'The World’s Greatest Mumbler' on 11

Universal Music Ireland Ltd.

An interview with Bryan Adams

For thirty years now, Canadian rocker Bryan Adams has been successfully entertaining fans worldwide. With the release of his 11th studio album, aptly entitled 11, the raspy-voiced rocker sat down with TheCelebrityCafe’s Dominick Miserandino and chatted with him about making music, revealing his real identity and switching to a new way of promoting his latest project.

Asked why he seems to be intensely promoting 11 as opposed to his other albums, Adams replied that he didn’t want to provide anybody an excuse as to say “Well, you didn’t do it so that’s why your record didn’t happen.”

Although he used to think that music should do the talking, he deems it necessary now to promote his album the way he promoted a film he did with Jeffrey Katzenberg at Dreamworks, where they had numerous interviews in one day. The rocker says, “… if that’s how they promote films I should do interviews for my album as well.”

When Miserandino mentioned that Summer of ’69 still finds its way to the top despite its being 25-years-old already, Adams said that he had a lot of songs like that one that were big hits in America but not anywhere else. He said that the song didn’t take off in Europe until after ten years of its release, prompting him to think that songs have a life of their own in spite of the promotion.

Subsequent to Miserandino’s remarks that the song is timeless, Adams said that the reason for its agelessness is because the track is about "making love in the summertime." He stated that there’s a minor misconception, with some people thinking that the song is about a year. He asserted that it has a sexual allusion and compared it to Little Red Corvette, a song most people mistakenly assume is about a car.

When asked why he pleaded in one interview not to show his old videos, Adams replied the materials were “badly directed.” According to him, he used to entrust the work to the people who were directing until recently, saying, “Maybe 10 percent of them are watchable and the rest of them are tripe.” Asked what he would have done differently, he said he won’t let people direct his videos anymore, which is why he made the last video all by himself.

While the video is a lot more work, he said that people can see him for what he is instead of a make-believe, concocted concept of what the track should be. He said, “There’s no point in doing anything that doesn’t represent you… I just want to be real, 100 percent. I don’t want to candy coat it whatsoever. Here I am. Take me for what I am. Right now, I’m on a tour in America just doing the whole thing by myself on an acoustic guitar.”

Even as he sees it as a more nerve-wracking experience, Adams declared it’s a way of showcasing his music in a manner that will make people realize how uncomplicated it is.

As to writing songs, he said he just lets the idea accumulate “on a back of a sheet and then sit down and go through the ideas and see if you can come up with a catchy tune.”

Saying that his songs are “just riffing,” Adams said, “I’m the world’s greatest mumbler because a lot of my mumbles have gone on to be great songs.”