Profiles

On Monday 13th July Little Man Tate announced that they have decided to part company.

Maz from the band said "Its something that we have sat down and discussed at length for a while now and we have decided that after a good innings, we've achieved what we set out to do and it's time we moved on to other things."

Little Man Tate's final gig will be on Saturday 3rd October at Sheffield 02 Academy.

Little Man Tate lead singer had his arm twisted and came in for a one on one chat with BBC Radio Sheffield presenter Rony Robinson, June 2008.

Jon Windle is 26 years old and from Sharrow, Sheffield. The son of a driving instructor and his mum a hairdresser. Rony’s opening question as he asks many of his guests on his show – if you weren’t here, what would you be doing?

Our house

“I would be re building my house and getting it to look like a house. Me and my girlfriend have just bought our first house. It's a complete messs, so I’m trying my hand at some D.I.Y. She’s getting better at cooking and I’m not great at much.

Whilst on the subject of his girlfriend, we find out how they met and whether it was all ‘rock and roll?’

“We met at 11 when we were at a wedding. I fancied her for years but nothing happened. We got it together, there were times when we just saw each other and then didn’t. We’ve now been together about seven or eight years now properly.

Jon was born in Jessops hospital in Sheffield. He was educated at High Stores School, he admits it wasn't the best time of his life and neither was he an ideal pupil.

“I was totally un-academic, no GCSE’s. My parents weren't too impressed but I had my heart on music. I wanted to do GCSE Music but the school picked what I studied which I didn’t realise until after I left school. I left without anything.

A curious question followed;

How on earth did you end up in a band?

“I tried to play guitar when I was younger but I struggled. I was never in a school choir. I don’t have a particularly good voice, it’s more a talky kind of voice. I ended up singing because nobody else wanted to do it!”

Let’s talk about Sheffield and why you live here and not ran away to London yet.

"I’ve never lived anywhere else. I’ve lived all my life in Sheffield, it’s fantastic. Ben from the band left Deepcar for about a month and then came back! That’s as far as he got.

“If you want to move then move but for me my friends and family are all here. Of all the places I’ve been in the world, I’m happiest with everybody around me. I don’t need to move, everything is on my doorstep and it’s what I’m used to.

Rony heard about a particular gig Little Man Tate turned down at High Stores School of all places…

“Years ago me and Maz were in a band when we were 18 years old. We wanted to do some gigs in schools at lunch time, which used to happen a lot. We approached High Stores and they didn’t want to know.

“We totally forgot about that until a couple months ago, we were asked if we’d play High Stores – not a chance”

Jon Windle, Rony Robinson and Maz

Rony asks Jon his final question;

How big are you going to be?

“I wanna stay 6”4…! We want to be the biggest band in the world.”

Rony interrupts “but hang on, you’re not even the biggest band in Sheffield yet”

“Exactly, we’re no where near that. How big we want to be and how big you’re going to be are two different things. I want to sell out gigs across the world but realistically it won’t happen. We need to build on what we’ve got, ideally I just want us to be the biggest band in the world.

“I know we’ve got luck on our side but I’m not sure if we’ve used it all up?”