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Flying Fox to Shakin’ Stevens
By now Ronnie had begun to work with Carlo Little again in his band “Flying Fox”. During this period Ronnie met Stuart Coleman, a friend of Carlo’s and bass player to Shakin’ Stevens (Shaky), and also a Radio London DJ. Stuart was to produce a new album for Shaky and asked if Ronnie had any material he thought might be suitable for the album. Ronnie said yes and so a meeting was arranged, along with their wives, at Stuart’s house.
Ronnie in 1976. The guitar is a Yamaha FG160, modified to an electric semi by friend Mike Wells, on which Ronnie wrote all his songs.
After a particularly nice
evening meal, they went into the music room where Stuart played Shaky’s new song, “This Old House”, ahead of its official release.
Ronnie played Stuart some tapes, but none of the demos were quite what he was looking for. Ronnie then said that he had just been working on his latest demo session. He had his guitar in the car and sung “You Drive Me Crazy” live to Stuart, who loved the song and said he felt Shaky would like it too. He asked Ronnie to let them have a completed demo as soon as he could.
Two weeks later, Stuart Coleman took the demo tape to CBS Records for Shakin’ Stevens and Muff Winwood, head of A&R for the Epic record label, to hear for the first time.
CBS needed a follow-up to Shaky’s massive hit “This Old House” and at that meeting they all agreed that the song could be the follow-up single. Shakin’ Stevens recorded it a few weeks later.
Shakin’ Stevens’ number one hit “This Old House” was in the UK charts for 17 weeks. The follow up, “You Drive Me Crazy”, went straight into the charts, going to number 2 and becoming Shaky’s second Gold single, selling over half a million copies in the UK.
The song went on to win Ronnie Harwood an Ivor Novello award (shown above) for the most performed work in 1981. “You Drive Me Crazy” enjoyed phenomenal success throughout Europe and has been covered by many artists, including instrumental versions by James Last and Klaus Wunderlich!
Several of Ronnie’s songs were also being covered by popular Scandinavian artists including Swedish star Jerry Williams, who was also being produced by Kenny Denton.
Arista’s Angel
In 1982 Ronnie signed a singles deal with Arista Records. “White Sport Coat”, written by Marty Robbins, was released, becoming a radio hit and going on to achieve moderate sales success. “White Sport Coat” featured the Darts on backing vocals and musicians Billy Bremner (guitarist with Dave Edmunds Rockpile) and Hot Chocolate guitarist Harvey Hinsley on guitars, Mickey Burt (Chas and Dave) on drums and Gavin Povey on piano. Later that year Arista released Ronnie’s composition “Cuddle Up”.
Winston Lee, head of A&R at Arista, preferred the stage name Ronnie Angel and so Harwood became an Angel for these two singles.
A promotional photo of Ronnie taken to support
the release in 1982 on Bell Records of ‘White Sport Coat’,
written by Marty Robbins and released under the stage
name of Ronnie Angel.
Ronnie’s career in music was on the up but he was careful not to rely on it too heavily in terms of securing the future family income. The TV aerial business might seem pale in comparison to a recording contract but it had brought financial stability in the notoriously unpredictable life of a musician. Having built a good reputation locally, it wasn’t something Ronnie was about to let go, and so North West Aerials was formed.
The Ron Harwood band was still going strong and playing regular gigs. Ronnie played at the wedding of Whitesnake guitarist Micky Moody in 1982 alongside Bob Young, who co-wrote “Caroline” and “Down Down” for Status Quo.
Micky Moody often played on Ronnie’s demos and had played lead guitar on the demo of “You Drive Me Crazy” and “My Cutie Cutie”. The photo to the right shows, from left to right, Pete Parkes (lead), Bob Young, Mike Wells (drums), Ronnie Harwood, Al Jarman (his head only just visible) and Tony Hall (saxophone).
Bob Young sharing a joke with Ronnie
at the wedding of Whitesnake guitarist
Micky Moody in 1982.
Text and all images © RonnieHarwood.com