Pete Agnew has been a working musician for the entirety of his adult life. For 50 years, he has been the rock-solid foundation of one of the most venerable and well-respected hard rock bands on the planet, Nazareth. Through the shifting sands of time and taste, through the implosion of the record industry, through multiple member changes, Agnew has continued to be the steady hand on the wheel, navigating the band through the varied vicissitudes of the music industry, continuing to write, record and release vital, dynamic music, and spending months each year touring the world to a continually burgeoning fan base.
Even as the band marks 50 years since its formation in Dunfermline, Scotland in 1968, Agnew and his current bandmates, guitarist Jimmy Murrison (a member since 1994), drummer Lee Agnew (Pete’s son, who has been in the band since 1999) and vocalist Carl Sentance, they released Tattooed on My Brain, a collection of 13 songs that demonstrate the band has not lost is affinity or ability for creating rock music of varied tones and tenors, from blistering rock, to more playful and contemplative numbers, all replete with the signature Nazareth sound.
Proof of the vitality and veracity of the band’s new music comes in the form of rave reviews for music industry tastemakers, and an outpouring of fan love and support such as Agnew said he has not seen for many years.
“The feedback has been unbelievable. It’s the best feedback we’re received, actually, from any album. It’s just incredible. I have been doing interviews, as you can imagine, for the last couple of weeks for the run up to the album release, and I haven’t talked to one person who didn’t think it was a great album. I know it’s really good because I never get people picking the same two songs as their favourites when they talk about the songs the love on the album, which is a lovely thing for the record, because you don’t just want everybody mentioning the same one or two songs and never mentioning the rest. There are no fillers on the thing. So, we are very proud of the album and I think it’s one of the best things Nazareth has ever done,” he said.
Tattooed on My Brain is the first Nazareth album since Rock ‘n’ Roll Telephone, which came out in 2014, and is the first album without iconic vocalist and co-founder Dan McCafferty, who had to step away from the band because of poor health in 2013. Linton Osborne filled in briefly before former Persian Risk, Krokus and Geezer Butler Band singer Carl Sentance would take over frontman duties in 2015.
“In live situations, the fans have already accepted him. For the last three years, since when he hit the stage at the very first gig he did, he got fans. People just took to the guy. And that was always going to be hard for him; you’re coming in after a guy who was a pretty iconic character in Dan, and you know it’s not a stretch to say he’s a guy who really made his mark as one of the top rock voices on the planet. So, to take on that position is not easy for anybody,” Agnew said.
“The thing is, we were never going to go looking for anything like a Dan McCafferty soundalike. We didn’t want that, and that would have rightly been slagged. We didn’t want to do that, and we didn’t do that. Carl came along after we had listened to many, many, many Dan McCafferty soundalikes and when we first saw and heard Carl, we knew he was the guy. He’s a great singer, but he has his own delivery and he sounds nothing like Dan.
“When he came aboard, he did all the old, classic Nazareth songs, that weren’t really his, they were Dan’s songs because he was the one who recorded them all. But Carl did a great job with them. And from the live performance side of things, it’s really been a new lease on life these last three years. We’ve been going like a storm every place we’ve gone and the thing we needed to do was capture that on record. So, this album was a chance for Carl to sing his songs. This is going to be his record to make his mark. And he really did an incredible job.”
And Agnew believes everyone on the band stepped up and did their level best because there was a lot on the line. Even with their legendary pedigree, and sterling reputation as a kick ass live band, having such a massive change at such a pivotal position in the band, and wanting to retain relevance in the 21st century means bringing one’s ‘A game’ to the table.
“Everybody was a wee bit nervous about approaching this album at the early stages because we realized we didn’t have any wiggle room with this album. Some people are going to slam it even if it’s a great album because some people won’t accept there’s been a change. But this had to be a great album. By the time we were ready to go into the studio with the songs we had, we through it’s going to be pretty good. But then the guys started coming in, while we were doing the album, every day with another song. People started writing really furiously when we were starting the recordings because the ideas just kept coming,” he said.
“Some of the stuff was really great and it was a great atmosphere to work in because everybody was writing, and everybody was excited. We are so lucky to have four songwriters in the band, so it’s a lot easier and a lot more creative when you have that. And you get the usual Nazareth diversity. So that’s what happened. We came to realize after about 10 days that we could make this into a killer album, and not just have 10 tracks on it. We ended up with 13 but we could have put 18 on.
“At the end of the day, we were absolutely delighted, from the minute we went into the studio. And the thing is, we finished the album at the end of February, so we knew what we had and knew how good it was, and we were dying to put it out. Can you imagine sitting on an album like that in the cupboard for nine months.”
The old Nazareth vibe, one that has passed through so many incarnations of the band, through hit songs such as Hair of the Dog, This Flight Tonight, Love Hurts, Broken Down Angel, My White Bicycle, Razamanaz, Dream On and Holiday, has melded seamlessly with the newer members’ contributions and musical sensibilities to create what in many ways is still a prototypical Nazareth album.
“Some bands have a concept of a specific sound for the album, and that does happen. You get in the studio and you set up, and you get the sounds off the board from each instrument and that is the sound and the vibe of he album. We don’t do that. We look at every song as a new thing. We ask how should each individual song sound? I don’t think about a ‘Nazareth sound,’ or about the band, I think about the song and how would you play this and how do you want this to sound. So, you have different vibes to each song that way,” Agnew explained.
“That’s how you get a song like Tattooed on My Brain, which is a very, very cheeky track, and then you have something like The Secret is Out, which is a huge, stompin’ loud, Bad Company type of thing. As I said, we do a variety of things, so you get a little bit of this and a little bit of that, but it’s still the same four guys playing and singing them all.”
Tattooed on My Brain is Nazareth’s 24th studio album since their formation in 1968, starting with their self-titled debut in 1971. Unlike other bands who have split up and reformed over a long tenure, Nazareth has stayed the course for all five decades, with Agnew being the lone member to endure for the whole 50 years. It’s an achievement that Agnew recognizes, but doesn’t get overly philosophical about.
“It’s fantastic to be marking 50 years, although I have a lot more hospital appointments these days than I did back then. Other than that, the time kind of sneaks up on you. It’s my life; my life has gone by and this is what I did with it. So far, I have done 24 studio albums, so that’s what I can point to and say, ‘that’s my legacy,” he said.
“I can’t really think in terms of years at all, it’s just been my entire life. I don’t know anything else. It’s been so great. I have been very, very lucky to be able to do this for my whole life, to make a living doing something I love, to make a living doing something you would have done for free because you loved it. So, it’s wonderful. And as I said, some days it feels like 50 years and sometimes it feels so fresh. I tell you what’s funny, I can remember a story in vivid detail and tell someone and realize it was from 1972. Then if somebody asks me what I had for breakfast that morning, that’s when I have problems.”
Even with the massive shift in the music industry, especially in the way people ‘consume’ music, and the advent of streaming services and downloads, Agnew said there is still something of artistic significance in putting out a collection of music, and releasing it in physical form, either on CD or vinyl, as is happening with Tattooed on My Brain. For him, and the other guys in Nazareth, being creative and productive is still of great importance.
“We try to get a record out about every three years. As a matter of fact, by the time this one comes out, it will have been four years since the last one, and five years since we recorded that one. I feel if you don’t make albums, if you don’t record, it’s hard for your credibility – street cred as they say. If you just go around playing your old songs, if you just do that, you end up on these oldies’ festivals, and they have lots of them over in Europe and it’s all about memories. You are not actually proving your worth on what you can do today. We are still being creative, and I think that’s the thing, the fans like to see that the band is being creative,” Agnew said.
“And listen, we play all of our old hits too, which we have to do, and we are very happy to do because it means we’ve had all these hits. But every time we make a new album, and all our albums are always different, they always get a good reception from the fans. And for them alone we would make albums.”
Agnew said he is pleasantly surprised at how many new fans the band has been generating in recent years, and how much of the positive input about Tattooed on My Brain is coming from these newer, usually younger fans.
“There are people discovering this and they have never bought a Nazareth record in their life. The video for the title track has gone crazy since it came out a couple of weeks ago. I have never seen such enthusiasm for one of our new albums. And to many of them, it’s a new band. If you talk about the old lineup to them, they don’t know, they are not interested. This is Nazareth to them, and that’s great for us,” he said.
Agnew said that Nazareth has always had a great fondness for Canada and Canadian fans, which is why the band crosses the Atlantic pretty much every year to tour the Great White North.
“You say you’re near Kingston? I know Kingston very well. I spent about five days there, a few years ago. We had to hang out for a bit; we were doing a tour and it was near the end of it and there was a big space between gigs for some reason. I can remember most of it, and spending time in that lovely little city, although the evenings are a bit blurry. There was an Irish bar that was in that equation I seem to remember. And I know Jerry Mercer from April Wine lives near there and I was speaking to him the last time we were through,” said Agnew.
“Canada is one of the best countries for us, ever since the early days. I remember it was in the 1970s and we came to do a tour there and we had three albums in the top 20 in Canada at the same time. So, if a country likes you that much, you kind of like them very much back. It’s a place that was always great right from the start, and I think the first time we came to Canada was 1972 or 1973. And honestly, I can’t even count the number of times we have played Canada – the number of times we have played Winnipeg alone is astonishing and the amount of good times we have had there is amazing. A lot of the big rock bands, they will play Toronto and Montreal, and they might play Vancouver, but there not that many of them that would play Regina, or Kingston or Brampton or some of the great festivals they have all over Ontario. So, yeah, Canada has been good to us.”
There are a number of tour dates already booked for Nazareth throughout Europe, including some in Russia and Spain, as well as a couple of music cruises. Agnew said the band should be back in Canada next summer. For all the tour dates, and more information on Tattooed on My Brain, visit www.nazarethdirect.co.uk.
- Jim Barber is a veteran award-winning journalist and author based in Napanee, ON, who has been writing about music and musicians for a quarter of a century. Besides his journalistic endeavours, he now works as a communications and marketing specialist. Contact him at jimbarberwritingservices@gmail.com.
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