This is influences

We consider ourselves to be singer /songwriters and as such we like to think carefully about both the musical structure of our work and also the lyrics. We have therefore, included in this page both musical and literary influences.

I took an interest in music at a very early age absorbing the revolutionary music of rock and roll in particular the work of Eddie Cochrane and Buddy Holly. By the time I was 15 I was already a drummer in a band but soon graduated to the guitar. A year later I was regularly going to folk clubs drinking in the styles of our local guitar wizards Mick Darwin and Aidan Murray. I became influenced by the R&B music from the Chess studios and was soon going to concerts to see people like Chuck Berry play. In 6th form I read a book called "The Country Blues" by Samuel Charters a book which was to point the way into the real blues. My biggest musical influence however has been my good friend and brilliant guitarist Ray Stephenson whom I have known since I was eleven, together we travelled our musical journey each influencing and encouraging the other to delve deeper into the murky depths of primitive sounds and recreating styles long since obsolete. Since Blues has been a major influence on our music I have decided to devote a whole page to it but for now let us consider other influences.

The arrival of Dylan on the music scene transformed the way people viewed lyrics in contemporary music and he , along with other word-smiths like Joni Mitchelle , Billy Joel, Jewel ,Ray Davis, etc have all influenced the lyrical content of our work.

It is not just musicians that have coloured my thoughts but books too have played an influential role .I have particularly liked To Kill A Mocking Bird, Gormenghast, Cider with Rosie, and the poetry of Tennyson. I know Tennyson is very much out of fashion these days but I just love his gothic imagery (lovely Victorian leather bound copies of Tennyson's poems are really cheap in secondhand bookshops)

On reflection, I guess music has always been part of my life, but I didn't really notice it there. My dad played the guitar and loved early rock & roll. I remember that he paid a large amount of money for one of the first stereo systems which were available in 1955. It was enormous with a cabinet and 4 huge speakers and you were supposed to put one in each corner of the room to get the best effect. However, he was not good at electronics and I cannot remember a time when all four worked simultaneously. My mother was a music teacher and played the piano very well.

My parents were both from Tyneside , but my father joined the Navy at an early age and I was born in India. When I was 3 years old we moved to Nigeria where we lived until I was 10. There were not many Europeans living in West Africa at that time and it seemed to me that the social life was far more important than work. There was a constant round of parties, fuelled by large amounts of alcohol, where my Dad's stereo, American record collection and guitar skills were in constant demand. Dad had most of the albums by Bobby Darin, Peggy Lee, Jerry Lee Lewis and Hank Williams, and although I didn't know who the singers were, I can still remember the words to many of the songs. My party pieces were Mack the Knife and Tom Dooley while Dad accompanied me on guitar - rather bizarre choices by a 5-year old.

During these years my parents were obviously very busy having a good time, so I had an African nurse or 'mammy'. It was she who put me to bed and sang me to sleep with her strange Yoruba songs. Perhaps it was from her that I first became accustomed to hearing African melodies, whose pentatonic scales also figure so strongly in the American blues.

However, all good things must come to an end, and by 1960 we had however hauled the stereo system back with us to England and I was still allowed to play records on it, so I spent some of my pocket money on 45s by Cliff Richard, Billy Fury and Eden Kane.

The Beatles followed, but I wasn't over impressed by them at the time, although I did buy their 'Twist and Shout' EP (I wish I knew where that was now). But by the time I went to grammar school, Dylan had burst on to the music scene. Poetry suddenly became more fashionable, and I began to see a few advantages in being good at English. I read and wrote lots of poetry, then I nagged Dad into buying me a new guitar. Armed with a Dylan songbook of words and chords, I taught myself to play and sing a few of his songs.

. There was a blues club in the nearest town, some 10 miles away. I didn't go often as it was difficult getting home, but I managed to see the Yardbirds play once, and I also heard Chicken Shack with Christine Perfect on vocals. Her rendition of 'I'd Rather Go Blind' was simply amazing. I also discovered bluegrass music around this time, and acquired a number of albums by other American country artists like Bobby Gentry, Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings.

My musical horizons widened considerably when I went to university. There was some interesting music around, but a lot of the ' psychadelic' bands seemed to take themselves far too seriously. I had always believed that playing and singing music should be fun. But I did like Jefferson Airplane, mainly because of the talent of their vocalist Grace Slick, and I also discovered Janis Joplin - for me, the best white female blues singer ever.

I also realised that, as far as I was concerned, the lyrics of a song were at least as important as the melody, and if a song did not have a point to make it was hardly worth listening to. Instrumentals still do very little for me.

'Glam rock' offered some light relief, and although I had to admit that Marc Bolan was the cutest thing I'd ever seen, I preferred listening to the music of David Bowie. His lyrics simply blew me away, they were unusual and creative, and way ahead of their time. I also liked Rod Stewart when he sang with the Faces, and I began my 30-year obsession with Alice Cooper who seemed able to combine his music with great theatre, fetishism, and biting social commentary.

After spending around 10 years in further education, at the end of which there was still little available in the UK in the way of interesting jobs, I left England again. Although I had gone to Texas primarily in search of work, it was here that I learnt a great deal about the music of that country. Perhaps this is because American music seems to affect and reflect the lives of the people more closely than it does in Britain. Texas has dozens of local radio stations, most of them playing country music, and I renewed my acquaintance with Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings and Roy Orbison. But now there were also singer/songwriters who were not welcome at the Grand Ole Oprey in Nashville, such as Hank Williams Jr, Willie Nelson, Michelle Shocked, K.D.Lang and John (Cougar) Mellancamp, all of whom had a great deal to say about life in modern America, some of which was not very complimentary.

Click to see the photos I took in the USA

When we weren't working, we explored Texas and Louisiana, discovering the culture and history with an interest that I had never experienced in England. My favourite city was New Orleans which seemed to me as if a 19th century European town had suddenly landed in the middle of 20th century America. The highways leading to it are modern and lined with big hotels and large billboards, but as soon as you reach the city limits, the houses revert to Spanish architecture, accents change from American to French, and the food becomes a mixture of French and Spanish. The music you hear from the clubs is jazz not country, the streets become narrow while parking is a nightmare; moreover white girls can be seen walking round with dark hair, unlike in Texas where to be blonde is pretty much compulsory.

In Louisiana the radio stations you hear when driving play Zadyco and Cajun music, incredibly infectious songs which often advise the listener to 'Laisser le bons temps roulet' (let the good times roll). This music is popular throughout Louisiana and many parts of east Texas, and is played predominantly but not always by black musicians. Usually you will find it performed at restaurants and bars on Saturday nights, so that members of the whole family can dance and have a good time. In some ways it seems to be the complete antithesis to the blues culture of the southern states.

Sometimes we headed west rather than east and arrived in Austin, where we would go to the studio where the weekly TV music show ' Austin City Limits' was filmed. This was Texas' answer to the Grand Ole Oprey, and it encouraged less conventional music. It was here that Janis Joplin got her first big break in 19 6-, and where we saw K.D.Lang perform with her first band, the Reclines. We also saw local bands such as the Fabulous Thunderbirds, Asleep at the Wheel, ZZ Top, and Stevie Ray Vaughn perform, just before he was tragically killed in a plane crash.