The Original Bucks Fizz

The Stag

Sevenoaks

Cheryl Baker is recovering from running the Great North Run on Tyneside when Go! speaks to her from her Ightham home.

"It was alright," she says in a sarcastic tone, "and the whole event is fantastic but I can't say I enjoyed it, it was bloody hard work! But I'll do it again. After the run I spoke to Steve Cram and he said 'if you can do a half marathon, you can do a whole marathon'. I thought 'tell that to my knees!'"

But the energetic Cheryl is not just here to talk about running. The pop group which shot her to fame in the 1980s has reformed, with the exception of one member, and Cheryl is excitedly telling Go! that she will be bringing the Original Bucks Fizz to her hometown of Sevenoaks later this month.

Cheryl, along with the other members of Bucks Fizz, Mike Nolan, Jay Aston and Bobby G, is best known for winning the Eurovision Song Contest in 1981. But behind the scenes Cheryl says these were troubled times, with arguments and controlling management pushing the group apart. The line-up changed repeatedly and Bobby G went on to form his own group, using the name Bucks Fizz. Another later addition to the line-up, David Van Day, also went on to set up his own version, called David Van Day's Bucks Fizz Show.

And so now, with Cheryl, Mike and Jay all back together (and only Bobby conspicuous by his absence), they are forced to call themselves The Original Bucks Fizz.

It's all very confusing.

So you may wonder what inspired Cheryl and the gang to get back together after all these years.

"Well, we were asked," says Cheryl. "Last year we did a programme for Living called Pop Goes The Band and we met Jay again for the first time in 24 years."

At this point Cheryl points out that Jay herself is in the room with her.

"When she left the band she was happy to go and we'd come to the end of a really bad part of our career where we'd all been hurt in a coach crash and our records weren't selling as well and she just went.

"And 24 years later we were introduced to Jay again through this TV show and it was really so much better than it was before. I can't explain it, other than perhaps we'd all grown up.

"Then Mike and I decided we should go out as The Original Bucks Fizz and then it became the three of us."

Oddly, Jay lives in nearby Tatsfield and Mike lives in Broadstairs.

Almost immediately the group were asked by their record company to produce a compilation album. Another company then approached them about another album, mixing some of their old songs with some new material and yet another company asked if they would do a tour.

"All these years on, it seemed to be starting up again. '80s music is really popular again and bands getting are back together," says Cheryl.

"And it's not just people who grew up with that music. My kids are 15 and they love it!"

The Stag is somewhere very close to Cheryl's heart. As a local, she has supported the often troubled theatre through thick and thin and regularly uses it for her theatre productions with her company Bullfrog Productions.

"I love that theatre, it's fantastic. They didn't want us to play at The Stag – they wanted us to play at Bromley. But Jay and I pleaded with them because it's our local theatre.

"It's got a big heart, if you know what I mean. And there's been so much good feeling and people wanting The Stag to succeed this time. It's going to be lovely to do the show there."

The show itself is set to be a lavish production with extravagant costumes handmade by Jay.

"It's quite theatrical," says Cheryl with Jay prompting her in the background.

"It's not just us signing songs. We've got four sections. It opens with Rio, so it's like a carnival, and then we go into the Hollywood section and thirdly the Pop section – where we'll do a medley of Bucks Fizz songs. And it finishes with a section called Fantasy and that's where we'll do Making Your Mind Up."

So, it's an obvious question but will any skirts be whipped off at the end of the show?

"Well, I'm not giving too much away."

By Caroline Read

Thursday October 29 at 8pm Tickets £18.50 from 01732 450175 or e-mail enquiries@stagsevenoaks.co.uk