TOAST ON FIRE

Do you remember how the name The Fades came about?

I came up with the name after many hours and ideas, I think my Dad actually suggested it in the end. Originally for interviews we were going to say: where I live in Ham, there are a lot of parakeet birds that fly overhead and one day I heard one fly above me squawking the sound “fades, fades, fades”. I also discovered that the particles of dust that are left behind after an exploding star are known as The Fades, so I thought that was pretty cool.

Dave Lightfoot
(photo by Stew Ruffles)

My first band had fallen apart and I was playing a lot of stuff with some mates at college (Jon Vick – later from the Moths and Ollie Walker – later from Mississippi Witch) We were on a music course together and we used to jam, playing punked up versions of Stones songs and Stooges tracks. So I wanted to take it to the next step. I started writing some songs at home with my brother and we went to record them with our mate Graham who also played drums. We started live briefly as Petrol Bomb, then became Molotov Cocktail. Eventually we got together with my old mate Jonny who I asked to join the band and then we became the Fades.