Better the devil you know

THE return of Stock Aitken and Waterman at a Hyde Park festival this July will, for some, confirm that we are living in an Eighties timewarp, reliving all the worst aspects of the decade: namely the recession.

Yet if Tom Jones can be given a second chance — and a third, and a fourth — then Pete Waterman is surely due a reappraisal. The man who wrote an autobiography called I Wish I Was Me is no dull backroom boy.

Cocking a snook at the industry, Stock Aitken and Waterman — SAW for short — wrote and produced hits for Kylie Minogue, Rick Astley, Bananarama and a dozen others, and became entirely autonomous when they started their independent label, PWL, in 1988. In fact, everything about SAW and PWL looks intriguing on paper: their DIY attitude, their anti-major label stance, their ability to write incredibly catchy tunes and score hits with ordinary kids without the need of a drawn-out TV talent contest.