Todd Almighty

As he turns 60 and prepares a new album and UK tour, Todd Rundgren surveys his brilliant 40-year career as a producer, solo artist and member of Nazz and Utopia. Interview by Paul Lester.

Starting in 1968 with his first album with Nazz, four Philly musicians with an Anglophile bent whose label saw them as an American Fab Four, Todd Rundgren, Beatle-killer Mark Chapman’s all-time hero, has been making music for 40 years (42 if you count his proto-punk band Woody’s Truck Stop) and produced everyone from Meat Loaf to Patti Smith, The Band to Cheap Trick. Over the last four decades, the original DIY synth-kid has mastered pretty ballads and electronic freak-outs, pithy pop songs and side-long prog suites, organic jams and peace anthems at the height of glam. He’s also big on concepts: high on hallucinogens, he made rock’s first stream-of-consciousness LP in 1973 with A Wizard, A True Star, formed a band, Utopia, with the express intention of communicating his new-found acid visions, and recorded an album, Healing, dealing with the fall-out from his psychedelic drug adventures. And so it makes sense that, on the occasion of his 60th birthday, we should do a concept interview with the artist variously known as Runt and TR-I (Todd Rundgren Interactive), in which he talks for 60 seconds about the 40 best, or at least most significant, moments of his 40-year career, from Open My Eyes to Arena, his forthcoming bid to recapture his arena-rock glory days. (All entries are Todd Rundgren …

by Paul Lester
<< Back to Issue 353

You must be a subscriber to view the full article, subscribe now for full access to all online content.

Already a Magazine Subscriber? Register now for online access.

Login Here

Free Newsletter


Subscribe to
our email newsletter by emailing:

anna.bowen@
metropolis.co.uk