You Need a Doctor

We Interviewed Dr Hook!

Dennis Locorriere with Dr. Hook received more than sixty platinum and gold albums and had number one chart success in over forty-two countries. His songs have been recorded by Willie Nelson, Bob Dylan, Helen Reddy, Crystal Gale and Jerry Lee Lewis to name a few. Today, Dennis still tours, writes books and is still a popular recording artist. We interview Dennis and gets to grips with the real Dr. Hook.

Hi Dennis, my first question is, what would you most like to be remembered for? Is it the music or the meaning? Or the gold suit?

I’m gonna do the best I can to accurately represent who I am and let it go where it’s gonna go. The people who really know me will remember me for who I really was. The rest will read something written by someone who read it somewhere else.

We know most politicians were born in the fiery pit of hell as the spawn of Satan, but what’s your opinion of the politics of the world today?

I hear what they say and wonder what they really mean. The more they tell us, the more I assume we don’t know.

Can you tell us all about your past, present and future? And especially your solo work!

I was a long-haired kid who loved The Beatles and just wanted to sing.
I would have handed my young life over to the devil for that opportunity and in many respects, I did (think I’m kidding?).
I’m grateful that Hook had the success it did but I don’t choose to relive the same brief period of my life over and over again. There’s something very sad and desperate about doing that. My present is whatever’s burning now (which also happens to be the title of my new book of poetry and cartoons).
My future? Talk to me tomorrow.

Tell us a little about your kind of music please!

These days I write everything I record and much of what I perform in concert. I’m at an age where expressing what I think is more important to me than trying to calculate what will bring commercial success. I can tell you exactly what inspired every song on my latest album, Post Cool, and what it means to me. It’s autobiographical but not to the exclusion of the listener. If a song or story makes someone else say ‘Yeah! Me too!’ then it’s done it’s job.

Which decade was best for music, 60’s, 70’s, 80’s or 90’s or the 00’s?

The 60s, hands down. The rest would not have happened the way it did without them.

How have you coped with being a sex symbol? I can offer advice if you need it.

That’s a question that obviously must have wound up in my pile by mistake. Honestly, there were a few years there, when I was singing all the love songs, that some of that sort of attention came my way. Celebrity of any kind was never really what I was striving for. I’m always taken by surprise when someone just starts talking to me as if they’ve known me all their lives.
I wouldn’t dream of stealing any of your ‘secrets’.

Have you ever heard of a band called Dr Hook and how is Sylvia’s mother these days?

Yes, and much of what I’ve heard is fiction. The poor dear is very old and has to rest for long, long periods of time .

If you were an alien visiting planet earth, what would you do? Would you turn around and go back? Or stay and try and help? Or maybe conquer?

I’d probably take a look around and stretch my legs (or whatever I got around on) after all those light years spent just sitting in the saucer. How long I stayed would depend on what I found. I’m not the conquering type.

What has been your greatest achievement so far?

Maintaining my sense of humour.

What has been mankind’s greatest achievement?

Continually extending the life expectancy so we can all die of new things.

If you had the chance to speak to every human being on earth, what would your message be?

We didn’t book passage on this trip. We all woke up onboard.

Do the best you can .

If your life depended on it, which Soap Opera would you do a cameo in?

I don’t really know much about them but a wordless walk-on in one of those Mexican soaps might be fun.

If a tree falls in a forest, and nobody is around to see or hear it, does it make a sound?

That’s where even a cheap tape recorder would come in handy.

Have you ever felt pressured by the fact that what you sing about affects society? Have you ever wondered whether you were doing the right thing?

I don’t have that much sway over society and would never want to have.I ponder whether I’m doing the right thing for part of each and every day.

What advice would you give to musicians today? And what’s your opinion of the highly engineered and marketed music we see in the charts today?

I can’t imagine what it would be like to just be starting out today. I doubt it would appeal to me at all.The charts are not relevant to what I do these days. I just do what I do and let water seek it’s own level.

Why do you think music and words seems to work so much better than just words as a means to get a message across?

These days I’m not sure that’s true. Too many exotic dancers and not enough philosophers.
I write more poetry than I do songs lately.

What kind of movies do you watch and why?

I find myself drawn to documentaries more than any other genre. I also like character and dialogue driven films. I’m fascinated by the way people speak to each other. Realistic verbal exchanges are the hardest to write and act.

What are your opinions about the power of the internet?

It’s called the ‘information highway’ and there are bodies strewn all along the way. Social networking will eventually bring about the end of civilization. It proves we’ve never had more ways to communicate and less to say.

Do you think man is created in the image of God (or Goddess) or the other way around?

I’m convinced that God was created because we’re so afraid to be responsible for ourselves.

A recent scientific report stated that religion will eventually die out completely. What’s your opinion on that? A good thing or a bad thing?

I’m antitheist. I believe religion is the most dangerous and destructive of all of mankind’s contrivances. I’ve heard it said that the best argument against religion is all the other religions.

Is “free will” the whole of the law? Can man ever be truly free?

Not as long as we live in such a competitive, commercial world. There are people who live in the remotest parts of Australia who don’t even know there is a Sydney. That’s probably about as close to ‘freedom’ as is possible.

Do you back Nuclear Power? If not, why not.

I own a microwave, if that’s what you mean.
That reminds me, I must clean it. It’s disgusting!

Do you believe in Ghosts? UFO’s (i.e. aliens visiting planet earth)? God?

As cool as I think it would be to discover there is something besides us, I don’t believe there is.

Have you ever experienced altered states of consciousness? How, why and was it beneficial? And would you recommend it to all politicians, business and religious leaders?

Everything doesn’t work for everybody.

What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done?

I constantly struggle to make sense of the randomness of life.

What would you still like to achieve?

I’d like to leave just enough blank space to be able to fill in as and when I see fit.

Would you ever record a duet with Justin Bieber?

I can’t imagine what the point of that exercise would be, but it would be interesting to just have a chat with the boy and see what makes him run.

Do you believe in manmade global warming? Or is it natural?

The planet is going to do a certain amount of evolving on it’s own, but I think we can all agree that humans are the only species that threaten the environment and that we are making things harder in the long run by attempting to make them easier in the short term. As the late, great Bill Hicks said ‘We’re just a virus with shoes!’