Born in Berkshire in 1971, Chesney Hawkes started his career at the age of 19, appearing in Buddy’s Song, a film that featured his single The One and Only. The song went on to top the UK charts for five weeks. His second single peaked at No 27, and Hawkes, dismissed as a one-hit wonder by the press, was dropped by his label aged just 23. In recent decades he has found a new audience at nostalgia gigs and tours. His first album in 10 years, Living Arrows, will be released on 28 March. He lives in Los Angeles and has three children with his wife, Kristina, a model and actor.
This photograph was taken at the start of everything, just as The One and Only was released. The expression on my face is of someone who has done 10 other shoots that day. I was tired, with dark circles under my eyes. The leather jacket became a “thing” – I used to wear it without a top sometimes, showing off the old six-pack. As for the hair, I probably blow-dried it, but there wasn’t a massive amount of work put in to achieve that volume.
When the song first broke, there was hysteria. I was 19 – younger than most of my children are now – and I found getting screamed at a very unnatural sensation to experience every day. I never got comfortable with the madness of the fans; I always just wanted to give them a cuddle, but I soon adjusted to the new normal. If I needed to leave the house I would get smuggled out in the boot of my mum’s car to avoid the paparazzi, or I’d sneak into the garden of the people who lived behind me. They would be sitting down having a cup of tea as I ran across their grass: “Is this all right? Sorry! Thank you! Bye!”
Losing privacy and freedom took a while to get used to. My life was not my own any more. All my friends were going to university and partying; ticking off those rites of passage, but I couldn’t even go to the pub. When you have that kind of fame, alongside a pop-starry look, strangers have visceral reactions to you. Sometimes those reactions aren’t good. So many of my friends got into scraps while standing up for me because some guy assumed I was looking at his girlfriend. Eventually, I got a bodyguard called Geronimo. He taught me how to scan a room and who to avoid.
I was quite precocious as a kid. I had an unflinching belief that I would make it as a musician. I think it was partly because I grew up around so many people in the industry: my dad is Len Hawkes from the Tremeloes, and my mum is Carol Dilworth, an actor who was in TV shows like Golden Shot and Sale of the Century. Gerry Marsden from Gerry and the Pacemakers was Dad’s best friend, and all the beat bands like the Searchers, Marmalade, Herman’s Hermits and Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich would hang out at ours.
My parents’ place was party central: sometimes my brother, my sister and I would get up to go to school and through the haze of smoke we would see musicians littered around the lounge. It was pretty wild. To people who haven’t experienced what I experienced as a child, it would sound overwhelming, but I didn’t know what a normal upbringing was. I only realised it was strange when friends came over and said: “Your family are fucking crazy!” For example, Mum did a photoshoot where she had her top off, a Page 3 type of thing. She was so proud of it she put it up on the wall. It’s still up now. Sometimes my band comes and stays at their house before we go on tour, and I have to say: “Don’t worry about Mum’s tits.”
My siblings and I had to be parents for ourselves at times, because Mum and Dad were a bit preoccupied with everything else that was going on. I don’t blame them at all: Mum was a party girl; Dad was often on tour and quite volatile when he did come back. I had to grow up fast, but I am so grateful for the madness – I had a great childhood, and their love made me who I am today.
One piece of advice that stuck with me from my dad was the phrase: “Don’t believe the hype”. It’s not real. None of it is, but I found out the hard way. After the craziness of The One and Only I got dropped by the label. I hadn’t followed up its success and I suddenly couldn’t get hold of anyone on the phone; the family I had for two years, the friends I’d met at the label, none of them wanted to talk. All of that tenacity and self-belief I had before was gone.
At the time, I pushed that hurt down, put the lid on and let it fester for years. During the mid- to late-90s, I tried to escape. I didn’t want anything to do with the name Chesney Hawkes, or to play The One and Only ever again. I wanted to be in Radiohead, so I formed other bands, turned my guitar up to 11 and shoe-gazed. I got into drugs and alcohol, too – nothing too extreme, but looking back it was my way of avoiding the trauma of it all.
At the turn of the century, I started to get inquiries to do university gigs as Chesney Hawkes. Initially I was not up for it. I figured the whole audience would be students who would have been no older than 10 when The One and Only came out. I worried they wouldn’t know who I was and that it would be humiliating. But I accepted a few gigs; probably because I needed the money. The setup was just me and my friend with acoustic guitars, and before we walked on the DJ would play banging techno music. I felt such trepidation. As soon as I stood in front of the audience, I saw a sea of Chesney Hawkes T-shirts and banners. From then on I never looked back. I did five years of student union touring and that boost kickstarted my confidence. I started recording my own music again and I realised I didn’t have to hide from being me any more. It was almost better the second time around.
Some people find it hard to get older, but I feel liberated. There was a lot of turbulence inside when the 1991 photo was taken; a lot of pressure to have another hit. For a while, I lost that unwavering belief I had as a kid, and I had been chasing it ever since. At 53, I think I’ve found it again. I didn’t want to know about The One and Only for a decade, but now I can appreciate that it’s a great record. In many ways, it’s not mine. I recorded it, but it has a life of its own. People often tell me it was the song they had played as their first dance, or at their family member’s funeral, or that it reminds them of their mum. It’s also a banger, so when I play it at gigs it raises the energy in the room. I am lucky to have it in the canon.
Back in 1991, my only priorities were making music and playing live. Those things are still important, but my life is centred on the people I love. In fact, my youngest son is my lead guitarist. One of my favourite things is to look over at my boy and watch him throwing shapes on stage. He definitely inherited the rock-star genes. Not from me – from his grandad!
