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‘That’s the Christmas No 1!’ How East 17 made festive favourite Stay Another Day

Brian Harvey said, ‘I’m not singing this shit!’ – and threw his headphones on the floor. It took two days to get the performance out of him

The dance era was coming to an end and Britpop was exploding, but then this American rock band Extreme had a huge hit with a power ballad, More Than Words, so I thought it would be OK to break the mould. The title was bouncing around my head because a friend’s father was dying in hospital but suddenly rallied and survived another 24 hours: he was obviously trying to stay, which broke my heart. The single’s artworkThere is nothing Christmassy about Stay Another Day, but I remember talking to producers Ian Curnow and Phil Harding about the production and telling them I envisaged an orchestra and a big crescendo.

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