Steve Hancock comes from Doncaster, South Yorkshire and his father Gordon was in a popular Country trio, Dusty Road in the early 1980s. The line up was Dave Hepworth (pedal steel guitar, lead guitar, banjo and vocals), Gordon Hancock (Rhythm guitar and vocals) and Chris Hartle (bass and vocals). Despite this upbringing in Country music, Steve was a late comer, not learning to play guitar till he was 20 when we was working as a RAF technician in Norfolk. Having learnt to play, he soon joined his first band, Country Style in which he played lead guitar and sung harmony vocals. The line up was Steve Hancock (lead guitar), Barry Loftus (rhythm guitar), Alan Gosling (bass), and David Smith (drums) with a young girl called Lisa on vocals. After a year with them he left in the early-1980s to front his own band Moonshine. The line up was Steve Hancock (lead vocals and lead guitar), Nigel Martin (guitar and keys) and Dave Bywaters (drums). The band quickly became popular in the Norfolk area. By the mid-1980s, Steve left the RAF and took full time employment working as a fitter at Norwich Airport. Travelling 50 miles to work and working in a band proved too much, and he had to leave Moonshine but he soon found a place as a bass player in a well established Irish band from Norwich called Spiral. The line up was Bill Docherty (vocals and rhythm guitar). David Downs (lead guitar), Steve Hampton (bass and vocals), Eric Coulson (pedal steel guitar, electric guitar and vocals) and Keith Greentree – later replaced by Collin Burrage (drums).
Despite a few changes in line up which included bass player Stuart Ramsden in 1996 and multi-instrumentalist Steve Harrop in 1998 and a change of name from Band to Trio, they continued to prosper into the 21st century. Steve Harrop’s son Robben took the place of Stuart in October 2000. At the end of May 2002 the band came off the road and Steve Hanks launched his solo career. During the 1990s and early 2000s The Steve Hanks band recorded a couple of cassette albums and a CD album but sales were never good and there have been no further albums.
After a couple of years as a soloist Steve teamed up with Tony Hornsby, another former member of the Steve Hanks Trio in a new duo and, in 2006, he joined multi-instrumentalist Jon J Paul in a new trio called C’est La Vie. The John J Paul Band from Lincolnshire was one of the top bands on the club circuit in the East of England in the 1990s. The new trio comprised John J Paul (lead vocals, guitar, keyboard and accordion), Steve Hanks (lead vocals and guitar) and Tony Hornsby (bass).
C’est La Vie toured for 14 months before Steve decided on a career change. C’est La Vie carried on and expanded to a 4-piece band. Steve first trained as a teacher but another career change came in 2009 when he became a contract manager for a major welfare-to-work organisation. He was, ironically, made redundant in January 2012 as a result of changes in government funding and restructuring. It was logical for him to return to the Country circuit as a soloist with a brief return to teaching during lockdown. He also now provides the PA for many Country events and between that and singing he is still much in demand.
Steve has also worked as a TV Actor/Extra and has had numerous appearances in programme’s such as Emmerdale, Coronation Street, Heartbeat The Upper Hand and speaking parts in A Touch of Frost and Coronation Street as well as several commercials and a couple of films.
Although always a prolific songwriter Steve initially avoided singing his own songs until 2002 when he was asked to write a song for a film called Among Giants, The song Why wasn’t used in the film for copyright reasons but the response he got from playing the song live has prompted him to continue writing.
Research by Nick Catford.