The 90’s were not a good decade for me. I’d had a tremendous run through the late 70’s and 80’s; the great surge of youth, punk revolution, the furious euphoric creativity of life with TMTCH. It was like leaping from stone to stone and landing in perfect rhythm each time. I was in a groove.

But as I turned into the 90’s, I felt the imperceptible click of a dial turning and suddenly I was in a different room. Right on cue, I turned 30 and the band split. Next thing I knew I was sleeping on a futon in one room of a damp house in North Acton. I moved to Brighton to blow my mind and my money, succeeding at both. I joined another band and kept writing, kept playing. That band, Liberty Cage, were underrated, overlooked and struggled to get out from under the shadow of what had come before. We couldn’t get a label, couldn’t get a publisher, could barely get a gig. But we kept at it.

And all the while the internal voice got louder. You’re 32. You could retrain. You could go back to education; move into management, be an agent, write books, get a job and move on. And every time I would answer; just six more months, just one more go, one more chance for something else to turn up. But, in the 90’s, nothing really did.

TMTCH reformed and made Never Born To Follow. It had some great moments but times had changed. The world shrugged, the label shrugged. I went back to the futon and the room and the nightly conversation and eventually I ran out of road and it was too late.

Thank God. Because that was when the dial clicked again. And, as my other options receded, I cleaned up, refocused and dedicated myself again to the thing I loved, that I could do. And bit by bit, year by year, I dragged myself back into the game.

Rock and Roll requires commitment. Faint hearts soon fade away. It’s a strange contradiction but, despite its reputation for dissolute fecklessness, you really cant do music properly without being reliable, hardworking and driven. Who’s there at Clapham Junction at 3.30 AM, waiting on the first train out? A musician, just finishing. Who’s that on the motorway at midnight, a long way from home? A musician. So it goes.

This is not some ‘follow your dream’ bullshit. You could just as easily be following your nightmare. Success and appreciation are usually a matter of chance. But loyalty to your identity is its own reward. You can sail if you pull your anchor out. But you can also sink.

Jennifer Grey is one of my favourite songs of those I wrote in the 90’s. I think it reflects how I was feeling in those days. To jump and hope, come what may; always searching for the harmony that comes with staying faithful to your groove.