Simon RushworthBlack Eyed Sons and former Quireboys guitarist Paul Guerin has swapped Tyneside for Texas and he’s embracing his new role as Blyth’s answer to ‘Whispering’ Bob Harris. Simon Rushworth caught up with Hillbilly Vegas’ new recruit as he juggles DJ duties with a fresh run of live shows.
Rushonrock: How did The Rock N Roll Basement radio show come about?
Paul Guerin: Well, I’ll tell you! And this goes back four years. We were on tour in America — The Quireboys. Dave ‘Bucket’ Colwell contacted me the day I was playing in Dallas, at a place called Trees. Dave said ‘there’s this fella that I’ve been talking to on the internet called Rob Colwell’. They met up via music and had the same surname! Bucket asked if we’d put him on the guestlist for the Trees gig — he said Rob’s a good man to know as he hosts an internet radio show and does mastering for rock bands. I met the fella that night and he couldn’t have been a nicer bloke.
Rushonrock: So we’re guessing you kept in touch?
PG: Of course. But I hadn’t met my wife Amy at that point. To start with Rob and I kept in touch via Facebook but then, after I met Amy, I started coming over to Texas more often. I was coming over for three months at a time and so while I was there I’d meet up with Rob in Dallas. There’s a restaurant just around the corner from where JFK was shot and they serve the best Shepherd’s Pie. That’s where we’d meet and, of course, we got chatting about Rob’s radio work.
Paul (left) with Black Eyed Sons
Rushonrock: Did you aspire to be a DJ at this point?
PG: Haha. Not at all. But one day Rob just dropped into conversation that the radio station was exploring a few new angles and were looking for a new DJ. Of course, I’ve never done anything like that before. But I’ve done enough interviews and whatnot and so I thought why not just go for it? What’s the worst that can happen? I said ‘I’d love to do it’ and I think Rob was a bit taken aback. He said ‘really?’ and I said ‘yes’. That’s the moment I felt truly terrified! I mean, you can put me in front of a live audience, right? No problem. But this is a whole new ball game. As soon as I agreed to do it, I was already wondering what on earth I’d agreed to!
Rushonrock: So what happened next?
PG: Look, it didn’t happen straight away. I was back and forth between Newcastle in the UK and Palestine in Texas. But while I was in Texas one of the regular DJs decided to leave and a slot became available. Metal Rob — that’s his DJ name — and his mate Lee came over to Amy’s house with what turned out to be an unbelievable bit of kit! The pair of them installed everything and then I did a few run throughs. I was nervous for the first time in 40 years!
Rushonrock: Did you have any teething problems early on?
PG: First of all I got this swanky new microphone but it turns out I had it pointing the wrong way round. I should know my way around a mic, right? But I had it back to front! It sounded terrible. I ended up with a cardboard box on my head to try and make things sound better. I was thinking ‘this isn’t practical and it’s not a good look’. I was just sat there wondering ‘was this what it was like for Tommy Vance when he was starting out?’. But once I realised my mistake, things started to fall into place.
Rushonrock: So did you have any plans for how The Rock N Roll Basement with Paul Guerin would sound and the kind of content you’d include?
PG: I didn’t think too hard. I just sort of dived in at the deep end. I did research around who was on before me and then I found out Metal Rob was the next guy up. So I did think about the start and the end of the show, in that context. But then I thought I can only play what I love. The show’s got to be authentic. What the guys at the station really wanted to hear were some of my stories. And I’ve got one or two of them! So after a few sleepless nights, getting more and more nervous, I just stayed up one night and wrote down the bare bones of about 90 stories. Once I commit to something I become quite obsessive and I wanted the show to be the best it could possibly be.
Rushonrock: So what goes into each hour-long show?
PG: Preparation’s the key. I think about that one hour on the radio all week! I put different playlists together, match them with the stories I’ve got and try to mix things up where I can. Amy works away in the background, building up the Facebook page and interacting with the audience so I get more of an idea of what people really want to hear. I spoke to Rob after a few shows and he seemed happy with how it’s all working out. I love it. I really do.
Rushonrock: So give us a give us a flavour of the kind of music we might hear on a typical Rock N Roll Basement with Paul Guerin show?
PG: You should see the notes I have for every show! It’s like Shakespeare’s written one of these scripts. I sit up all night thinking about the bands to feature and the songs that fit. You can expect everyone from Newcastle’s Raven to Bap Kennedy’s Energy Orchard and everything in between. I’ve opened up with Nazareth before and obviously I’ll play a load of Michael Schenker and UFO stuff. I’ll add in a little tale about when I played with Schenker or when I watched UFO. The shows are, to an extent, guided by the people I played with as much as the bands I love. It’s whatever comes to mind. I’ve always got a pen and paper nearby — I suppose you’d call me old school. I did a link with Geordie and AC/DC the other day. It just seemed like the right show at the right time.
Rushonrock: Your North East of England roots run deep throughout the shows…
PG: Well, there’s so much material to pull from. I might be living in Texas with my Green Card now but I’m very proud of where I come from in Blyth, Northumberland. Growing up we had so many musicians and bands to look up to from our area. Geordie was the first single I paid for with my own money — fronted by Brian Johnson. When I was putting together the radio show one week that got me on to playing AC/DC’s Have A Drink On Me and then I dived into a story about when I was 15 and I used to drive the van for a band called Vegas. Don’t tell the police! They were on the same agency as Vegas so we’d do ‘double bubbles’ with Geordie at Heaton Buffs.Â
Paul (right) with The Quireboys in his hometown of Blyth
Rushonrock: Since you’ve mentioned Geordie — are your American listeners tuned in to that North East accent yet?
PG: I do make an effort with how I talk. And what’s quite funny is I was talking to Bucket the other day and he said ‘you know, I try to talk more slowly in the US and you have to, right?’. I remember a thousand years ago watching Brian Johnson get interviewed on MTV and they had subtitles! Bucket says I sound like ‘Whispering’ Bob Harris on the radio — what a compliment! I’m very aware of the accent but I’m not changing it. I just adapt it to fit in with wherever I am on any given day. And that’s the case in the studio. But this is the internet and the shows goes all over the world. My mate Paul back home said I didn’t even sound like me! You can’t please all of the people all of the time!
Rushonrock: Now that you’re a few months into your DJ career do you regret never doing it before?
PG: No. You know, I’m a real firm believer in serendipity. I’ve ended up in Texas at this time of my life with a beautiful new wife and it feels like there are so many new opportunities. I need a focus and I need to keep busy and the radio show’s landed at just the right time. It was the same when I got the opportunity to play with Hillbilly Vegas. My Green Card had just come through and next thing I knew the guys there asked me if I’d play a couple of shows with them opening up for Blue Öyster Cult. It was great timing. All of a sudden, I’m living on the other side of the world and I’ve got my own radio show and I’m in a new band. I’ll just roll with it!
Paul with wife Amy at a recent Hillbilly Vegas show
Rushonrock: What started your love affair with rock music?
PG: It started with Slade. That was down to a lad called Chrissy Bower who’s still a great friend of mine today. He had a guitar and he had some Slade records. And we were both the same. My mother and his mother, they wanted us to get our hair cut and we wouldn’t, because Georgie Best hadn’t had his hair cut. But I digress! We were 11 at the time and the big thing back then was the marching bands — they were called juvenile jazz bands — associated with the church. They used to meet every Sunday morning and had the kazoos and the drums and all that. My mother took me down and it cost whatever for a uniform to join. Now, I wanted to play the drums as it happened. But I’d been twanging away on Chrissy’s guitar and I quite liked that too. Anyway, one day, my mam stopped me outside the Welfare Hall in Blyth and she said ‘you’ve got to make your first real decision as a man — do you want the marching band uniform or a guitar for your 12thbirthday?’. I went for the guitar and the rest, as they say, is history!
Rushonrock: At that point did you dive head first into rock?
PG: So it was Slade who kicked things off and then, of course, the whole thing exploded. It was UFO, Thin Lizzy, everybody you can imagine. At the Newcastle City Hall in the 70s and 80s there were five bands a week coming through. My sister, Zelie, and I would go to gigs together and tickets were often just a few quid. The next step was to form a band at school, which we did. There was a geography teacher there called Mr Stephenson, who also played the guitar, and I used to play my guitar with him during assembly. He arranged that we could use the sixth form block after school to rehearse. That whole 70s period was just brilliant and I got into Kiss massively back then.
Rushonrock: Tell me about your first Kiss?
PG: There was a record shop in Eldon Square in Newcastle where I used to go and that was the first time I saw Kiss Alive 1. I’d never heard of them, never seen the band. But that cover did it for me. I had to have that record. Then we’d go down to the Handyside Arcade and try to get some Kiss posters. That wasn’t easy in Newcastle back then! But everything was extra special because you really had to work for it.
Rushonrock: Do you have a Black Eyed Sons update that you can share with us?
PG: We put so much effort into our debut album which was so well received and then we toured off the back of that. And look, that didn’t work out so well, a few dates were cancelled and we all took a step back. We looked at the current climate and the increasing importance of advance ticket sales and it’s tough out there right now. It’s the same for every band, across the board. It’s just the same here in America. So to answer your question I’ve had time to reflect — I’m a bloke of a certain age with the chance to live a new life in America and I’ve given 40 years to rock and roll. It’s time to look after myself — I’ve just got married and life’s perfect right now. These days Black Eyed Sons can make new music wherever we all are in the world and, when we regroup, that’s what we’ll do.
The Rock N Roll Basement with Paul Guerin airs every Wednesday on 128db Rock Radio at 10pm UK time (4pm CST). The show is repeated on Thursdays at 10am in the UK (4am CST). Select episodes are available on demand via Mixcloud.
Main image by Tom Gold