SharePaul Carrack, singer, songwriter, composer and multi-instrumentalist chats with Kevin Cooper about his love for Sheffield Wednesday Football Club, working with the late Paul Young, his latest album How Long (Has This Been Going On) Greatest Hits and his forthcoming 2024 50th Anniversary Tour of the UK.
Paul Carrack is an English singer, musician, songwriter and composer, who has recorded as both a solo artist and as a member of several popular bands.
He rose to prominence in the mid 1970’s as the front man and principal songwriter of rock band Ace and gained further recognition for his work as a solo artist and for his tenures as a member of Squeeze and Roger Waters’ band, The Bleeding Heart Band, intermittently handling lead vocals on Squeeze and Waters’ recordings.
From the mid 1980’s to the late 1990’s he enjoyed considerable success as the co-lead vocalist (with Sad Cafe’s Paul Young) and a songwriter for Mike + The Mechanics. Following Young’s death in 2000, Carrack served as the band’s sole lead vocalist until he left in 2004.
Originally starting his career with jazz-rock band Warm Dust in 1970, before he helped find pub rock band, Ace. The band’s debut single How Long (Has This Been Going On), written and sung by Carrack was a massive 1975 hit in both the UK and America. When the band disbanded in 1977 he worked as a backing musician for Frankie Miller and as a keyboardist for Roxy Music.
In 1981 he joined Squeeze as a replacement for Jools Holland. They achieved international success with their studio album, East Side Story, with Carrack as vocalist on the song Tempted, their biggest American hit at the time. He left the band in 1982.
In 1985 he joined Mike Rutherford of Genesis fame new project Mike + The Mechanics which he left in 2004. He then re-established his solo career with hits like One Good Reason and Don’t Shed A Tear. He has also toured with Ringo Starr & The All-Starr Band and with Eric Clapton.
Whilst busy promoting his forthcoming tour, he took some time out from his busy schedule to have a chat with Kevin Cooper and this is what he had to say.
Good morning, Paul.
Hi Kevin, how are you today?
I’m very well thank you and before we move on, let me thank you for taking the time to speak to me today.
It’s no problem, but please do remember I have another interview at 11.30am and I know just how whenever you and me chat, we always seem to get carried away (laughter).
That’s a good point very well made (laughter). As from this moment in time, let me assure you that the clock is most definitely ticking (laughter).
Thank you (laughter).
So, just how is life treating you at this moment in time?
Pretty good, thanks, pretty good. The wife is in the hospital at the minute but apart from that on the domestic front there are a few bits and pieces but life is currently treating me far better than 99.9% of the world’s population most probably. At least I know where my next dinner is coming from.
So, you are currently fending for yourself?
(Laughter) yes, I am but I really don’t mind doing that. But anyway, we won’t get into that (laughter).
Before we speak about the music side of things, just how do you think that Sheffield Wednesday are going to do this season?
Let me put it this way, I am dangerously optimistic that we might just have a good season. Funnily enough I am sitting here in a Sheffield Wednesday t-shirt because I just grabbed it from the washing (laughter). As we know, it is a long, long season but let’s put it this way, we are certainly in better shape than we were at the beginning of last season.
Right, on that point, moving swiftly on, can you believe that it is fifty years since you wrote and recorded How Long (Has This Been Going On) with the group Ace?
No, not really. It sounds crazy actually, but it is a fact. Please don’t ask me where the time went, as you get to this end of things, it seems like it was over in a flash but of course, in the middle it really was quite daunting with questions such as, ‘just how am I going to survive’ as a forty year old with my hair falling out, but with four kids and a mortgage. But anyway, we almost seem to be on the other side of all of that now and it really is not a bad place to be. But talking specifically about How Long, it is amazing really, it’s a simple little song which has just stuck around and it won’t go away.
Can you believe that some fifty years on the song would still be being played and would be as popular now as it was when you wrote and recorded it?
The simple answer is no. No, I mean I didn’t even envisage it being played on the radio back then, never mind fifty years later. It’s amazing really because it is a pretty simple little ditty, but having said that it has got a strong hook, and the original recording had a certain vibe about it, a certain atmosphere and it just seems to have struck a chord. It is just one of those things. I’m flipping glad that it has (laughter). I just wish that I had had my head screwed on when I signed the various recording and publishing contracts (hysterical laughter). However, we don’t dwell on that, we are still here, still standing, still enjoying life, enjoying music, and I feel that I have very much to be grateful for.
At the time of writing, did you feel that you had something special?
I kind of did; I think I did yes, but I have to say that I was fairly naive then. In fact, thinking about it I was very naïve. I think that I was naïve enough to think that it was a bit special. Everybody seemed to like it. I made the original demo recording on a Revox tape recorder, which was a stereo recorder, but it had the facility where you could record a track on one side of the stereo then you could bounce it over to the other side of the stereo whilst you were doing an overdub. You could do that a couple of times before the quality got really bad. It was my first way into writing songs in that way, slowly building up a little track, doing some harmonies, and things like that.
So, yes, it was all pretty exciting, and I feel that How Long actually clinched us a recording contract, which we hadn’t had up until that point. Ace was basically a pub rock band, and very few pub rock bands were getting signed up at that time. We actually all thought that we had missed the boat; they had been down to see us a few times, but various labels always seemed to pass us bye. At that point in time, we started playing How Long in the set, and I think that clinched it, and we finally got signed to a very small label, and I honestly do believe that it was on the strength of that song that clinched it.
Am I right in believing that recording the song was not quite as straight forward as you would have liked?
(Laughter) just who the hell have you been speaking to (laughter). You are absolutely correct when you say that. When we tried to record it we weren’t very experienced in the studio. We had a couple of attempts to record it as a single but it didn’t really happen. So, in the end we said, “oh sod it” (laughter). We had two weeks booked in Rockfield Studios to record our album, and we all agreed that we would give it another go when we got down to the Rockfield Studios. And that’s how it came about. It was kind of different to how I had imagined it; I imagined it as quite an upbeat Motownesque kind of song, in fact I could always imagine The Four Tops performing it. However, because we were all stoned hippies it ended up being more of a laidback atmosphere (laughter).
I have to put my hands up and say that I, like many others, thought that How Long (Has This Been Going On) had been written about an affair.
(Laughter) ah come on, you knew that it wasn’t written about an affair.
No, not at all.
Oh God, I mean I’m amazed that by now, everybody should know what the song is all about. So, that’s fair enough. The song is actually written about the bass player in Ace.
I had a similar conversation with the late Steve Harley who told me that Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me) was written about the underhand way in which band members were leaving.
Is that right?
Yes, it is and surprisingly enough it was the bass player once again.
Well, I didn’t know that, so we have both managed to educate another today haven’t we (laughter). With How Long, as I have said that we were basically a pub rock band; we were really into it, we were all having a good time, and there was another band that shall remain nameless, who we were kind of buddies with. They were in a better shape than us; they had a record contract, they had tours booked supporting Elton John and things like that. They borrowed our bass player Tex for a few gigs while their bass player was ill. However, we actually realised they were actually trying to persuade him to leave us and join them permanently (laughter). So, as you can imagine, we were very put out about that because we were having such a good time with our little band. Anyway, he didn’t leave; he stayed, so there you go (laughter).
Moving on to the album How Long (Has This Been Going On) Greatest Hits there are nineteen tracks on the album. Just how many did you begin with?
(Laughter) well, when you consider that we have got three or four hundred tracks out there on Spotify, we had to include the obvious ones; How Long, Tempted, Living Years, Over My Shoulder, Love Will Keep Us Alive, and then there were so many it really was a case of take your pick. I think that we kind of took a bit of information from some of the streaming sites in order to see which songs were the most popular. I personally have got other songs that are my personal favourites that aren’t on there.
Tell me about the idea behind you putting out a Greatest Hits album?
The idea behind the album was that it’s fifty years on and people still don’t know, in many cases, that it is me singing especially with the Mike + The Mechanics stuff. So, the problem was, with those older hits, I couldn’t get the permission and the rights to allow me to use them. Even if I could it was quite a faff to get round it and it would cost such a lot that it would hardly have been beneficial for me to do that. So, we all got our heads together and agreed that it was the right time to put my name to some of those tracks, because I think that the vocals have been quite important on some of those tracks.
In many cases, people still don’t associate my name with any of the songs such as Living Years and Over My Shoulder. So, we thought that we would re-record them. So, on the album there are seven re-records, and the others are songs from various albums of mine because apparently, I have released quite a few now (laughter). I’m not sure just how many it is as I’ve not counted them, and that’s not a cliché, I honestly don’t really know. What I do know is that it is in the late teens now. So, there we have it (laughter).
Once you made your mind up to go for it, if you pardon the pun, how long did it take you to dwindle four hundred tracks into the nineteen that appear on the album?
To be perfectly honest with you, I really didn’t get that much involved with that side of things. The reason for that is that I would have picked certain other tracks that are possibly my favourites but not that necessarily that well known. So, in the end we kind of went for the ones that have been popular. We did have quite a run there when we had big support from the radio, and in fact they still do play a lot of the singles. We made the Radio 2 playlist a number of times but then they suddenly dropped us like a stone (laughter). So, as I say, I didn’t particularly get too much involved with it, but what I will say is that I think that they are all good tracks, and you could have easily picked another twenty but the important thing is to get the big ones on there I think and have them under my name which I have to say I don’t think is unreasonable.
I have to say that my personal favourite is Tempted. As soon as you hear that Hammond Organ you just know that you are in for a good time. Correct me if I am wrong but didn’t you originally sing that track as a member of Squeeze for their 1981 album, East Side Story?
(Laughter) Yes, I did, you are absolutely correct when you say that. I have to say that it is a great song, a great, great song. That track is not actually a new recording, nor is it the original recording, that track was recorded for the Squeeze album Spot The Difference. When they re-recorded all of their hits, they asked me to go along and record a new version of Tempted. Not only was it for their album but they told me that I could use it as well. So, that is what that version is.
I count myself very fortunate to have seen the original line-up of Mike + The Mechanics with you and Paul (Young) many times and I have to say that you were absolutely brilliant.
Thanks’ for saying that, it really is much appreciated.
I know that you have crossed swords with Mike (Rutherford) in the past so we won’t go into that and all that I will say is that having seen both entities; I feel that the original line-up was by far the best.
Thank you, what can I say, I don’t know that much about the new entity. I have left it and I have moved on, so it is what it is. Mike wanted to keep it going; he claimed that it was his own brand. He has kept it in that same kind of format, and fair play to him; it was originally his project in the first place. I wouldn’t say that we were mercenaries, simply because we always gave it one hundred percent but I think that it was a great line-up, it was good fun, and let’s just say that we made it work.
Well, if the new version of Mike + The Mechanics was a TV show you would be being played by a certain Andrew Roachford (laughter).
(Hysterical laughter) that’s the way that they have kind of done it. From what I understand he sings my songs, and the other fella sings Paul’s songs. I don’t bear any grudge really, I was glad of the situation at the time, it was fun, we gave it our all, and I think that we could have been treated a bit better but, it is what it is, and I am not in any way, shape or form claiming to be a victim. The only thing that upset me was when they put out a Greatest Hits album, with the photographs and acknowledgement of the new band (laughter). However, life is too short, and I have lots going on, so it is what it is.
I was recently speaking to Tony Hadley and Paul’s name cropped up in the conversation, and Tony said “the best way that I can describe Paul is that he was a man of extremes”. Would you agree with that?
(Laughter) what can I say, I totally agree with Tony. Paul was a man of extremes; he lived it, he loved it. He totally loved it and he was Mister rock ‘n roll. He really was rock ‘n roll. It only needed a couple of people in the room to pay Paul some attention, and he was off (laughter). I think that in his heyday, which I feel was before he joined Mike + The Mechanics, when he was in the band Sad Café, I would have put him up there with anybody, any of the front guys. Paul was a great singer, and he was a great front man. He absolutely loved it. It was a very sad time and an absolute shock when he passed.
Going back to the album, am I right in thinking that you won’t be releasing it on vinyl this time around?
That’s right. At this moment in time there are no plans to release the album on vinyl which I have to say was a little bit of a faff. I’m not exactly sure just what the main issues were with that, but thinking about it there was the cost, together with the fact that we wouldn’t have been able to put all of the selected tracks onto a vinyl album. There is something like 75 minutes on a CD where you cannot get anything like that on vinyl, without it being a double album. We had a bit of an issue with the vinyl on a previous album, These Days. HMV took 2000 copies off us, and they then mysteriously went bust and they weren’t able to pay us out on it (laughter). So, that might have had something to do with it (laughter). The cheeky buggers want to take them off us again now that they have opened up again. We have told them that we will let them have a couple of hundred copies to see just how they get on (hysterical laughter).
Coming right up to date and your forthcoming tour, are you looking forward to being back out on the road?
Yes, I am actually. I really am looking forward to it. The last ten years really have been quite hectic touring wise because I have been doing a lot of the (Eric) Clapton stuff. I haven’t done that this year for various reasons, so I have been at home a lot which is great. We have had a few things to sort out, but I really am ready for it and I’m looking forward to it. In fact, you could say that I’m hungry for it.
Friday 27th September you are here in Nottingham once again at the Royal Concert Hall. What is it that makes the venue so special?
It’s not really about the venue, it’s about the people. Don’t get me wrong it really is a nice venue, it is a modern venue, it’s comfortable for people, and I have had some good nights there in the past. It’s in the centre of town, and I have to say that the city is always buzzing. Do you live in Nottingham?
Some seven miles outside.
Yeah, that’s probably a good idea (laughter).
Swiftly moving on (laughter). I think that Nottingham and Sheffield have a lot of similarities.
Although I’ve not actually lived in Sheffield since my late teens, I have always had a strong connection with the city through my love of Sheffield Wednesday Football Club. My family still live up there but of course, that is dwindling now. I’m losing a lot of my older cousins, but I am still in touch with my brother. He is a few years older than me; my parents have long since passed, but the funny thing is that all of my band are Sheffield guys.
Are they really?
Yes, they are, and let me tell you, that really was a great move on my part (laughter). It was twenty odd years ago when I stopped cobbling a band together from the folks down here that I knew; guys in the circles down here who I knew, session guys and proper touring musicians. I bolted myself onto this small club band up in Sheffield (laughter). All of my contemporaries down here were saying, “just what the fuck are you doing” and I have to say that yes, it was a bit rough to start with, but it has just developed into a really good band. They bring a different vibe altogether. There are no dramas, they are always available, they love what they are doing, it is the best gig in the world for them, and I have to say that it is just great. We have a laugh, and nobody is looking for the next gig.
I was recently up in Sheffield photographing and reviewing the Tramlines Festival. Have you ever been invited to perform Paul?
No, I have to say that I have never been fucking invited, how about that.
Between you and me let me tell you that it feels like The Human League are performing there every year.
If the festival is anything at all to do with the City Council, then they most probably do not even know that I’m from Sheffield. They have got a big thing up there outside the City Hall and Richard Hawley is currently the big thing, together with The Human League, Arctic Monkeys, and this, that and the other together with loads of names that I have never heard of. I’m not even on that (laughter). So, there we go.
What was the first record that you bought?
That was Raining In My Heart by Buddy Holly.
Who did you first see performing live?
Well, at the Sheffield City Hall I saw The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Shadows, Chuck Berry, and Roy Orbison. I play there now, and I can never get over it, how about that (laughter). I get butterflies thinking about the people who have trod those boards before me, every time that I play the City Hall. For me it really is something special.
What was the last song or piece of music that made you cry?
That’s easy, I don’t cry. I’m a hard arsed fucker and I think that it comes from losing my dad when I was eleven. That proper broke my heart. After that I have always said that I would never experience anything like that ever again. But then of course I had bloody kids and grandkids and now it’s like, ‘oh bugger what have I done’ (laughter).
What is currently on Paul Carrack’s live rider?
Absolutely nothing extravagant at all. There will be some sandwiches, a few beers for the lads, but nothing extravagant. You really would be surprised. There will always be a few sandwiches but no M&M’s (laughter). It really is basic.
On that note let me once again thank you for taking the time to speak to me Paul, as usual, it’s been delightful and we are finishing on time (laughter)
(Laughter) thanks, Kevin, more to the point thanks for your time and interest in what we are up to. Stay safe up there in Nottingham and make sure that you come by and say hello. Bye for now.
Tickets for the tour are now on sale
