NEED TO KNOW
- Suzi Quatro’s new album Freedom is out now.
- The star says that even though she’s 75, she has no plans to slow down.
- Suzi reflects on working with good friend Alice Cooper -and her Elvis Presley regret.
- Suzi hopes to tour Australia again – for the 42nd time – and a secret fear won’t hold her back.
Suzi Quatro likes to talk in numbers.
The legendary rock queen speaks emphatically about her 18th album, Freedom, how she’s played “the same Fender bass guitar for 62 years”, and that she’s counting down to her 42nd Australian tour.
But by far, the most impressive number is 75 – an age that seems so mismatched for this energetic and magnetic force.
“I like to be busy. I’m as busy now as ever. I’m all over the place! I’m back on the road. I’m 75, but that means nothing to me,” she tells New Idea.
“I’ve always made a point of seeing something I want to do and just going for it. Yes, I’m 75. I make no attempt to hide that. I’m comfortable with the age I am. I am owning it, and I’m being the best version of me.”
Suzi Quatro’s new album Freedom is out now. So what inspired her?
The message behind Suzi Quatro’s new album Freedom
For this latest album, Suzi enlisted the help of her son Richard Tuckey, with whom she’s worked with since 2019.
She had one goal: “Strip everything back and take a trip back to where it all began for me, musically.”
“It’s about owning who you are, being proud of who you are, and feeling comfortable with who you are,” Suzi says.
“It took me a lifetime for me to get there, but that’s the message behind this album.”
She says collaborating with her son is “so easy”, as he challenges her “in a really good way”.
“And of course, he knows me better than anyone,” Suzi adds.
“He knows who Suzi Quatro really is because he grew up with her.”
The title track and album name were purely instinct.
“I heard the riff and just shouted, ‘Freedom!’” she says.
“It feels like that’s what we all need right now because if you ain’t got freedom, you got nothing!”
Why Suzi Quatro’s album Freedom features rocker Alice Cooper
As if Suzi needed any more street cred, she tells us she’s been friends with rock icon Alice Cooper since “we were just kids back in Detroit”.
It was that decades-long connection that Suzi leaned on when she asked him to duet with her for a cover of the classic ‘Kick Out The Jams’ – a song she describes as “so right” for them.
“We have been friends for years,” she says.
“But it was so hard to find a time to get us together and for us to both be in the same place long enough to record.
“In the end, Alice said, ‘Why don’t you just come to Detroit and we’ll do it?’
So I did, and we got to record the song face-to-face in the studio. I know everyone is going to love it.”
What is Suzi Quatro’s secret fear, and when will she return to Australia?
Fresh from her 10-date tour of the UK, Suzi will next play a spate of gigs across Central Europe.
And while her loyal Australian fans may have to wait for her return Down Under, it shouldn’t be too long because Suzi’s had such a long affinity with us, she’s dubbed herself “the Queen of Australia!”
“I have a lot of fans there,” she says, adding that she loves the place so much, she’s willing to overlook her fear of flying.
“I hate flying, but I love being Down Under and seeing my fans there. I have been touring Australia since 1974. Even Elton John can’t compete with that!”
The truth about Suzi Quatro and Elvis Presley
Understandably, for someone who has spent so much time in music industry circles, Suzi has amassed her share of rock’n’roll tales over the years.
Yet one story that still stands out is the time she nearly met her hero, Elvis Presley.
“He called me in 1974 … He told me how he thought my cover of ‘All Shook Up’ was the best he had ever heard,” an amazed Suzi recalls.
“He actually invited me to come meet him in Graceland, but I never did go. I was so busy, and also, I really feel like I was never supposed to meet him, so I never did.”
Though the adage ‘never meet your heroes’ rang true for Suzi, Elvis’ influence on her life’s work was enduring.
“Elvis is the spirit on my shoulder. I wouldn’t be here now if it weren’t for Elvis,” she says. “I was five, almost six years old, when I first saw Elvis [on TV]. I knew from that moment I wanted to do what he was doing.”
What’s left on Suzi Quatro’s bucket list?
When she’s not rocking out on stage, Suzi splits her time between Essex and Hamburg with her husband of 33 years, Rainer Haas.
One has to wonder, after more than 60 years as a global artist, what else does Suzi have to tick off her bucket list?
“There is always something. I am proud to have done so many things in and outside of music.
I have done acting. I wrote a musical. I have been on the West End. I have written seven books, but I still want to do more,” she says.
“I just want to keep on creating for as long as I can. Anything other than retirement is good!”
