Article compiled & edited by Mike Clifford from an interview by Graham Mackie. From MT 17  July 1998

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Playing live, everybody makes the odd mistake and most go unnoticed. It’s the ones the other musicians pick up on that lead to a bit of ribbing. On one gig, the only two musicians playing were Vanessa and me. I glanced over to the guitarist who stuck his tongue out and gave me this rock & roll guitar type ahhhhhhhh! Being distracted I played a bar of the wrong chord on the synthesiser. Vanessa glanced around and smiled, acknowledging my mistake. The next bar was perfect.  

We were paid £125 per day - not a lot compared with some other tours. After the tour, we either had to invoice the Mel Bush Organisation who promote Vanessa or EMI depending upon the gig. Mel Bush paid within a month but EMI took six months to pay up. There must be thousands of pounds floating about in unpaid fees at any one time.

On tour all your hotels, bills and expenses are paid. You can get PD’s, which means you can have cash on the day if you need it. If you are totally stuck the tour manager will give you an advance from the petty cash.

Besides the tour we did  T.V., promotional work and one-off gigs. On one occasion I left Hinckley in the morning to fly to Edinburgh where the band mimed to Vanessa’s latest single on top of the castle for a promotional video. It took about five minutes. I then caught the plane again and was back at home for tea.  

We did a promotional tour, spending two days in Finland and two days in Cologne, Germany then on to Madrid in Spain for three days. We did a lot of T.V. shows and promotions. I realised I had been out on the road for a whole week and I had not played an instrument ONCE! All I had done was mime to music - in fact mime to someone else playing.

I also mimed with the band and Vanessa on the live BBC, Saturday night, lottery show in October 1996. The show has two dress rehearsals during the day with two lottery draws to check that the machines are working. I won £10 during the dress rehearsal but it’s only the 8.00 pm draw that counts.