Marti Pellow and Wet Wet Wet are still as popular as ever

The Clydebank quartet – singer Marti Pellow, bass guitarist Graeme Clark, keyboard player Neil Mitchell and drummer Tommy Cunningham - had had an impressive run of classy, blue-eyed soul hit singles in the preceding couple of years: Wishing I Was Lucky, Sweet Little Mystery, Angel Eyes, Temptation, the chart-topping With a Little Help from My Friends (with Billy Bragg), Sweet Surrender, Hold Back the River.

Marti Pellow to perform Popped In Souled Out in Glasgow

Then there were the albums: the number one debut, Popped In Souled Out (it sold 2.2 million copies worldwide), The Memphis Sessions, Holding Back the River. The Wets would have four number-one albums in all: Popped In Souled Out, High on the Happy Side (1992), End of Part One: Their Greatest Hits (1993) and Picture This (1995).

The Glasgow Green concert was attended by an estimated 50,000 people. “As the huge searchlights swept across the city skies the thousands of fans trooping home from last night’s free concert will remember this great day of music for a long, long time”, wrote Bryan Burnett in the Evening Times. “… Wet Wet Wet could have come on stage playing a medley of Max Bygraves’s songs and still they would have gone down a bomb”. Other critics, such as the Herald’s David Belcher, were more critical.

Review: Wet, Wet, Wet, SSE Hydro, Glasgow

Some 600 youngsters were taken to first-aid specialists at the concert, suffering the early effects of exposure as the temperature dropped. The training officer in charge of the St Andrew's Ambulance Association's first-aid posts commented: "Most fainted because of the cold. They did not come properly dressed, many were wearing T-shirts and hadn't eaten properly through the day" Other casualties suffered broken bones or other injuries as the huge crowd surged forward.

Wet Wet Wet of course would go on, five years later, to have a colossal hit with their cover of the Troggs’ 1967 hit, Love is All Around, which topped the singles charts for 15 straight weeks between June and September 1994.

Much has happened to the band since then. Pellow has been a solo artist for years. Graeme Clark is the sole surviving founder member of the group, fronting a seven-piece alongside their highly regarded, long-serving lead guitarist, Graeme Duffin, and singer Kevin Simm, a winner of The Voice and formerly of Liberty X.

Marti Pellow (Image: PR)Pellow, who in his time had had well-documented issues with heroin and alcohol, has released around a dozen solo albums since 2001, beginning with his debut, Smile, with his 12th and most recent offering being Stargazer, released in March 2021. In it, the Guardian noted, he “pays homage to heroes such as Marc Bolan, Harry Nilsson, John Lennon, Curtis Mayfield, Anthony Newley and David Bowie in a series of self-penned songs”.

He has also become a star in the world of musical theatre, appearing on stages in Broadway and the West End.

Wet Wet Wet singer tells of his battle with heroin

In an interview with the Guardian to promote Stargazer he spoke frankly about his addictions. “February 14th, Valentine’s Day, 1998. Twenty-three years clean and serene,” he said. “You can say 23 years sober, but really the person who has the longest clean time is whoever gets up earliest in the morning. If you get up at 7am and I get up at 7.30, you’ve got the longest clean time, because it is about the day. Do I think I’ll ever beat it? No, I will always acknowledge it. Every day is a school day with addiction.”

He also recalled the fuss created by the Wets’ huge hit, Love is All Around, which was part of the soundtrack to the hit film, Four Weddings and a Funeral.

Wishing I was solo: Marti Pellow quits Wet Wet Wet

“I was in a cinema and the trailer came up for Four Weddings and a Funeral, and they played a bit of the song and a guy behind me went: ‘Ah, not that song again,’ and I turned round to him and said: ‘Imagine how I feel!’”, he said.

Asked if it was true that the band asked for the single to be deleted so as to terminate its reign, he responded: “Hell yeah, you’re darn tootin’, we did. We just thought it was time to give someone else a shot.”

Wet Wet Wet today (Image: Stuart Bennett/Deacon Communications)In March Pellow will take to the road with the Love to Love Orchestra, playing Popped In, Souled Out in its entirety. Fans at Glasgow’s OVO Hydro on Saturday, March 16 can expect a run through his old band’s peerless hits, from Wishing I Was Lucky to – yes – Love is All Around.

His old band, meanwhile, is also hitting the road in the New Year, co-headlining the Best of Both Worlds tour with Go West, whose own hits range from We Close Our Eyes, Call Me, and Goodbye Girl (all from 1985) to 1990’s King of Wishful Thinking.

The joint tour includes dates at Edinburgh’s Usher Hall on February 6 and Glasgow Royal Concert Hall the following evening.

To coincide with the tour, the band is releasing a limited-edition double vinyl album, Live in Denmark, recorded last year. It is available from the band’s website and will also be sold at selected dates on the new tour. In addition to Duffin and Simm, the 2024 version of the Wets features Matt Carter on keyboards and Simon Lea on drums.

In an exclusive interview with Retropop’s January 2024 issue, bassist Graeme Clark says: “I look at Duran Duran and I respect them because they’ve continually made new music over the last 25 years and it’s a testament to where they sit now.

Review: Wet Wet Wet, BBC at the Quay

“They’re out, they’re back on the road and playing arenas all over the world, and I think it’s because they’ve remained current”.

He adds: “If I could point to any problematic nature of where we were in the last 35 years it’s that we didn’t service that new music thing because there wasn’t the energy from the people that were there at the time. Now, I think the energy with the younger guys in the band, and for me it’s all about creating music”.

The songs themselves that will be resurrected in both Pellow's show and the Wets' gigs have lost little of their sparkle or appeal. Listening to them afresh, it's easy to see why the quartet became so big in the first place, and why the musicians have held onto their original fan-base while continuing to appeal to younger generations.

Surveying the Wets in his 2018 book Rip It Up: The Story of Scottish Rock and Pop, Vic Galloway concludes: “For over three decades pop fans loved the band while the critics baulked, but Wet Wet Wet remain incredibly popular”.

Marti at Glasgow's 'Big Day' music festival in George Square, June 1990 (Image: Newsquest)Indeed. As the band’s website observes, the Wets have sold in excess of 15 million albums and singles, spent some 500 weeks on the official UK charts, entertained more than four million people on world tours, enjoyed a sold-out run of 10 nights at the SECC, and played not only Nelson Mandela’s 70th birthday concert at Wembley Stadium and the Live 8 event at Murrayfield.

It is, however you look at it, a legacy that many other bands would kill for.

* https://www.martipellowofficial.co.uk/; https://wetwetwet.co.uk/

* https://retropopmagazine.com/wet-wet-wet-reflect-on-their-past-problematic-attitude-towards-new-music-while-readying-the-bands-eighth-studio-album-exclusive/