Lead vocalist Jean-Jacques Burnel talks their fifty-year anniversary, upcoming Australian tour, and why he once stuck a banana up a journalist’s arse
I admit it: I was nervous. Not just the usual pre-interview jitters either, these were real nerves. For a few good reasons too.
The first was my Dad. A lifelong Stranglers fan, he’d taken it upon himself to be my unofficial research assistant.
For a whole week before the interview, I couldn’t escape his relentless barrage of potential questions. “Ask them about how Golden Brown was written!” he’d say, every time I passed by the sofa. “Ask them about the lyrics to ‘No More Heroes’,” he’d call out as I tried to load the dishwasher. Each time, I sighed, jotted his suggestions down, and promised that I wouldn’t screw this up—or risk being kicked out of the house.
The second reason was that, according to what I’d read, The Stranglers weren’t exactly known for their warm, fuzzy relationships with journalists. In fact, I’d come across a story where they’d once poured beer over an unfortunate reporter. In light of that, I opted for the safer, perhaps drier choice: a Zoom call.
“Bonjour, ravi de vous voir, M. Fitzpatrick,” came the voice on the other end of the screen, carrying a distinctly French accent.
My heart skipped. Was this going to be the whole interview in French? My mind scrambled for every scrap of high school French I could remember, my palms grew clammy. I fumbled through a halting response, “Bonjour, je m’appelle Jake,” to which Burnel chuckled.
“Ah, at least you made the effort,” he said, his English accent cutting through the conversation like a much-needed rainstorm after a long dry spell.
I was speaking with Jean-Jacques Burnel—bass guitarist, co-lead vocalist, and the sole remaining original member of The Stranglers. The man who had lived through it all and survived to tell the tale. While the thick mop of black hair was now a light grey, and his facial had visibly softened, there was no mistaking him.
“I’ll be honest,” I said, feeling a little sheepish. “I’ve heard you don’t really like talking to journalists. Is it true you’ve poured beer on a few?”
Burnel’s laugh cracked through the screen, his eyes twinkling with mischief. “Oh, we’ve done far worse than that,” he replied. “There was that time we tied up a journalist and took his trousers off on the first floor of the Eiffel Tower. Thought it was funny at the time. We also stuck a banana up another journalist’s arse after he spat at us.”
I blinked, unsure whether he was being entirely serious, but his tone was one of casual amusement. “And in Australia, we had a bit of trouble with Joh Bjelke-Petersen, the former Queensland Premier. We got chased over the border into New South Wales. It was quite exciting.”
It’s hard to imagine The Stranglers of today stirring up such ruckus, not with the energy of their youth. In fact, the reason I was speaking to Burnel in the first place was to talk about something far more celebratory: the band’s upcoming fiftieth anniversary. The Stranglers are returning to Australia this March, marking half a century since their inception—a milestone that has a certain resonance. Or as Burnel puts it, “We’re fucking ancient!”
Burnel, born in Notting Hill to French immigrant parents, never planned on being a musician. After leaving school at eighteen, he took off for the South of France, working in bars and creperies. But eventually, the road led him back to education, where he studied economics, French, and business before realising they weren’t for him. “The Stranglers were an accident,” he says, almost as an afterthought.
It was while working various jobs—including with a man named Jet Black, whose ice cream truck funded his musical pursuits—that Burnel found his way into the band. The Stranglers weren’t originally destined to be rock stars, and getting a foothold in the music industry wasn’t easy. “A lot of venues were closed to us,” Burnel says. “They used to say, ‘We won’t have people with short hair coming to our bar.’”
But that was exactly what made The Stranglers stand out.
They didn’t fit into any of the neat boxes that many other bands of the time so easily fell into. Their sound was unlike anything else. In fact, it was punk. Before the word ‘punk’ existed.
“We were the first band to be asked to play with Patti Smith,” Burnel recalls. “Chrissie Hynde from The Pretenders would come to our gigs. We were part of something bigger, though we didn’t know it then.”
And though their rebellious spirit marked them as outsiders, Burnel doesn’t think it was just about an aesthetic or a pose. “It was synchronicity,” he says of the birth of punk. “The UK was going through a bad period. The time was right for bands like us to emerge. Music had become pretentious. Punk was a reaction to that—bit provocative, bit dangerous, a bit exciting.”
For Burnel, the Stranglers’ longevity has been about keeping things fresh, exploring a wide array of musical styles from jazz to reggae to rock. “If you like music, you’re not just connected to one style. You try to extend yourself.”
And although he’s no longer living the chaotic, dangerous life of their early years, Burnel’s still very much involved in his own passions. These days, he lives in his parents’ old house in the South of France, where he spends his days motorcycling and making music. He also owns a karate studio in London, where he sometimes teaches.
With fifty years under their belts, The Stranglers are also seeing a new generation discover their music. Burnel smiles at the thought. “It’s fantastic. You’ve got the old fans, then you get young people coming to the shows. They’re either brainwashed by their parents, or they’re curious. Either way, they’re welcome.”
As for me, I hopefully sit somewhere comfortably warm between the two.
The Stranglers are performing in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. Tickets can be purchased here.
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