Fact #167718

Colin Vearncombe (Black) : When I write, I wait for the bullet, like most people do; wait for the muse to strike and then after that is what makes people's songs individual. I don't think anybody can really say for sure where the ideas come from, but the more open you are to them the easier they come..

After that, actually finishing off a song is much harder than getting the idea for one. You've just got to get off your behind and walk about the streets on your own until you find some inspiration. And then, eventually, they come together, the music and the lyrics go hand over shoulder until they're done.

Wonderful Life was written in about five minutes in 1985. My wife had given me the words by dumping me, and I was descending into self-pity, and I caught myself just in time. Everything had gone wrong. I was homeless and didn't have anything. I was staying on people's floors basically.

And then, one afternoon, I just had that melody line that's in the chorus, 'No need to laugh and cry, it's a wonderful, wonderful life.' Bang! It was just there and I just worked it backwards from that point. It was absurdly easy.

The original four track demo was pretty much unchanged, just embellished later on when I was trying to get a publishing deal, but no-one would go for it.

They said they liked Wonderful Life but they didn't really care much for anything else. So I hung onto it and by then I was with my present manager, Steve Baker, who basically put himself on the line and, instead of paying money that was supposed to go to the taxman, we sat down and wrote out a schedule of two days recording in a 16-track and two days in an eight-track to do three songs.

So we went in and did them, including Wonderful Life, and made an independent single. We had met a couple of brothers who had some money and had always had a dream about owning an independent label, so we hooked up with them.

Then we managed to get a manufacturing and distribution deal, and hired a plugger and press person at a very low-key level, and it made No72 in the charts on its own.

However, we decided to pull it even though the phones were ringing, because we knew we wanted to re-release it at a later date with a proper chance - because basically an indie record in 1985 just got swamped.

So we started negotiations which eventually A+M won because they had one of the only guys with any real ears in the A+R Departments, Chris Briggs.

After a couple of experiments, they let me go off and make it on my own with my ex-partner Dave Dix in the producer's seat.

We took the recording that we already had and finished it off as we would have done if we'd had the proper budget, which was basically a remix and a couple of overdubs and that's the single that sold over a million copies.
(Source : Inspirations by Michael Randolfi, Mike Read and David Stark, Sanctuary, 2002)

Colin Vearncombe (Black) : Once you’ve had a hit, if you can write another song without having that in the back of your mind, you’re not crazy. It’s taken some time to be able to do that. For a long time, I would find myself hearing, ‘I like it, but it’s not Wonderful Life’.

It was surprising how little of the 'pop star' life was as I might have imagined it. I was frustrated by how few of the people that I ran into in the music world I respected. Maybe I just didn’t go to the right clubs. I’ve never been a great schmoozer or networker and the idea of setting out to meet a certain type of people is anathema to me.

I just wasn’t turned on by running into Sam Fox and Rick Astley everywhere. The highlight was meeting Roddy Frame, and he looked as pissed off as I was. It was two years of disappointment, not at all what I expected. I didn’t have any wild sex, I’m not a druggie, so I was just digging a hole for myself.
(Source : not known)