At 73, is George Thorogood still bad to the bone? Lexington is about to find out.
Wasting no time in getting to the crux of a conversation, George Thorogood did away with requisite introductions and greetings. There was no ‘Hello’ or “How ya’ doin’?” as the veteran rock ‘n’ roll roots merchant, the “Bad to the Bone” boogie-man, opened the interview. He instead opted for a question of his own.
“What do you want to know that you don’t know already?”
The greeting isn’t rude, just practical. With a devotion to blues, boogie, folk-country tradition and all things rock ‘n roll that began in high school and a recording/performance alliance with his Destroyers band a mere month away from its 50-year anniversary, Thorogood assumes his fans know who he is and what he does.
Pondering a half-century milestone, though, was not part of the plan at first for the guitarist/bandleader, who returns to the Lexington Opera House for a Nov. 7 concert. During the band’s early years, the primary goal was simply survival.
“Fifty years, I don’t know about that,” Thorogood said. “You don’t even know if you’re going to live that long. With the world of music back then, there was no way you could have predicted this.”
Hank Williams, Bo Diddley and Thorogood
“When we started, there was no MTV. There was no Sirius radio. There was no classic rock radio. There was no American casino rock at that time. All these different avenues, House of Blues and what have you, popped up and were created over the last 25 or 30 years, which has allowed me to make a living. So, no, I never would have thought that back then because we didn’t know what the future was. We thought we would be in small, quality venues, of course. But we didn’t know it would expand like this.”
When Thorogood’s initial records with the Destroyers began gaining traction with rock radio stations around the country in the late 1970s, the industry was being overtaken by the punk revolution – a rebellion against lofty, over-produced records in favor of scrappier, coarser and more immediate rock music. Thorogood had all the attitude of a punk rocker, but his music was inseparably bound to tradition. He was a proud disciple of such stylistic journeymen as Hank Williams, Bo Diddley, Elmore James, Chuck Berry and Willie Dixon. His 1978 sophomore album, “Move It On Over,” sported youthful, high octane guitar re-wirings of tunes by all of those giants.
The thrill of discovery, Thorogood said, came as much from the song as the sound or style that first gave it life.
“First of all, we’ve got to like the tune. It doesn’t have much to do with the kind of style it is. I love Hank Williams. So people are like, ‘Oh, so you like country music.’ Well, I don’t know what you call what he does. He’s not a country artist because he came from the city. He came from Montgomery, Alabama. He’s a city guy. If I hear certain reggae tunes I love and I could play them, I would play those, too. If I could play ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ on my guitar, I’d do it. When we pick certain songs, we’re thinking, ‘Well, I just happen to like this tune, so let’s see how it works.’ Then we play it and if a live audience digs it, we stay with it.”
The song that made him a star
The same kind of thinking went into Thorogood’s own songwriting. The title track to his 1982 album “Bad to the Bone” became a major radio hit, a jovial ode to the blues and boogie grinds of Muddy Waters and Bo Diddley. The tune’s accompanying music video (which featured Diddley) then introduced Thorogood to audiences of MTV, the cable music network then in its infancy. Topping it all was the song’s appearance in numerous hit movies from the 1980s. Among them: “Lethal Weapon,” “Bull Durham,” “Terminator 2: Judgment Day,” “The Color of Money” and “Christine.”
In short, “Bad to the Bone” became not only Thorogood’s biggest hit, but an anthem to the roots-savvy grooves his music was born out of as well as the attitude — yes, the punkish attitude — that fortified it.
“Well, we had the attitude before we ever played a note of music,” Thorogood said, erupting into laughter. “That came first. That had to come first. Jerry Lee Lewis was a wild one before he ever touched the piano. Keith Richards was from the other side of the tracks before he ever touched a guitar. So with certain people, it’s attitude first and then it just comes out of them in whatever they happen to do.
“(Marlon) Brando was such a natural. He just rebelled against authority naturally. He hated it. He went to boarding school and something just rubbed him the wrong way. Somehow, that just came out in his work. You can see it and feel it. The attitude is always there first. Then comes the other stuff. It doesn’t go the other way around. It’s not, ‘Well, now that I learned the guitar, I’m going to learn to be a bad ass.’ No, no, no, no, no. Keith Richards was a bad ass to begin with. People tell me, ‘Well, your guitar playing is kind of dirty and nasty and it’s borderline punk rock. And I’m, ‘No, I was a nasty little (expletive) even before I played.”
Back on tour after health scare
Thorogood is now 73, so being bad to the bone brings with it some staying power. Still, real life occasionally intervenes. Last spring, a month’s worth of North American concerts were canceled due to what his website announced only as “a very serious medical condition that will require immediate surgery and quite of few weeks of recuperation and healing.” Thorogood didn’t stay on the sidelines long, though. He has been touring steadily again since late July.
”Things are in a good place right now because I’m not in the hospital and I’m not in the joint. Everything else is a bonus.”
George Thorogood and the Destroyers
When: Nov. 7 at 8 p.m.
Where: Lexington Opera House, 401 W. Short.
Tickets: $60.50-$80.50 through ticketmaster.com.
