WARREN — Peter Noone is best known as a pop star.

As the lead singer of Herman’s Hermits, Noone had nearly 20 top 40 hits in the U.S. in the 1960s, even more in his native England, and sold more than 60 million records.

But he’s always been an entertainer. He appeared on the long-running British soap opera as a child, did movies and every television opportunity that came around during Herman’s Hermits heyday, and he continued to take the occasional acting gig after the Hermits disbanded — a turn on Broadway in “The Pirates of Penzance,” guest-starring roles on everything from “Laverne & Shirley” to “Quantum Leap.”

During a telephone interview, Noone said he and the rest of Herman’s Hermits learned early on they needed more than just a few hit songs to entertain an audience.

“We called it shtick,” he said. “Before they made it, The Beatles had the greatest comedy routine … It all got locked away (when the band became famous) because people just screamed through the breaks between the songs.”

It’s a skill he continues to use as a performer, and it will be on display when Noone comes to Warren’s Robins Theatre on Dec. 9.

“I’m amusing, I say amusing things,” Noone said. “It’s selective-onset Tourette’s syndrome or repartee, as they call it in England. I have a standup act with a fall back to ‘Henry the Eighth.'”

He offered a hint of that sense of humor at the start of the phone interview. When his “Hello” was greeted with “Is this Peter?” he replied, “How many other Englishmen do you have calling you today?”

Unlike the top tier of British Invasion acts — The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Who, The Kinks — the members of Herman’s Hermits weren’t songwriters, but they also were smart enough to realize it.

“We knew we couldn’t write songs,” Noone said. “We tried. We went looking for others’ songs. We pillaged and raped. We got other people’s songs because we could do them better than the original people.”

The band also realized that the songs that click with audiences might not be the ones that earn them praise from their fellow musicians.

“I hate that other musicians decided they could be critics of music,” he said. “Herman’s Hermits chose outside songs successfully — ‘My Girl Lollypop,’ ‘Mother in Law,’ ‘Mrs. Brown, You’ve Got a Lovely Daughter.’ Those outside songs were all successful, but not with other musicians. We didn’t care. Once The Beatles started to worry about what other musicians thought about them, it all changed and went wrong.”

Noone will be playing more than just his hits next week. He’ll also mix in some holiday songs for a show billed as Peter Noone starring in Herman’s Hermits’ Old English Christmas.

Not surprisingly, Noone’s most fond Christmas memories revolve around music, singing traditional carols in the parlor with the family. Noone’s grandmother was choirmistress at church and his grandfather was the church’s organ player. His father played trombone, his uncle played trumpet and his aunt was a pianist.

Herman’s Hermits didn’t really record any Christmas songs, Noone said, so he’ll perform some old traditional favorites, not necessarily in traditional ways.

“The most modern song we do is ‘Jingle Bells’ and we do it as if we’re the Sex Pistols,” he said, then singing a couple lines of the song in an exaggerated Johnny Rotten-like snarl.

In addition to touring Noone is working on a book. He said it will be less of an autobiography and more a series of stories, 60 anecdotes about the ’60s.

But between his tour schedule (he’s played 65 shows since things have started to reopen following the COVID-19 pandemic) and interacting with his fans (called Noonatics) on social media, he admitted the book has been slow going. And judging from a half-hour conversation, Noone’s biggest challenge will be limiting himself to 60 stories.

Noone, 74, isn’t planning on his schedule slowing down any time soon.

“I want to work for another 10 years. Then we’ll see what happens. And that’s 10 years from today. Yesterday it was 10 years from that day. It’s sort of the mantra of the group.”

If you go …

WHAT: Peter Noone starring in Herman’s Hermits’ Olde English Christmas

WHEN: 8 p.m. Dec. 9

WHERE: Robins Theatre, 160 E. Market St., Warren

HOW MUCH: Tickets range from $25 to $75 and are available at the Robins box office and online at

robinstheatre.com.