Madness - Glasgow 1980
Because I worked for the Specials I knew the chaps in Madness from the Two Tone Tour, but I took few photos as they had their own favourite photographers and I did not want to intrude.
Then they quit the Tour and were replaced by Dexy's Midnight Runners, another great band from that era, with a leader who had more passion than anyone I had ever met.
When Madness subsequently went out in their own tour I was commissioned to photograph them. To be honest anyone could have done these guys, posing came naturally and they had a cohesion that made for great photos every time. But instead of the action packed photos they were used to doing I decided to simply take a photo of their heads, this picture was done in a couple of minutes backstage in Glasgow.
Not long after this I ended up on a train to Oxford with them, I was just going to their show and had no cameras with me. I got talking to Suggs and Kennedy's assassination came up, he had little recollection of an event that causes everyone from my generation to remember exactly where they were when they heard the news.
Then it dawned on me, Suggs was the first person I knew who was born in the 60's, not the 40's or the 50's. I realized that he was part of the next generation, and at the age of 27 I felt old for the very first time.