“They were pretty damn good - I still have the demos,” Gramm says. (And next month, a DVD of a 1978 show at the Rainbow Theatre in London will be unveiled.) A new Foreigner album with Gramm is not currently on the table, though he says he and Jones worked on “six or seven songs” for a new record before Gramm left the band. Last year, the modern Foreigner released a live album, on which they were joined by an orchestra for updates of older material. I haven’t floated the idea, but I may at some point.” Casinos have beautiful rooms with the best acoustics, and we could perform a week or 10 days. “Perhaps if it was done modestly and with a little time to rest between shows. “At first it was a little odd,” says Gramm, “but once you get over it and realize that’s the way things are … they’re great guys and they’ve been friendly to us.” Gramm’s dream scenario is a Las Vegas residency featuring the founding members. At certain shows, the current Foreigner lineup performs first, followed by a reunion of the original band, including Gramm. In recent years, especially after they were both inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2013 and performed together, Jones and Gramm have reached a degree of détente. “I hope I won’t be sitting there criticizing the vocals: ‘He didn’t make that high note, did he?’” “I was surprised, but it’s exciting,” says Gramm, who wonders how he’ll feel on opening night. For his part, Gramm, who left the band in 2003 and hasn’t always spoken highly of Jones’ decision to hire a new singer for a post-Gramm version of Foreigner, only heard about the project two weeks ago in a phone call from Foreigner’s management. “I’m not a huge fan of musicals! But we figured maybe it’s time to take a shot.” Jones’ central role was helping audition cast members for the singing parts, and he and his stepdaughter, singer-songwriter and DJ Samantha Ronson, supplied the show’s lone new song, “Save Me.”īoth Jones and Gramm will attend the Toronto opening night, where the two are scheduled to join the cast for an encore. But Jukebox Hero didn’t come together until he was approached a year ago by Jeff Parry, a Canadian impresario whose company has mounted theatrical productions and tributes to the Beatles, Pink Floyd and the Band ( The Last Waltz Remembered).
#Foreigner juke box hero movie
Jones says he toyed over the years with the idea of a musical or movie using the songs that he (and sometimes lead singer Lou Gramm) wrote. “We figured it would probably be better to have a story that would have a little bit of drama.” In the course of the show, the cast belts out “Waiting for a Girl Like You,” “Feels Like the First Time,” “Cold as Ice,” “Hot Blooded” and “Dirty White Boy” as well as deep album cuts like “Women” and “Blue Morning Blue Day.” “Our original story was a little self-satirical at one point,” Jones chuckles when asked if he’d considered telling Foreigner’s own tale in the show.
(Yes, the name of the musical is spelled differently than the song.) Eschewing the bio format of hit shows like the Carole King story Beautiful and the Four Seasons saga Jersey Boys, Jukebox Hero tells the fictional story of Ryan, a rock star who’s called upon to help his Pennsylvania hometown after the closing of its most prominent factory along the way, he ends up confronting what production notes call “the ghosts of his past.” I didn’t even know she knew our music.”Ībout four decades later, that suggestion has bloomed: Jukebox Hero, a stage musical that works in 20 songs from the Foreigner catalogue, opens a five-night run on Thursday at Toronto’s Ed Mirvish Theatre, with road work to follow. “She said, ‘That song “Juke Box Hero” could be a great stage presentation.’ I said, ‘Wow.’ That song is a pretty ballsy rocker, so for her to even know it was flattering. “She had just done The Wiz, and said, ‘You know, you have a great song that would really lend itself to a musical,’” Jones recalls. As Mick Jones tells it, the origins of a jukebox musical featuring the songs of his band Foreigner date back over 40 years, when he found himself stranded in an airport lounge in Atlanta with none other than Diana Ross.
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