‘There were fist-fights down at CD:UK’ – 90s pop remembered by those who lived through it

Formed in May 1997, Five, AKA Ritchie Neville, Scott Robinson, J Brown, Sean Conlon and Abz Love, released their debut single Slam Dunk (Da Funk) just six months later and found themselves living in a house together as teenagers. The band’s 11 UK Top 10 singles, three Top 5 albums and two arena tours spanned less than a four-year period. That it ended in burnout, depression and fist-fights was hardly surprising given their light-speed ascent. In recent years, there has been a happy ending of sorts with Neville, Robinson and Conlon reuniting as a three-membered Five and releasing a new album last year. But it all started out via five lads standing out from an initial crowd of 3,000 wannabes that featured a pre-fame Russell Brand among their number …

Chris Herbert (manager, Five) The idea [behind Five] was Boyzone were going to bring you a bunch of flowers and Five were going to fuck you against a wall down the side alley. Girls love a bad boy and boys could relate to it. Musically it was going to be harder and tougher.

Scott Robinson It was an audition I’d found in the Stage and it was looking for the Spice Boys. I remember wearing a grey Kappa tracksuit – I’m from Essex – and some white Reebok Classics. I had a cropped haircut that I gelled down, which looked horrific.

Ritchie Neville I turned up and it was a media circus. There was press there and a Spice Girls tribute band performing. I was in this queue just going, “What the hell is this?”

Scott J was breakdancing, which is hilarious because he went on to really not like fame and stuff like that. Everyone was standing in a semi-circle and J was in the middle doing head-spins.

Sean Conlon I saw Abz at my audition. He had some sunglasses on and looked a little bit like how Peter Andre used to dress. He really stood out from the whole queue.

Scott Russell Brand was there. He denies that now. Which is funny because he’s done some dodgy things in his career and auditioning for Five isn’t the worst thing he’s done.

Ritchie At the time, pop bands had always been five people, so they wanted to do something different and have four people. But they couldn’t decide which one of us to lose, so they kept it as five. Which is one of the reasons we called ourselves Five.

Scott I remember Simon Cowell was [at the audition] and he said, “You’re the band, I’m signing you to RCA Records on a five-album deal, this is happening very soon.” We auditioned in May and by Christmas we were Top 10 in the charts with Slam Dunk (Da Funk). It was so quick that it was too quick, actually. That’s why it didn’t last.

Sean We had a lot of moments when we really did get on but there were bits of testosterone and bits of friction here and there. Just lads living together trying to find their feet. It wasn’t always great but we did have some laughs.

Scott It was funny but it was mental. Put five young teenagers in a house with no parents and see what happens. There’s a lot of drinking, but also a lot of work. We worked so hard.

Ritchie They wanted a band with edge and that’s what they bloody well got. We’re all very strong characters so eventually there’s going to be those eruptions. We were young, we didn’t have that level of maturity.

Scott When we got into that band, even when money was coming in, we were given £100 a week to live on. I had had a couple of jobs as a pot collector at a local social club, then I ran a burger wagon, so I was always trying to make money. Sean was 15. He’d never seen £100. I remember him going, “Have I got to share it?”

Ritchie Most bands take off in the UK, then Europe, they might go to Asia, and then after a few years, if they get really successful, America comes knocking. Whereas the whole world knocked for us at the same time. It sounds like fun, and it was, but it was genuinely us waking up on a coach and not knowing what continent we were on.

Chris Herbert It burned them out. In hindsight, I would never do that again. We took on too much too soon.

Sean There were frictions within the band. And between the band and management. Then the band and the label. Frictions everywhere.

Ritchie We had America on a plate. But it was like a self-destruct button with some people. Like, “I’m going to do everything I can to fuck this up. I’m going to be obnoxious and rude, I’m going to disappear at a huge photoshoot with a major US magazine.” To the point where the label came in and were like, “You fucking British guys are a bunch of twats and you can fuck off.”

Scott There would be rows that would break into fights. And J would always be in the middle of that. There were points where a couple of us would be recording and then we’d go and the other three would come in.

Ritchie I personally harbour no ill-will to J or Abs. I would want nothing more than to hear that they’re happily getting on with their lives. J was quite a domineering character and he wanted things done his way. He was willing to get that point across in a physical way sometimes.

Simon Jones (former publicist for the TV shows SM:TV and CD:UK) They definitely had fist-fights down at CD:UK. They had to be separated a couple of times. And it would always be threatening to kick off with other bands as well. They were punching each other. Stories would naturally occur, which we’d then give to the tabloids. I’m sure I gave that story about Five having a fight to them because it mentioned SM:TV and CD:UK, so I’d done my job.

Scott Back then, the fans didn’t want to have a conversation with you as if you were a normal person. I had my face and my neck scratched, like I was bleeding because they just wanted to say, “I’ve got Scott’s hair under my nails, yay!” Once I had my shoe stolen by a fan. We were on tour in Italy. I knew whoever stole my trainer was in the audience. So I went out on stage and said, “I am not going to sing Until the Time Is Through until I get my trainer back.” From the very back of the arena, followed by a spotlight, this trainer got carried across people’s hands.

Chris Herbert I knew the band were exhausted. But they were also becoming hard work as well. I couldn’t recognise whether it was pure exhaustion, whether they were suffering mentally, or whether they were just playing up. It was a combination of all those things. There was also a bit of bullying going on.

Sean We had just come back to do a new album [Kingsize] and I was really struggling with anxiety, feeling overwhelmed. We didn’t really have any help, you know, so the other guys in the band said I should go and see a counsellor. Back then, it was unheard of. So I went to see a counsellor, saw a psychologist and they were the ones who signed me off and said he’s not mentally healthy enough to come back and work.

Ritchie We’d started the promotion for Let’s Dance and they paired me with Sean to sit with the journalist. The journalist asked, “How are you guys doing?” Sean sat there with his head down and he was like, “Yeah, yeah, I’m fucking good, man,” and he just kept repeating, “I’m soooo fucking good.” Then he got up and walked off. Afterwards I went to the tour manager and he was like, “He’s in the van, he’s going home, he needs a bit of time.” I still didn’t understand it at this point. We were told he didn’t want to be bothered by anyone or anything, he just wants space. So we respected that. Then he never came back.

Scott We had to lie and tell anyone that asked that Sean had glandular fever. We knew that he was having a breakdown and he’d left. But the label wanted to make sure that Kingsize was going to sell so they said we couldn’t tell anyone.

Ritchie Most people only see the videos, where you’re selling a dream. It’s a happy place. But you might have been crying before that take and the makeup artist says, “Come on, you’ve got puffy eyes, let’s get that sorted,” and then you’re back in dreamland.

Sean The label were in a rush and they didn’t want to wait, so they convinced the band to use a cardboard cut-out of me [in the video for Let’s Dance]. It did hurt a little bit. It was like the label saying, “Well, he’s so miserable anyway and he’s not smiling and he’s so quiet that he might as well have been a cardboard cut-out.” That’s what it felt like to me.

Scott I was also struggling. My eldest son was in intensive care because he was born six weeks early. He was really poorly and I remember a call when I was at the hospital looking after him saying, “You’ve got to go on CD:UK and perform,” and I was like, “I couldn’t give a fuck, I’m not doing it.” I ended up doing the performance. I was crying in the corridor and I think Rich looked at the boys and said, “This is done.”

Sean Simon Cowell was quite bitter about it back then. I don’t hold anything against him; he was younger and he had his eye on the prize. I think he looked at me like, how could I not appreciate everything I’d been given by him? But I just needed a little bit of help. I literally went from school to the next minute being on TV and really famous, but still a child.

Ritchie At the time, it was really hard, but it’s almost like it’s giving back now. It’s nice now.

Sean I definitely don’t regret being in the band. I wish that I could have found the strength to not have to leave. But it’s not a regret because I had to do it. If I could change anything, I would put myself in a better place to handle it, you know.

The Brit awards have always prided themselves on their unique collaborations, and the 1999 show was no exception, as Steps, Cleopatra, Billie Piper, B*Witched and Tina Cousins donned their finest highly flammable satin flares for the four-part medley, Thank Abba for the Music. If that riled up the “real music” gatekeepers, they would soon get their own back when Belle and Sebastian caused the biggest award show controversy since Jarvis Cocker waggled his posterior near a Jesus-aping Michael Jackson.

Claire Richards (Steps) There was a real snobbery around pop. People like the Spice Girls, you can’t ignore that volume of success, so they had to acknowledge them in a way, but everybody else was never given as much attention. We were selling more records and selling out more arenas than quite a lot of those acts who got their moment.

Pete Waterman (music industry impresario, and the man who signed Steps) They used all the acts doing Abba to get the audience, because that was the big thing at the time – B*Witched, Steps and all that, it was enormous. They knew there were no big acts to get the kids watching TV so they put them on. But it was more, “Get them on and get them off as quick as possible.”

Ian “H” Watkins (Steps) That night was crazy. It was definitely us versus them. The room was full of the coolest people in the world and there was us. I filmed all the rehearsals, so there’s Lisa and I watching Cher, backstage footage of Stephen Gately playing the slot machines and us rehearsing with Billie Piper. I just couldn’t believe my luck – this iconic show and they had us on there. And they didn’t really do pop. Those cool cats, the bigwigs, they don’t like pop.

Claire It was one of the first public votes using the internet [for British breakthrough act]. We were being told constantly that we were going to win. No one told us what order the awards were going to be done in. Everybody that was in that category was in our performance pretty much. So we were all stood backstage [ready to perform] and someone went, “Is that our award [being read out]?” We found out we hadn’t won and then we had to go out and do Abba.

Stef D’Andrea (joint owner of Belle and Sebastian’s former label, Jeepster) We got an invitation from the BPI. We thought it was a bit peculiar. Radio 1 were promoting [the award] and saying you can vote for your favourite via phone voting and via the very new form of internet voting. A lot of Belle and Sebastian’s fans were 14 to 20. A chap who worked with us called David understood where the internet was going. He had started the band’s mailing list, which the fans would join and have these great long chats. So the suggestion came from one of these chat rooms – why don’t we spread the word to all the Belle and Sebastian fans to vote via Radio 1’s website?

Mark Beaumont (writer for Melody Maker and NME) It was the first show of strength of the internet because the Brits were the establishment stronghold and here was Belle and Sebastian using the weight of their fanbase to break the stranglehold of pop. I think it was the first high-profile example of the internet being used to shift culture.

Claire No one had even heard of Belle and Sebastian.

H Who were they again? Who?!

Pete Waterman Had I heard of them before? No. Had anyone? No. Did I care? No. I felt sorry for Steps.

Claire I remember Pete Waterman going crazy and causing a real stink because if it wasn’t us who should have won, Five were in that category, Cleopatra. It was all the new pop of the time. No one could believe it.

Pete Waterman I wasn’t surprised [when Steps lost]. I’d made it quite plain that I thought the Brit awards were basically the major labels patting themselves on the back and that was proved.

Stef D’Andrea We were literally one man and his dog. Me and my friend started [the label]. We were in a tiny rented office in west London, we had two teenagers working for us and that was it. It was probably the last shocking moment at the Brits really, after the Jarvis incident and the John Prescott Chumbawamba thing [Prescott received a cold shower at the 1998 awards].

H There was a lot of controversy around it and Pete went to town.

Stef D’Andrea We then went back to our office and suddenly all these phone calls started coming in from the Mail and the Sun, asking for comment. It was like, “What? Who is Pete Waterman? What is he saying?” When I told the band about it they all pissed themselves laughing.

Pete Waterman To apologise for the year before, you then dream up a new category [biggest selling live act]. How does that work? I thought that was nonsense. That was an even bigger insult than not giving them the award in the first place.

H When we did win that award a year later, they told us to pay to get a physical copy of it. So it was £500 each and everyone paid for their one, but I said, “No, stick your Brit award, I don’t want one, thank you.” I’m not paying for something I’ve won.

Mark Beaumont If you see the indie versus pop thing as a bit of a battle, which to some degree it was, it woke the pop world up to the potential of what could be done with the internet. Over time, they certainly weaponised that.

Pete Waterman If nobody loves you, you don’t care, do you? If people hate you, then you know there will be no good reviews written about you so you don’t have to read reviews or care what people think. There’s no point, you know where you stand.

Reach for the Stars by Michael Cragg is out on 30 March, published by Nine Eight Books.