The musician puts on his old suede jacket and remembers his big break – and big hair
Born in Luton in 1956, Paul Young is the heart-throb responsible for some of the biggest chart hits of the 1980s. After the breakup of new wave soul group the Q-Tips, Young went solo, providing the opening vocals on Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas? and releasing the transatlantic smash Every Time You Go Away and the multimillion-selling duet with Zucchero, Senza una donna (Without a Woman). Paul Young and Go West tour the UK in May; he takes The Essential 80s Tour with T’Pau and Hue And Cry on the road in the autumn.
This was one of those endless teen magazine photoshoots. I have a vague memory of the photographer asking me to stand like that; it was quite a tight-fitting jacket made of a stiff suede so it was difficult to lift my arms up high. The clothes were bought at Johnson’s on the King’s Road, where Adam Ant got all his mad suits from. I would have styled my own hair, too – I’m quite particular about it. Even today, I’ve got the right kind of product, so if it blows about it goes back to its original place.
