Over a 40-year career, Joe Cocker's audience has moved from the wild fields of Woodstock to genteel New Zealand vineyards, writes Grant Smithies.
I first stumbled across Joe Cocker in Woodstock, the movie about the huge 1969 festival in upstate New York. There he was, his face as red as a smacked arse, his short meaty arms flailing around like he was trying to swat mosquitoes, belting out a cracked and desperate version of The Beatles' "A Little Help From My Friends". Behind him, huge storm clouds gathered. In front of him, half a million acid-gobbling hippies cavorted in the dust, many of them naked. Overwhelmed by strong emotion and even stronger chemicals, couples shagged like rabbits in front of the speaker stacks.
JOE COCKER: A former gas-fitter from Sheffield, is blessed with a voice that's equal parts foghorn, Ray Charles and Rod Stewart.
Thirty-eight years later, Cocker's audience has changed dramatically. He's coming to New Zealand next month for a winery tour, and this time the decorous middle classes will be scattered among the vines on picnic rugs. Pinot gris and sauvignon blanc will be the drugs of choice. There's unlikely to be any public nudity or al fresco shagging. Instead we'll be treated to the rather more mundane sight of an unusually tipsy Pippa calling the babysitter on her cellphone to make sure Josh and Isabella are asleep while her husband Jeremy snakes his hand into the hamper for another rocket, prosciutto and acid-free tomato sandwich.
"It's amazing how the scene changes, isn't it?" says Cocker from a hotel room in Germany, his voice a lovely husky rasp. "It's totally bizarre how my audience has changed, but it just evolved that way. Thirty years ago I'd never have imagined I'd be playing in wineries, but it works very well, especially outdoors in the summer. People tend to get a little blazed on all the wine while they're watching you, but that's entirely forgiveable. I stopped doing it myself, of course, but I got no problem with others doin' it. If they like to drink, they can drink, and if they like their rock'n'roll, then we'll give it to 'em."
Now 63, Cocker gave up drinking six years ago, but in the late '60s, he was a brawling, booze-sodden, drug-hoovering rock'n'roll renegade. Much of the late '60s and early '70s went past in a drunken blur, but looking back, this was his musical heyday.
His first two 1969 albums, With A Little Help From My Friends and Joe Cocker!, still sound as exciting today as when they were made, and 1970 double live album Mad Dogs and Englishmen shows what a powerful proposition he was on stage in those days.
Led by Oklahoma keyboard king Leon Russell, Cocker's band really cooks behind him, serving up a tasty stew of rock, gospel, soul, swamp blues and New Orleans funk; and out there in front, growling and flailing and wailing his heart out, stands Cocker, a former gas-fitter from Sheffield, blessed with a voice that's equal parts foghorn, Ray Charles and Rod Stewart.
You can say what you like about more recent music travesties such as "You Can Leave Your Hat On" or "Up Where We Belong", but Cocker really earned his stripes in those days. He preferred singing covers to writing his own songs, often reworking the arrangements to give the songs greater emotional kick. His cover versions frequently outclassed the originals, as with his superb big-band soul versions of Russell's "Delta Lady", The Boxtops' "The Letter", Traffic's "Feelin' Alright" and The Lovin' Spoonful's "Summer In The City".
"Yes, people still love those early songs, so I still sing them, but I've been lucky enough to have hits now across four decades, so I have plenty to choose from. I'm a crowd-pleaser, you might say. I always do the hits. People say to me Joe, why don't you throw some new ones in? and I do a few, but generally, people want to hear `You Can Leave Your Hat On' and `When The Night Comes' and so on.
"And my voice is still in good nick, fortunately. Over the years I've lost a bit of high range but gained a bit of timbre, you know. One thing that's been a real godsend is that smoking has been banned in a lot of places. Smoke really does your voice in, as you can imagine."
You have to imagine rather a lot when having a conversation with Cocker, because he's not much of a talker. I've spoken to him several times before, and it's always the same: he sounds uncomfortable, even slightly bewildered, and his answers are generally shorter than my questions. His considered response to any statement he half-way agrees with is "Right, man, yeah". You get the impression that he does interviews because he has to, but would dearly love to be doing something else.
"Right, man, yeah. I would, actually. I do a lot of interviews, because when I'm touring I do an awful lot of shows, and people want to talk to you in every place. Like on this tour in Europe, we've done over 100 shows this summer so far. We crack a good pace by anyone's standard, whether they're 63 like me or 23. And it all gets a bit tiring, you know, not just doing the shows but talking about them as well."
So I ask what he'd rather be doing, and Cocker suddenly perks up. He talks of home, and it's clear that the poor bugger is intensely homesick. He lives on a ranch near Aspen in Colorado with his wife, Pam, who married him in 1980 and who he credits with rescuing him from the tailspin of drugs, drink and depression he was in at the time.
"Me and Pam have lived in Colorado for 16 years now, and I really miss the place when I'm away from it. It's very remote where we are. We seldom get any visitors. In the last few years, me and Pam have taken up fly fishing. In the summer we go out on some of the rivers in the Black Canyon, close to where we live and it just..."
His husky voice trails off. I fear he's going to cry. "It just, well, it moves me, you know. It's spectacular out there. There's bears and mountain lions around the ranch, because we're up at around 7000ft. I love the rugged nature of the place. It's a long way from Sheffield, I can tell you."
Anyone who's ever visited this somewhat grim South Yorkshire city will know what an understatement this is. Surrounded by coal mines and the centre of Britain's steel industry, Sheffield is no oil painting. Indeed, George Orwell wrote in 1937 that "Sheffield, I suppose, could justly claim to be called the ugliest town in the old world."
Cocker is one of the unlovely city's favourite sons. "Yes, but there can't be that many other famous people from Sheffield, can there? Who else is there? Let's see. Besides me and that band ABC, there's the Human League. And that rock band with the one-armed drummer. You know, Def Leppard."
Actually, Sheffield also gave us post-punk innovators Cabaret Voltaire, stirling techno label Warp Records, people's poet Jarvis Cocker and his band Pulp, and more recently, Arctic Monkeys. Not that any of these names mean much to Cocker. His record collection is full of fairly "mainstream and traditional" artists, he admits, with a leaning towards early blues, R'n'B and soul singers, in particular Ray Charles.
Cocker is something of a traditionalist in other areas, too. For instance, he is a big fan of the Queen. The feeling is apparently mutual. One day Cocker was at home in Colorado, surrounded by his beloved bears and mountain lions and wide open space, and he heard that dear old Liz had awarded him an OBE for "services to music" in this year's Birthday Honours List. "I'm taking the wife up to Buckingham Palace on December 16, and we're both very chuffed," he says.
"I haven't lived in England for a long time, so I was floored to be getting this award. I've never met the Queen before, either, even after all these years. I almost did once, but Tom Jones elbowed me out of the way.
"She was going around, you know, shaking hands at this event, and I was waiting patiently in line, but then Tom jumped in front of me and pushed me to the back. I couldn't believe it!
"But never mind. Good things come to those who wait, and I'll definitely shake her hand this time."
Joe Cocker A Day On The Green tour dates: Saturday Jan 26, Mudhouse Winery, Waipara; Sunday Jan 27, Alana Estate, Martinborough; Monday Jan 28, Villa Maria Estate Winery, Mangere. Tickets from Ticketmaster,