Allstars

Not content with having successful TV show with STARstreet the Allstars are ready to blast over the airways with the debut single "Best Friends". We caught up Sam and found that not only was he a fellow Mancunian, but that he actually used to have a few soft drinks in our local. A TV show and a Pop career? Sounds similar. Well so be it, Sam used to be in the first incarnation of S Club 7 a few years back when he was just 15. Read on to find out what happened with the S Club Party and how he joined the group which make S Club look like Radiohead.

Q: For our readers who are likely to be bit worse for wear on Saturday morning. What's this "STARstreet" show all about?
A: What it is basically is 5 guys - 2 boys and 3 girls. And we live in this house which is really odd and all these futuristic and spacey type of things happen. Its all bright colours so if you've got a headache it may not be that good.

You turn it on on a Saturday morning and its really easy to watch. Its just us 5 and its really surreal. We do all weird things like fall down the back of the couch, go inside Ashley's head, we can go through mirrors, the fridge hands us food. You get out your bedroom and there's no stairs - you just go down a slide into the living room and in the slide you also get changed for the day. Its like a perfect house in a way!!!

.....And then we break into song as well would you believe. Its not as cheesy as that sounds. Its not like "Oh and I know. There's a good song to match that lolly stick and we all sing a song about a lolly stick" If you watch the show its done really subtly.

Its doing really well on SM:TV. We've brought in an extra 200,000 viewers than the rest of SM:TV has, so its doing amazing well. Were doing a second series because its being sold to France, Singapore and Australia.
 

Q: Before you did this you all did different things though?
A: Ashley and I were mates beforehand. We went to college together when we were 16. I'd always been interested in acting since junior school and I got to play Mole in "Toad Of Toad Hall" when I got to secondary school.. It was the first time I'd got to play a major role in something and the when the audience applauded at the end it was like "Wow, that amazing!!!!" There's no better feeling in the world ever.
 

Q: Didn't you used to be a lap dancer though?
A: It was just a joke. We did this advert for the Box and they asked "What did you used to do this before this?" And I replied a barman, a baker and then I said lap dancer as a joke. But if there is anyone out there who'd like me to dance for them, as long as they're female and rather good looking, its fine by me. And also Alan Partridge gives me that Lap Dancing thing - I just find that really funny!!
 

Q: You're from Manchester. Didn't you want to be Liam Gallagher or Ian Brown?
A: They're wicked at doing what they do but I'm not that style. I'm not as cool as Liam, d'yer know what I mean. He's got that amazingly cool style of Liam Gallagher, he is who he is and he's great!!! I'm wicked at being cheesy and making little kids love me. That's what I can do, whereas Liam would never be able to do this and I would never be able to pull of what he can do.

I'm similar to Liam though. The Beatles are my favourite band and I've been brought up listening to that since I was tiny. I'm more into the 60s and 70s vibe of music than anything. At the moment I'm really into Coldplay and I've just got into the new Travis single. At first I thought "Oh No!!! Its Pants" but there's something in it that makes me want to hear it.
 

Q: Back to your own songs. Are you writing with other people or doing it yourself?
A: Were working with Ray Hedges, Peter Cunnah and Chris Porter. The people who have dealt with B*Witched, Take That and Boyzone. Were really lucky to have these songwriters working with us and Ashley and I both play guitar. We've written hundreds of songs between us and we did the B-side to "Best Friends" which is called "Rock-A-Bye". Its a nice little 60s vibe sort of tune with just us two singing.

Hopefully on the second album the girls will start writing as well. As Ashley and I have written  loads of songs before and we play the guitar it was just natural. We went in and wrote a song with Peter Cunnah who was from D:Ream. When you join an act like this they don't know how talented or untalented you are so when they started realizing were not just five puppets who'd do anything they let us have input in everything - scriptwriting, songwriting, everything!!!
 

Q: So you're going to take the crown from Hear'say then?
A: Yeah. Hear'say are wicked, five talented guys who've done really well for themselves. But this thing has been going on for 3 years. We've all worked really hard for it whereas Hear'say in a way have had a bit of an easy ride. They worked for 3 months and then they had a number 1. We worked for 3 years and who knows where were going to get in the charts.

We did a 3 week schools tour starting in Glasgow and working our way down to London. We were doing it to Primary schools because if a pop band came to my secondary school they'd have a bit of stick. As you can imagine singing about best friends it would be like "Don't think so" - it was never going to happen. Little kids were crying as we were leaving and it was the most bizarre thing because none of us had experienced it apart from Ashley cos' of Hollyoaks.
 

Q: Didn't you used to be in S Club 7 at one point though?
A: I recorded songs with them and then I got thrown out. It was quite weird because I was with Paul, Jon and Hannah from S Club 7. I auditioned with Jon all the way through and he's a nice lad, I recorded two songs with him and then I got thrown out which was nice.

I was 15 at the time and to be honest my voice wasn't up to it. My voice had just broken and I couldn't sing as well as I knew I could. As knew as I left the recording studio that I hadn't got it. I saw them the other day and it was really weird because they all remembered me.

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"Best Friends" is out soon on Universal
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