Exclusive chat with the iconic Pete Waterman ahead of his Lytham Festival DJ set

The celebrated record producer and songwriter Pete Waterman is one of the exciting acts at TK Maxx presenters Lytham Festival this year.

The 78-year-old star will bring his Hitman DJ set to the festival on Sunday, July 6 as part of the support for headliners Simple Minds and Texas.

Before his arrival in Lytham, we were given the opportunity to chat to Pete all about Lytham Festival, his fantastic career and his love of Lancashire so take a look at what he had to say below:

How are you feeling about being one of the acts at Lytham Festival this year?

“Fantastic. I mean, because I've worked with a lot of these acts… over the last 30 years. You know, I did Justin Timberlake when he was in N-Sync. I worked with Stevie Wonder back in 83’ with Musical Youth. I've done television with all the other acts and I know most of their managers so this is a real treat.

“When I was first booked, I thought I was going to announce all the bands. I thought, ‘this is amazing. This is like going back 60 years’. I didn't realize that I was going to be doing a DJ set. So, you know, it's what I've wanted since lockdown because I've been working for the BBC for god knows how long doing radio, you know, local radio- WM, Coventry, Warwick, Manchester. When lockdown came down, because of my age, they stopped us going into the studios so... I sort of thought, well, the only way I can keep in touch with music is to sort of start playing it again. I didn't think of like this. This was just around the house and picking up playlists and bits and pieces. Then we did the Stock Aitken Waterman tour and then last year I did, in November, I did the Steps Musical, and this year we go on tour with the Steps Musical from August onwards to next April. So I'm really busy, but I like playing music.”

What can people expect from the set if they've never heard of the hitman?

“Oh they've heard of the hitman, let me tell you, if you ain’t heard of the hitman, you ain't bother going! This is the great thing about this festival. If you look at the acts, it's a time frame from all over and I was a major, major television, radio, you know, record producer, someone at this period. So if you remember Alanis, you remember Pete Waterman, if you know Justin Timberlake, you know Pete Waterman, if you know Stevie Wonder, you know Pete Waterman, if you know Simple Minds, you know Pete Waterman, because when they were having their hits, I was on television playing the hits. So if you were set, let's just say 20 you then you'll be at the festival”.

So what sort of music can we expect you to play? Will it be the acts that you have worked with?

“You can expect me to play bangers all the way through. There’ll be no drum and bass. It'll be sing along, sing along. I'm there to warm the crowd up for the acts on that night. That's the way I see my job. Entertain the crowd for an hour, make sure that they're ready for the main acts, because I'm the warm up and so if you don't like Rick Astley, don’t turn up, because I will be playing Rick Astley at some point.”

And have you ever done any DJ sets in Lancashire before?

“Come on, Christ, I must have done Blackpool 60 times! Christ, I grew up in Blackpool... I've done so many big gigs in Blackpool. I did one festival in Blackpool by the tower which was with Rick Astley and Little Mix- fantastic night. I mean, just fantastic. Blackpool's like my second home. When I worked for Granada Television, Blackpool was still massive in entertainment venues at that point. You know, if you were an entertainer, Blackpool was like your second home, because, you know, the whole northwest went to Blackpool at that point. I got introduced to Blackpool in the 50s because, of course, [during] the August bank holidays in the Midlands, everybody went to Blackpool for the long weekend with your false teeth and your frothy bubble nose, Yates’s Wine Lodge. I mean, that was, that was tradition!”

Having enjoyed the entertainment of Blackpool back in the 50s, how does it feel being that entertainment 70 years later?

“I still can't get over it. You know, it's like, every time you walk out and people stop you in the street…and say, you know ‘you were the music of my you know, youth, you were the background to my life’. Well, it's an amazing statement to make to somebody that's walking down the street… Funny enough. The thing that gives me away every time is my voice. I can go on a train and nobody recognizes me. I say one word, and every head on the train goes up in a woomph, because my voice is so familiar to people, whether it be from television, whether it be from radio or other stuff. I mean, I've been doing this for 60 years. That's a long time in entertainment.”

Will you get much of a chance whilst on stage to talk to the crowd about your amazing career as well as playing music?

“Oh, I talk to the crowd!... Listen, this is live. I play to the crowd, you know? I have a DJ, Steve Saylor, used to be at Blackpool, the mecca of Blackpool- he will be spinning the discs, I will be calling the tunes, I will be out there with the audience and the dancers. You know, I am not beyond the head with the headphones, not talking over. I am not that sort of DJ. I am a ‘Come here, come for fun, I'm going to entertain you. If you can't dance, then you'll join me, because I can't dance either, but we'll have a good time, and then you'll be ready for the main acts later on. That's, you know, all these DJs with the headphones going ‘woosh,very clever, but it's not me. I ain't that clever.”

If you could give us a sneak peek into some tales you might tell. Could you perhaps name me a highlight of your long career?

“To be honest, I've had so many highlights. When you start off in this business, you have a dream. I said to my mum, who died very early -she died with only a wedding ring and a walking stick, that's all she had, - I said ‘you know what, Mum, I ain't going to do this. I'm not going to work as hard as you to die impoverished. That's not what life's about. I'm going to try my best to make sure that my children and their children have a slightly better beginning than I did’. Don't get me wrong, I loved what I did, but I didn't want to go down that route that my mum had gone down, just working herself to death so I said, I'm gonna give myself five years to do what I want to do. After that, I'll go and do what everybody else wants to do. Now, my mum never lived long enough to see me really successful. She saw the first part but if I ever said to my mum, my granddad and dad ‘Okay, your son is going to get the OBE. He's going to be the Queen's Council. He's going to be at the palace three nights a week, looking after the entertainment. He's going to speak to the President of the United States, in fact two of them are going to text him on a regular basis. He's going to work for the government. He's going to have a record that has now got 5 billion plays and everywhere you go, you can hear Rick Astley.’ They wouldn't have believed me. My granddad would have said ‘bloody, grow up and get a job’. So that's all a highlight of my life.

“Three weeks ago, I was at Pinewood Studios opening the studio there with Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London. He spent 15 minutes telling me how much I'd meant to him as a kid with ‘Hitman and her’. That's amazing, that I've had that impact on people's lives. I know it's television, but they can tell you the minute. I mean, I remember once when Princess Di was alive, and I think it was when William had just been born, and she was up in the middle of the night, feeding the baby, and I was the only thing on television. She spent an hour one night telling me how bad the show was. I said ‘Ma’am, you could have switched it off’ and she said ‘there's nothing else on television!’ And that's the truth. There wasn't. That was it, this was the first night time television show. It was live. It was reality. I was telling somebody else just earlier: we must have been called in by the broadcasting authorities more than anybody else because sometimes it went over the limit. We were doing stuff that now you wouldn't even think about because you see it on Big Brother and and all those fantasy islands, it’s there all the time now. Then - crikey, somebody's taking the clothes off on television? Woah, this was like a no no.”

And of all those acts you've worked with, could you possibly name a favourite or a major diva?

“No is the answer to that because I can't, I loved every act. I've only worked with one act that I'd never work with again. We had a major hit with them and I just said no, because to me -Simon Cowell and I have the very same thoughts on this- if the act is hard to work with, don't work with them. If you don't like them, don't work with them, because it's hard enough working with people you love and like because the enormity of what you do is that it is their livelihood. You know you're making and breaking careers. If you don't like the person, don't do it because you can't win.

“Mark Twain wrote a very profound statement, and I've lived with this all my life: ‘if you pick up a starving dog and feed it, it will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a human being and an animal’. That's the truth. With humans, you always get bit if you're too generous so you just have to accept that at some point it will all change, that the artist will want to go off and do their own thing… That is very tough if you don't like them, if you like them and you all have respect for each other, you understand why.”

Returning to the acts at Lytham Festival, is there anyone else, other than the ones you've worked with, that you're interested in seeing?

Well I know all these acts, that's a great thing, these are all acts that I've worked with… But I mean, this is just a privilege. I'm just going to have a ball. All I want to do is set up the night for Simple Minds and the other guys, so they have a great show and people go away on that Sunday night and go ‘wow, that was amazing, what a great night that was’. I don't want to pick out anybody else. I just want to make sure that people have a good, good, good night and I've been assured by somebody from Lytham that the festival's in a micro climate, so it's going to be roasting. He's guaranteed me that so he's going to have to buy me a drink if it's not!”

I’m afraid it tends to be either roasting or pouring down!

“Well don’t say that for God's sake. Be positive. It's going to be sunshine!”

Why should people in Lancashire get tickets to go to Lytham Festival to see you?

“There's nothing better to do on that Sunday night than come and see us! What else is there in Lancashire to do? You just told me it could be pouring with rain so you might as well come and dance in the rain and have some fun!”

So you’re going to explore Lancashire outside of the festival then?

“I know Lancashire very well indeed. I live here for God's sake. You know, this is my part of the world, that's why I moved up here. I actually moved to Warrington in’ 83 to live in Lancashire, because it was in Lancashire. Then it was only three weeks after I moved there that they moved into Cheshire! So I'm a frustrated Lancastrian.”

Is there anything else in the lineup for you after Lytham Festival that you want to mention?

“Just that the Steps Musical starts in September…The show is brilliant and I just can't wait for it to get on the road.”