Born in 1958 in Liverpool, singer, songwriter and producer Ian Broudie is best known for his Britpop-era hits with the Lightning Seeds. As well as being a producer for the likes of Echo and the Bunnymen, the Zutons, the Coral and the Fall, Ian’s eclectic career has included playing guitar for 1970s post-punk group Big in Japan, as well as scoring a No 1 hit with 1996’s football anthem Three Lions. His son Riley, 32, who manages Ian and plays guitar for the Lightning Seeds, will be joining the band as they celebrate their 35-year anniversary with a greatest hits album and tour.
Ian
For the first five years of Riley’s life, we lived in a sandstone cottage on Beaconsfield Road in Liverpool, opposite Strawberry Fields, the orphanage that inspired the title of the Beatles’ song. In this picture, he’s about four; he’s picked up a guitar and is singing over whatever melody I was trying to write. Often Riley would try to distract me and get my attention when I was working, but I didn’t mind. We would have ended up just playing songs together.
I was more of a studio type of musician and didn’t tour until the third Lightning Seeds album, so I was around a lot in Riley’s younger years. I look back at this period at home with him as halcyon days – the happiest times of my life. I didn’t have too much success yet, but I was on the journey.
Riley was a couple of weeks late. When we went past the due date, I started writing The Life of Riley – the lyrics describe my worries about what I would be like as a dad. As it turns out, I was quite overwhelmed. When I first saw him I was scared and didn’t trust myself not to drop him. The midwife – a proper scouse nurse – said to me: “It’s a boy! Here you are!” and gestured for me to take him. I said: “I don’t hold babies.” She said: “You do now, love.” She put him in my arms. It was incredible.
Like all little babies, Riley would wake up throughout the night. I had a Citroën at the time that had suspension brakes. At 4am, I’d wrap him up and we’d get in: I’d turn the heating and suspension on, as well as Oasis’s first album. The songs would play incredibly loud from the stereo while the car went up and down; I snoozed in the front seat while he snoozed in the back. What a sight on our drive that must have been for our neighbours. It’s no wonder he grew up to love Oasis.
I split from Riley’s mum when he was seven, and after that we lived apart. I was worried for a lot of that time about what would happen to us, and how our relationship would go. But we became great friends. I decided when he was little that I was going to treat him like an equal: I would explain everything to him like he was an adult, and tried not to fob him off with silly answers if he had questions. It just so happens that he became very inquisitive at school. Teachers were kind of peeved about it, but I thought it was amazing.
Riley’s a lot brighter than me, in most ways. I’m not well educated. I left school when I was 15 and I’ve got a really awkward way of writing songs – it’s based on not knowing how to do certain things and being obsessive until it’s right, but that can also take me to interesting places creatively.
The first time we were on stage together, he was 14 and the two of us played acoustically in Liverpool. I wanted him to have that experience, and our chemistry just worked; the way we played guitar knitted together really well, like it does with brothers. At that time, my heart wasn’t in my music. I felt like the band had gone from the Premier League to the fourth division. Gradually I did some more gigs, including one solo show with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in 2014. Ian McCulloch came on for a song, as well as Terry Hall and James Skelly and Bill Ryder-Jones from the Coral. Riley was on guitar. His energy that night was a catalyst for me to enjoy it all again.
Gradually, as stuff needed doing in my career, Riley started doing it for me, so he became my manager. I was talking to him the other day, and said: “I find it weird that people say I’m hard to work with. I’m not hard to work with …” There was a long pause from Riley, so I said: “Are you not going to say anything?” He replied: “I’m not going to say anything.” I spoke to his mum later on and she confirmed it: “Yeah, Riley says you’re a nightmare!”
It might be the case, but working with my son is great. He plays with love, and he also phones me up and tells me what I need to do and where I need to go. I need that, as I can be quite unfocused. This photo sums us up: I am a head-in-the-sand kind of person, while he’s more: “What’s going on! Let’s get it sorted!”
Riley
This photo epitomises my childhood – sat in the garden, playing the guitar with Dad. If we weren’t doing that, then we’d be kicking a football around. Or hanging out in the house, listening to his songs on the radio.
Dad’s job always felt normal to me. There was never a moment when it was weird. My mates would know the Lightning Seeds’ stuff, and mostly everyone was nice, even if it was a bit frustrating when people sang Three Lions at me. That didn’t happen too much, and I never felt embarrassed by what my dad had achieved. I was proud.
My dad is a big part of my life – as a parent, but also professionally. We’re super close. My mum and dad split up when I was younger, so I only saw Dad at the weekends. Now we play and tour together, I get some of the time back that we didn’t get when I was growing up.
Like anyone with a parent, you get to a certain age and the roles reverse a little. The child feels more responsible. As someone who manages their dad, I certainly feel like that towards him. He now trusts me to make sure everything is right for his career. We have a good laugh on tour, and thankfully if anyone needs telling off, the tour manager can do that – not me. Dad knows that everything I do is for the best. The best for us, for the band and for his songs, which are so personal.
I never expected to join Dad’s band. I was very into studying history. In my gap year between going to university, Dad asked if I wanted to do some gigs with him. One of the first ones was at Glastonbury in 2010. I was very nervous, but after a while I realised that even though I was standing on the Pyramid stage, it was kind of the same as us playing together in the garden. After that, I caught the bug. Playing my dad’s songs is like second nature. They’re so deep inside my consciousness.
My dad is open, but he expresses his feelings best in his lyrics. If there’s something he can’t say in a conversation, he hides it in a song. Because I know him very well, I can see it. There’s something special about having a collection of his music, his thoughts. A part of him is here, for ever.
