IAN HUNTER – DEFIANCE, PT. 1

Ian Hunter – Defying the Odds

Ian Hunter – 2023 (Ross Halfin Pic)

Taking advantage of the time off in the early days of the pandemic, octogenarian British songwriter and Ian Hunter hunkered down in his Connecticut home studio to craft a few dozen new tunes.  Initially unable to develop the songs beyond demo status, Hunter’s friends and admirers around the globe soon joined the cause from their home studios, contributing to an album roster that reads like a who’s who of modern music. With collaborators including Ringo Starr, Slash, Mike Campbell, Todd Rundgren, Billy Gibbons, Jeff Beck and a slew of others, “Defiance – Part 1” might be the most star-studded original album ever recorded.

Vintage Guitar: Your fans were absolutely thrilled when a few months back it was announced that you’d written a large cache of new songs.  How’d this come about?

Ian Hunter: The pandemic fueled it…we did the Mott ’74 tour in 2019, and then we did four nights at City Winery (New York City) for my 80^th birthday, and shortly after, I woke up with tinnitus and Covid hit around the same time, so I was pretty much stuck in the house.  I just went downstairs and started writing.  At the same time, I was talking with (friend and photographer) Ross Halfin, and he said “Slash fancies doing a track, Billy Gibbons too…” It just sort of fluked its way on from there. My manager Mike Kobayashi knows everybody in the business, and now I do too. Some volunteered, some we asked. For example, Andy York and I were down in the basement doing “Bed of Roses,” and we thought “let’s try for Ringo” and it went from there…

VG: “Bed of Roses” also features a great slide part from Mike Campbell which just works perfectly. It really has a George Harrison feel…

IH: I had a smile on my face when Mike sent us that track, which is mainly about The Star Club in Hamburg, a great club.

VG: Despite the fact that your special guests did their parts in their own studios, there’s a cohesiveness that sounds like a great rock and roll band performing together…

IH: Thanks. Part of that is sending the right tracks for the right people, to find what suits them, like ‘This would be good for Todd Rundgren, this might work for Slash.’ 

VG:  For this batch of songs, were you writing on both the piano and the guitar?

IH:  I wrote two on my Martin acoustic and the rest on piano.  On “Defiance,” I tracked my acoustic guitar and sent it to the engineer, and it came back sounding like a Les Paul. There are so many sounds you can use now. Then Slash did his parts for that tune, which sounded lovely against Dane Clark’s snare drum.

VG: Going back to its early days, rock and roll has always been about the spirit of defiance. What does the word mean to you?

IH: It means that I’m not supposed to be doing it at my age, so I’m doing it…and if you’re going to call it that, it’s got to be good (laughs).

VG: Your new single “I Hate Hate” has a very energetic, sort of Jerry Lee Lewis pumping feel harkening back to early rock and roll, yet it sounds very contemporary.

IH: That’s me playing piano, with Jeff Tweedy on guitar and bass and Dennis DiBrizzi from The Rant Band on background vocals. Andy Burton also plays some keys on that.

VG: And like the first rock and roll records in the 1950’s, “Defiance Part 1” is on Sun Records.  How’d that come about?

IH: I wanted it real bad, and Sun got ahold of my manager. As a kid, I didn’t know what I was for until I heard Jerry Lee Lewis on Sun Records. I was down in Nashville not too long ago and I talked with Jimmy Van Eaton, the drummer on “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On.” It was a big deal for me, because that’s where it all started. So when I saw my name on that label, it was a huge buzz. Of course, we just lost Jerry Lee Lewis…

VG: Speaking of musicians we’ve lost, “No Hard Feelings” captures what might be the final recording of Jeff Beck, one of your favorite guitarists. Does he play both the solos and that great hook of a repeating slide riff??

IH: The slide part is Johnny Depp – he knows how to play!  As far as Jeff, he plays the middle and end solo on “No Hard Feelings.”  Defiance 2 will contain the last track Jeff ever played on, and it’s a song called “The Third Rail.” That record is about 60% done…but now that Andy York is back on the road with John Mellencamp, we’ll have to wait to complete it.

VG: Andy does play a prominent role as both a musician and a producer here…is he helping with the arrangements as well?

IH: Oh yeah, we did them in my basement as just demos, and he’s very good to work with because he’s hyper critical and doesn’t let anything go…Andy came around with a computer and a little black box, and recorded all of these tracks. What you hear are the original demos, with others’ parts added on, and it worked!

• Tom Guerra