Suzi quatro autobiography

Unzipped is the legendary 70s rocker's utterly candid account of the highs and lows of a life lived hell for leather.

Little Susie from Detroit grew up to be legendary rocker Suzi Quatro, international superstar musician and actress, icon of the Seventies. The transformation was fuelled by huge talent, determination, hard work and a fabulous sense of humour, but it wasn t easy.

In UNZIPPED, Suzi tells her story of life behind the scenes and in the thick of it , working, partying and rocking with other legendary figures such as Noddy Holder, Alice Cooper and Iggy Pop. Little Susie learned a love of music at home with her fascinating, fractious family, then she forged her sound by touring dives all over the States. She came to London just as Glam Rock was kicking off and became a star, a passionate woman in a man s world.

Then there was fame as a Hollywood actress in Happy Days, a turbulent personal life and the need to juggle her family with her career, touring all over the world. There were lows as well as highs, but she never lost her total joy in music or her sense of adventure.

Suzi Quatro has met anyone who was anyone in music over the last thirty years. She remembers it all and this brilliantly personal, funny book is her thrilling account of a life lived going hell for leather.

From the ages of 10 to 14 I was obsessed with Suzi Quatro, I bought her early LPs and even skipped church once so I could watch her as Leather Tuscadero on Happy Days.

This was a phase I grew out of and I have hardly listened to Suzi Quatro’s music since the early eighties. Reading the autobiography was tinged with nostalgia, I remember the words for the early hits like Can the Can and 48 Crash but had no idea what they were about. Suzi Q has had an interesting life, she started touring America with an all girl band, the Pleasure Seekers and then Cradle before being discovered by Mickie Most and brought to England. After a few lonely months, she hit the music world, when her debut hit single Can the Can reached no.1 in the UK charts. The memoir is strange in that it has little Susie Q interrupting the mature Suzi Q writing the autobiography, (How can I forget anything with you sitting on my shoulder, little Susie?) maybe this is because she is a Gemini, she is really into astrology and believes in ghosts. Her career continues to this day, though she no longer has the hit singles, by the eighties she wrote: I was becoming a household name but in reality my career was down the toilet. She still regularly tours and managed to sell more records in Australia than the Beatles!

Suzi, you are so quotable and so interesting.

She has quite an ego.

Near the beginning of the book she mentions her Napoleon complex, she may stand at a mere 5 foot 2 but she is domineering and may see her impact on the rock world as being bigger than it was. She was a trailblazer for women in rock and directly influenced Joan Jett and Chrissie Hynde but the burgeoning punk movement of the late seventies also allowed many women singers to flourish in what had been such a male dominated industry.

On my YouTube channel I look at Suzi Quatro’s autobiography and compare it with Bryan Cranston’s biography “A Life in Parts.”

My rat

American rock musician (born 1950)

For her 1973 eponymous album, see Suzi Quatro (album).

Musical artist

Susan Kay Quatro (born June 3, 1950) is an American singer, bass guitarist, songwriter, and actress. In the 1970s, she scored a string of singles that found success in Europe and Australia, with both "Can the Can" (1973) and "Devil Gate Drive" (1974) reaching number one in several countries.

Quatro released her self-titled debut album in 1973. Since then, she has released 15 studio albums, 10 compilation albums, and one live album. Other songs, including "48 Crash", "Daytona Demon", "The Wild One", and "Your Mama Won't Like Me", also charted highly overseas. Following a recurring role as bass player Leather Tuscadero on the popular American sitcom Happy Days, her duet "Stumblin' In" with Smokie's lead singer Chris Norman reached number four in the US, her only song to chart in the top 40 in her homeland.

Between 1973 and 1980, Quatro was awarded six Bravo Ottos, an award given to musicians as voted in the German teen magazine Bravo. In 2010, she was voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends online Hall of Fame. She is reported to have sold over 50 million records worldwide, and continues to perform live. Quatro's most recent studio album, Face to Face, was released in 2023 and follows the 2021 collaboration The Devil in Me with her son Richard Tuckey, who had already taken part in No Control in 2019. Quatro also remains active in radio broadcasting.

Early life

Quatro was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, United States. Her father, Art, was a semiprofessional musician and worked at General Motors. Her paternal grandfather was an Italian immigrant to the U.S. and her mother, Helen, was Hungarian and she died in 1992. Her family name of "Quattrocchi" ("four eyes", meaning "bespectacled") was shortened to Quatro.