Bernie Marsden
Yes, it did. Bernie Marsden’s cv reads like a budding rock muso’s dream. Not only has he lived alongside some rock greats, he’s also one of the best blues-rock guitarists of his generation.
Bernie Marsden’s cv reads like a budding rock muso’s dream. Not only has he lived alongside some rock greats, he’s also one of the best blues-rock guitarists of his generation.
Buckingham boy Bernie Marsden has come a long way since he started out on the local club scene in the late 60s. Aside from being one of this country’s most revered blues-rock guitarists, he’s no slouch in the songwriting department either. He’s best known for his time with Whitesnake, the band he co-founded with David Coverdale and Micky Moody in 1978, during which they recorded classic albums such as Come An’ Get It, Saints & Sinners and Live… In The Heart Of The City. Marsden also co-wrote their biggest international hit, Here I Go Again, which topped the US chart in 1987, five years after its initial release.
Either side of Whitesnake, Marsden has been a member of UFO, Wild Turkey, Cozy Powell’s Hammer, Paice Ashton Lord, Alaska, MGM and the Company Of Snakes. There have been solo albums too, including And About Time Too!, Big Boy Blue and Tribute To Peter Green: Green And Blues, plus great friendships with some bona fide legends. Having recently published his absorbing memoir Where’s My Guitar? The Inside Story Of British Rock And Roll, 68-year-old Marsden gives Classic Rock a guided tour of his eventful life. Cue tales of ex-Beatles, surreal pub games with AC/DC, hanging out with James Bond, making peace with Coverdale and waging war on UFO.
“I’m lucky to have had the pleasure to work with so many people,” he reflects. “And it really was pleasure. Well, most of it, anyway.”
Who was the first guitarist to really capture your imagination? I loved Hank Marvin in The Shadows as a kid, but Eric Clapton was the first guitar player I really adored, because I was old enough to relate to it. George Harrison comes into this as well, then it was Peter Green. I saw Fleetwood Mac on so many occasions. In 1968 I travelled down to North London to see them at a pub on the Seven Sisters Road, just after the first album had come out. I got there early and helped out the roadies with the gear, then shuffled off into the corner. Somebody must’ve told Peter that I’d helped out, so later on he came over and said: “You look like you could do with a beer.” Then he sat down and chatted. It was such a great moment.
You weren’t academic at school, so was playing music always going to be your career? I think I could’ve been academically good, but that would never have been brought out in the school I went to. Once I’d had a taste – when people would take me to pubs when I was fourteen or fifteen because there was a band playing – that was it. Getting other jobs, like working in a hairdresser’s, was just to please my parents. In 1967, when they asked you what you were going to do for a job, you couldn’t turn round and say: “I’m going to play the guitar, mum.”
Did your parents accept your chosen career? They were always very supportive, because they realised that I could play quite well and other people had told them so. But when I did come in one day and tell them I was turning professional, that was a worry, especially with my mother. She was like: “What about all the drink and drugs and wild women?” I told her: “That’s what I want to do it for!”
Your band Skinny Cat, which you formed when you were seventeen, seemed bound to fail, but was it a good grounding for you? They were the typical big band in a small goldfish bowl. Even I knew that it wasn’t meant to be. Everybody could play well, but the drummer was married with two kids and needed his thirty quid a week. Then the bass player told us that he was taking over his dad’s garage. So it was inevitable that I would be gone. And people kept saying: “You’re a really good band, but you’ve got to start writing your own material.” The other guys weren’t interested in that, so I decided to start auditioning for ‘name’ bands.
“Mum was like: ‘What about all the drink and drugs and wild women?’ I told her: ‘That’s what I want
to do it for!’”
You successfully auditioned for UFO in 1972, but you didn’t really get along with them – the country boy outsider among a group of Londoners. Did that discourage you at all? I was naïve and green, and thought that joining a pro band and moving to London was going to be like the cover of a Beatles EP, with everyone jumping in the air and being happy. It turned out to be anything but. At the same time, without that break you and I wouldn’t be talking today. But it was pretty bad at the time. When you’re seriously considering packing it all in, after only ever wanting to do this, what are you going to do? The answer is to join another band.
When you were in UFO it got physical at times, with fisticuffs on stage at a gig in London in 1973. Looking back, it was unbelievable, really. You think: ‘Did that really all happen?’ Some nights it was even worse than that. I ended up travelling solo to gigs, I didn’t travel in the same car as the rest of the band.
Around that time, you shared a house in Shepherds Bush in London with Mott The Hoople’s Mick Ralphs. You were privvy to David Bowie’s demo of All The Young Dudes, right? He said: “What do you reckon to this song? David Bowie sent it to us.” It sounded great just as it was – Bowie and the Spiders – so I think Mott just went in and copied the demo. Mick also had a cassette of [Bad Company’s] Can’t Get Enough, which Ian Hunter had turned down for Mott The Hoople. Mick said to me [adopts thick Herefordshire accent]: “’Ere Bern, what do you think of Paul Rodgers? He wants me to form a group with him.”
I went: “Well if you don’t do it, Mick, will you put me up for it?” “I’ll give it a go, then,” he said. It wasn’t like he was reluctant, he just wasn’t really happy with Mott. And the rest is history.
You say that Paice Ashton Lord was the first real big-time band you were involved with. Did that feel like an important step? I suppose so, but that’s more to do with Rolls-Royces. Jon Lord used to drive me around in his, and I’d always be pointing at things and going: “What does this do, Jon?” I must’ve annoyed the hell out of him. But he was lovely. I’d already played in Cozy Powell’s Hammer and done session work for Mickie Most, but the big step up was between Babe Ruth and Paice Ashton Lord. That’s when I said to myself: “I’ve got to keep myself together here.” Paice Ashton Lord turned out to be a flash in the pan, although it’s one of the best things I’ve ever done.
Were Jon Lord and Cozy Powell particularly important figures in your life? Absolutely. And as people, first and foremost. Both of them were intelligent, realistic and easy to work with. They were guys you could take any problem to, whether you were worried about a song bridge or how to fix the tyre on your car. Cozy was best man at my wedding. The hardest thing with Jon was trying to get him to take credit for anything. I think he only has one credit with Whitesnake, on Outlaw, and I more or less insisted he take that one. He’d always say: “If it wasn’t for those chord changes I would never have thought of it. So it’s all down to you, dear boy.”
You became good friends with George Harrison after Jon Lord had introduced you to him. What was he like to hang out with? He was terrific. I never stopped pinching myself, really, because he was the man. George invited me to [Harrison’s mansion] Friar Park and ribbed me about my fondness for Beatles memorabilia and trivia. Then he took me into his studio and showed me the Fender Stratocaster that he’d played on Magical Mystery Tour, plus his Sgt. Pepper suit. It was magical. I remember him saying to me once: “You’ve been in a lot of bands, haven’t you? I envy you for that, because I was only ever in one.”
“Jon Lord used to drive me around in his
Rolls-Royce.”
In 1976, your rehearsals with Paice Ashton Lord at Pinewood Studios coincided with the filming of the James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me. Is that when Roger Moore popped in? He was fascinated by my twin-neck guitar. He said: “How the hell do you play that?” I remember turning to him and going: “James Bond could play it,” and he really laughed. I showed him how all the band stuff worked and he had such a nice time. He ended up saying: “Thank you so much for showing me around. Why don’t you visit the set?” I didn’t realise at the time that the Bond set was closed, so I was honoured when he showed me around.
You first met David Coverdale at a studio in Munich, recording the Paice Ashton Lord album. Did you click straight away? There was an instant rapport between us. He was like a surrogate brother to me. Neither of us had any