On This Day In 1949, Philip Lynott Was Born: Revisiting a Classic Interview

Another hotel room, another interview, but oddly enough, after nearly four years in this paper, my first formal encounter with our own Philip Lynott, a man whose work I've celebrated and despaired over in roughly equal proportions down the years. The evening interview is taking place in Cork city, where Thin Lizzy will later play to a thronged and jubilantly partisan audience in the local City Hall. For my part, it's an opportune moment to converse with Lynott, given that I believe the Renegade album - released at the tail-end of '81 - to be a stirring return to form, both for Lynott as a writer, and for Lizzy as a re-organised, revitalised, creative and playing concern.

Despite the unwelcome attentions of a sore throat - which had, by his own admission, played havoc with his singing during the previous night's gig in Athy - Lynott is in a receptive mood, and patently eager to talk. By way of getting into it I ask him about the reference to the prophesies of Nostradamus on Renegade's opening track, 'Angel Of Death'. An unsettling song, the ideas it expresses bordering on fatalism, I suggest.

"I personally do believe there is a Great Unknown," gasps Lynott between another coughing fit. "Satan, cults, UFOs, I pack the whole lot together. I thought Nostradamus was very near the mark, he must have scratched the nerve somewhere. How he did it, I don't know. But basically, myself, I'm a very practical person, I live day to day. So I don't go too far into it, I could find myself like, y'know, the Don Juan of Crumlin (laughs). My saving grace, or my cop out if you like is when I say in the song 'Do you believe in this?' So the listener has the option. Like, Chris Tsangrides who co-produced the album went to Canada where the album has really taken off, and this geezer said to him, y'know, 'Is it tongue in cheek'. And Chris says, 'An album costing £60,000 to make. Do you think it's tongue in cheek?' But then he said, 'Knowing Phil Lynott, it could be.'"

The prophesy around which the song is based refers to an apocalypse in the late 20th century, and regardless of whether you place any credence in Nostradamus' predictions or not - and personally, I don't - there exists, in the here and now, the very real threat of a holocaust resulting from the senseless stockpiling of nuclear arms. Lynott believes that the song does have a genuine value in the present context.

"I do feel that something can be done," he says. "I think one of the best tactics that can be used is fear. Y'know like on the telly they show people going through car windows, they smash eggs and say 'This could be you' and people do go 'Hey, I've got to wear a safety belt.' Shock tactics, I did it with 'Killer On The Loose', which got misinterpreted. But, yeah, I am an optimist. I mean, I've got two children."

The 'Killer On The Loose' controversy, however, was and is only part of a wider, more fundamental issue. In the past Lynott has been often accused of sexism in some of his songwriting and it's a point he now seems prepared to acknowledge.

"I think there is grounds for it," he concedes, "simply because I was brought up in the Irish Catholic schoolboy system, which does, to a certain extent, cultivate that attitude. But my defence of it is that I revealed it, so that people saw what goes behind that mentality. The idea that when a bunch of fellas do get together it's like y'know (clicks finger) lady killers, lookin' in the mirror. Or like, 'Don t Believe A Word' where the guy will do anything to get the chick in bed. Because the thing for the guy has always been, y'know afterwards he realises, 'Yeah, I really like this chick' whereas before it's just lust to a certain extent. For a girl it's the opposite, the big decision is beforehand, like 'Do I like this guy enough to let him go into me'. So there is a difference. but when it comes down to equal rights, equal pay and so on I regard it that anyone with average intelligence will see that men and women are equal on certain levels and on other levels they're different."

All of which might sound like Lynott walking right into it again. But I don't think that's really the case. While I disagree with Lynott's generalised assessment of sexual politics - although no more than I'd deny that in specific instances the example he gave could be true - I'm certain there isn't any implication on his part that men are intrinsically superior to women. Given the time limitation on the interview, the broad issue of male/female relationships wasn't something I wanted to pursue too heavily, but it is an area where I've found Lynott's attitudes - as expressed in jokey lyrical innuendoes and live ad libs etc. - to be dubious, although never malicious to the extent that some people have perceived them. (Indeed, en passant, it's occasionally been my experience that the very people who intellectualise on matters pertaining to sexual politics are often the last to demonstrate their highly trumpeted concern in practice.)

What is enlightening is that Lynott, unlike many other more culpable rock'n'rollers, is acknowledging the problem and is presumably more aware of the dangers involved as a result.,

That assessment has imbued Lynott's writing with a greater depth than heretofore, and the resultant development of style and content are magnified elsewhere on the album. The title track, for example, deals with a character who appears to have walked right out of 'The Rocker', but whereas back then Lynott merely glorified and revelled in the one-dimensional persona of 'The Rocker', Renegade strives to get, and succeeds in getting, much closer to the heart of the matter.

Phil: "'The Rocker' is as old if not older than 'Whiskey In The Jar', and it was at a time when I was going, like, 'I'm the hard man, I'm no fuckin' pansy.' See, there was this thing then that anybody who got on stage was a nice guy, it was the showband era. So I was gettin' up on stage and I was the rock'n'roller. But with Renegade, obviously I'm older.

"I got the idea when I saw this guy in London and he had a Thin Lizzy patch on the back of his leather jacket and a Motorhead patch on the top. And underneath he'd painted himself Renegade, and I thought, y'know, 'great word'. And I was reading a book by Albert Camus called 'The Rebel', and if you know Albert Camus . . . Jesus Christ, I mean, Joyce is heavy. So I'm struggling through this book and he goes at it from every angle - outside, inside the other guy's opinion. And knowing that both words mean the same I picked up on how he talked about there being a rebel with us all. At some stage everyone says 'That's it, I've had enough, that's the limit, no.' They use those words. So instead of going renegade-biker-killer-whoarrgh, I thought, I'll do it from the inside.

"'Cos everyone regards me as being different, whereas to me everybody else is different. Y'know, 'It must be odd being Irish and black', I mean, if I'm asked that once, I'm asked it a million times. To me it's the most natural thing in the world. So I thought, great, I'll write it from the inside."

In general terms, Lynott feels that the new course much of his songwriting has taken was brought about by a need he felt to make direct, personal statements. Having taken stock, he deemed it important to lay his attitudes on the line.

"I'd say from the tail-end of Chinatown through Solo In Soho, Renegade and Fatalistic Attitude, I've become opinionated. In the old days, I always used the third person so you could interpret it any way you want, and if I was writing a love song I'd conceal who I was singing about. Obviously 'Sarah' put a stop to that 'cos I was writing about my child. I hit a stage in my life where I felt that if I was doing this for all the reasons I said I was I'd have to start reflecting major events in my life, so I had to write about what this child meant to me.

"Again, I found around the time I was doing Solo In Soho there was no major black artist saying anything for black people. There were points to be made. And I think in general I started to gather my experiences and form opinions and be prepared to stand by them, whereas before I'd played safe."

As well as examining his own conscience, simultaneously, Lynott was re-assessing Thin Lizzy's role in the scheme of things.

"Chinatown was the end of the slide," he says. "I thought a valid criticism that was made was that ever since Robbo left after Live And Dangerous the set was always an imitation of that set, because we'd have Gary, we'd break him in one year and then he'd go, then we had Midge helping us out for six months 'cos we had commitments, then he'd go. Then we got Snowy and it was like 'C'mon Snowy, you ve got to learn the set, we ve gotta keep this going'. 'Cos by then, we had a thing called success hanging around our necks, so we had to create an illusion that we were still a successful band."

The pressure, Philip believes, caught up with them at the Milton Keynes festival last year. "It rained, only 10,000 came, I got there early and got drunk and we were slaughtered in the press," is his sober post-mortem. And while matters were rectified at Slane Castle where a good attendance, fine weather and a generally upful atmosphere combined to give Lizzy's headlining set the quality of a celebration, Lynott had already decided that a change was long overdue.

So, on the current tour they've altered the stage set-up - "a heavy band where you don't see any amps" laughs Phil - and performed much-needed surgery on the set itself, which now includes new material from Renegade, and re-arranged versions of such as 'Don't Believe A Word' alongside the established stage favourites. "Overall, I think there's enough new stuff and enough new ideas for people who are on our side to say, 'Hold on, they're not stagnating, they really are trying to do something different'," he says.

Certainly, the Renegade album was the sound of a band who far from stagnating, were moving out and up with surprising intent and invention. For people, like your present correspondent, who felt that Lizzy were in serious decline, the album gave cause both for relief and jubilation, with perhaps a little repentance thrown in for our sins of doubt. Interestingly, Lynott feels that the success of his Solo In Soho project and attendant singles was crucial to the band's relocating their singular pulse.

"They weren't jealous of the success of the album," he's quick to point out, "but they could see the questions that would automatically follow - 'Are you going solo?' 'Do you need the band when you are already classed as the image of the band?' - And all of a sudden the boys went 'Hold on a minute, he's not the band and we'd better start making statements.' So Scott started writing and Snowy and there was a Lizzy feel which is just what I'd wanted.

"I think the solo album also showed that keyboards could be used. The very idea of keyboards sounded like the band was lightening up, but we finally found a way of putting it into the structure and not taking away form the power of Lizzy. 'Cos in the studio it's easy to be introverted and you can become real self-indulgent. But on-stage, I've always been an extrovert. I don't think I could stand in front of a couple of thousand people a night and sing love songs. That's why there's always been only one or two slow songs in a Lizzy set. I just can't get into that feeling.

"It's different in the studio, there's nobody there, the lights are low, whereas on-stage it's the power, the fun, the laugh, the glory. I go for the live gigs almost for the same reason as the supporters - to have a good time. They know they're as important to our show as the band is. Like, I went to see ZZ Top and, man, I was screaming in the aisles. (Laughs)

"One thing about the new bands coming out, especially the New Romantic/Futurism stuff, is that the records are brillo production, tunes, texture, quality, they're fantastic. But there's been no great new live act to come out in the last five years really. That's the breakthrough I'm waiting for before I really think Lizzy's days as a live act are over. Although, I mean, there should be room for everyone, that should be fairly obvious."

Thus our conversation changes tack to address itself to such notions as Lizzy's relationship with their audience, the band's status as an established act potentially under threat from new youngbloods of every hue and fashion, and most pertinently, Phil Lynott's appraisal of his own position after more than a dozen years out-front. He s been thinking about this supposedly vexed matter of age.

"James Brown, BB King, Stevie Wonder, they were all workin' before I started and they're still workin' but nobody asks what age is James Brown, what age is Stevie Wonder, yet it's always 'Do you not think you're getting a bit old to play this?'. For a while I was asking myself that question, yeah, but then I came to the conclusion that it gets more ludicrous if you go (chairman of the board voice) 'Mick Jagger, you have reached the age of 30. Here's your gold watch. We would like to thank you for your contribution to rock'n'roll. You can now only play music for 30 year olds and over.' Y'know, then you really start to see how ludicrous it gets.

"But I do honestly believe that each generation should have bands of their own age. That's why I think The Jam kick all their critics in the balls every time they get a Number One, because it's the fans that are making them. But, yeah, there's room for The Jam same way as there's room for Thin Lizzy and even though The Jam have become unfashionable in some areas of the music press they're still very relevant to the kids, 'cos they're saying a lot for them.

"But obviously there's a time when you are the generation you're singing about and then there's a time when you're not. And lucky enough, I never wrote songs for my generation, I always wrote songs for me. So when I had a daughter I wrote a song about my daughter, when I was feeling low in Soho, I wrote 'Solo In Soho'. Even on the new album (the not-yet-released Fatalistic Attitude) there's a song called 'Somebody Else's Dream' which I wrote when I felt I was becoming too much their image. But then I realised that everybody in some form or other is doing it, whether it's the guy going to school and being presentable or the guy at work trying to be the person they want him to be."

Lynott, it seems, has been going through a necessary process of distancing himself from his public image of yore, thereby bringing to bear a more mature perspective on the 'rock star' archetype which can so easily get out of control and become a virtual invitation to invasion of privacy.

"I would definitely say I enjoyed bein' a rock star more five years ago, bein' well known, than I do now. It gets a bit over the top when guys are saying to you 'Can we come and photograph your house', and like the Sunday World wanted a shot of me with an apron on. Another article I did for the Sunday World I was throwing snowballs - 'Could you throw a snowball this way Phil, could you look mean!' Or the Daily Mirror want to talk about Leslie Crowther and the kids. I mean it's fuck all to do with the music, or the particular album I'm promoting, which is why I'm doing the publicity in the first place. I do believe that as the line in the song says 'do the people have the right to know it all?'

"Well, I don't know it all. I'm not like some fuckin' guru. Like in Belfast they asked me to go and see some kid in hospital. Lucky enough, he was gettin' better and gettin' out. Then in Dublin I was asked to see a guy who had terminal cancer. Maybe you shouldn't print this, y'know, but it's relevant to what I'm tryin' to say. Did you ever hear that 'Some Product' by the Sex Pistols where Paul Cook goes 'I'm not fuckin' Jesus Christ'. And, y'know, sometimes you feel that the press want this shot - he can heal the sick and raise the dead.

It's a weird situation, yeah, but when they're trying to make a publicity story out of it, it gets really sick. So when the kid was gonna get better I said 'OK, I'll go and see the kid, you can take the shot and use it.' The kid that was gonna die, I wouldn't have the photograph taken, 'cos like, it would live to haunt me, that I used that whole scene as a publicity angle."

One of the main reason's for Phil's decision to live in Ireland with his family is precisely because he feels less pressurised here. "Deffo, plus the fact that it's the place I know the best and I've always drawn my strength from it."

Ultimately, he says, he's trying to 'just normalise things'.

It's the small hours of the morning that we reconvene to tie up a few loose ends, after a gig which saw Phil's voice holding out against the odds - especially important since the show was being recorded for a possible live album release, tentatively titled Live In Your Face - and the band turning in a performance which, if not exactly inspired, still offered plenty of moments worth savouring. There had been the odd compromise - 'Whiskey In The Jar' had eventually to be served up to appease the insatiable appetite of fans with long memories - but overall nobody could claim dissatisfaction.

Back in the hotel, we talk about Lynott's plans to play Jimi Hendrix in a projected bio-pic. In fact, as Phil explains, the movie was just one of three US offers which have come his way in the last year.

"One was like the black guy with the white chick, kind of Guess Who's Coming To Dinner. Then there was an athletic one, something like Raging Bull, but I mean nowhere in the same class. And then there was the Hendrix one. And that appealed to me, obviously, 'cos Hendrix happened to be one of my heroes. But it was too sensationalistic, the way they wanted to do it, so I said I wanted to do it more seriously. But because the news broke and it got round that I was saying this, they started to think, maybe this is the way it should be done rather than a botch job. So I got the screen test and now I've to wait for the script. That sounds really corny, but I'll only do it if it's up to par, if it says about the man what I think it should. So I really want to see what they re doing."

As for Fatalistic Attitude, Lynott's second solo album, it now looks set for release in either April or May. He's still not sure of the tracks he'll include, but, whatever the final outcome, the fact that he's worked on it with people as diverse as De Danann and "some really hot funk players", suggests it won't be lacking the element of surprise.

"With Lizzy," he says, "you work within a structure of guitars, bass, drums, keyboards and voice and the challenge is trying to get something out within that structure. But with the solo stuff, I'm totally free, and I don't want to do imitations of Lizzy."

But as ever, Lynott's primary concern is Thin Lizzy. They will always, he says, get the cream of the crop in terms of his writing. And with regard to the present line-up, he seems confident of their being able to continue to work off the special chemistry they utilised to such fine effect on Renegade.

"I'll do it like a football team," says Phil. "Downey's the great goalkeeper, I'm the good centre-half. I'm used to playing with two wingers and there was rivalry. Snowy, though, is like the midfield player who can go to the front and be like a heavy forward. And Snowy, like, doesn't have an ego, he just wants respect for what he does. And the keyboards, again, is like we're covering the back 'cos we use it more like the rhythm section. And it's only 'cos Darren's so bleedin' talented, he gets the 'Fats', he gets the 'Angel Of Death', and he's only nineteen years of age."

A fine balance of youth and experience as Jimmy Magee might say. Philip Lynott changes the analogy for his parting shot before retiring for the night.

"You can never say a group is like a marriage, it has to stay together. Jeez, I hope it does. But like even though we've kept the name, for me it's always new bands starting off. I really thought Lizzy's days were numbered, we were stagnating, we were doing cover jobs, we were always trying to replace guitarists, but now we have a line-up that works. I really feel it's like the start of a new Lizzy."