The Sun from Biloxi, Mississippi • 40

Rick Wills of Foreigner is happy to be a juke box hero By ERIC MINTON MARQUEE MUSIC WRITER he term "commercial success" has such bad connotations in rock roll circles that once a group is tagged with it they are dropped from what is generally considered the artistic elite of pop music That of course overlooks the fact that groups playing music have a larger audience that they have the power to test their artistic wings and that the Beatles are the epitome of commercial success Pop music is afterall popular music So when the rock group Foreigner entered the studio early this year to record their fourth album after their first three critically acclaimed albums went platinum they wanted to experiment a little with a new lineup yet maintain their impressive track record Specifically "We really wanted to break new ground with this album" said bass player Rick Wills in an interview from New York last week "Plus we wanted to get the energy back that we felt we had slightly lacked in Head Games (their third album) "We tried different things different ways of playing things which was really fun to do but weren't really Foreigner So what we had to do at the end was come back to what we felt was us breaking new ground and making new sounds and still keeping the Foreigner sound and the way we do things think we The album certainly did 4 is the most successful album in the group's career About a month after its release it reached No 1 on the Billboard album chart a first for the band 4 is already nearing the double platinum standard of two million unit sales and their North American tour which comes to the Mississippi Coast Coliseum on Tuesday should bolster sales even more s- eat i Foreigner: (clockwise from bottom left) Rick Wills Lou Gramm Mick Jones Dennis Elliott Wills called his tenure with Foreigner "a real process of learning" and financially comfortable since it is the most popular band he has played with But he also went through the traumatic period that surfaced shortly after Wills joined and as the group was recording Head Games Essentially a conflict arose when Gramm and Jones of two founding members felt there were two major obstacles to the band's development: Greenwood and the other founding member Greenwood and McDonald were also dissatisfied with the band's direction After recording Head Games and playing through a strained tour Foreigner fired Greenwood and McDonald "There were a lot of friendships involved" said Wills "It wasn't a cutthroat sort of thing it was a difficult decision I hope finished with that altogether" Instead of hiring replacements Foreigner became a foursome and that lineup benefited work on 4 according to Wills since the songwriting team of Jones and Gramm didn't have to fit six musicians into each song It also gave the band more freedom when recording "We did it with just the four then we brought in other people as and when we needed them which we been able to do before" Wills said Taking their act on tour however required more than a foursome So they hired three backing musicians See COVER STORY Page 19 The success of 4 is all the more staggering when measured against the earlier albums Foreigner Double Vision and Head Games all of which resurfaced on the Billboard charts after 4 was released The album also succeeded in breaking new ground It has the melodic ballad "Waiting for a Girl Like You" the introspective story "Juke Box Hero" and the hit single "Urgent" which with its Jr Walker saxaphone solo is obviously a Foreigner song but differs from anything else they have ever done "Urgent" by itself broke into areas where Foreigner had never been before making the disco charts as a single "We thought that was quite amusing actually" Wills said it Foreigner needed a successful new album after a year of internal strife and turmoil Ironically the period as the band's only newcomer Wills describedit may have led to that album's success Formed in 1977 with a nucleus of established studio musicians Foreigner originally consisted of six members drummer Dennis Elliott singer Lou Gramm guitarists Mick Jones and Ian McDonald keyboardist A1 Greenwood and bassist Ed Gagliardl Two albums later the group underwent its first change in personnel when Gagliardl left Enter Rick Wills the main character of what he calls a "fairy story" A native of Cambridge England Wills had several years of experience on the English club circuit in the band Small Faces years of pure craziness I can assure you it took me about six months to get over Roxy Music and touring with Peter Frampton Wills was visiting New York in March 1979 when he heard through the grapevine that Foreigner was auditioning for a new bass player At the time he hadn't been doing much and was feeling "very sort of down about my Wills knew fellow Briton Mick Jones but know much about Foreigner He called up anyway and was Invited to the studio "I know what to do because I didn't know their stuff very well" he said "I had obviously heard of Foreigner with the Double Vision success but I didn't know the songs very well didn't know how to play them "But being the old ham I am I managed to get away with it" he said with a laugh That audition went well for Wills cooking with drummer Elliott and playing the heavy guitar-based driving rock 'n' roll of Foreigner But the group had lined up about 60 bass players for auditions and it wasn't until three weeks later that Wills was given the job just can't imagine what it meant to me" he said "I was just here at the right time I guess I'm one of these lucky guys and that was one of those breaks that you get Boy I needed it" 18- MARQUEE The SunThe Daily Herald Saturday September 19 Friday 'September 25 1981.