“I WAS VERY SHY,
SENSITIVE AND EASILY
INTIMIDATED. ALCOHOL
HELPED...”
PLANET ROCK 47Post-UFO, you returned to Scorpions to
record the Lovedrive album. Did that feel like
a comfortable fit?
No. Rudolf knew that I was the ticket for Scorpions to
break in America, because I’d written a hit album with
Lights Out. I tried to fit in, because my brother cried
on the telephone after the first time I left, and he
begged me to help again. But I knew I couldn’t do it,
and I didn’t stay. I couldn’t face telling them, I just had
to run away, I was too shy. I knew if I tried to talk to
them they would try to seduce me into staying, so
I had to run so far away to where they couldn’t find
me. Rudolf was so disappointed. But I had left UFO
for a reason, and here I was doing the same shit
again. Why? I had my own vision, and I’d experienced
enough fame at that point to know what I wanted
to do and didn’t want to do. I didn’t need fame or
success, I wanted to be an artist. But then [manager]
Peter Mensch was waiting for me and he threw me
straight back into the machine! I thought, “This is
crazy! What am I doing here? I just ran away from my
own brother, and now I’m back in the same situation!”
From 1978 to 1980 I was in limbo-land, in transition.
It wasn’t a good time for me.
You had offers to join Thin Lizzy and Aero-
smith in 1979. Did you take either of those
offers seriously?
I was friends with Phil Lynott, but I didn’t want to join
Lizzy. With Aerosmith, I got as far as rehearsing
with [drummer and bassist] Joey Kramer and Tom
Hamilton in Boston. At the time, Steven Tyler was in
hospital, and I remember [rhythm guitarist] Brad
Whitford coming into the room, being shocked at
seeing me, and running out again, saying, “Fuck!” I
think he went to see Tyler in the hospital and said,
“Michael Schenker is trying to steal our rhythm
section! You need to do something!” So they decided
to carry on Aerosmith without me.D
ETERMINED TO FORGE his own path,
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Let’s talk about the formation of the Michael
Schenker Group. What was your initial vision
for the band?
Well, the original line-up was me, Billy Sheehan,
Denny Carmassi [ex-Montrose] and Gary Barden,
but I was really untogether, and that fell apart:
basically, I lost the whole band. As I said, 1979 was
a difficult year, and I needed to sort myself out. Then
Peter Mensch wanted Mutt Lange to produce
our album, but I didn’t want to sound like AC/
DC, and we argued over that. Mensch also
kept talking about working with David Cover-
dale, and we actually wrote one song together
at his apartment, but of course Coverdale didn’t
want to leave Whitesnake, he wanted me to
join him. So then Gary came back and Mensch
found Mo Foster [bass] and Simon Phillips
[drums] and off we went. I thought the song-
writing was really good on that first album, but
it could have been more powerful. I liked
working with [Deep Purple bassist]
Roger Glover, but his production wasn’t
as deep as what Ron Nevison might
have done, and the rhythm section,
while brilliant players, were lighter than
what I wanted.
With the MSG album, the band’s
second recording, you scored Top
20 success in the UK and Japan.
Was that a happy time for you?
Making the album, I wasn’t in a great
place, mentally, and I think [producer]
Ron Nevison wasn’t either. We ended up going to
Montserrat to record, but we spent too much time
messing around, and basically treated it like a holi-
day. The songs were very good, Gary and
I wrote them in [rehearsal studio] John Henry’s in
London when we were completely straight, but we
got less focused in the studio. Things were happen-
ing so fast. Suddenly, we’d a live album to record,
[1982’s One Night At Budokan] and by the time it
was released Graham Bonnet was in the band, and
he was autographing album sleeves for a record he
wasn’t on! It was all a bit confusing. And then I got
a phone call from Ozzy Osbourne in the middle of the
night, stuttering, asking me to help him out because
Randy Rhoads had died in that plane crash.
But you said no...
I loved Sabbath, and I should have been delighted to
join – I instantly had visions of Ozzy dragging meacross the stage by my hair – but a voice in my head
said, “Michael, follow your vision.” I’d left UFO and
Scorpions because I didn’t want to go any further
with the fame thing, and I wanted freedom and
peace, so I felt it would be crazy to join. Ozzy knew
that I was Randy’s favourite guitar player, so he
thought I’d be the perfect fit, but it wasn’t the right
time: we were already rehearsing the Assault Attack
album with Graham Bonnet. The only way I could
think of getting out of the Ozzy gig was by making
outrageous demands, so that’s what I did. In his book
[I Am Ozzy] Ozzy said I asked for a private jet, and
that’s true, but it was only so that he’d turn me down.
Graham Bonnet came in the Assault Attack
album, but left within the year. What went
wrong between you two?
Nothing! I liked Graham. I think he was a little inhibit-
ed because in Rainbow Ritchie [Blackmore] was in
charge, and Russ Ballard was writing the hits, so
I think Graham didn’t have as much writing experi-
ence as I imagined. But he came up with some great
melodies. We went to the Château d’Hérouville in
France to record, and the album was
good. One odd thing I remember is that
Graham liked to sing naked from the
waist down, he thought it helped him hit
the high notes, so poor [producer] Martin
Birch had to stare at his bits while recording
the vocals. But yeah, I never had a problem
with Graham until he freaked out on-stage
and got his cock out. I turned around and
he was gone! Thankfully, Gary [Barden]
came back in, after being dumped, and
we had a very happy Reading festival
audience.
You started the ’90s playing with
Contraband, with members of
LA Guns and Ratt and Vixen. How
did that band come about? Was
it always intended as a one-off
project?
What happened was that Robin McAu-
ley and I moved to America. We had
one song, Anytime, on Save Yourself,
which was almost a big hit, but we had
a bad TV appearance which destroyed
everything. For some reason, our management, Left
Bank, decided we had to wait six months to record
the next album, and so while we were doing nothing,
Warren DeMartini asked me to help out with Ratt
when they had problems with Robin Crosby. I went
on tour with Ratt and recorded an MTV Unplugged
session with them. Then Left Bank were putting
together this supergroup Contraband, and they
asked me to join. That band was really interesting,
but [guitarist] Tracii Guns and [vocalist] Richard
Black had a chemistry problem, and so it just
fell apart.
You disconnected from the mainstream
music business for a while after that and
made the Thank You album as a completely
independent release. Was that liberating?
Totally. I’d wanted to disconnect in 1979, but
IC Peter Mensch kept me in the game for another
O
N
IC
PI
X
DISNEYLAND
In 1977, a pilled-
up Schenker went
AWOL during a
visit to Disneyland
with The Runaways.
Rescued by Rodney
Bingenheimer,
the German showed
his gratitude by
pissing all over the
DJ’s car seats.