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The STEPS Story

This story was written by Matt so please contact him to gain permission before using any information from it. The story was written for an official interview CD-ROM but unfortunately was not used.

The pop sensation that was STEPS began way back in the spring of 1997 where the five members of STEPS, who had never met each other, all answered the same advert that appeared in "The Stage" to attend an open audition for a five-piece line-dancing pop group. The advert was looking for five young people who were exceptional in singing and dancing, and most importantly had bright personalities. Five thousand applicants later and over a period of six months these entries were whittled down to just five lucky people who were to become one of the biggest pop groups that the world has seen. The five lucky people were Claire Richards, Faye Tozer, Lisa Scott-Lee, Lee Latchford Evans and Ian Watkins.

All five members of the group were out of work when they turned up for the audition which was held in a small hut in Surrey. Before the auditions, Faye had been working at a holiday camp where her duties included bingo calling. Ian (H) had been working at Butlins as a children’s entertainer, Lisa was touring the UK as a singer/dancer, Claire was enjoying her time after the collapse of her former band 'TSD' and Lee was on the road to becoming a professional footballer. Tim Byrne, Steps' manager, was looking for five people who could help teach the public dance steps and the original concept was that all the singles would be line-dancing songs (similar to 5, 6, 7, 8). This was a shock for the five members and Faye was tempted to leave the band upon hearing this.

Steps were only really 'designed' to last one song and on the 7th November 1997 their first single '5, 6, 7, 8' was released. This single shocked both Steps and their management team. 5, 6, 7, 8 hung around in the UK charts for three months and went on to become the biggest selling single of the 90s not to enter the 'UK Top 10', selling 290,000 copies in the United Kingdom and 500,000 elsewhere. Due to the overwhelming success of 5, 6, 7, 8, Steps were signed to Jive Records, the home of the Backstreet Boys. Tim Byrne approached Jive because he was impressed with what the success had achieved with the Backstreet Boys, "especially internationally."

After signing with Jive Records, STEPS went on to release their second single (initially another line-dancing number) but as the band thought this would be the wrong road to travel down, Pete Waterman came up with 'Last Thing On My Mind' - a 'Bananarama' song which he originally wrote. 'Last Thing On My Mind' was released on 17th April 1998 selling 330,000 copies and gave STEPS their first UK Top 10 hit, peaking at number six. It was this single that made people notice Steps as a pop group and not just as a 'one hit wonder'.

Now that they were being taken seriously, the next stage of development was an album. This took top priority for the next few months as they rushed to complete an album. Waterman said that STEPS album would be "making sure the kids get a good deal... just like the good old days by rediscovering 'classic pop music'". Before the release of the album, STEPS released their third UK Single, 'One For Sorrow'. This was released in the UK on 31st August 1998 and sold 363,000 copies and shot STEPS into stardom. 'One For Sorrow' entered the UK charts at number two, narrowly being beaten by the Manic Street Preachers, and stayed in the Top 10 for long enough to give their debut album a boost. 'Step One' was released on 11th September 1998 and smashed into the UK Album chart at number two, being beaten to the number one spot by the Manic Street Preachers again! Step One was given good reviews by most music magazines and has sold more than 2.4 million copies in the UK!

By this time, STEPS had a huge following of fans and released their Christmas 1998 single on 6th November 1998. 'Heartbeat' was released as a Double-A single with a cover of the Bee Gees' 'Tragedy', which appeared on an album of Bee Gee cover songs. This single entered the UK’s Top 10 at number two again and after three weeks looked destined to leave the Top 10 before the Christmas Chart was announced. But sales increased and STEPS managed to stay in the Top 10 for Christmas. The following week, STEPS had moved up to number one to become the first number one of 1999! Finally STEPS got that number one that they deserved, selling almost 1.3 million copies.

STEPS were nominated at the 1999 BRIT Awards for the Best Newcomers, as voted for by BBC Radio 1 listeners. STEPS were also asked to perform as part of an ABBA Tribute for the ceremony. They were joined by Tina Cousins, Billie, B*Witched and Cleopatra. Sadly, the 'Best Newcomer' award went to Belle and Sebastian, and Pete Waterman launched a protest. He said that he had been told three days before the ceremony that STEPS had won, but an influx of votes for Belle and Sebastian on the last day of voting won them the award. Waterman claimed that the voting was rigged for a band that released their first single in 1995, and so were hardly 'newcomers'.

After the success of 'Heartbeat / Tragedy', STEPS released their fifth single from their debut album 'Step One'. 'Better Best Forgotten' was released on 8th March 1999 and peaked at number two, again, in the UK. Many magazines saw this as one single too many from the album and sales have reflected this. But demand for the ABBA tribute which STEPS had performed at the BRIT awards meant that it was released on Epic Records on 29th March 1999. It entered the UK charts at number four.

In July 1999, Steps released their first single from their new album 'Steptacular'. 'Love's Got A Hold On My Heart' was denyed the top spot by just 3,300 copies by the increasing popularity of Ricky Martin's 'Livin' La Vida Loca'. The single was given mixed reactions and was priced at £3.99 from the day it was released. Also the interactive part of CD2 came under heavy criticism and these factors may have stopped STEPS gaining their second number one.

STEPS then started their first tour of the United States, supporting singer Britney Spears. STEPS also release a remixed version of 'One For Sorrow', however, it failed to overwhelm the Americans. They also released their first US album in 2000, a mixture of 'Step One' and 'Steptacular'. Again, it did not do as well as hoped.

But STEPS did enjoy success in other areas of the world. STEPS have had hits in Australia, Belgium, Sweden, Singapore, Taiwan, India, Indonesia, Japan and New Zealand to name but a few of the countries their fans live in. 'Step One' was also released in Canada.

Before the release of 'Steptacular', the group released another single - 'After The Love Has Gone'. It was given good reviews and even made the Radio 1 playlist. The single was released in early October and debuted at number five. The song featured an oriental style video and the single was followed by the release of 'Steptacular' in late October 1999. The album debuted at number one and stayed there for over 4 weeks keeping acts such as 5ive from the top spot. The album has sold over 1.2 million copies in the UK alone!

The Autumn/Winter of 1999 saw STEPS embark on the biggest UK Arena tour ever. Over 30 dates were played in 3 months, including a special Halloween performance live on pay-per-view channel 'Sky Box Office' on the 31st November 1999. During the tour they took a two week break and popped over to the United States to film a Disney Concert which aired in the U.S.A in February 2000. All nights were sold out on the tour and firmly established STEPS as one of the biggest UK acts since the Spice Girls.

December 1999 saw STEPS battle for the UK Christmas number one as the Spice Girls said that they were not going to release a single in time for Christmas. The battle was tough and the victors were Irish boy band Westlife. STEPS reached number five with their double-A single 'Say You'll Be Mine / Better The Devil You Know'. The single later rose to the higher position of number four.

The start of the Year 2000 marked STEPS trying to gain success in the United States. Promotion of the album and single in the US and around the world took heavy priority in the beginning of the year as STEPS traveled to places around the world such as South Africa, Australia and Asia to promote the 'Steptacular' album and the single which accompanied the pending release.

February 2000 saw the release their second single in the United States, Tragedy. The Disney Channel broadcast their concert to promote the American releases, and fans also saw the premiere of the new STEPS video for the single 'Deeper Shade Of Blue' which caused some shocks in the STEPS camp. The video was very much different from their previous videos and presented a more 'grown up' look for the group.

In May 2000 we saw another huge UK Arena Tour for STEPS and the release of 'Deeper Shade Of Blue' in April. The was followed shortly with 'When I Said Goodbye/Summer Of Love'. The video for 'When I Said Goodbye' featured many shots of Faye sitting by a fountain, and some fans assumed this meant she was leaving the group. 'Summer Of Love' gave fans their first glimpse of the forthcoming new album.

The 30th October 2000 saw the release of Steps' 3rd studio album, 'Buzz', which took Steps in a new direction as they worked with some of the most popular American and Swedish Pop production teams. 'Stomp', released before the album, hit the UK #1 spot giving Steps their 2nd UK #1 single.

Buzz proved to be a success with the fans, but not necessarily the media. Reviews were varied due to the sudden change of the 'STEPS style' as their British pop cheese had been replaced with more professional sounding pop sounds from the US and Sweden. It was seemingly an obvious attempt by Jive to try and gain some success in the US.

Steps hit the road again for the Christmas Tour 2000 and the show was their best yet. Despite a less lavish stage as the previous tour, it had much better lighting effects. Strangely, few songs were performed from the new album - most of the songs performed were taken from pervious albums with only a handful of new songs from the recently released Buzz album.

STEPS followed up the success of 'Stomp' with the Swedish produced 'Its The Way You Make Me Feel' which was released on the 1st January 2001. With a lavish video the single was set to be a huge hit, but some stores accidentally sold copies of the single a week early. Eager Steps fans saw this and snapped them up causing the single to enter the charts in the Top 75. Jive Records were not impressed. When the single was officially released it reached number two.

After the release of 'It's The Way You Make Me Feel', Steps took a long break from the UK music scene as they attempted to spread their sound around the world, appearences on global TV in Asia, Europe and the US with their more "global" sounding album brought them some success in places where they hadn't had much before. In the US they performed for 'TeenNick', but the actual show shown on TV upset a few people in higher places. Steps performed songs which had never been performed before, like 'Buzzz' and these songs were removed from the TV Show.

Steps returned to the UK a massive 5 months later with the huge single 'Here and Now / You'll Be Sorry'. The media loved 'Here and Now' - another song from Sweden - but unlike the mellow 'It's The Way You Make Me Feel', this number was more in line with the classic Backstreet Boys or Britney Spears sound. The video was comprised of two parts but it seemed obvious to STEPS fans that 'Here and Now' had a much larger budget than 'You'll Be Sorry'. The single stormed various UK radio stations and music channels. People were lining up to request the video on music station 'The Box'.

News then appeared that Steps' next release would be a Greatest Hits package, and rumours circulated that the group was going to split after the release of the album and tour. Steps denied this in every interview that they gave.

Gold Greatest Hits was released on 15th October 2001, and was promoted using the single 'Chain Reaction'. Fans loved the cover of the song, it was more dynamic than previous covers and had a great video to match.

The Gold album promised 4 new tracks, including 'Chain Reaction', which fans managed to hear when the new greatest hits package was released. The new songs were received with mixed opinions; some loved the new songs - including one which was written by STEPS themselves - others hated them but liked having all of STEPS' singles on one CD.

The album release meant yet another tour for STEPS, the Gold Greatest Hits tour, featuring a lavish stage set, great lightning and special effects and even a walkway which appeared at the end gave everyone in the entire event a good view of STEPS performing.

The last single from the Gold Greatest Hits album was 'Words Are Not Enough', written in 1999 and released in December 2001. The video was a computer animated spectacle and cost £200,000 to make. Although the song wasn't a major fan favourite the single still did well like all previous Steps releases and reached the top 5.

The last night of the Steps Gold Tour saw yet another Sky pay-per-view concert from Manchester. At the end of the show, members appeared to be crying as they left the stage, many Steps fans put it down to just being the last show of the tour and they where a little emotional... news developed and rumours persisted across the Internet.

On Boxing Day, December 26th 2001, Steps announced their Split to the public. Fans of course were upset, but very angry. As we moved into 2002, people were contacting news programme 'Newsround' and even the major news networks and it was reported everywhere that Steps fans were upset about the the group had split. They had denied everything up until the night of their last show and then suddenly broke the news at Christmas time. People complained that STEPS had only stayed together to ensure that they could sell as many albums as possible before the split, to make more money.

This arguement continued for months and months. Eventually the news appeared that H & Claire were joining up for a new duo project and had signed up to Warner Music. Also news was circulating that Lisa and Faye were planning solo careers.

As 2002 progressed it became apparent that Jive were planning one last Steps album release. Some news items reported that the album would contain new, unreleased songs and exclusive, previously unreleased remixes. The last STEPS single, 'Baby Don't Dance' was also to be released.

'The Last Dance' was released by Jive Records on the 25th November 2002, but only in the United Kingdom. The album failed to meet expectations and contained only b-sides and remixes which were already available on other releases. A week before the release of 'Baby Don't Dance', Jive Records cancelled the single. We can only assume that they believed the single would flop, or that the former members of STEPS managed to prevent the release.

Information

This story was written by Matt so please contact him to gain permission before using any information from it. The story was written for an official interview CD-ROM but unfortunately was not used.