4.52am Issue: 008 13th November 2016

the Spencer Davis Group but by then was
working as an A&R guy for Island Records,
came and said hello and that he was sorry,
as he wouldn’t be signing the band, but
that he would have something for me in a
couple of months. I didn’t really believe it,
but he was as good as his word and two
months later I got a Telegram from Muff
asking me to get in touch. That was pretty
flash, you only got them for bad news
normally. Anyway, I rang his office and he
invited me to the audition with Andy and
Chris, for the Sharks’.”
How did the audition itself go?
“I knew I wasn’t first choice, the word was
that both Leo Sayer and Robert Palmer had
auditioned, but I don’t think it got that far
as they both had other things they were
waiting on, or had said ‘no’, but it went
really well.”
Was it true that Andy Fraser wanted to sing
in the band?
“People said that, and it was definitely the
rumour, but Chris says he definitely didn’t
want to, so there it is.”
What happened at the audition, where was
it?
“It was at Island Records, and the
drummer asked if I had any of my own
songs, and I had loads, so I ended-up just
playing lots of them. I don’t think they had
many songs at that point, and their faces
all lit up, apart from Andy’s. Don’t get me
wrong, Andy was a brilliant musician and
arranger, and we kept waiting for him to
come-up with something special for the
first album First Water - he had written All
Right Now so he had it in him, but it just
never happened, he didn’t bring anything.
We were playing a lot of my songs and I
don’t think Andy liked it over much, I don’t
think he liked the competition in a funny
way.”
So you were in the band and recording First
Water what was that like?
“Overall it was great to be playing with
them, but Andy was odd. I’ll give you an
example, he would make me sing the same
parts over and over up until the point where
it wrecked my voice, which didn’t make a lot
of sense when you are trying to make the
best record you can. But I think that was
just Andy not liking the competition, it was
something in him. Brilliant but flawed in
other ways.”
With the album complete, Sharks went off
on a UK tour for publicity, travelling in Chris
Spedding’s Pontiac Le Mans, which he had
augmented with a fin on top and a set of
teeth in the grill. Which was great until an
accident saw the car hit a tree and Andy
Fraser sustain an injury to his wrist.
After a short break the band went off on
tour, supporting Roxy Music until the album
was released. In April. Andy chose at this
point to leave the band, suggesting that he
saw the car crash as a bad omen, but Steve
wasn’t so sure,
“I just don’t think the band had gone the
way he wanted it to. I think he saw himself
as band leader and that he would give
everybody their parts and they would play
them as he wanted, but the Sharks were
never like that. It was always freeform
songwriting, letting things develop then
choose what to keep, which arrangements
later on. I mean, you don’t give Chris
Spedding guitar parts, he is a genius, you
just give him the space and ask him to do