The Welcome one and all to another episode of So Diaker on songwriting. This is Simon here with my trusty co-host

Brian and joining us today as a fine British singer-songwriter and guitarist who

enjoyed mainstream pop stardom as the frontman of Hercup 100 in the early 80s before reinventing himself as a respected solo artist.

As we record this, he's readying his ninth solo album for release, his first for nine years.

We are delighted to welcome the evergreen Nick Hayward to the show.

You know Nick's responsible for what are to my mind some of the greatest pop singles of the

80s. You'll get no argument from me friend. I mean you've got the

haircut 100 stuff love plus one fantastic day

favorite shirts which are just irresistibly fun breezy catchy pop songs then

there's the more introspective but still really cheerful stuff like Whistle down the wind on a Sunday blue half for a blue day from his first solo

album and he was only in his early 20s when he made those records

the bastard who's already demonstrating the real sophistication in the songwriting.

And he's done consistently great work ever since and his new album probably will be a worthy

addition to the Hayward discography, I'm sure.

Well, we'll be hearing more about that from the man himself shortly, but first we'll give you a brief biog.

Nick was born in Beckinham, South London in 1961.

He began writing songs around the age of 15 and played in a number of bands as a teenager

before co-founding Haircut 100 with bassist Les Neems.

With Nick's lead vocalist, guitarist and principal songwriter, the band signed to

Aristet in 1981 and released their debut album, Pelican West, the following year.

The record topped the album charts, yielded no less than four top ten singles and catapulted the band to fame.

However, success came at a price and a physically and mentally

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