Did you continue to play guitar and write music? I hibernated musically for many years until my oldest son Jo- nathan, now successful Liver- pool-based


singer songwriter,


began to take up an interest in playing guitar. Jon was also ac- tively listening to many of the same recording artists and his interest served to wake me up. I


resurrected songs from my


early creative period. We pla- yed gigs together and regularly took part in magical nights at a local restaurant pub called the Red Cat. The range of excellent music played there by regulars and visiting musicians created a full house following. A one time pot-washer James Walsh played and I developed a friend- ship with him and members of his band, Starsailor. Johnny & I were drawn into a world of tours and gigs where James Walsh went from strumming guitar in my lounge to doing a showcase for EMI and charting a top ten single and debut top five album. Watching the band appearing on the now defunct BBC Top of the Pops seemed surreal to me at the time.


Did all this inspire you? Yeah, I was fascinated by James Walsh’s meteoric rise and all the euphoria that came with being at after show parties and wat- ching up close his band at gigs, I was playing Neil Young songs then, Old Man, Heart of gold, Southern Man and Don’t let me down and it seemed only musi- cians or fans got those songs at the time. However, my time has come with Neil Young being ele- vated into a ‘rock god’.


You’ve met some famous musicians on the way and have recorded albums over the past ten years. Bring us up to date?


In 2000 I formed a band River and began recording a self-pro- moted album with Runrig musi- cian, Georges Rogalski. Georges had his own local ‘Dugout Stu- dios’ and me and Johnny used his recording and mixing for the debut CD, The Emotional Jukebox (Big Paws Records). Action Records at Preston cur- rently have a rare copy for sale at £200. That CD was followed up with a second album, Keep the Blood running, (after Geor- ge sadly died) which we recor- ded in a studio in Bolton and a


house studio in Manchester in 2001. A common thread was that the double bass player, Dave Atherton, had played with me in Ulysses 30 years earlier. His bass is featured on tracks for both al- bums. The Manchester recording was mad in that the studio was in a terraced house and because of a lack of space, Dave Ather- ton played bass in one room whilst me and Local jazz guita- rist Matt Wells played in another. We were filmed for a Granada television


pet-related series in


2003 I was presenting Matt con- tributed to three tracks including my tribute song to Neil Young, Like and Inca (Forever Young) which has now been remixed by Mikans for our new album THE CROSS BREED. I have met Paul Buchanan, lead singer with the Blue Nile a few times, Graham Nash at his photography book launch when I was filming for Granada in Manchester. Even from Magnet, modern folk sin- ger songwriter Jim Moray. I hope some of their success rubs off on me.


Recording those debut CDs allo- wed me to learn about recording and practice singing and playing


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