Old Dogs, New Tricks: The Continued Resurgence Of FM

We may be living in a 'golden­oldie­age', where countless bands reform for one last hurrah, but few of those venerable acts have returned with the creative potency and commercial impact of Britain's finest AOR group, FM.

With the band currently touring the UK in support of their excellent new album, 'Heroes And Villains', we caught up with Steve Overland to chat about one of the most remarkable resurrections since Lazarus bolted from his tomb, how teen spirit halted pop-rock and the fight to stay relevant.

You had a good fan base back in the day Steve, so why did you split up in 1995?

Grunge came into play and started to take over, and we made the conscious decision that we really had nowhere to go. We could have carried on, selling out the same gigs, trudging around the circuit, but that's not what we wanted to do. We would have just been treading water. We all parted as friends and said: 'Look, let's see how the climate goes.'

I spoke with Kieran Dargan, organiser of Firefest, and he said he had to push very hard to get you guys to reform, which you finally did in 2007. Why the resistance?

Probably because we were all doing other things, and you've always got that thing at the back of your mind: 'Will people still want to hear what we did?' We created a bit of a legacy and didn't want to come back and ruin that. So we were like: 'We'll leave it another year, let's wait and see what happens.' We were doing everything to try and put it off.

I bet you're glad you relented. It was a magical night.

We didn't really know what to expect when we got on the stage as the headline band. It was the Saturday, which is the biggest night, and we were absolutely bricking it. We walked out at Rock City and couldn't actually start playing, everybody was just chanting. To realise, suddenly, that nothing had changed was a massive shock. We were completely overwhelmed and had to compose ourselves before we could start. So, it was the right time to stop and the right time to come back.

Your music since returning is as good, if not better, than ever. What's the secret?

When we reformed we made a conscious decision to create a new FM sound that was relevant today, incorporating all the old ingredients like melody and the stuff we did back in the ‘80s. I think we've achieved it with the crew we've got around us. We've had the same guy mixing all the records, he does everything from the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Kylie Minogue ­ and we try and make the albums sound as modern as they can, not taking the normal rock approach to mixing and production. We're always open to trying new things, and we're probably bigger now than we ever were. That positivity keeps us going. We keep writing, we're always itching to get to whatever the next thing is. So we're as enthusiastic as we ever were, probably more so.

Because you never had massive success, did you still have a point to prove?

Maybe, but we don't think like that. We take each day as it comes since we reformed, but it's been a bit of a rollercoaster ride really. We got back together not knowing how far we could take it and it's just gone from strength to strength. Record companies, big agencies, big management. We didn't have that in mind because we were away for 12 years. We don't dwell on the past and 'we should have done this' or 'we should have done that'. We always look forward, that's why every album we try and make it better. We're so happy to be where we are now.

And there’s been the BBC Radio 2 support.

Oh, it's fantastic isn't it? The Shape I'm In, the new single, is being played on Chris Evans, Ken Bruce, Steve Wright. We're the only 50-year-old rock band that are getting records played there.

Jeff Smith at Radio 2 is now a big supporter of the band, he's one of the main programmers there.

It's unbelievable how everybody seems to have taken FM on board at this stage in our career. We're getting 20-year-old people coming to see the band because it's on Radio 2, which is fantastic because we need the next generation of fans if we're to keep going as long as we can.

Let's talk about 'Heroes And Villains', which feels like a best of FM album with brand new songs. There are elements of all your past work. Was that deliberate?

Not really. Whenever we go in the studio, we don't have a set plan. We never say: 'Right, we need an anthem, we need two ballads...' We record everything and pick the album we think is the best piece of work from maybe 20 songs. We're very meticulous, a lot of ideas don't even make it to that stage. The quality control's quite high. We realise we can't afford to make a bad album because we haven't got 15 years to try and grab it all back, which is why we probably take a year and a half to make each record. But Life Is A Highway could be a relative of American Girls, it's got that vibe about it. There are some elements of the old stuff so you've hit the nail on the head.

Diggin' Up The Dirt musically nods to the ‘80s but is lyrically rooted in the present.

I went round to somebody's flat and all the magazines he had were Heat magazine, all this shite about who's got the most cellulite. We don't want to read about real news do we? Everyone wants to know who's put two stone on if they're famous. I had the title Diggin' Up The Dirt, because that's what they want to do – take photographs of people in compromising positions. It's not pleasant. I sat there and thought: 'I'm gonna write a song about this.'

There's some interesting new touches too – Fire And Rain has quite funky verses.

I quite like dance stuff, and one of the things for me is trying to get groove into songs. One of my big bands growing up were Free, who had great grooves on songs like The Stealer. So that song hankers back to that kind of ‘70s riff, but with a dance kind of groove over the top, with a piano thing over it. So trying to mix styles and eras of music as much as we can.

The album is bursting with great melodies – what's the secret to crafting them?

This will sound really cocky and blasé, but that's how we write. I start with a title then I'll mould the melody around that and work backwards from the chorus. I'll write the bridge, the verse, all backwards. All the people I've written with, like Desmond Child who wrote Livin’ On A Prayer with Bon Jovi, they all start with the chorus. The things that are gonna get the crowd singing. I learned a lot writing with lots of big writers and you've got to have that hook that everybody remembers. Melody for me is what gives a song life, makes it last forever.

Since you've been recording again Jim Kirkpatrick has been your lead guitarist. He's a real throwback to a time when solos were memorable and not an exercise in showing off.

That's exactly what he is, and he'd be thrilled you've said that because that's what he strives for. He's only a young man but has a very old head on his shoulders. He's a fantastic blues guitar player but he's also got the same ear for melodic playing as my brother [Chris] had in the early days. He always wants to know what the vocal melody is, because he bases a lot of what he plays around what the melodies to the songs are. He just writes these guitar solos that, if you're going to play that song, you've got to play that solo because it's the only one that fits.

Your rhythm work also adds an extra dimension as you're both doing interesting things that weave together well.

It's very important to me. You won't ever hear me and Jim playing the same guitar part live or on a record. You want something that counter rhythmically, and sound wise, creates something new in the song. That's part of the FM sound, it always has been. It's great fun coming up with all these arpeggiated guitar parts that go over a straight rhythm that maybe give you an off beat and make it sound a little different.

Fans love your new stuff, but the one criticism is they'd like to hear more of it live. How do you respond to that?

We'd like to play all the new album but we can't, that's the truth of it. Although we're going to try and play three or four off the new record, people want to hear the songs that got FM to where they are. The new stuff is what we get off on as well. I've been playing That Girl for thirty years, so I'd much rather play Diggin' Up The Dirt because it's new and fresh and what the band are about today. But we're gonna try our best to mix the set up and put as much new stuff in as we can.

What are the high points of the band's career?

There's been lots of them. The comeback gig in 2007 was a massive high. The tour with Bon Jovi, when 'Slippery When Wet' went to number one all over the world, we were with them. They were great guys and were as shocked as any band would be. It was an amazing feeling to see their complete transition from being a band that just had a name to being the biggest band in the world. Suddenly people were queueing down the street trying to get in the shows and it was like being on tour with the Beatles, everybody was going completely mad and the tour was fantastic for us.

And your lowest point?

Disappointment with the way things went in America when the two sides Of Epic were fighting, vying for who was going to control the band and the only people that lost out were the band. At one point it looked like FM were going to go do great things in America, but the American label thought we should be in America, and the English label wouldn't let us go. So we lost out big time, we really did. But these things happen. Do I lose any sleep over it, with the way things are now? I don't. I try not to think about the low points and just move forward.

And what does the future hold?

There's lots more planned for this year, it's moving at a massively fast rate and it's exciting. Being older just makes it all the more enjoyable. When we did the European dates with Journey and I walked on the stage and there's this huge arena, and Neal Schon's at the side warming up, I still get the same kick out of it. I never take it for granted. It's amazing to be able to do it again at this stage in my life.

FM Upcoming Tour Dates are as follows:

Fri May 08 2015 - NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE O2 Academy Newcastle
Sat May 09 2015 - MANCHESTER Academy
Sun May 10 2015 - LONDON O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire

Click here to compare & buy FM Tickets at Stereoboard.com.

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