In a new interview with Noise11‘s Paul Cashmere, iconic guitarist Michael Schenker, who is currently promoting his upcoming album My Years With UFO, celebrating the 50th anniversary of Schenker‘s years with UFO, discussed some of his other yet-to-be-released recording projects.
He said (as transcribed by blabbermouth.net), “So I went into the studio in June ’23. I wrote all the songs. I mean, of course, [the] UFO [album] was already written, but the MSG, Michael Schenker Group album, and the next [Michael Schenker] album, I wrote the music. The second album was supposed to be an electric, like an instrumental album. And the reason was I wanted to make three albums in one go to let the people know what I’ve done in the last 50 years. So I did UFO, I did MSG and I did an acoustic or electric [album] and both instrumental music. So after we finished with My Years With UFO, I started putting down my guitars for the MSG album, which is gonna be called Don’t Sell Your Soul. And it’s with [former Skid Row frontman] Erik Grönwall singing most of the songs, Robin McAuley singing, and Michael Voss, my co-producer, he’s also singing. And then I did the instrumental album. As I was putting down my guitar, my composition, the instrumental part, Michael Voss kept singing, and I went, like, ‘Michael, this sounds really good. I think we should turn this into a vocal album,’ and have, like I used to do with UFO, Belladonna and Love To Love, all of these songs used to be instrumental songs. And then they turned into vocal songs. And so we invited Herman Rarebell from the Scorpions, ex-drummer. And so this album is like now one of my favorite albums. It turned into this amazing album. Somebody had the idea to tune it to a 432 [Hz] instead of 440 [Hz], which is the same tuning as Dark Side Of The Moon, Pink Floyd. And we added this, we added that, and it was like building a house. All of a sudden, I was shocked what came out of it. And people will be shocked when they hear this album because they will not believe what they’re hearing. And it’s called Freedom Of Expression.”
Produced by Schenker and Voss, My Years With UFO marks the 50th anniversary of Schenker‘s era with UFO, spanning from 1972 to 1978. The “German Wunderkind” was asked to join UFO at just 17 years old. Touring the globe as a teenager, Schenker became a driving force behind some of UFO‘s most loved tracks, such as Doctor Doctor, Rock Bottom and Only You Can Rock Me.
Schenker has released two songs from, My Years With UFO, click on the highlighted song titles, to listen to them. Mother Mary (featuring Erik Grönwall and Slash) and Rock Bottom (featuring Kai Hansen).
My Years With UFO, is scheduled for release, on September 20th through earMUSIC.
2 Responses
UFO’s records with Schenker have some of the greatest riffs ever written. I’m not into instrumentals personally but I will buy the record with Gronwall.
I still feel there’s more to the Skid Row story with Eric. We may be er know. It usually has to do with the $$$. I guess these “legacy” bands can be stingy, even with past members. Like Sebastian Bach.