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‘We never stole from kids, just insured places’: Armand Schaubroeck, the ex-con muse of Andy Warhol

A gangster at 14 and in maximum security prison by 17, he turned his experiences into warped rock that thrilled New York’s art scene. Fifty years on he recalls one of music’s strangest careers

Alt-pop follow-up I Came to Visit; But Decided to Stay (1975) was a narrative about a priest killing a suicidal nun to save her soul before determining to live on her grave so they could be together (“probably my Catholic background or something”), whose lead single was a cover of Auld Lang Syne; his final album, 1978’s Ratfucker, was a brilliantly disturbed junk rock record about the depravity of man. He turned it into a Rochester institution – once he overcame public suspicions: “It spread everything was ‘hot’, because I was an ex-convict, but it wasn’t true.” Known for zany TV commercials that featured the likes of Ramones, his enduring shop House of Guitars has hosted rock royalty (Ozzy Osborne, Brian May, Lemmy, Metallica) and boasts impressive memorabilia on its walls (John Lennon’s military jacket; a pair of Elvis Presley’s pants that once belonged to Paul McCartney). Unlike his previous work, it isn’t conceptual – “they stand alone as individual songs” – except for I Got So High and No Junkies in Shangri La, two connected tracks recorded with Ginger Baker (“a good guy, I liked him”) when the late Cream drummer visited House of Guitars to host drum clinics.

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