My Biography

I was born at 3:30 in the afternoon on a Thursday. Thursdays child has far to go, that has certainly proved to be the case, Heaven knows how many miles I have travelled and I’m still travelling. There was three feet of snow on the ground and it was touch and go as to whether my Mum and Dad got to the hospital on time. The day was the 10th of March, the year, 1955. Bill Haley and the Comets were enjoying the number one position in the hit parade with a song called Rock around the Clock.

My dear Mum and Dad were and still are a perfect example of two people in love, although sadly my Dad died on the 17th of December 2009. His memory lives on in all our hearts, he was a truly wonderful man who taught us all how to love. He encouraged me from an early age to play the drums, he was a drummer in the cadets. When I was five years old he made me a kit out of feed tubs that were used on the farm where I grew up with my elder brother and younger sister, Brian and Teresa. Great Tong Farm. What an idyllic backdrop that wonderful place was for a child to grow up. Smack in the middle of the heart of the beautiful County of Kent which is known as the Garden of England.

I was eight when the Beatles had their first number one called “She loves you” from the moment I heard that I wanted to be Ringo Starr. My Dad cobbled together a fantastic drum set and my musical career began with my first band, The Sunbeams, my stage name was Sandy. My brother and sister on guitars and me on the drums.

On arrival at Cornwallis Secondary School, at the age of eleven, I met who was to become my best, closest and oldest  friend, Roger Manning. We forged a bond that lasts to this day. It was not long before we had our own band which was called Sister Ray. We were heavily influenced by The Velvet underground, hence the name, Sister Ray.

We were, in my opinion, way ahead of our time and peaked when we all had an average age of sixteen, way before the advent of “Boy Bands”

We were heading for and enjoying the smokey days of the seventies and the next band was called MeanBarLean whose front man was a complete caner and out right nutter, Jonny Orrell. He went on to be the Borough surveyor of Brighton and I believe had a big hand in the re build of the Brighton Pier. I became a steel fixer and Roger a painter and decorator.

I worked on the Maidstone shopping centre and went on to work on the construction of an oil rig in Loch Kishorn. That was a tough job. Throughout the record breaking temperatures of 1976 I was working 12 hour nights in driving rain, poor me. In 6 months I managed to save just short of £5000, which, in those days was enough to buy a large house out right. I bought a Gretch drum kit and Rolex watch. The Rolex watch I still have. The Gretch was changed for a Yamaha, why I don’t know. I have now graduated to the classic Ludwig.

By now I’m 18 and playing in a band called Muffin. A friend I met during my brief time at college, Jez, asked me to play with a country band called Redwing. This was to change my life rather dramatically as after a couple of months with them, Tim Collingwood, the bass player and earstwhile beer drinking partner, suggested that we made a move West to America. We did’nt get to America but we did get to Cornwall. We accepted a job with Frank Yonco and the Everglades , from there we proceeded to play in just about every Town in Britain as just about everywhere had a country and western club. I stayed with that for 3 years.

I went on to play the drums backing the likes of Billie Jo Spears, Frank Jennings and Patsy Powell. At the age of 27 a bass player called Dave Quinn saw me playing at a Jam session in The Duke of Cornwall in St Austell and asked if I wanted to join the lendary mechanics. The Mechanics were to be my main band for the next15 years. Fronted by the amazing talent of Big Al Hodge. This band was like a run away express train. Dave Quinn was and still is one of the finest bass players in the world, no-one nails a groove like him. He taught me so much.

Al Hodge who sadly died 4 years ago remains a complete legend. What an amazing virtuoso guitar player and singer. Most of all a beautiful man, husband and father to my God children, Jodie and Luke.

They were also part of the backing band for Leo Sayer, they set me up with an audition and in 1983 I got the job with leo and went on to travel the world many times. Thank you Leo. You really are a great  entertainer and fantastic singer and working with you was a wonderful experience.

During those years I also played on several Jackie Leven albums. What a talent, great singer and songwriter. He was the front man and writer for a band called Doll by Doll. He was a larger than life scotsman with a massive voice, sadly no longer with us.

Examples of his fantastic albums are in the Discograhy.

Starting in the late 80s to the present day i have played on a regular basis with an amazing covers band called The Chase. A fantastic singer, Vince Martyn, Bass Mark Clements, guitar Rufus Ruffell, Pedal steel Melvyn Duffy and sometimes augmented by Alden Evans on guitar and Gareth Young on Bass. This band reaches out to people in such a special way, playing beautiful songs with such feeling and emotion.

In 1998 I joined a band called Wood. What a band. Their engineer at Abbey road was working on the never to be released album which Leo was Co writing and producing with Albert hammond. Now there’s a songwriter, I would’n’t mind one of his PRS cheques getting miss directed into my bank account.

Chris Wood, the engineer, hooked me up with Wood and we went on to record the beautiful album “Songs from stamford Hill” We were signed to Columbia and recorded the album in Phillidelphia with a great producer called Dave “Stiff” Johnson. Check out this album, it really is a cracker.

We did several tours of America supporting the likes of Train, Paula Cole, Mishell Indegio Encello, Susan Tedeski. I love that band, James maddock, Singer and guitarist, Bill Newsinger, Guitars?Mandolin, James O Malley, Bass Guitar, and Bill Drake, Piano.

The second album was produced by Malcom Burn, unfortunately due to various reasons, the album was never released.

On my return to England I received a call from Alden Evans inviting me to play in a band with an outstanding singer whose name is Treana Morris, a beautiful girl with the voice of an Angel. This band became known as The House in the Woods. Along with bass player Paddy Rule we enthralled audiences with a mixture of tasteful covers and original materiel playing gigs across the South West. While recording demos at Jo Partridge’s Airfield Studios, we teamed up with Olly Beach to become The Wire Daisies. Under the Management of the World renown and highly respected manager of Queen, Jim Beach, we went on to record the beautiful album; “ Just Another Day” Recorded and produced by the great John Cornfield.

Early  on this year I played the drums on the all singing and all dancing west End production of the Blues brothers show. A nation wide tour that was a fascinating experience, the cast, band and crew were super proffessional and lovely people.  I managed to save some money from this work and financed my debut album.

”Songs from a drummers heart”

The album was recorded by Gareth Young at Cube Recording, thank you G, you did a great job. The album was mastered by the master himself John Cornfield, thanks John. My wonderful and talented friend Melvyn Duffy played guitars, pedal steel, mandolin, dobro and banjo. He gave his heart and soul to this project and what an amazing job he did.

The lovely Kath Williams played beautiful cello and Dan Benney sang harmony and played guitar on careless Angel.

I dedicate this record to my dear old dad, he knows how much I love him.