Chords for Hugh Cornwell 'I don't know why the Stranglers call themselves the Stranglers'

_ _ _ _ English musician and former singer with the Stranglers, Hugh Cornwell, is in Vancouver,
and the Stranglers are still around.
But when Hugh was involved, they happened to be a personal
favorite of mine, a prolific punk rock new wave group from Guildford, England.
Cornwall
has been touring and making his own music since 1990.
We are very lucky, by the way,
that Hugh Cornwell is _ in Vancouver.
He's had to cancel some of his tour dates because of
the federal government's changes to work permits.
Now, he has a new album out called Totems
and Taboo, and he's playing a free show at Zulu Records in about an hour and a half at
5.30. in Vancouver. Then he's off to the Biltmore, but first he's been good enough to stop by Studio 10. Hello to you. Hello, Stephen. How are you doing? I'm very well, thank you. And George Strombolopoulos is with us as well. Hello, hello. And feel free to jump in because you guys, you go way back. I've interviewed you several times over the years, a couple of times on the radio. And I was shocked when you told me when it was I came in to do a thing with you. Seven or eight years ago, almost. It's longer than that. Once in the 90s, my friend. Tell me about your trouble performing in Vancouver, first of all, because you've had several Canadian dates cancelled or in some way altered because of_ Yeah, these new guidelines have come in and if certain classes of venue, bars, to be precise, if they want to stage a show with foreign musicians, foreign crew, they have to pay a tax for each person who's supposed to be working on the show from abroad. And so a lot of places are finding they can't afford to put shows on. And we had a show in Calgary at a _ _ _ place and it had to be pulled because they couldn't afford to stage the show. And it was the straw that broke the camel's back. So we ended up having to cancel Edmonton and Winnipeg too. As also the Thanksgiving weekend as well. This does appear to be one of the unintended consequences of a new law that's meant to force or encourage employers to hire Canadians rather than temporary foreign workers. Do you feel like when you're here playing in Canada, you're taking away jobs from Canadians? Well, I can see how they can class musicians as like nurses or office workers in an accountant's office because people have just got qualifications and they can_ Why can't a Canadian do this? Why does he have to do it? So I can see that, but I don't know if it sort of applies to what we do because_ It makes no sense at all. I mean, I would love a Canadian franchise of what I do going out so I don't have to come and they can just do it for me and pay me some royalties. That'd be great. I believe they call that a Hugh Cornwell tribute band. I'd love that. But then I wouldn't be coming here. There's something about playing the tours is that you enjoy coming. So that's part of it. Let's talk about the Stranglers if we can. I was an enormous Stranglers fan. I once took a train from London to Birmingham. That's not that far. No, but it was the slowest train ride in the history of all trains and I almost missed a flight out of London the next day. But when you have been putting out solo records now for as long as you have, do you get tired of people asking you about the Stranglers or saying, oh, you know, hey, play Peaches for me? No, not really. I mean, it's songs that I contributed to, either wrote or co-wrote. And so I feel they're just as much mine as Stranglers material property. So people enjoy listening to them. So if I can enjoy playing it, then I don't mind performing it, mixing it up with my new catalogue. But I don't carry keyboards on the road now. And that's sort of a conscious decision. I did it when I first left. But then I find it more interesting to go without keyboards. It's a distinct difference from before. And it means that when I do the old songs, I have to do new arrangements, which keeps them fresh in my mind. I wouldn't like to still be going out doing them exactly the same as they were before. So they sort of reinvent themselves, the songs, in that way. There is still a band called The Stranglers out there. Do you have any relationship with them at all? No, I don't. I mean, I think it's a bit mad that they're still calling themselves The Stranglers. Because there's actually only two of the originals in the band now out of four. So they're a 50% original, and I'm 33 and a third percent original, because I'm a trio. So I mean, I might as well go out and call myself The Stranglers now, you know, but I don't particularly want to. I've seen you play with The Stranglers in Canada as well. And I remember a gig in Ottawa very distinctly, because the PA stacks were threatening to come down with people dancing, and they were starting to shake. And the roadies got very worried and pushed everybody off the dance floor. _ You guys rocked really hard in those days. Is this, is rock and roll, do you think, and I, of course, have aged as well along with you, is rock and roll a young man's game? Is it still something that you can do night after night? Well, I can still do it, but I have to be, I can't pop up as much as I used to. You know, that extra drink has to be staying in the bottle. And I have to think, well, I need to get some hours sleep [Eb] now. So as long as you can do that. And it's down to your health, you know. I mean, I try and stay healthy and eat healthy. And so it's down to that. And if you manage to do all that and you're still doing it, then you're very lucky. Tell me about the new record, because it has got a sound. A lot of people compare this to Lou Reed. Is that a good thing? Do you like that? I'm a big fan of Lou. So _ _ that's quite a compliment. One of the songs we're going to play is called God's Guns and Gays. Sounds to me like you've pretty much grown tired of political talking [N] points and just politics in general. Is that a fair assessment? Yeah, I mean, it's that song in particular is it's an observation of my thoughts on American society. And it's not in any way derogatory to gays. It's actually trying to say that the big three big things I can see that that that that occupy American society and culture is a religion and the fact that they can carry arms because that's it affects the whole life in America and also the freedom of speech. But God's Guns and Freedom of Speech wasn't a title that sort of worked for me. So I thought, well, what let's have an example of that. And the obvious one is a gay pride. I mean, that started in America and it's now gone all over the world. And without it being started in America, it might have taken a bit longer to happen. So that's why the word gays is in the title. It just rolled off the tongue. When you're playing songs, as you've been mentioned from the Stranglers catalog and realizing that you're connected to what happens in current events, do the lyrics still ring true to you? What is it like to say things that you might have said when you were 25 and to sing them again? Well, interesting. I mean, if they're about certain people, it just reminds me in a nice way about those people. And I do enjoy playing the songs that I play live. I don't play them if I don't enjoy them. I only play ones that I really enjoy playing. And and in a funny way, a lot of them are weirdly are still still relevant. I mean, I mean, singing No More Heroes. I mean, it's quite it's quite interesting these days, you know, all the time. We have pillars of our society, fate going away. And then we have to we're confronted with what do we hold up and value? It's to do with this whole thing, the state of my retotement of what I'm thinking about. That's I mean, No More Heroes is another way of saying it, really. I want to get to the song. Hugh Cornwell, such a pleasure. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for inviting me. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _