Singer: Joe Bouchard
Words: Joe Bouchard
Music: Joe Bouchard

JB: That's correct. I was perfectly fine with writing what I consider "heavy" material at the time. Screams is my first attempt. Screams was about me moving to the "big city". Inspiration came to me as we used to drive on the long Island Expressway into a NY club on a hot summer night. I was just a young kid from a farm in upstate NY. The city was scary to me.

Singer: Eric Bloom
Words: Sandy Pearlman
Music: Eric Bloom, Allen Lanier, Albert Bouchard, Joe Bouchard, Donald Roeser

JB: That's pretty correct also. We all tossed in a bunch of chords and that was that. Eric probably did most of the vocal melody.

Singer: Eric Bloom
Words: Sandy Pearlman
Music: Eric Bloom, Albert Bouchard, Joe Bouchard

JB: Another tune where I tossed in a chord or two. I think I suggested the chords for the final build up.

Singer: Joe Bouchard
Words: Joe Bouchard
Music: Joe Bouchard

JB: Yeah that's all me. We worked up that song pretty quickly at our house on Eaton's Neck. It had no title and after a particularly spirited run though, Sandy Pearlman suggested Hot Rods to Hell, taken from an old B movie title. I think Donald said it should be Hot Rails to Hell. And that's what I remember about how that title was chosen. Not much real thought behind it....

Hot Rails was written about a slick promoter in the early days, Phil King. He and I lived in the Dix Hills house with assorted other freaks. He first introduced me to Alice Cooper back in 1971. He booked the band when nobody else would. He was shot to death in a gambling dispute. We were on tour in Rochester, NY doing a week-long stint at a club at a gig he booked for us called The Funhouse at the time - it was mostly mostly bikers and pool players... It was a shock. I guess we never paid his commission. ;-(

Fact: 1277 was the number of a subway car I rode in with Bill Gawlik coming back from NYC after a jazz concert. And indeed it had "KING" sprayed in red paint on the inside of the train car. Graffiti was rampant in those days. Pretty scary sight when Phil King had only been murdered only a few days before.

Singer:Eric Bloom
Words: Joe Bouchard
Music: Albert Bouchard, Joe Bouchard, Donald Roeser

JB: That's correct except I did much more work here than with the other collaborative songs. I remember staying up most of the night reworking Sandy's lyrics. Just rearranging the order of things so they were more singable.

The next day I went down to the living room in our rented Dix Hills house and wrote most of the music on our Hammond B3 which was conveniently set up in the center of the room. Albert and Donald made a few suggestions and developed the jam at the end, but this song is a lot of me. I always took heat for ripping off an Allman Brothers riff, but it came out cool in the end.

Singer: Joe Bouchard
Words: Joe Bouchard
Music: Joe Bouchard, Albert Bouchard

JB: I don't know what Albert wrote of this song. I wrote the words and music. He might have something to do with the arrangement but I can't remember. I have to confess several of the words were "freely" adapted from Spanish poet Pablo Neruda. Just a line here or there. It was an English translation I was reading at the time. But it was no more than John Lennon's borrowing a line from Kahil Gibran.

Singer: Eric Bloom
Words: Sandy Pearlman
Music: Joe Bouchard, Albert Bouchard

JB: Yes that's right. I wrote the music, chords and melody. Albert's contribution was the arrangement and what a fine one it is. He wrote the connecting riffs and he came up with the Panic in Detroit rhythm at the end.

Q: As this is probably my favourite song of all - and to be honest, of most BOC fans I know too, could I ask a "follow-up" on this one - is there any background info you can recall on this song - was it originally a melody you already had dabbled with - or was it written from scratch to fit Sandy Pearlman's lyrics?

JB: It was written from scratch to fit Sandy's lyric. The "clock strikes 12" lyric was a later line in the poem that Sandy wrote. I moved it to the opening line for obvious reasons. The melody came to me as I was walking on the beach near our house we rented on Eaton's Neck Long Island, NY. Here's a photo of that same beach.

Q: Who was responsible for the Imaginos version's arrangement - and what did you think of it?

JB: Albert did the arrangement, influenced by Thommy Price and Jack Rigg I think. I don't like it much. Donald does a credible singing job, but it's pale compared to the original.

Singer: Joe Bouchard
Words: Joe Bouchard, Murray Krugman
Music: Joe Bouchard

JB: What's Murray's name doing on this song? I wrote the words and music. Murray only suggested the title. Eventually the title was morfed into a section of the song, but I was quite surprised when Murray's name ended up on the remastered version. To me it was no more than Pearlman's suggestion of the title of Hot Rails, and Sandy didn't claim credit.

Usually it's a trade off in songwriting credits. For most group efforts, being stingy with credits is not a big gain. That's why often someone who didn't do much with a song, just a minor cosmetic touch, ends up getting a credit. But you trade it off with generous credit on a bigger tune of yours. Unless the song becomes a huge hit, it's a fair deal.

That's the story. . . . So far. Enjoy. Joe

P.S. Do you ever read those Beatle books when they talk about song credits? I'm sure each one of us in the band would have a different opinion.

[ to be continued.... ]