大象传媒

When you meet Carol Decker you don't quite know what hits you. A flurry of flame-coloured hair, a big friendly smile and a slight raspy voice greets you, and before long the T'Pau frontwoman displays her marvelously dry sense of humour.

I tell her a memory of mine when China In Your Hand was released in 1987, that I was in my bedroom trying to hit those beefy high notes that are all to prevalent in that power pop tune.

Did she have to work on a voice like that?

Preparing for a 1988 Top Of The Pops performance

"I've always had a strong voice and quite a decent range," she says, momentarily seriously, "but China In Your Hand can be a bit testing sometimes, it's a big song to sing and I feel under enormous pressure to always deliver it immaculately, cos it would be tragic to just being going (in throttled voice) 'arrrrrgh!' 20 years later!"

T'Pau seemingly lept on to our TV screens out of nowhere with their first hit Heart And Soul in 1987, which was initially a flop over here.

However the song reached number four in US Billboard Hot 100 chart after appearing in a jeans advert. The UK soon followed suit months later.

Their debut album Bridge Of Spies was consequently a chart topper in the UK, winning several awards to boot.

But behind the scenes the sudden fame came at the tail end of a long hard graft for Carol.

"It's almost the sense of it being a bit surreal, like it's happening to someone else," she says.

Carol Decker, still looking great today

"Particularly in my case, I'd worked hard for a long time and really struggled to get a record deal - I was 28 when I got my record deal, so I was used to being in club bands and playing in bars and pubs.

"And all of a sudden I'm in the top five and people like Elton John are shaking my hand and telling me how great I am.

"It was like it was happening to someone else - like a movie playing out in front of me."

A query about how the band got signed leads to another Carol quip.

"I slept with the managing director of the....", she says before a bout of giggles.

"No," she quickly corrects, "we finally got a decent manager who was connected in London because I lived in Shropshire, so I wasn't really connected with anybody.

"We sent tapes away so we caught the attention of someone in management and then they were in a position in London to start sending it to record companies.

"Siren Records was a subsidiary of Virgin and we got what's called a showcase audition, so Siren paid for us to go into this fantastic rehearsal studio called Nomis, in Shepherd's Bush.

"I think we did three songs cos that's all we had time to rehearse cos I cobbled the band together really quickly. It was just me and my ex-partner Ronnie Rogers.

"And we gave it as footballers say, (puts on a gruff voice): a hundred and ten per cent, and we got a deal. I couldn't believe it!

Carol in the Top Of The Pops dressing room in 1988

"I was so used to people saying 'don't give up your day job', we finally got a deal and we were on our way."

The name T'Pau comes from Star Trek, named after a female Vulcan priestess, though the band were certainly not fans of the sci-fi series.

"I was watching the telly and I was actually doing the ironing," Carol remembers. "I just thought it was a really snappy onomatopoeic word and I ran it by the band.

She adds: "We'd actually recorded our first album, it was in the bag, it was done and dusted and we still didn't have a name.

"So we had to come up with something, and T'Pau was the one we disagreed on the least."

The name is now synonymous with the 80s with hits such as the aforementioned Heart And Soul and China In Your Hand as well as Valentine, I Will Be With You and Secret Garden.

And it's these songs you'll be hearing at the 80s Rewind Festival in Henley this coming August, even though Carol has penned some new songs.

"It is a homage to the 80s so we'll stick to the point," says Carol of the festival.

"I am working on a new album but that's not what Rewind will be about, it'll be about celebrating those great days and all our big hits, so (in a mock exasperated voice) I'll being singing China In Your Hand again."

Though perhaps disapointingly she won't be wheeling out her old shoulder-padded costumes or her former big 80s hairdo.

"It's not a fancy dress party, it's a gig!" she laughs.

"I gave a lot of it away," she says of her 80s clothes, "you get a lot of requests for charity auctions and for your soiled clothes to be auctioned off!

"I've only got one or two skirts and things that I'm saving for my daughter. They might be back in fashion by the time she's grown up".