Mike Peters, the effervescent frontman with The Alarm, is a difficult man to keep down. Even when he’s battling cancer, as he currently is for the fourth time.
He’s touring the UK again this month, doing solo acoustic shows which start in Liverpool on 24 May, and releases a new album, Forwards, on June 2.
How is the treatment going at the moment?
The treatment is going fantastically well and the doctors are really pleased with how the new drugs are working. I have hospital treatment every two weeks to back it up. I’m currently having chemotherapy and two types of IV treatment, including an immunoglobulin therapy to treat the blood cancer. I’m very fortunate to have these treatments that gives us hope and a lifeline.
Later this month you’ll embark on The Alarm Acoustic UK Tour. Are you looking forward to getting started?
I can’t wait. It’s a chance for me to go right through the songbook. I’ve just done an Alarm Staycation Weekend, where I plugged in to everyone’s favourite songs and requests, so I’ll carry some of that into this tour. I’m gauging the songs that I’ll be playing from all the requests I received since the pandemic started, when people asked for songs on The Big Night In series I did on You Tube. I’ll be experimenting with getting lots of songs in over a short space of time in a medley. I’ll be on stage for a couple of hours and the fans can hear 50 songs and hopefully some will be surprised to hear songs they never expected to hear alongside all the favourites too. I hope it’ll be a good balance.
You have so many songs to choose from. Will you be varying your set from night to night?
It’ll be a different show every night and I think that’s very important with the internet, where people share everything, so there’ll be a different start song every night and different songs throughout the set so everyone gets surprised.
Is this a solo tour of your interpretation of Alarm songs or will the band be joining you too?
At the moment it’s a solo tour, as I’m still coming to terms with my treatment and how it’s affecting me. Last year I was at death’s door and I didn’t want to over commit, just in case I have issues to deal with, as it’s still a very unpredictable situation, as the drugs I’m on are so new it’s hard to predict with any certainty if they decide to turn on me and kick back. I just thought that if I had an Alarm tour booked with the band and had to cancel some dates, it wouldn’t be a great situation. I wanted to avoid that until I was certain I could do back-to-back shows. I also have to get back home for treatment during the tour, so I have to factor that in too. I wanted to make sure that would work, and then I could start to look at dates further afield and factor the band in again. We’ll start with some one-off dates and then build up for some touring. It is difficult at the moment, as my treatment schedule is every two weeks, so it’s hard to get a run without stopping and having to go to hospital, and you never know what will happen on those hospital days. The doctors think I’m crazy going off and playing shows, as they think I should be at home, resting. I don’t want the cancer to take anything away from my life. I don’t want it to win. It’s important that I maintain who I am and what I do the best I can.
Will you have to have any special provisions in the venues to protect you from possible infections?
No, my blood count is absolutely fine at the moment, and this new treatment has got it right under control. The immunoglobulin therapy I have every month gives me the immune system of 1,500 other individuals to boost my own immune system. I have a big defence mechanism on my behalf, but the big fear is the treatment failing and having to go back into hospital and cancel shows. That is something I’m trying to avoid. I’m just trying to make the best of my life right now. I’m very tactile as a human being and like shaking hands and being friendly, as that’s how I’ve been brought up, so it is difficult for me to just do a fist bump or something instead.
For many bands the transition from electric to acoustic can be quite tricky, but The Alarm`s music seems perfect for a tour like this. Do you tend to write the original songs acoustically before you electrify them?
Yes. My benchmark for an Alarm song is that it has to be able to be performed on an acoustic guitar, and if it can work like that then it can work in a band environment or any other environment. It has to stand up on its own as an acoustic song and a melody.
You’ll be in Newcastle at The Cluny on 30th May. What do you enjoy about your shows up here?
Whenever we come to the North East, the fans sing every word. They are really loyal and passionate about The Alarm. I love playing up there. We always get such a good reception when we visit and they make the night something special.
Last year you celebrated your 40th anniversary. That`s an incredible milestone to achieve. Does it feel like 40 years since you first started The Alarm?
It doesn’t feel like 40 years, as it still feels so fresh. It only seems like yesterday that we did the 30th anniversary and then the 40th came along so quickly. Forty years is such a milestone. We’ve survived a lot of change, lived through different eras and changing dynamics within the music industry, and we’re still around to tell the story. To be able to still write about things happening within our community and in the wider society is great and I’m really proud that we are still part of contemporary music.
Did you ever dare dream that you’d be here four decades later, still playing some of these songs that you wrote all those years ago?
I always hoped I would be and I wanted a career that I’d enjoy. I always said that I’d go on for as long as I enjoyed it, and I am still enjoying it – more than ever. I have the autonomy to make a record when I want and we have been lucky to have been supported by our fans that allows us to be creative and they’ve always bought our records and come to the gigs to allow us to continue, and that audience wants to hear new music and not just 68 Guns and the hits.
A while back you did a box set compilation where as part of the package you would record an individual acoustic version of any of your songs that the fan requested. Would you do something like that again?
We did The Alarm’s ’80s catalogue on CD in a box set called The Alarm 2000 Collection. You choose an acoustic version of an Alarm song and I’d record it with a dedication, and that was really ground-breaking at the time. We have carried through to now where fans can go onto our website and buy a personalised handwritten lyric to any song and they can have an acoustic song recorded to CD with a dedication too if they want. I love doing it, as it makes me touch base with my catalogue and look at songs I wouldn’t normally pull out, as I have over 400 songs now that have been released and they’re all popular to somebody.
You have a new album out called Forwards on 2nd June. How do you feel ahead of its release?
I’m really looking forward to the album coming out and we’ll be at The Cluny just a couple of days before the album is released. It’s exciting times. I wasn’t sure I’d get back to a day like this when I was back in hospital in October, when it was touch and go. It’s good to be alive and good to have new music to celebrate with.
Does the album reflect what you were going through at the time?
It does. I knew I’d be in hospital for a long time and I was having a lot of intensive treatment, with breaks in-between. I asked my wife to bring my guitar in for me just to keep my fingers going. I was only playing it quietly for a few minutes a day, but people asked me to play more and said it was nice to have some live music. All the noises in the hospital became like a rhythm track, and before I knew it new songs kept coming up. Writing these new songs gave me a new sense of optimism. The album was my way of finding my own survival guide. I wrote a letter to my fans explaining where I was and how I was doing, and as I was ending the letter I used the word “forwards” and from that I wrote a song and it became the album title.
How do you approach the song writing process?
I never sit down to write a song, they just come from anywhere in my imagination, and my guitar is like a midwife that gets those ideas out into the world. You make the song up in your mind and then transcribe it with a pen and a guitar.
What have you got lined up for your Love Hope Strength Foundation?
We have the annual hike up Snowdon, where we’ll have a little acoustic festival in the mountains. We then go hiking in the Alps in September to support facilities we’ve built in Africa and support a cancer centre in Kathmandu, Nepal. We’ll be doing the bone marrow donor drives and I’ll be going to the cancer leaders summit in California in October. We’re constantly working on it. Even when I was in hospital, my wife Jules went to the Sahara Desert and raised £100,000 to help those with cancer in Africa. That is the theme of the charity. Wherever we raise the money, that’s where it stays. We try to help nurses on the front line to make people’s days in the cancer centres a little bit easier. We hope that by doing this we`ll help them get better outcomes.
- Mike Peters’ solo acoustic Alarm shows begin at Liverpool’s Epstein theatre on 24 May. Ticket details for that show and the rest of the tour is HERE. For more on the Love Hope Strength Foundation visit www.lovehopestrength.co.uk. The Alarm’s latest album, Forwards, is out on Twenty First Century Recording on 2nd June.
