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Tony Christie's career has spanned four decades and is still going strong today. His fame rocketed in the 1970s after numerous hits with the MCA label, including 'I Did What I Did For Maria' and 'Is This The Way To Amarillo', so much so he sold over 10 million records during that decade alone.
The 90s saw Christie jump back into the limelight with hits 'Sweet September' and 'Walk Like A Panther', recorded with All Seeing I and written by Jarvis Cocker, though it was in 2005 that Christie's legendary status was affirmed, with the Phil Kay inspired re-release of 'Is This The Way To Amarillo', which was released in aid of Comic Relief and which reached number one in the charts, outselling its previous release.
Christie is now set to release his new album, 'Made In Sheffield', with Richard Hawley, which features contributions from various Sheffield-based performers, including Alex Turner and Jarvis Cocker. Tony took a moment to tell us about his incredible career in our Same Six Questions.
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Q1 How did you start out making music?
I used to sing with my school mate. We would walk home from school together and he would sing the melody and I would sing the harmony. I also sang in the choir at my local Catholic church, so that gave me a lot of experience as we had to learn some quite complicated masses. From that I sort of graduated from being a double act, to a single act, then singing with various groups before going back to being a solo singer and making records.
Q2 What inspired your latest album?
The latest album project came about because I was making an album of covers of various well known songs. I planned to record Richard Hawley's song 'Coles Corner' because I loved it and later found out that he had sent it to me three years earlier, but unfortunately I had not been able to do it because of my commitments (it was in the middle of all that Amarillo madness). We asked Richard if he fancied producing that track for us and to our surprise he said, "Why don't we do an album of Sheffield songs, by Sheffield artists and writers?" We tossed the idea around and decided it was a great idea. Richard then said he would like to produce the whole album, so here we are.
Q3 What process do you go through in creating a track?
Once we have decided on the song, we, that is myself and the musicians, sit around and play with it until we find the right key and the right feel. Then we start to build up the track, almost like building a house, layer by layer until we are satisfied that it is habitable. This can sometimes happen very quickly or, if the song is complicated, it can take days and days (in extreme cases, weeks).
Q4 Which artists influence your work?
When I was very young, my dad came back home from the Air Force. He had been stationed in India and Egypt. He brought with him a huge collection of 78" records which he let me borrow from time to time. I used to listen to them for hours on end. My dad was a big band fan so I got to listen to Harry James, Glen Miller, Benny Goodman, Stan Kenton, and dozens of great bands plus, of course, the singers in them. The voice that changed my life was Frank Sinatra. His timing, his phrasing, and the pure musicality of his singing just mesmerised me. At the time all my mates were into Elvis but I had my own god, Franky boy. I really was into voices more than anything and could pick out any singer (if they were good) just by their voice. Ella Fitzgerald, Peggy Lee, Vic Damone, Sarah Vaughan, Mel Torme, etc. etc. I later got into rock 'n' roll and loved Little Richard and a very underrated singer called Brook Benton.
Q5 What would you say to someone experiencing your music for the first time?
To anyone experiencing my music for the first time I would say to them, "If you want to find out about any artist listen to their albums, not just the hit singles, because on the albums you will find out what the artist is really about".
Q6 What are your ambitions for your latest album, and for the future?
My ambition for my new album is to for it to reach a new audience that only know me by the poppy hit songs that get played on the radio. I want them to know that I can sing a bit. As for the future, I plan to record an album of my own songs (there's a couple on the new album) and hopefully, if they have the time, Richard Hawley and his co-producer Colin Elliot will work on it. Then I would be happy.
published november 2008
