I'm from Pemberton, Wigan, and was born into a poor family. I grew up on a council estate. My dad was at first in the Army and then in the coal mines. My mother had four children by the time she was 23 so money was always tight.
I once had a gig in Gothenburg and went on the most unbelievable theme park ride, which was a rollercoaster built into a mountain that went through plants and tunnels. It was huge and a thrill to go on.
Yes, I would say I had quite a rough time from 1992 to 1996. After the highs of the Eighties, work became slow from around 1987 to around 1997. I was running a small recording studio in Shepherd's Bush but wasn't making a great deal from it.
I've just been on a German TV show called 'Come Back', a bit like 'Reborn In The USA', and the pressure of being scrutinised all the time by cameras has made me very self-conscious.
There's so many oldies stations with 'Never Ending Story' and 'Too Shy' on their playlists, thank God. People still love the songs.
Yeah, I could get an internet page and maybe get a thousand downloads of new songs but it's a lot of work. I'm 57 now, I really feel like I've got the T-shirt. I just like performing. It's instant. I go off, I do the show, it's over. I like that.
