Cool and catchy at the same time, Clare Grogan’s distinctive vocals became one of the sounds of the 1980s, as lead singer of Altered Images – renowned for their No 2 hit Happy Birthday
Clare Grogan is taking on the Altered Images mantle once more for the Happy Birthday Tour to mark the hit’s anniversary.(Image: Sony Music Archive via Getty Images)
Regularly appearing on Top of the Pops, with her punky style and gamine beauty, Clare Crogan’s face graced the covers of countless magazines.
But she never expected that 45 years after their most famous record flew up the charts that she’d be singing it again – in her 60s. Now Clare is taking on the Altered Images mantle once more for the Happy Birthday Tour to mark the hit’s anniversary.
Still instantly recognisable, she laughs as she reflects on what her teenage self would have thought, saying: “I’d have been mortified if you’d told me I’d still be singing Happy Birthday in my 60s! After Altered Images ended, I had a big pause and when I first got asked back to do an arena tour, I remember thinking ‘I can’t be singing Happy Birthday when I’m in my 40s.’ Here I am at 63 singing it! But I really enjoy it.
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“I love looking out into the audience and thinking ‘we’ve all been through some s**t in life, but we’re still able to come together to have this really joyous moment.’ I think it becomes more powerful as we get older. And everybody loves an anniversary, so when you’ve got a song called Happy Birthday and it’s going to be 45, you might as well get out there and do it.”
The band – who met as schoolmates in Glasgow – will be performing the entire Happy Birthday album on their tour of England and Scotland, together with a selection of other hits. But Clare says she was nervous about the idea at first, admitting: “I did wonder – can I pull this off? But I’ve got the kind of voice that is quite unique and it hasn’t changed that much and I thought ‘somewhere inside, I am still that girl.’
Clare Grogan still looks the same as she did 40 years ago.(Image: David Scheinmann)
“I listened to the entire album and at first, I was like ‘oh my God!’ It’s so young, so fresh and quite raw. But I realised I would love the opportunity to sing these songs one more time. When I was younger, I was quite bolshy – I was a Glaswegian teenager who wanted to take over the world. I love thinking that I’m still that person who was in their bedroom as a teenage girl, singing along to songs with a hairbrush in my hand. I still do stuff like that.”
With six Top 40 singles in the early ‘80s, including See Those Eyes and Bring Me Closer, things came to an end after three hit albums and the band split in 1983, mainly due to physical and emotional burn-out. Clare says: “I was pretty much lost at sea at that point. I was 23 and it seemed like it was all over for me.”
Shockingly, she was also penniless. She says: “I hadn’t made any money, despite three successful albums. Ask any band from the ‘80s and they’ll tell you that somebody made some money, but it’s very rarely the band. Even when I was at the top of the charts, I was earning £75 a week. The music business is notoriously messy and we were at an age where we desperately wanted to be part of it, so we didn’t ask questions. Also, there seemed something vulgar in talking about money. That was the way I was brought up, but I think that’s a big mistake – you’ve got to ask the questions. We trusted people.”
Clare’s success in Altered Images coincided with her starring in 1981 coming-of-age film Gregory’s Girl alongside John Gordon Sinclair. Still at school and only 17, she was working part-time as a waitress in a Glasgow restaurant when she was approached about a role by a friend of writer and director Bill Forsyth.
Clare’s success in Altered Images coincided with her starring in 1981 coming-of-age film Gregory’s Girl alongside John Gordon Sinclair.
Clare recalls: “He said ‘Bill’s making a film this summer and he thinks you’d be really good for it, can we have your telephone number?’ I refused. I’d been brought up by my mother not to hand out my phone number, particularly to older guys. The restaurant manager told me that Bill was a genuine film director and a nice man and I might want to reconsider. I said ‘I’ll see.’ I was so casual about it!”
When Altered Images ended, Clare began working as a Sky television presenter, as well as re-establishing herself as an actress. She starred in three series of Red Dwarf, appeared in Father Ted and also spent a year in EastEnders as PI Ros Thorne. She recalls: “I was Ian Beale’s love interest having started off as a private investigator looking for Cindy.
“It was an amazing experience, but initially it was a bit disappointing, because I couldn’t wait to get to Albert Square and my first scenes were all done in Lake Como. The rest of the cast were like ‘we’ve been doing this show for years and no-one’s asked us to go to Lake Como.’ All I wanted was to be in the Queen Vic!”
Clare is married to former Altered Images guitarist-turned record producer Steve Lironi. The couple own three restaurants together and live in north London with their 21 year-old daughter Elle. Determined to be a mum, she experienced six miscarriages and four failed attempts at IVF before she and Steve finally adopted Elle as an eight-month old baby.
Clare Grogan is married to musician Stephen Lironi.(Image: Daily Record)
Clare says: “It was a tough decade. I lost my first baby when I was 31. I was 43 when Elle came into our lives and I’d had a recent miscarriage even before that happened. But we got to the conclusion that we were always meant to get to. I really believe that. She was the daughter waiting for me. People sometimes say to me ‘why are you so happy Clare?’ And I say ‘because I know what it’s like to be sad.’”
At the height of her fame, Clare was linked to Spandau Ballet guitarist Gary Kemp, who later admitted to having a huge unrequited crush on her, even penning the 1983 No 1 hit single True about her. Clare laughs: “That’s the kind of inspiration I am! I was really friendly with Gary for a while. We had a really nice time together, but to say that we were dating would be a slight exaggeration, because we were both so busy.
“I used to tease my husband about True. I’d say ‘can I just say, I have inspired one of the greatest love songs ever!’ I’m actually almost embarrassed about it now. I don’t know why, because it’s obviously such a lovely thing.”
Finding stardom in the ‘80s and the incredible people she met continue to have a profound influence on Clare’s life – while Altered Images is never far from her mind. Three years ago, she and the band released a fourth album Mascara Streakz, – 37 years after the last one.
Still proud of her old hits, which she never tires of, she says: “I don’t think I’d be doing what I’m doing now if it wasn’t for them. As for Happy Birthday, I have to sing it at family parties. I always say ‘are you guys not sick of me doing this?’ And they’re like: ‘No!’”
Altered Images the Happy Birthday Tour begins in September – Tickets available via: http://alteredimages.band/