The American Dream of Thin Lizzy Chris ODonnell talks to us about the Thin Lizzy and Phil's dream of breaking America!
The American Dream of Thin Lizzy
Such a terrible sleeve for Fighting!
It was the only sleeve that the Phonogram art department had anything to do with. The photograph used on the front cover was supposed to be shot at night, but the photographer could only make it during the day. When I argued that you could see the red post box and white houses, he said Don’t worry, we can airbrush those out and make it look like it was shot at night. The art department told him that there was no budget for that effect and put together the sleeve and said That’s your album cover. The fighting makeup shot was Philip's idea, but it looked so unrealistic. Mercury Records didn’t like the cover and sent me a sketch of what they wanted to go with, which was a teenage couple on a sofa watching a wrestling match on tv. I said that’s not happening and sent them a photograph that was so different from the UK version that they used that
Brian Robertson is from Clarkston, A very nice place indeed, but not from what BR told us when we first met him. He had us believing he was raised in the Gorbals. All was revealed when we were invited to his parents’ house, where he grew up, after a gig, not to find a rundown tenement building, but a very nice semi !!
In the book, i wrote so much of it when it was originally going to be called the American Dream of Thin Lizzy. The purpose was to show how important those American tours were to the making of the band. It is my account of what it what like to be part of that Dream.
I showed it to various publishers who were interested, and then suggested it needed more ‘ the wild man of rock and roll ‘ stories. I responded that I was writing a journal and not a cliche-ridden book about being on tour with the kind of band that engaged in throwing tv screens into swimming pools and trashing hotel rooms.
During the pandemic, a friend sent me an email asking what it was like living in London at that time and to describe it . The reply was read and then shared to some friends. The following week, he wrote and told me how everyone had enjoyed reading it.I wrote back and that turned into a weekly email that was read each week by over 100 + people. In doing this, I learned so much about how to get the reader to believe he or she felt like they were there with some of the things I was writing about. When we came back to work, and after reading what I had written, it was very factual, but I couldn’t feel enough of what friends had told me about my lockdown emails that they liked so much.
I left it for a while, and then I had a moment when you realised what you wanted to say with a book. It was in the immigration line up on the first tour that when I got to the booth with my passport and the officer asked me the purpose of my visit. Now it may have been a dream to get to America, but after I told her about the tour, she stamped my passport and said, “Welcome to America “ and with those three words , my life changed forever.
I’ve read some of the TL books that are so inaccurate and rely on anecdotes that were hearsay in so many cases. Even when I have been interviewed, the writer uses his voice as it were to write what I said. I read them back and wonder why they didn’t just write what I said.
The record industry uses www.townsendmusic.store.
The printer ships the books straight to them, and they pack and post out the orders.
All you do is set up a link to the site from your site. They do ship worldwide, but there is also Gardeners, the company that all publishers use.
I am avoiding all the cliches with this book and giving an account to the fans as to what happened on those American tours
I read so many stories about some of the events that happened, that never actually happened. One example was in an interview, a radio promo guy for Phonogram in the UK who had never been to America, let alone on tour with the band, had this to say.
In New York, when the band loaded the equipment into the venue, the mafia strong-armed the crew and said If you want to use your equipment, you have to pay us $1,000
When Phil found out, he demanded to see the guy and told him we are not paying and how a row with him.
Well, Phillip or the band are never at the load in, why would they be? All venues in New York are Union buildings, and if you are not a Union member, you have to be a temporary member on the night; the fee for the whole crew is $100
It was the head teamster who asked to meet Phillip, as he was from Waterford. It was not his kind of music, but he loved the guys and said Anytime you guys play in New York, you make sure you call me. So there you have it.
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