Steps interview: “In a way, we were kind of punk rock”

Once upon a time, the mere point out of the title Steps would ship shivers of concern down the spines of those that discovered sparkly pop as horrifying as being caught in a carry with Gemma Collins.

However 20 years after they first burst onto the charts, one thing’s modified. Pop’s shiniest, happiest, disco dandies have, towards all the percentages change into respectable, credible and, dare we are saying, cool? Nicely, sure truly. It will appear that they’re. 

When the all-singing, all-dancing 30-something boy-girl pop combo returned to the charts in March with Scared Of The Darkish, it wasn’t simply the devoted followers who’d supported them again within the day who revelled within the gloriousness of the intricately constructed and produced new observe.

So, too, did the sorry saps who’d hidden away within the pop closet for thus a few years solely now to seek out the power to combat the emotions they’d stifled for thus lengthy.

And so it got here to go, that for a couple of hours Scared Of The Darkish usurped Ed Sheeran’s reign on the prime of the iTunes chart whereas their critically-acclaimed comeback album Tears On The Dancefloor piqued the curiosity of previous and new followers who had been in want of just a little hope and pleasure.

The constructive response got here as an enormous shock not simply to these followers but in addition to the band themselves.

“The press have been so good to us, I’ve been shocked by how folks have accepted us and wished us,” a genuinely shocked Faye Tozer tells Traditional Pop after we meet up with three of the band.

“We’ve had extraordinary folks inquisitive about us this time spherical. Even punk magazines have talked about us, all types. Possibly we’re a bit retro now; possibly it’s fantastic now to say it’s okay to love Steps occasionally!”

It’s time to start − now rely it in…

After all, again in 1997, as Britpop reigned supreme within the charts, Steps had been a bunch you both beloved or hated. However even probably the most devoted followers would say they’d be hard-pressed to fall completely for Steps Mk1.

Initially they’d been conceived and developed as a one-hit novelty act whose schtick was to sing the boot-scootin’ line-dancing tune 5,6,7,8.

Even as we speak, the very suggestion of it fills our hearts with dread. However for Tozer, Lee Latchford-Evans, Ian ‘H’ Watkins, Lisa Scott-Lee and Claire Richards, this was their probability to hit the massive time.

“We had been employed to entrance that one single,” Faye recollects. “And so far as we had been involved we had been going again to
our jobs afterwards.”

Lee added: “We had been instructed by the blokes behind the band, Steve Crosby and Barry Upton, that the concept was for us to launch a line-dancing tune,” Lee says of the band’s origin story.

“There was no label and no cash however we had been all hungry to get began and we had been like, ‘okay then, we’re in’.”

Whereas the remainder of the band had been hoping that this line-dancing combo would kickstart their careers, self-confessed pessimist Claire Richards was much less optimistic a couple of fruitful future.

By this level in her younger life, the pop-loving lass had already been one third of a flop girlband known as TSD so wasn’t overly hopeful.

“I believed TSD was going to be my massive break,” Claire remembers. “However it wasn’t, so this time I wasn’t certain what was going to occur.”

Claire’s confidence was dented much more when producers twiddling the knobs balked at 5,6,7,8 themselves.

“The engineers and musicians within the studio had been mortified,” Claire recollects, “they didn’t wish to do it. I keep in mind them saying to me, ‘if you wish to come and file some correct music, tell us.’ I don’t suppose they really put their names on the file. Which is foolish actually.”

No matter what anybody thought in regards to the file, 5,6,7,8 went on to change into a Prime 20 hit and caught the eye of pop supremo, Pete Waterman, who noticed one thing particular.

Not solely did he suppose they’d nice pop voices, additionally they had a pure chemistry. He knew he’d stumbled upon one thing particular and realised that what the world wanted was a modern-day ABBA… So Steps 2.0 was born.

Step One: We will have numerous enjoyable!

Pete dusted off a few Bananarama’s Please Your self album tracks and repackaged them for Steps. The lead single was Final Factor On My Thoughts, a observe which had barely scraped the Prime 75 for the ’Nanas again in 1993. Nonetheless, for Steps, the tune turned their calling card.

“It was an enormous shock and great that Pete Waterman had a imaginative and prescient for our future at the moment,” Faye recollects. “We out of the blue in a short time modified from being a line dancing band to a pop band.”

And so the group set about recording Step One, a set of recent songs and little-heard covers that had been all given a glistening pop sheen by the likes of PWL studio whizkids Topham and Twigg, Andrew Frampton and Pete Waterman.

It peaked at No.2 and impressively would go on to promote 1.4 million copies.

In opposition to the percentages, the general public actually appeared to purchase into the group, replicating the easy-to-follow dance steps and giddily abiding by the color schemes set out by the group for every single. Nonetheless, critics had been quick to dismiss them as trashy pop.

“It positively bothered us,” Claire says defiantly. “We had been younger and we took all of it very severely. It was our profession and if you’re promoting the type of data that we had been – and don’t neglect we had been promoting out arenas – folks nonetheless thought we had been a joke.

“A variety of our contemporaries had been being given designer garments however nobody would contact us with a bargepole. It was a bit upsetting, if I’m trustworthy! We actually didn’t perceive why we didn’t get the popularity from the business.”

The group keep that their enduring success is fan-driven. “The followers have caught by us and have given us all the things. They beloved us, they love us nonetheless and don’t care about what the business says,” Claire provides, wanting genuinely touched by the help.

“That’s crucial factor that we are able to take away from the early days and this time spherical it’s opened our eyes as to how unimaginable the followers are, and that’s how they’ve all the time been for 20 years.”

Each step you are taking I’ll be watching you

After Step One and a sell-out area tour, work began on the group’s eagerly anticipated second album Steptacular. With a stronger and extra cohesive sound, the album stormed in at No.1 and shifted effectively over a million copies. Enter from the band was as soon as once more minimal, however that was fantastic with them.

“We had been so busy going from nation to nation, “ Faye remembers. “It was a loopy time in our lives. We had been busy performing, having fun with ourselves, assembly wonderful folks and going to wonderful events. I don’t suppose we had any thought how the music was going to sound. We simply left it once more with Pete and our administration.”

The standout observe of the album was the moody membership observe Deeper Shade of Blue, which turned the tune that after once more pushed them towards credibility. And the brand new course was simply what the band felt they wanted.

“We had been over the moon that we might go in barely clubby course,” Faye squeals. “We went down a extra credible sounding route, one thing that might match what was occurring within the charts.

“Up till then we had all the time felt like we didn’t have a spot within the charts. Though that was our triumph ultimately, that we had been doing our personal factor.”

The mature sound continued into the band’s third album Buzz, which once more was an enormous promoting chart-topper. The album featured a divisive cowl of Kylie’s Higher The Satan You Know. Whereas die-hard Minogue followers had been appalled, the band and their youthful followers beloved it.

“I truly suppose it’s higher than Kylie’s model,” Claire, a loyal Kylie fan herself, boasts. “Truly somebody who labored at PWL for years instructed me they favored our model greater than her’s, too. I can not hear Kylie’s model in my head anymore.”

Like Steptacular, Buzz continued to embrace membership and dance sounds impressed by the likes of Extremely Nate, but it surely was the album that gave the band their first alternative to flex their writing muscle mass.

Given a possibility to decide on a producer or songwriter they wish to work with individually, Faye opted for 80s legend Cyndi Lauper. After some preliminary hesitation, Cyndi invited Faye to stick with her at her home within the US.

“She was an absolute dream,” Faye reminisces. “She was as loopy and as great as I wished her to be. We recorded and wrote all around the home and she or he did backing vocals on certainly one of my demos.”

When the sensation’s gone and you’ll’t go on

In 2001, Steps followers had been devastated when on Boxing Day the group introduced they had been splitting up. Little did anybody know on the time that the break-up hadn’t been as amicable as first thought.

As a substitute of the band mutually agreeing to take a while out, H & Claire had shocked their bandmates simply minutes earlier than their remaining tour date in Manchester (which was being televised dwell by Sky that evening) with a letter of resignation.

“I don’t know why H and I break up after we did,” Claire says. “I believe I simply couldn’t do it anymore. I don’t like confrontation in any respect. I’ll associate with one thing for so long as I can take care of it. I’ll simply put up with it till I couldn’t take it anymore.”

Though the hectic schedule performed a component in her resolution to give up, she admits that the animosity from different members of the band, irritated that she was given so most of the lead vocals, harm her, too.

“Clearly there have been tensions between sure members of the band as a result of I used to be given numerous the lead strains. To be trustworthy, I all the time felt uncomfortable about the entire singing scenario. And it simply acquired to me and upset me.

“I don’t suppose anybody did this on goal however I all the time felt I like I had finished one thing flawed as a result of I used to be getting many of the vocals. However all I used to be doing was moving into and doing what I used to be instructed.”

Wanting again, Faye says that she, too, was having reservations about her place within the band and divulges that she had considered strolling away lengthy earlier than it was a seed in H and Claire’s thoughts.

“I went by way of a stage when all of it felt just a little bit too overwhelming for me,” she confides. “I believe I felt it took over my life and that scared me. I believe we had been closely overworked.”

With the advantage of hindsight, Faye says she now thinks that the break up in 2001 was actually “excellent timing”. She stated: “We left on the prime, despite the fact that it was painful on the time. I believe it was truly for one of the best and that’s the reason we’re right here as we speak! We lived to inform the story.”

Lee, too, says that H & Claire’s resignation got here as a mighty shock to him however is philosophical about what occurred. “I’m an enormous believer that issues occur for a cause,” he muses.

“I wouldn’t return and alter something, good or dangerous. It helps you develop, you study from errors.”

He added: “Was I prepared for it to finish when it did? I’d should say no. We had been all very harm, we had been all fairly shocked, and to be trustworthy, I actually didn’t imagine it for an extended whereas. I simply thought they had been having a second.

“I actually don’t like the best way it occurred, however I do suppose that issues occur for a cause. And had that not occurred I’m unsure we’d be right here once more now. We might have simply pale away.”

Virtually six months later H & Claire launched an album of their very own, One other You One other Me, however their former bandmates merely pretended it wasn’t occurring.

“To be trustworthy,” Lee pipes up. “I can’t title two songs off their album. I do know they’d a observe known as DJ, I believe. However I didn’t purchase the album, or hearken to it.” Funnily sufficient, neither, it turned out, did the file shopping for public – the album did not make the Prime 50.

Whereas her bandmates might have been secretly laughing their pants off on the disappointing efficiency of One other You, One other Me, Claire reveals that she was completely mortified.

“I used to be devastated by the best way the album did. I actually was. And that was the rationale why I finished doing music for a very long time. The lead-up to the discharge of the album had been so constructive. DJ was No.2. We had three Prime 10 singles and I believe the album was an excellent file. I nonetheless stand by it now.”

When the second single Half A Coronary heart halted at solely No.8, she remembers their label panicking and demanding on the eleventh hour that she and H file a super-Steps-sounding observe known as All Out Of Love, penned by the group’s writers, Carl Twigg and Mark Topham and Andrew Frampton.

Claire was heartbroken: “I actually hated it. I fought towards releasing it, which is bizarre now as a result of I believe it’s actually good.”

Claire retreated from public life and focussed on household. “That have actually scared me off music,” she recollects. “I’m not a danger taker, which might be why I’ve by no means launched any solo materials.”

Let’s take an opportunity on a contented ending

Ten years later, the group had been reunited for a confrontational Sky TV present the place they got here head to head for the primary time since that Manchester gig and ultimately cleared the air. The following UK tour was a sold-out success and their second biggest hits a chart-topper.

It regarded like Steps had been given a brand new lease of life. However their then supervisor Steven Howard (who had beforehand labored with Lulu) had different concepts and determined that it could be a good suggestion for them to launch an album of Christmas ballads to help a particular festive theatre tour that he had roped them into.

Gentle Up The World turned out to be much more disastrous than H & Claire’s solo effort. Claire stated: “We had this concept to do a Christmas album. Initially it was going to be filled with upbeat Phil Spector-type songs.

“However then our supervisor stated he didn’t need us to do this and wished us to have much less Christmas songs so it had extra longevity. That was silly and a mistake. He didn’t get us.”

So right here we’re in 2017, with a brand new album of dance songs, which they’ve launched by themselves and with out a label.

“We’ve utterly completely different administration [Peter Loraine who was behind The Saturdays] so we knew that it wouldn’t be prefer it was that point,” Claire says. “There was a little bit of umm-ing and aaah-ing about whether or not we must always have launched only a single, a repackage or an EP.

“Ultimately we determined {that a} model new album was one of the simplest ways to go. I’m glad we did because it’s actually an excellent album and the response to the one has been unimaginable.”

The file, which has been produced by The Alias, has been described as “all killer and no filler”.

“We had all the things to say about this album,” Faye explains. “It’s so thrilling. It’s the primary time we as a bunch might choose and select the songs that we expect the viewers desires.”

Their triumphant return marks the group’s twentieth anniversary and seems to have been orchestrated with foresight and panache -– in contrast to the Spice Women, whose personal twentieth anniversary celebrations collapsed when Posh and Sporty refused to enroll.

“We’re gutted they haven’t been capable of pull it collectively,” says Faye. “Our energy of getting a lot success this time is we’ve come again with the unique line up.

“We might by no means have reunited if somebody didn’t wish to do it. We all the time stated we’d by no means come again if somebody didn’t wish to. It was all or nothing, 5 or no one.”

And it’s clear that the love for the band stays, 20 years on. Why have Steps managed to maintain that fireplace burning within the hearts of their followers whereas the likes of S Membership haven’t?

“We had been trustworthy and open – that’s why the general public jumped on us greater than S Membership and Spice Women,” Lee suggests. “We had been having enjoyable, we weren’t attempting to be something apart from a pop band.

“In a manner, we had been type of punk rock, in that individuals beloved us regardless of the actual fact we did the other to what was deemed as acceptable and funky.

“It was like we had been sticking two fingers as much as the individuals who thought we had been garbage, figuring out that we had that loyal viewers behind us.”

And that loyal viewers have stayed true to this very day. And Lee understands why. Steps weren’t only a happy-go-lucky pop group. He reckons they had been a much-needed soundtrack and protected place for younger folks combating features of their lives.

Lee stated: “We’ve a giant homosexual following and now we have all the time had messages from folks telling us that we actually helped them throughout a tough time of their lives. I’m not saying we had been fixing third world issues however we had lots of people who actually took the band to coronary heart.”

So with the album out and filling the chilly gray world with color and heat once more, can we count on them to stay round a bit longer? “We’re going to play it by ear,” Faye teases.

“We didn’t suppose we had been going to get this response and we expect now we have a bit extra left in us. It seems to be prefer it’s extra constructive so it seems to be like there could possibly be extra after subsequent 12 months!”