Dave (DD) Little - The DD was bestowed on him by a former AXIS singer who likened his look and "unpredictable" temperament to one KK Downing of Judas Priest. Longevity is a rarity in the rock 'n' roll business but Dave has as he says, "served my time".
After leaving school, Dave spent the first four years of his apprenticeship in a shipyard. A tough environment but one that would focus him onto his music as an avenue for escape. "It was an eye-opener. I had expected to go to college. I wanted to teach but somehow found myself in this world of machinery, huge industrialised workshops, dark spaces in the lower levels of huge oil tankers. As the college route was frowned upon by my family, I was told 'get a trade it will be the making of you'!" The upside was a lesson in life and the formation of some enduring friendships. "The guys I met and worked with had a 'no bullshit' view of life, something that I find is a rarity in musicians. I still find their company refreshing". During this time, Dave met a guitar player who would have a major influence. "I worked with a guy in this shipyard, Kenny Relton. He was a fearsome guitar player, very blues based, loved Leslie West from Mountain. I was seventeen, I used to go out on the road with his band. He taught me a lot about attitudes to guitar playing and life, I am eternally grateful". Dave jammed around with bands, usually friends from the same shipyard, "We would put a band together, knock a few tunes out, it was fun. There was no master (Marshall!) plan, that wasn't the point. The guys I worked with in those long lost days were and are fine men". Dave's mentor, Mr Relton would turn up occasionally at gigs in years to come! "He would always berate me about too many notes, more feel and less noise".
The turning point for Dave would come with a meeting with Mike (Sandy) Sanderson, at the time the Manager of local band, White Spirit (The band that would eventually give the world Janick Gers of Gillan and Maiden fame). The two became firm friends and Dave would often travel with the band up and down the country, helping out with whatever needed doing at the time. "That was so good, seeing this band develop and become a really powerful outfit. That whole comradeship thing and 'surviving no matter what' appeals to me". Dave now had the blueprint, a manager with a wealth of experience to draw on, and an up-and-coming hot guitar player in Janick Gers who he could watch and learn from.
The chance soon came. Local Blues band, Axis, were looking to recruit a second guitar player. "I went for the audition, I remember having to learn a couple of Scorpions tracks, Deep Purple, UFO". The chemistry was right! "I realised that the other guitar player, Mick Tucker, was very special. I knew I could work with him, learn from him and create something different". Dave had darker designs for the Axis image. "I wanted to get away from that blues thing, create our own image, our own sound, I wanted it to be harder edged".
Axis Logo © & designed by Bob Saint (see our links page)
It worked. Within six months, Axis had been signed by Neat Records, one of the strongholds of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. Axis were one of their very first signings. They were, by the label's standards, an unusually professional, though not all that heavy metal sounding group. Founded in the late 70's and making their name on the circuit as a solid blues band dishing out slices of Hendrix and Robin Trower but only really finding their true direction when Dave joined in the later part of the 70's.
Davy & Mick (Axis)
Dave was now a contributing songwriter within the band and the main lyric writer, "My fondness for writing lyrics came about as a necessity. We had singers who could only write about one thing, I wanted it sharper, more imagery, words are a wonderful tool".
Mike (Sandy) Sanderson could only help so much. As White Spirit were snapped up by MCA and he had obvious workloads and commitments, Axis needed their own manager. They found him and acquired the services of an uncompromising manager in John J. Lancaster who shared a similar outlook on life to Dave (its our way or no way!) "Sometimes friendships are forged in fire, ours was and it prevails to this day".
"So grab your beer and ringside seat
We're back home at the Buccaneer Bar
Rose Cross and symbols of the dawn
Deals signed in the glare of the Dog Star"
He steered the band to success and Axis were one of the leading finds in the NWOBHM. Their single "Lady" hit number one in many countries in Europe. Endless tours followed, along with endless line up changes "and endless fun" but with the "Axis" of Tucker, Little and Lancaster staying true to the cause. Until................ Mick Tucker left the fold. He replaced Janick Gers in White Spirit as Janick replaced Bernie Torme in Ian Gillan's Band. It was a savage blow. It had seemed the band had got it right at last. They had cut out the keyboards and had a versatile new singer, Sam Blue. "Mick was very important to the band. It didn't feel right going on. Anyway we were partied out, we'd had the best of times".
"Raise your glass of beer on high and seal your fate forever
our best days had passed us by, the golden age of leather"
At least Axis could be said to have served as a good training ground for its musicians, who later re-emerged individually in higher profile bands like The Pauline Gillan Band, Samson, White Spirit and Tank.
Dave's contacts in London had told him that Ian Gillan's sister was looking to put a band together. He auditioned and the deal was done. "The drummer (Keeth Naylor) and other guitar player (Davy Bell) were great musicians. We needed another great musician and I knew exactly who we wanted." The answer was an outstanding classically trained musician, Chris "Wiz" Wing. "There wasn't an instrument that Chris couldn't play - violin, piano, bass, a truly talented man, he gave us depth and a different view of songwriting".
As in all rock 'n' roll stories luck is everything, Deep Purple's reformation for the "Perfect Strangers" album elevated the Pauline Gillan Band immediately. "It was very fortunate, Pauline knew that the link was always going to be a 'story' but she didn't ever exploit it. It was the record company that insisted we use her name". This became a problem, as the press would constantly compare her to her brother, "A difficult situation for Pauline, to be compared to one of the world's greatest rock vocalists but if we took the fast track to popularity then it was inevitable. I felt for her, she was true to herself and a very strong woman. She needed to be, I admire her greatly, I miss having those people in my life".
The Pauline Gillan years were a great success. The band toured Europe and England year in, year out, "We had a great time. The band were powerful, tight and really rocked. I wanted John (Lancaster) involved as he knew the business and got things done and it worked". Powerstation, the PGB's record company had ideas that would, they thought, give greater success in Europe "They were always after turning us into a euro pop/rock band, more keyboards, more sampled drum sounds, less clothes for Pauline, (There's a surprise!). They even suggested other musicians recording a hit pop single. F*cking outrageous! I disliked those people immensely".
The band had great reviews for their debut album, "Hearts of Fire",....."What the Pauline Gillan Band have going for them is great songs amped up on the razor edged guitar strafing of lead player, Dave Little and the honest intensity of Pauline's throaty vocal delivery.....Lady of the Night is epic, chilling attempts at a chilling guitar solo, orgiastic and strangely old like great wine ........the band build and build while Little and Gillan do what they do best, throwing their cares to the wind and melting like rock and pop snow" (Mick Wall, Kerrang)......."Adepts of masterly melodic rock" (Derek Oliver, Kerrang). The follow up album was written darker, harder hitting. The record company were anything but pleased. "The songs we had written rocked, Pauline was really at her best. They were products of a band on the road, working together, fighting together, drinking together, exchanging ideas on life and the afterlife! Obviously too much reality for a graduate in a record company A & R department, bless em!"
Dave became more disillusioned with the business with every passing year. Personal problems for Dave and for some of the band members were coming to an inevitable conclusion. "My disillusionment came about not because the PGB weren't making it. I don't have a picture in my head of what making it is about. I'm a musician, I was living a decent life, we were working. It was dealing with so many devious, slippery people who would lie about everything. The whole damned business was full of them. They say that opinions are like arseholes, everyone's got one. Well if that's the case the people that I dealt with had a plethora of arseholes!!
The Band staggered on in its death throes. Powerstation were losing interest. The band were thrown a lifeline by Producer, John Spence (Mostly Autumn, Bill Nelson and Producer of the "Hearts of Fire" album) and his company Cue Rain. They demo'd some hard-hitting tracks at Fairview Studios, England, "John (Spence) was wonderful. He believed in us and I thank him from my heart. He is one of the best producers. We got back to basics, rocking, intense, dark., I liked it, but record companies weren't interested. There's a pattern here". Pauline was becoming marginalised by the pressure. "We lost each other and we lost something of ourselves in the record company process. It just faded away to nothing. I will feel bad about that situation and how we all went our seperate ways for the rest of my life".
The band continued to write and work with a succession of girl singers, Lorraine Crosby of Meat Loaf fame being one. All of them were top session singers but the chemistry was gone, "I seemed to be in a world of female singers. I didn't know what was going on. My head was somewhere else at the time but I will never ever make the same mistake again! We were chasing the "hit" and it doesn't work. The sad, sad part of it is that it has a fallout on the friendships of the people in the band".
Dave left the business, and headed home from London back to his native North East, "I wanted normality and straight-talking people and that's the place to get it. From the late 70's to the 90's is too long in that madness. Sometimes I think that rock 'n' roll is such a barbarian, pagan art form that merely alluding to the underworld can get you there. Ask Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain. Ask the two suicide boys who listened to Judas Priest day and night and saw something in a working class, Brummie boy's lyrics that was so profound they took a shotgun to themselves. Suicides who die listening to your lyrics, thats not good.... but it's good for album sales. It's like the story when you're a kid, 'hey, don't f*ck with the Ouija board', invariably you do and you have a bad experience, Hey kids, listen to your mother, rock 'n' roll is bad for you, get a trade"...............
Twelve long years passed, Dave occasionally picked up the guitars but nothing would entice him back into the game. "I became pretty reclusive, kept out of the way, did my own thing, didn't return calls and kept away from musicians. It was good for me. I have a problem with 'muso' types. If you want conversations about string gauges, the splendours of a 19?? Strat or Les Paul, the varying degrees of sound from valves and transistors, how you use gold plated guitar leads because 'the tone' is better, how you really wanted to be in an original band and write your own stuff but this tribute band will do for now, or how you came second for the Whitesnake/Black Sabbath/Iron Maiden/Scorpions job and 'of course' they have put you on file, then talk to someone else! Read your Guitar Monthly magazine, jump around with your guitar in front of a mirror or trawl the "sinternet" for your panacea, but don't waste my time! However, if you want to talk about life's multi-faceted panorama, how you have triumphed over life's many adversities, your contribution to life or your thoughts on life in general, then I'm your boy but I will not listen to bullshit!"
And now..............The Lies of Smiles Project has evolved and moved on.....its a great place to be, we do it because we can! Simple! At this time in my life I have the most important people around me. We have a great band, great friends, we had a ball recording Cross & Claw with"Sir" Fred Purser. But I know .........the story doesn't end here.........................
