Get the latest gossip

‘It knocked Eminem’s Stan off No 1’: how we made Can We Fix It? by Bob the Builder

‘I was sitting between Annie Lennox and Stevie Wonder at the Ivor Novellos awards when Bob the Builder won bestselling single of the year’

This was when you could make an actual phone call from the aeroplane, and I had to speak to Neil Fox on Capital FM’s chart show, as Bob, about what it was like being Christmas No 1. I worked with Richard Briers on an animation called Coconuts, which led to me doing the music for Noddy, the BBC’s flagship children’s show in 1991, and in 1998, I was asked to pitch for Bob The Builder. When Barack Obama came into office and started to say “Yes we can”, all the time, I said: “Here’s an opportunity – we could phone up Bruce Springsteen and see if he wants to record a version.” But Hit Entertainment, who owned the rights, weren’t biting.

Get the Android app