Introduction

The story of Bucks Fizz begins in late 1980. It starts with a young songwriter named Andy Hill, three former members of the group Rags and two songs: 'Making Your Mind Up' and 'Have You Ever Been In Love'. Rags were a vocal trio comprised of Steve Glen, Nichola Martin and Jill Shirley. In 1977, they entered the Song For Europe with a song called 'Promises, Promises' and released five singles between 1977 and 1980. Although Rags disbanded in 1980, the group members remained in touch as they began branching out in different directions. Steve Glen moved into songwriting and production, recording a solo album and working with other artists; Jill Shirley ventured into management, opening the Razzamatazz agency in London; and Nichola Martin embarked on a professional and personal relationship with Andy Hill and formed the music publishing company Big Note Music Ltd.

In a Radio One interview from 1983, Andy Hill described the two songs he submitted for the Song For Europe, 'Making Your Mind Up' and 'Have You Ever Been In Love', as the third and fourth ones he had ever written. 'Making Your Mind Up' was initially an instrumental backing track in the possession of Nichola Martin that she encouraged Andy Hill to write a song around. Andy Hill enlisted the help of a guitarist he had worked with named John Danter, who was subsequently credited as co-writer of 'Making Your Mind Up'. When the demo of 'Making Your Mind Up' was recorded, it featured vocals by Andy Hill, Nichola Martin and a singer Nichola already knew named Mike Nolan. Mike had previously auditioned for a group that Nichola was in, called Love Together, in 1974, and they had remained in touch since then. From 1977 to 1980, Mike had been a member of the vocal group Brooks, but a chance conversation led to Nichola contacting him to ask for his help in recording the demo of 'Making Your Mind Up', as Mike told Me'shah Bryan on the Stage And Screen podcast in 2025:

She (Nichola Martin) was up at Polydor Records having lunch with someone from the record company, and he was telling her about this group he had let go, a group called Brooks. She said, 'Who's in that band, Brooks? That rings a bell', and he gave my name, the one he remembered. She said, 'I know him. He tried to get into Love Together'. So, she phoned me up and said, 'We're entering some songs for Song For Europe, and I wondered if you wanted to come to the studios and help us do the demos for the entries?' I said, 'Yeah, of course I'll do that for you.' We went up to the studio, and it was a Saturday morning. We did it verse by verse, got it down, put all the harmonies in there and finished it. Nichola said, 'That was really good, Mike; if the song gets through, I'll put you in the group.' Anyway, the song was accepted. She said, 'We want you to be in the band. You might as well be in it, Mike; it's another thing to put on your CV. It's Song For Europe, and let's face it, 'Making Your Mind Up' will never win it anyway.'

The demo of 'Making Your Mind Up' featuring Mike Nolan, Andy Hill and Nichola Martin had been submitted for the Song For Europe, with Nichola writing the name of the artist as 'Bucks Fizz' on the entry form. At the point 'Making Your Mind Up' was accepted for the 1981 Song For Europe, 'Bucks Fizz' was only a name on a sheet of paper and the group themselves did not exist. Nichola Martin now had to put a group together who could perform 'Making Your Mind Up' at the Song For Europe on 11 March 1981. Mike Nolan had already helped to record the demo of 'Making Your Mind Up', and Nichola had asked him to be a part of the group should the song prove to be successful in progressing to the Song For Europe final. Mike Nolan, therefore, became the first member of Bucks Fizz, and the group was built around him.

Cheryl Baker was the next person to be approached to join Bucks Fizz. Like Mike Nolan, she did not have to audition for the group, and her journey to being a member of Bucks Fizz began with a chance meeting. Cheryl was born Rita Crudgington. She left school at 16 and became a secretary, but her love of music led her to join a local amateur operatic society and sing with a couple of bands (including the wonderfully named Bressingham Spire). Her professional break came in 1975 when she replied to an advertisement and successfully auditioned for the vocal harmony group Mother's Pride (who shortly afterwards would change their name to Co Co). The group had already released two singles on Pye Records, and in the summer of 1975, they had a residency at Blackpool Opera House as part of 'The Freddie Starr Show', a variety show headlined by Freddie Starr which included Mike Burton, Lynn Rogers, Francis Van Dyke, Mothers Pride, The Mistins and The Second Generation Dancers on the bill. Following their change of name to Co Co, the group would appear at the 1976 Song For Europe (finishing in second place) before representing the United Kingdom at the 1978 Eurovision Song Contest with 'Bad Old Days' (finishing 11th). By 1980, times were hard for the group, as Cheryl told Barbara Michaels, 'Work in England had been getting less and less because basically we were a cabaret band and cabaret venues here were closing down and opening up again as discotheques. We got work abroad, we were in a hotel in Finland for six weeks, and we took it because we needed the money.' In June 1980, Cheryl left Co Co and took a job working for Mayfair Sound Studios in London. Speaking to the Lewis Nicholls Life Stories podcast in 2024, she said:

I left Co Co in the summer of 1980. I'd had enough, and I went to work for Mayfair Sound. I typed their letters, as that's what I was trained for; I did their invoices, and I was there to do backing vocals if anyone needed it. One day, in walked Nichola Martin and she said, 'Cheryl, why are you here?' and I said, 'I've left Co Co'. So, she obviously logged this. This would have been probably September, October time, and just before Christmas of 1980, I received a phone call to say that she wanted me to be in this band called Bucks Fizz.

In the meantime, the other song that Andy Hill had submitted for the Song For Europe, 'Have You Ever Been In Love', had also been accepted, with the name of the artist written on the entry form as 'Gem'. For a while, Nichola Martin contemplated putting herself in Bucks Fizz alongside Mike and Cheryl, but on reflection chose to be a member of 'Gem' with Andy Hill. Her decision left two vacancies in the Bucks Fizz lineup needing to be filled, so Nichola turned to her former Rags bandmate Jill Shirley. Jill had opened the Razzamatazz agency in London, representing young singers, dancers, drama school graduates and musical theatre performers. Razzamatazz sent anyone on their books who might be suitable to Nichola to audition. They had to be a similar height to Mike Nolan, be good-looking, blonde or prepared to go blonde, and be able to sing. One of these was 19-year-old Jay Aston, who was on their books as a singer and dancer. She came from a showbiz family as her parents and elder brother were all in the business, and Jay performed her first summer season in Skegness aged just 14. 'I've never really considered anything else but showbiz', she told Smash Hits in 1982, 'Either I would teach dancing, keep fit or ballet or something, or be involved in the fashion aspect of it.' Jay had been working in Jersey doing dance classes when the audition for Bucks Fizz came up:

I did the audition in Nichola Martin's front room, and Mike Nolan was already in the band. They wanted us to fit around him, being quite petite and blonde. I didn't really want the job if I'm completely honest, and I was really happy with what I was lining up in Jersey. I was asked to go back, and I met Andy Hill. We went into a studio just off Oxford Street, and I learned my harmony - I'm usually on the third harmony - I put it down, and they basically offered me the job there and then. (Vinyl Vibes podcast, 2024)

The final place in the group was originally offered to Stephen Fischer, who later became one half of the 1982 Song For Europe winners, Bardo. He declined the offer due to a prior contractual commitment to a touring production of Godspell, and so an advert was placed in The Stage, which resulted in Bobby G (Robert Gubby) joining the group. Bobby had built up his own building firm in the early 1970s, but as the recession hit the trade, he returned to music, playing the cabaret circuit. 1980 saw Bobby playing Pontius Pilate in the West End production of Jesus Christ Superstar, which was scheduled to go on tour in the new year. The Bucks Fizz audition came during a convenient gap in his schedule, as he told the Here She Is podcast in 2024:

My Dad phoned up and pushed me to go and do it. It didn't really sound much to be fair. I went up for the audition, which was with Andy Hill, and Mike (Nolan) was there. At the time, there was no money in it, and I just had a gap. I thought, 'It's a couple of months out of my life, I'll go and learn a song.' I was quite keen to do some recording in the recording studio, as that's not something I had ever done. When I got (the place in Bucks Fizz), it was, 'I'll do the song, I'll do the performance and (then) I'll go back to my job.'

Mike and Cheryl first met on 7 January 1981 at Nichola...