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[POWER-POP ROYALTY] Paul Collins could act like an angry, bitter asshole and nobody would hold it against him.
Fate has been particularly dickish to the 57-year-old songwriter. His debut as a frontman, in 1979's the Beat, was obscured by the success of L.A. rival the Knack, who made it big playing a similar but toothless brand of guitar-driven power-pop. The same year, Collins was forced to alter the name of his band (from the Beat to Paul Collins' Beat) to avoid confusion with the emerging English ska group. And to this day, when he performs "Hanging on the Telephone," even his own fans think he's covering Blondie—only record geeks know his first band, the Nerves, did the original.
After smacking that hard against a wall, most musicians would quit. Many of Collins' peers did. But he's still recording and touring. Not only that, he's happy. In fact, speaking via telephone from his home in New York, he sounds more content than just about anyone else playing for crowds of 100 people more than three decades into their career. He called his last album The King of Power Pop! and he probably deserves the title for perseverance alone.
"I'm one of the last guys from my era still doing it," he says. "I'm not on the glory road, I'm not playing stadiums. I'm busting my ass. But I'm gonna go to town to champion this music."
It's ironic Collins even wants to be associated with the power-pop genre, much less be a crusader for it. When journalists first began using the term to describe the revved-up, girl-crazy music coming mostly out of L.A. in the late '70s, "we hated it," he says. "It sounded wimpy, not like the kick-ass rock 'n' roll we thought we were playing." After the Nerves broke up, Collins moved from behind the drum kit to form the Beat. Its self-titled first album, full of vintage Beatles melodies delivered at Ramones tempos, was praised by critics. But then the Knack's "My Sharona" happened, and Collins became an also-ran. He went solo in the '90s, dabbling in alt-country, then relocated to Spain and started producing.
In recent years, however, Collins returned to the states and to his original music. As he's seen numerous young bands define themselves by the sound he helped create, he's come around to the power-pop label. As his adolescent desire to write a hit has faded, he's grown satisfied with his status as a cult figure—a king to a tiny group of admirers, but royalty all the same.
"With
age, you redefine what your concept of success is," he says. "I make
music, I have a beautiful son, I have a great place in New York, and I
don't have to do a stupid job."
SEE IT: The Paul Collins Beat plays Slabtown on Friday, Feb. 4, for the Slabtown Bender. 6 pm. $14 or $30 for three-day wristband. 21+.
WWeek 2015