‘Ever since Chas died, I’ve dreamt of him every single night’
Dave Peacock on life without his bandmate and best friend, singalongs with Princess Margaret and the ‘rockney’ duo’s guilty secret
sung in their own accent about things they knew. It was the beginning of Chas & Dave.The duo soon became known for that unique “rockney” style, which mixed pub singalong, music-hall humour, boogie-woogie piano and preBeatles rock ’n’ roll.
Their debut album, One Fing ’n’ Anuvver, was released in 1975 to critical acclaim. Rockney was also the name of their record label, which produced their major breakthrough single Gertcha in 1979.
It peaked at No20 and remained in the charts for eight weeks, the first of eight Top 40 hit singles including Ain’t No Pleasing You (No 2), Rabbit (No 8) and Snooker Loopy (No 6).
That same year, more than 200,000 people
HAPPIER TIMES: Dave with his wife Sue who died of lung cancer
turned up to see them at one of the largest rock festivals in Britain, Knebworth. “It was no big deal for us but we walked out on stage and I think we enjoyed it,” laughs Dave, modestly. “But at that time there was a need for good honest music and that is what we provided.
We never tried to commercialise ourselves or have any gimmicks.We just liked to play.” Their career opened doors, even leading to a “sing-song” with Princess Margaret at a charity gig in Birmingham. Dave recalls: “She asked us if we knew a song called Wot Cher! Knocked ’em in the Old Kent Road (a British music hall comedy song). “I started singing at her and the comedian Dickie Henderson was looking at me and shaking his head much as to say, ‘You don’t suddenly burst out singing’. But I sang it all the way through and she said, ‘That was my granny’s song’, meaning Queen Mary. I was knocked out about her liking a Cockney song.
“She was a right girl, Princess Margaret. I will never forget her puffing on a fag and eating at the same time.” By December 1982, the duo hit the peak of their popularity, appearing on primetime TV on the BBC and ITV’s biggest Christmas shows (Chas & Dave’s Christmas Knees Up). The Nineties saw them on gruelling tours in Britain,Australia and the US.
In 1999, they had another smash with Eminem’s My Name Is after the US rapper sampled British singer Labi Siffre’s 1975 track I Got The (Blues), which the pair had played on as session musicians.
“I remember playing bass on the track and that’s the bit that got sampled by Eminem on his first record,” says Dave. “But me and Chas never got paid for it because it was Labi’s track.”
Disappearing from the limelight, they reemerged in 2003 on Jools Holland’s New Year’s Eve music show Hootenanny. Dave says: “It was a great show to do, He had always been a fan of ours and everybody who was on it loved us. It was like we were acceptable.”
Then, in 2007, they played Glastonbury Festival, drawing in huge crowds. “We were the only band to do three different stages at Glastonbury in one weekend,” recalls Dave. “Everyone went mad for Rabbit and what knocked me out wasn’t the amount of people but how many knew all the words to the songs. People have said that Chas & Dave only appeal to a certain audience, but we had fans aged from five to 95.We used to get letters from a woman in Yorkshire saying, ‘My four-year-old daughter won’t go to sleep until she has heard one of your songs’.”
In September 2009, the band confirmed they were going their separate ways after the death of Dave’s wife hit him hard.
“I didn’t have the heart to continue gigging,” says Dave. “I love my music and I loved playing but I didn’t like being on the road and I really didn’t want to go up and down the motorway any more.”
HOWEVER, in June 2010, it was announced that Chas & Dave would reunite for one final tour in 2011. But the musical duo were dealt the cruellest blow when Chas was diagnosed with cancer of the oesophagus. “There was never an inkling this was going to happen to him. My darling wife never had a fag in her mouth her whole life and got lung cancer and so there are no rules. Everything is luck.
“Me and Chas both used to smoke cigars and he packed up 10 years before I did.”
Performing will never be the same for Dave, who lives quietly in the Hertfordshire countryside.
“I would never be able to perform Rabbit. It takes two clever blokes to sing that,” he admits. “One clever bloke is not here any more and the other who is left ain’t clever enough to do it on his own.
“I’m a bit of a recluse anyway. I live right in the middle of the woods. It’s just me and the dogs and the horses and the chickens.
“But I still play every day. It’s like a drug to me.When I get out of bed in the morning, I’ve got guitars and banjos lying all over the shop and I’ll pick one up. The hardest thing is knowing Chas ain’t going to turn up and start strumming away with me.”