The Sweet: An Awkward Encounter With The Group's Onetime Vocalist Brian Connolly

Originally published in Rave-Up #11 (1986)
Interview by Devorah Ostrov

During a Rave-Up holiday in London, my friend Sara and I met onetime Sweet vocalist Brian Connolly. Sadly, it was not the wonderfully fun encounter you might have imagined.

Sweet - 1973 Bravo magazine 
(Photo: Gered Mankowitz)

Y'know, prior to this interview, someone could've told me that the guys in Sweet weren't completely thrilled with their outrageous early-seventies glam rock persona. And maybe someone could've mentioned that Brian Connolly didn't thoroughly enjoy performing all those fabulous bubblegum pop tunes penned by the team of Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman.

If I'd known beforehand how much they yearned to be a normal-looking, normal-sounding hard rock outfit, I could've prepared some earnest questions. (Or perhaps skipped the whole thing and avoided what was probably once, a long time ago, Connolly's sure-fire pick-up line: "Come sit next to me, little girl.") Instead, I blundered my way through this (as it turned out) very short and somewhat awkward exchange with the group's former lead singer. At least he was mildly interested when he heard that Sara and I were from California.

Brian Connolly on the cover of Music Star - 1974

Brian: I'll never forget the States. We had the wrong image when we went over there. We weren't doing our own material. We weren't doing rock, which the Sweet was all about. We were doing the commercial Chinn and Chapman songs. We were doing all that glam/glitter stuff.

Q: But we loved Sweet's glam image and all those Chinn and Chapman songs!

Brian: Oh, we got away with it, but we didn't think we would in the States. We thought we would shake off the glitter and the lipstick. We thought America was ready for rock, and we could be the rock band we wanted to be. We arrived in Los Angeles, got to the Sunset Strip, and there it was in huge glam rock neon: WELCOME THE SWEET!

Q: So, you guys didn't like the Chinn and Chapman tunes? You wanted to be a hard rock band.

Brian: Oh God, yeah! Well, it was mainly me. A lot of the Chinn and Chapman songs were based on me. "Little Willy" was based on me. I was a bloody alley cat. If there was a club or a party, I would never go home, as in: "Little Willy, Willy won't go home/But you can't push Willy round/Willy won't go..." Also, if you're from Scotland [Brian was born in Glasgow], they either call you Jimmy or Willy. Chapman got wind of this and said, "Hey, Blue..." That's what he called me. "Why do they keep calling you Willy?" I explained it to him, and he said, "Great! That's bloody great!" Then one night, he came up to me and said he had an idea about a song — it was "Little Willy."

The Sweet (publicity photo)

Q: What about "Ballroom Blitz"?

Brian: "Ballroom Blitz" was written during the time of the ballrooms, when they were literally going berserk in this country. We had "stomp-mania." It was us and Slade. We were literally pulling gigs to bits with people just going berserk!

Q: Would you consider working with Steve, Andy, and Mick again?

Brian: Yeah, I'd love to do an album with them again! I'm talking to them now. Steve's in for it. Andy wants to do an album, but not roadwork. I know Mick is in for it 'cause he's the only one that has nothing going for him. With the way things are going for me, I have a good chance of going out by myself anyway.

* * *

R.I.P. Brian Connolly, who passed away in February 1997 after suffering several heart attacks and liver failure.
R.I.P. Mick Tucker, who passed away in February 2002 from leukemia.