got scared, and
that’s when being in UFO stopped being fun
for you. Famously, you disappeared for
a while, with UFO telling the press you’d
joined religious cult The Moonies. What
actually happened?
Yeah, I felt I was going to be trapped, to be pres-
surised into writing more hits, and have to be touring
all the time, and therefore drinking all the time. I said
to Gabi, “Let’s get out of here, I don’t think I can
handle this.” I sold everything and we went to the
South of France and bought a couple of mopeds and
then went to Barcelona, where I used to go with my
parents as a kid, and spent a few months by the
ocean. After a while we decided to go back to Munich
to get an apartment, and I realised that I was in all the
German newspapers, reported as missing. When we
moved in, the receptionist in the building said, “You
know your mother is very worried about you?”
I thought, “Oh shit!” I contacted her and she was like,
“Michael! Where have you been?” I said, “Oh, we had
a big hit, and I couldn’t face the pressure of being
famous.” I’d always played guitar as recreation, I didn’t
like having expectations put on me. All the ‘Michael
Schenker is God!’ stuff just freaked me out.
After your break, you returned for 1978’s
Obsession...
Yes, Pete Way talked me into it. Because of that time
away I felt rejuvenated, I came back with a new
energy. It was almost like I’d forgotten all the things
I hated. We were living in America and relations in the
band were good, and on that album we had another
successful radio hit with Only You Can Rock Me. And
then, of course, we went on tour and recorded two
shows [in Chicago and Louisville] for what became
Strangers In The Night.
When we were mixing that album, the arguments
started again. They wanted to use one version of
Rock Bottom, but I played much better on the other
night, and as it was my song, I thought I had the right
to insist that we use that version. In fairness, [produc-
er] Ron Nevison was looking at the bigger picture,
the sound of the whole recording not just my guitar
solo, but being a passionate guitarist, I was pissed off,
and tired of not being listened to. Phil had already
punched me in the stomach at the end of the
Obsession tour, and I’d always told him if he hit me
I would leave, so between that and the argument over
Rock Bottom, I thought, “I don’t want to go any further
with this.” It was time for me to make my next step.
Which of the UFO albums you made is your
favourite?
That’s such a hard question. For me, it was all about
development, so with every album I thought, “Wow!
That was amazing!” I know that Phil expected No
Heavy Petting to do really well, but Chrysalis didn’t
support it and it somehow got lost... maybe it was
the monkey on the album cover! Working with Ron
Nevison on Lights Out was amazing, but the focus
that he and I had on that album wasn’t matched by
the others, they were just having a laugh. Ron got the
very best from each of us, though, and put it together
in a way that was truly remarkable.“I WAS RUDOLF’S TOOL,
HIS SLAVE. HE TOOK
ADVANTAGE OF ME.”