'Life couldn't be better' - Chas on new music and Spurs

The stars are certainly aligning for Chas & Dave this week.

Not only do the Spurs-mad ‘Rockney’ legends - Chas Hodges and Dave Peacock - have new material out on a new album for the first time in 30 years today (Friday 20 April), they are also playing to a sold-out Royal Albert Hall and 24 hours later, their beloved Spurs take on Manchester United in the FA Cup semi-final at Wembley – Spurs+FA Cup=Chas & Dave - it's all coming together.

To recap, Chas & Dave’s - first big hit was ‘Gertcha’ in 1979 with ‘Rabbit’, ‘Ain’t No Pleasing You’ and, switching sports, ‘Snooker Loopy’ all top 20 hits.

‘Ossie’s Dream’ was the first of many Spurs hits including the likes of ‘Tottenham, Tottenham’ (the follow up for the 1982 FA Cup Final), ‘Hot Shot Tottenham’ and ‘When The Year Ends In 1’. In total, there have been eight Top 40 hits and nine charting album.

Below: Chas & Dave outside the Royal Albert Hall

Now it’s time for another chapter with the album ‘A Little Bit Of Us’ out on Friday.    

Speaking this week just before rehearsals at the Royal Albert Hall, Chas, now 74, explained: “A lot of things have happened since the last album and this is the first Chas & Dave-produced album for a while now. The timing is just right.

“We had a warm-up gig for the Royal Albert Hall at The Borderline (club in London) on Sunday and people were singing along to the new songs. That’s great. That’s a good sign - the perfect sign.

“It seems like yesterday when we made our first album, it really does. My mum always used to say that, she’d say ‘back in the 1920s seems like yesterday to me’ and I say ‘how can you say that?’ but now I’m saying the same thing. She was right!

Below: Chas & Dave's new single 'A Little Bit Of Me'

“New fans are being born all the time and we’re being re-born as fans discover our old stuff. Now there’s brand-new stuff as well, well on par with all the old recordings. People have said ‘this is the best album you’ve done’ so how good is that at our time of life? It couldn’t be better.    

“We’re playing the Royal Albert Hall on Friday, sold out, Spurs doing well and in the semi-final - life couldn’t be better.”

Chas on.,,playing the Royal Albert Hall
“It’s like playing at Wembley, it really is. The last time we played there about three years ago I remember standing at the side of the stage when they were announcing us on, the roar was like a Spurs crowd! It was a great, great feeling.”

Chas on…music transcending the ages
“I’m on Twitter and I love it when kids warm you our music. They like it or they don’t like it! I hear almost weekly ‘my four-year-old daughter won’t go to bed until she’s listened to ‘The Sideboard Song’ or my five-year-old son loves to hear ‘Rabbit’ before he goes to bed. It’s great - we’ve new Chas & Dave fans being born every day!”

Below: Chas & Dave at the Lane with Keith Burkinshaw in the early 1980s

Chas on…hooking up with Spurs in 1981
“Both myself and Dave are Spurs fans and we ended up with a manager in 1978 called Bob England, who was also a Spurs fanatic. To cut a long story short, Spurs were doing well and when we started doing alright in the early 1980s, Bob said ‘how do you fancy writing a song for them?’ and it went from there. That was the start of the association. It was great. We got to know the players as well and we still know them now.”  

Chas on…still hearing 'Ossie’s Dream' at matches now
“I was sitting in the stand and a little kid about 10 years old was singing it. He didn’t recognise me or anything like that but he’s right there singing ‘Spurs are on their way to Wembley, Tottenham’s gonna do it again’ and I thought ‘yeah, I wrote that’. It’s part of the Spurs. I was nine when I first went up the Spurs, it never even entered my head that something like that would happen, that I’d end up writing a song that all the fans love singing. I wasn’t even playing then! I can’t picture the thought. So when it happens, it’s great.”

Below: Chas and Dave pitchside at the Lane Finale last May

Chas on…what Spurs mean to him
The Club means a lot to me. I was born on the border of Edmonton and Tottenham at North Middlesex Hospital and I first went up there when I was nine. I used to go and see the reserve matches with my brother. In those days, all the matches were at the Lane. My mum didn’t want me to go up there with the big crowds, so we went to the reserve matches, 5,000 there, a great afternoon. I remember we turned up one weekend and it was a first team match! I can’t remember who we played but we loved it. We got home and said to mum ‘we were alright, we looked after ourselves, can we go again?’ and she let us! Yes, I’ve great memories of Spurs.”  

Chas on…the current Spurs team
“On their day, they can beat anyone. I even Tweeted before Chelsea at Stamford Bridge ‘you do seem to have lovely surprises up your sleeves these days’, we were all hoping they would beat them and it was brilliant. They can do it and they do do it - that’s the feeling I get from today’s team.”