Born on 20 May: Nick Heyward (Haircut 100), the dandy of British Pop

He was born in Beckenham, Kent, in 1961. Nicholas Heyward grew up listening to the Beatles, though this is only faintly evident in the carefree pop hits of his band Haircut One Hundred.

Heyward started writing songs very early on, scribbling lyrics in his school notebooks and showing them to his friends, Graham Jones and Les Nemes. After some hesitation over their band name, they eventually settled on Haircut One Hundred at the very start of the 80s. Their debut album, Pelican West (1982), which went platinum in the UK, featured no fewer than four hits: Favourite Shirts (Boy Meets Girl), Love Plus One, Fantastic Day, and Nobody’s Fool. Their dazzling brass, thumping bass, funk-infused pop and a hint of jazz proved intoxicating to a generation.

“We just wanted to do something joyful, danceable—something that sounded like an endless summer,” Nick Heyward said in a 1982 interview with Smash Hits. “I was obsessed with melodies. I wanted us to sound like an audio picnic.”

Behind the band’s seemingly euphoric lightness, tensions were brewing, and the adventure came to an abrupt end when Heyward announced his departure in January 1983.

“I was young, stressed, and suddenly we were famous overnight,” Heyward recalled in a 1994 interview with the BBC. “I struggled to handle the pressure, and I began to feel isolated, even within the band.”

Despite a second album without him, the group didn’t last long afterwards. Heyward, meanwhile, launched a promising solo career. His debut solo album, "North of a Miracle" (1983), revealed a more introspective artist, whose melodic richness nevertheless followed in the footsteps of his first band.

The subsequent years were quieter, punctuated by highs and lows and a few brief Haircut 100 reunions. Up to 2017’s Woodland Echoes (his first recording in ten years), he released ten studio albums—admittedly uneven, but with some gems like Postcard From Home (1986). In 2022, when he was barely expected to return, Nick appeared once more, this time with India Dupré, an Englishwoman raised in Australia who has directed a few minor films. She also shares the microphone with her sister Saffron. Together, they produced the very folk-inspired, dreamy and spiritual album The Mermaids And The Lighthouse.

(MH with Stéphane Soupart – Photo: © Etienne Tordoir)

Photo: Nick Heyward at the Video Clip Festival in Saint-Tropez (France), 10 October 1984