“My confidence was very low come the end of ’82 when The Jam split. I didn’t know what I was going to do. My publisher phoned by and gave me a confidence boost so I had a go at writing some more songs. He got a band together for me. ‘Freak’ was the first single and did pretty well.

The album wasn’t bad, but there was no quality control. The label said they saw me as a solo artist and were behind me for four or five albums, they weren’t. It transpired they just wanted to cash in while I was still fresh in The Jam fans’ heads. Everything I was writing they would say, ‘Yeah, that’s great.’ I like four or five songs on the album, the rest were like a school report, could do better. But, it got me going again.”