Doctor Quatro has a full appointment list
SUZI Quatro was the bass-playing singer clad in a leather catsuit who smashed the charts in the 70s with hits such as Can The Can, Devil Gate Drive and 48 Crash.
Now 67, she’s still rocking and also a writer of novels and poetry, a presenter on Radio 2, an actress and an honorary doctor of music – from Anglia Ruskin University last year.
She’s set to headline The Legends Live Tour alongside David Essex, The Osmonds and Hot Chocolate at Glasgow’s SSE Hydro tonight – and that trumps anything else as far as the Detroit-born musician is concerned.
She said: “I write, do theatre, radio, TV, I’m one of those people who does the whole entertainment ball of wax.
“I was never going to do just one thing. Rock was always the main thing, it always has been, but I’m an artist, I have to create and entertain.
“I am so proud to be Dr Quatro. When you don’t have a high school diploma and get made a doctor, it’s pretty damn fine. It’s sort of like snubbing your nose up at society. I couldn’t be more pleased.”
She is also a feminist icon after breaking through the gender barriers of male-dominated rock music in the 70s.
Suzi said: “I just followed my path. It is in the history books that I was the first female to have success as a genuine rocker playing an instrument. I always say the reason it happened is because I don’t do gender and never have. I don’t think of myself as a female musician, just a musician.
“After I made a rock record, people were saying, ‘Hey, you’re the first woman’. I said, ‘Am I?’
“My mother was a housewife who raised five kids and loved it. That is just as important as what I’m doing. Whatever kind of woman you are, be that woman – let your light shine. Don’t be what society, your husband or parents dictate, be who you are.”
For Suzi, who formed her first band The Pleasure Seekers with her sisters Patti and Arlene, that’s a rock star.
Glasgow will be her stage tonight and the audience will get everything she’s got.
Having sold more than 55million albums in her career, she doesn’t need to work. So when she does, it’s got to be good.
She said: “Every time I go out there, it’s the same thrill. Each concert is like a war to be won. You don’t take it for granted. You go out there and need to see everybody smiling.”