The True Story Behind The Most Confusingly Named Album Of All Time. Digging back 20 years into one's past can be a pretty strange experience, sometimes memories (and recordings) are better left long lost but after I'd said yes to Mike's idea of making the Various Artists Solo Album available again, who better to tell the story than myself. So here goes... Punk had turned to New Wave while I'd been at university in Sheffield - far from the Kings Rd epicentre but close enough to still be feeling the shock waves (Cabaret Voltaire, Human League...) and a chance encounter with Elvis Costello's 'Alison' in a Virgin Megastore pretty much got me started seriously on songwriting. ...show more

The True Story Behind The Most Confusingly Named Album Of All Time. Digging back 20 years into one's past can be a pretty strange experience, sometimes memories (and recordings) are better left long lost but after I'd said yes to Mike's idea of making the Various Artists Solo Album available again, who better to tell the story than myself. So here goes... Punk had turned to New Wave while I'd been at university in Sheffield - far from the Kings Rd epicentre but close enough to still be feeling the shock waves (Cabaret Voltaire, Human League...) and a chance encounter with Elvis Costello's 'Alison' in a Virgin Megastore pretty much got me started seriously on songwriting.

I'd been a teenage bassist in dodgy cover bands in my native Birmingham but hadn't played a gig for three years when fate and romance directed me to Bristol (if you want the full story listen to 'Time of My Life'). Within a month I'd been introduced to Gerard Langley via another ex-Sheffield student friend Wojtek Dmochowski and all three of us were on-stage at the Ashton Court festival as 'Art Objects'. Our idea was a 3 piece group: one dancer (Woj) one poet (Gerard) and one musician (me). Gerard knew I wanted to start another more song oriented band because I'd written a bunch of songs instead of studying for my finals, but when he told me his brother was "probably the best drummer in Bristol" I took it with a pinch of salt - I mean I could write the book on supremely talented kid brothers.

Once I'd got over the shock of actually meeting John Langley (the Langley brothers, chalk and cheese personified) I realised there was no 'probably' about it - John was a percussive genius, and still the best drummer I've ever shared a rehearsal room with. Purely by chance my first Bristol flat was shared with a ferociously intelligent, cynical, vegetarian bass playing Joey Ramone lookalike - Bill Stair, so we three recorded 4 of my songs at the ubiquitous Steve Street's Studio (now there is an essential person for Bristol's musical heritage) and when local label Heartbeat was looking for tunes for a compilation LP 'Avon Calling' we squeezed in by the skin of our teeth and made our first appearance on disc - 'Own Up'. It didn't set the world alight but it gave us all swollen heads for a month or two, and because we didn't really expect to continue we used the throwaway name 'Various Artists'. Besides I liked the idea of the phrase "Various artists own up..." - I've always had a curious sense of humour. ...show less