Dr Feelgood’s Robert Kane finds new rhythm with debut solo album
Sunderland-born Robert Kane’s been fronting Dr Feelgood since 1999 but the singer-songwriter’s finally released his debut solo album. Simon Rushworth is engrossed by a story of triumph over adversity
It was the spring of 1987 and Sunderland pop rockers Well Well Well were readying their debut album for Arista Records.
Home to Whitney Houston, Aretha Franklin, The Grateful Dead and Dionne Warwick, the major label had high hopes for a dynamic quartet they’d signed on a two-album deal.
“I took the band name from a John Lennon song,” recalls lead singer Robert Kane, who’d cut his teeth on the buoyant North East scene fronting new wave disruptors Showbiz Kids. “Like every band, we went through the list of suggestions for names. It was the usual frustrating process of ‘cross that one off’, ‘no, that’s rubbish’, ‘move on’.
“And then one day I said ‘look, I was listening to this Lennon album yesterday with the song called Well, Well, Well. Sounds like a band name to me’. And it was one that nobody disagreed with! So that became the name.”
Cue the first of three serious setbacks that, for a while at least, looked like curtailing Robert’s career barely before it had gained any semblance of mainstream momentum.
“When we were recording our album, a new band called Wet Wet Wet released their first single,” adds a wistful Robert. “Their first hit was Wishing I Was Lucky. It peaked at number six, I think, and of course we couldn’t believe that another band had a name that sounded so similar to ours.
“We said ‘that’s a bit close’. Do we change it? Do we stick with it? Do we hope that they’re one hit wonders? And we banked on that being the case. Wrong. Very wrong.”
While Robert and his band mates placed their faith in Well Well Well, rivals Wet Wet Wet racked up hit after hit. The first three singles from the Scottish band’s debut Popped In, Soul’d Out landed inside the Top 10 and the Wearsiders were left wishing they’d been just a little luckier.
“Our debut album, Dangerous Dreams, dropped in 1988 but it wasn’t the record we imagined it would be,” admits Robert. “For whatever reason, our American producer had been sent the wrong demos and he just didn’t like the two songs that had secured our record deal in the first place. It was a disappointing experience.”
Things went from bad to worse for Well Well Well. Shortly before Dangerous Dreams was released, Robert was sidelined for six months with a serious bout of pneumonia. By the time he returned to action, the band’s first single had flopped and time was running out — fast.
“It was just one setback after another,” adds Robert. “But when I was fully recovered the label said they’d put out a second single with a video. They gave us a budget of £30,000 to shoot the clip which, in the 80s, was a decent chunk of money. And somebody from the record company came up with the idea of doing it on an oil rig.
“We all headed off to the middle of the North Sea and filmed the single for a song called Revolution. The week it was released, [oil rig] Piper Alpha blew up. Suddenly there wasn’t a television director in Europe who would touch the video. That’s the kind of luck we had with Well Well Well. When I look back on it now, as an older man, I just realise it wasn’t meant to be. At the time, I was utterly broken.”
Robert’s confidence was shot, his dreams shattered. “I thought ‘that’s it, I’m done now’,” he adds. “By then I was 33, 34 and with two small kids. I’d had my shot at the big time… and missed. I felt absolutely lost. The image I use is as if somebody is standing in the desert and looking 360 degrees and there’s absolutely nothing to see for miles around. That’s how my life felt at that point.”
Fast forward 35 years and Robert couldn’t be in a better place. A full-time member of British R&B royalty Dr Feelgood — he’s been the band’s charismatic frontman since 1999 — devoted grandfather and vocal supporter of Sunderland’s resurgence as a nationally recognised creative hub, the 70-year-old singer-songwriter’s enjoying a richly -deserved Indian summer. He’s still performing and still writing — more on the latter in a moment.
Having picked himself up off the floor following Well Well Well’s dramatic decline, Robert reinvented himself as the vibrant voice of North East favourites The Alligators, before joining Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Hilton Valentine — gigging globally as part of The Animals II. It was during that period he came to the attention of Dr Feelgood and the rest, as they say, is history.
Fresh from a tour of Spain with Canvey Island’s original cult heroes, Robert’s squeezing in four UK dates (including a stop off at Barnard Castle’s The Witham on October 8) before a five-stop trek through Switzerland. “We had a month off before the Spanish dates and I was itching to get back out there,” he beams. “Dr Feelgood’s a live band. It’s what we live for.”
But this week’s all about Robert’s debut solo album. The bullish Blues Is Blues, released by North East label Conquest Music, has been 70 years in the making and it’s the glorious sound of triumph in adversity. Why now?
“I’m always writing down words here and there — just in case they could come in handy for a song some time,” says Robert. “Some of those words or song ideas just don’t fit Dr Feelgood and certainly the material I wrote for Blues Is Blues wasn’t right for the band.
“One day I had a debate with myself: is a song actually a song if nobody’s ever heard it? Maybe not. These songs should be heard so I decided to record them. Most were done as first takes and they’re all stripped down to the bare bones. But I love that. What you hear are the most authentic versions of the songs I love to write.”
Blues Is Blues is a beautiful record. It’s raw, heartfelt and disarmingly optimistic. There are those who suggest Robert’s never sounded better. If he wished he was lucky back in the dark days of the 80s then fortune’s always favoured the brave — and Blues Is Blues is the bold sound of a proud Wearsider who refused to be beaten.
“I just always knew I could do it,” he adds. “It was something instinctive. Something inside me told me that I could do this. I’m incredibly proud of my Sunderland roots, the career I’ve built and the contribution I’m continuing to make to what’s always been a magnificent music city.”
Blues Is Blues is available now via Conquest Music.
Dr Feelgood play The Witham, Barnard Castle on October 8. The band’s final live date of 2025 is at Newcastle’s Cluny on December 19.