How a 50p theft helped launch one of British pop's greatest songwriting duos
In short: Before the hits and the fame, Chris Difford was a solicitor's clerk and a cardboard box flattener. Driven by a small act of larceny and a stolen 50p coin, he set an advertisement in a window that would change the landscape of New Wave music forever.
The legendary partnership between Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook, the architects of the band Squeeze, began with a simple, somewhat illicit maneuver. Seeking a guitarist, the Greenwich-born Difford used 50p taken from his mother's purse to place an advertisement in a local sweetshop. The only person to respond was Tilbrook, initiating a collaboration that would produce fifteen studio albums as Squeeze and the 1984 project Difford & Tilbrook.
Difford's path to songwriting was far from linear. Raised in London as the youngest of three sons, his early years involved elocution lessons to combat a severe stammer and a brief stint as a skinhead. His pre-fame employment history was a mosaic of working-class labor, ranging from a wages clerk's role to flattening boxes in a cardboard factory and even editing soft-core films. His musical inspiration shifted from writing nursery rhymes to professional songwriting only after being introduced to the works of Bob Dylan and David Bowie.
The duo's catalog includes iconic tracks such as 'Cool for Cats', 'Tempted', and 'Black Coffee in Bed'. While Squeeze saw massive success in the mid-1980s with the album Babylon and On, Difford's career has been marked by both immense creativity and personal struggle. He faced significant substance abuse issues during the 1980s, eventually entering rehab in 1990 and achieving sobriety in 1992. Today, he continues to influence the craft through his annual songwriting retreat and various podcast ventures.
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- Summary by Intellect · source: Chris Difford
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