2. The SmithsHatful Of Hollow
In the early 80s, I was not really knowing what to listen to – there was Culture Club, Adam And The Ants and all kinds of rubbish at that time. I remember everyone at school going on about The Smiths on Top Of The Pops, it was a massive thing when that happened, and someone took a record to school and told me to take it home, it was Hatful Of Hollow. Then I remember buying it at Piccadilly Records. I listened to that to death. It was the first indie record I ever bought. I was a mixture of mad stuff like Boomtown Rats, Blondie and Paul Young, but that was the record that changed everything.
Both sides of your family are from Liverpool, but you seem to have always gravitated towards Manchester, were The Smiths a part of that?
Oh definitely. I was born in Liverpool, but my dad got a job in Manchester so I grew up halfway – in the Leigh area, which I came to represent as an MP. I was always more Manchester orientated than my brothers, I’d get the bus to the Arndale and go around Afflecks, I was into that stuff. The music took you in that direction anyway, when you start listening to The Smiths. For football I was into the other end of the M62 but for music, clothes, fashion, everything else was Manchester.
