He’s enjoyed Britpop glory with Ocean Colour Scene, shared space with Paul McCartney at Abbey Road for a ‘90s redux of Come Together, and backed Paul Weller for ages. But what makes Steve Cradock most proud are the relationships he’s formed through making music.
“Being friends with the people I’ve worked with means a lot,” He tells Guitar World. “They’re my closest friends. We’ve never lost it to insanity or musical differences or any of that Spinal Tap bollocks.”
But to be in the biz is to be subject to madness – and Cradock has seen and taken part in his fair share… like smoking shaved-off bits of Jimi Hendrix’s guitar wrapped in pages of the Bible while demoing Ocean Colour Scene’s Moseley Shoals. (More on that later.)
He’s just completed a tour with Weller, and Ocean Colour Scene have big plans for 2025. But Cradock remains modest when asked how he’s stayed afloat.
“Luck,” he shrugs. “Everyone needs a bit of that.” Of course, there’s more: “You have to take it seriously. You have to take it with a pinch of salt as well. Both are important – and I still really love music.
“Music blows my head on a daily basis. Just listening to stuff, and the vibration of it lifts me and speaks to me. I’m in awe of that. Music makes us all better. Whatever your favorite thing is, there’s a vibration that helps us on our way.”
You’re known for your Gibson SG, but you also use Teles too. Does that come from your love for Steve Cropper?
“I suppose so – it’s difficult to say. I’ve got a cream-colored Telecaster that looks similar to the one Steve Cropper uses. He’s not what you’d call a guitar virtuoso, and that’s why I like him. I like the fact that he’s a great guitar player who doesn’t shove it down everyone’s throat.
“And I prefer the look of Teles to Strats. Strats are a difficult guitar to play, I think. You have to be a better guitar player than I am to cut it on a Strat, I think!”
What differing purposes do the SG and Tele serve for you?
“They’re hugely different; and both are beautiful guitars. For starters, the SG has the whammy, and that’s the main thing for me. And you’ve got all the bollocks about whether it’s a humbucker of a single coil, but I don’t think that’s the reason you would choose a guitar.”
What do you look at when choosing?
“I don’t think about the pickups; I think about what feels right. To be honest, it’s just instinct. I just know. I’ve been playing long enough to know what guitar I need to use for what song.”
If forced to choose, are you going Gibson or Fender?
“I’m a Fender guy at the moment because I’ve been on the road a lot with Paul. It just seems to work. I don’t use it on every song. Fender has helped me out with a couple of guitars, which was very kind. I’ve got some fantastic Telecasters.
“I’ve got a new blue one… see, I don’t even know the model number! I’ve got a blue one and a green one, and they’re sick. They’re so fucking good. I’ve been playing them a lot.”
Do you prefer new guitars to vintage ones?
“I’ve got a ’72 Tele that I’ve had for many years. This new blue one takes a while to play in, but once you’re in on it, I think it’s as good as my ’72. It’s probably not worth as much, but playing-wise and sound-wise, I think it’s as good.”
Are you still mainly using Blackstar amps?
“Blackstar started when four lads who used to work at Marshall all left at the same time. In Birmingham around 2000, Joel Richardson came to see me with the prototype Blackstar. As soon as I plugged it in, I was like, ‘This is the amp I want to use.’ I’ve used them ever since their first prototype. And the new St. James is just fucking incredible.”
I thought it’d be fun to crumble a bit of the wood off and pop it inside a spliff
How does your current rig compare to the ‘90s rig that you recorded Moseley Shoals with?
“For the first couple of Ocean Colour Scene albums I was using a Marshall JCM800. And I had my Gibson Les Paul and my Telecaster. In a way nothing’s changed, because the Blackstar is kind of modeled after the JCM800!”
Did you use a similar rig while working with Paul McCartney on The Help Album [for the charity War Child in 1995]?
“Oh, that was amazing – what a day that was. I was actually using Paul Weller’s Epiphone Casino. It was a ’66 Casino on that, Come Together, and I would have been going through his Marshall Bluesbreaker.”
How did you end up in the session with Paul?
“I was told that there’s a charity set up by Go! Records, and was asked to be on it. We all turned up and laid down the backing track. Then they told me that maybe Paul McCartney would be coming down. That day just opened up into the most incredible thing.
“Paul McCartney is just a fantastic guitar player. It was kind of a beautiful afternoon, where even Johnny Depp and Kate Moss showed up. It was all kind of fancy, really!”
What was your biggest takeaway from the experience?
“Well, gratitude. It was for War Child – and we’re talking about fucking pop stars and bollocks, really. But it was with great musicians who I love, right?”
Would you call that your most memorable studio experience?
“That’s a difficult question. I guess it was; but there’s been so many moments. I’m trying to rack my brain, but that would be a hard one to top. We’ve also had other days of beautiful creation of our own music that have to be close behind that.”
There’s a story that when Ocean Colour Scene were in a studio owned by a member of The Move, there was a Hendrix Strat on the wall, and you scraped a bit of the finish off, mixed it with some weed and smoked it.
We always kind of went full tilt into recording sessions. There was never a dull day!
“That’s true. We smoked Jimi Hendrix’s guitar – fuck! Roy Wood from The Move wasn’t there; it was actually a guy called Bob Lamb. This would have been 1990 or 1991. Bob jammed with Jimi Hendrix and was a drummer in Trevor Burton’s band. He had what he claimed to be a black Stratocaster that was owned by Jimi Hendrix.
“There were no pickups in it; it was just the body of the guitar on his wall. So, I thought it’d be fun to crumble a bit of the wood off and pop it inside a spliff.”
Did anybody object?
“I can’t remember! It was just one of those stupid things you do, you know? It seemed funny. And this is probably not good to hear in America, but we used a page from the Bible as the paper to roll it up with. We got a nice verse out of Psalms and skinned up the guitar.”
Were you hoping to imbibe some of the spirit of Hendrix into your playing?
“No – I mean, he’s untouchable. I love Jimi Hendrix. We did it because it was stupid. But I can confirm that, yes, it did happen.”
Was the band actually recording that day or just hanging out?
“We were always hanging out and we were always recording. We’d have been doing demos; we’d accumulated up to 50 tracks, which served to be the majority of Moseley Shoals and Marchin’ Already.”
Would you say that was your wildest studio experience?
“Oh, certainly not! We always kind of went full tilt into recording sessions. There was never a dull day!”
Is that energy and spirit what made those records great?
“You need to have good songs and arrangements, don’t you? To be fair, without a really good song, we’d be fucked. It wouldn’t have the same weight. I stand by the recordings and the arrangements. They stand the test of time, I think – I hope.”
What’s next for Ocean Colour Scene?
“We have a big 25-date tour for next March and April; and then we’ll be doing a new album, which is the first album in like 10 or 11 freaking years or something.”
- Check out Ocean Colour Scene’s 2025 tour dates.
