Paul Needs Biography

E-Mail: enquiries@paulneeds.co.uk
"The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway
where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side."
-Hunter S. Thompson

Biographic notes

Paul Needs has been successfully performing solo for the last 15 years or more. His Shadows tribute CD, "Shadow Play", is now available, and his swing CD, "Hot & Cool" is available for legal MCPS-licensed download via Apple iTunes, Sony Connect, MSN Music, Wal-Mart, Virgin.com, AOL Music Now and many others.

His covers CD, "Don't Ask Me (I'm just the guitar player)" features songs he performs in his live shows and is also available via this web-site and at shows , while his last original album, “Songs From The Long Land” is available world-wide via CDBaby.com e-commerce web site, and is also available for download from Apple iTunes and Microsoft’s MSN Music.

Paul - a guitarist/multi-instrumentalist and vocalist of no mean ability in either respect - performs a non-stop selection of massive hits, both with and without guitar.

Paul is no stranger to the stage, having been a musician for most of his life. He played French Horn in The West Glamorgan Youth Orchestra at the age of 13, and took up guitars a year later.

His material has been played on a number of radio stations - including BBC Radio Wales, Swansea Sound/The Wave and Red Dragon Radio - both when a member of south Wales rock band “The Reactions” , and as a solo performer.

He has shared the stage with the legendary Man band, played bass for Brian Connolly (It’s a puppet!), jammed with rock-blues legend Rory Gallagher and performed everywhere from small pubs to 4,000-seater halls.

He has also appeared at the Grand Hotel in Llandudno, The Beaufort Theatre in Ebbw Vale, The Grand pavilion in Porthcawl, and at Swansea Grand Theatre. More theatre performances are lined up in the near future.

^2.Paul learned to play recorder, French Horn and Oboe while at school. His parents bought him a guitar for his 14th birthday - thirty.. umm.. something years ago - and the fascination has yet to abate...

At the age of 16, he and a school-friend, Peter Watkins, started to play and make music together. They later formed their first band, General Paralysis of the Insane (G.P.I.) with two other friends from school - Gareth Thomas on bass guitar, and Gary Richards on drums. Playing a mix of standards, New Wave, Who, Kinks.., they travelled to Liverpool to record together at the Wallasey Sound studio in early 1979.

Later that year, Gary left to enter drama college, and was replaced for one gig by Steve Tooze, and then permanently by Mike Morales, who was in primary school with Paul. Gareth eventually left to pursue other interests, Paul moved from guitar to bass and the band changed their named to The Reactions, and played together in this line-up until 1987. They recorded some more original songs at the respected Slaughterhouse Studios, and continued to gig in south Wales, Bristol and London.

By mid 1987, Paul had become somewhat disillusioned with a lack of progress & shitty venues, and moved home to London to become an IT writer and Editor. Colin Baker ably replaced him in the band, who changed their name again, this time to the Steps.

Paul became very successful in his new career, but music would not go away. He continued to write and record songs, and he returned to the stage in 1991 with a club band called Solid Gold. The band split, and Paul chose to continue as a solo performer.

Paul Needs Recording Credits:

The Reactions               The Joys of Aural Sex
                                    In One Era and Out of the Other
                                    Faded Pictures (The Reactions & Steps live anthology Double CD)

Pete Watkins CD “Madness in My Method” (played on two or three tracks
recorded with The Reactions)

Solo projects                 Did you ever see a man?
                                        That was Now
                                        Songs from the Long Land
                                        Sid Says EP
                                        Don't Ask Me
                                        Hot & Cool
                                Shadow Play

Production Credits No. 9 Blast EP plus own recording projects listed above.

More facts about Paul

Favourite songwriter: Pete Townshend
Favourite Musicians: John Alec Entwistle, Pete Townshend, Colin Baker, Pete Watkins, Leland Sklar, Simon Phillips,
Favourite colour: Blue
Favourite quote: "However, a fart has no nose"
Favourite People: His fiancé Beth, and his son Matthew.
His loss of hair was caused by rampant fan pulling it out at a show in 1966.

Next project: He wants to write an overblown, pretentious and thoroughly un-insightful rock tribute to Holst's "The Planets". 'Music from Uranus' is the only song underway at present... His fiancé, Beth, thinks the song's 'a heap of
sh!te' and that he's a bag of gas...

Current state of mind: "Too many years, too few teeth".

"If the whole world is but a stage, I want better lighting".

"Don't tell me what kind of a day to have!"