LONDON: It’s three in the morning and a rampant telephone slices the night silence. The caller is in New York, but the line is crystal clear. Familiar hoarse-hearty tones burst through my earpiece. I say hello to Billy Idol for the first time in four years.

He is interrupting sessions for his third album, Whiplash Smile, to give this solitary interview. I have to admit to the odd tremor as I sat waiting for him to call. Since I’d last seen Idol—just before he left London to start again in the U.S.A.— he’s risen from singer in punk rock group Generation X to megastar-icon of the rock video generation. I’d heard the stories— how fame had supposedly turned him into a crazed megalomaniac dealing out tantrums from his court. Plus, you know what it’s like when you meet someone again after some years without contact.