A long life with many achievements, but more to come for Robin Campbell

UB40 founding member Robin Campbell has been at the forefront of one of the biggest reggae bands in history, with classic songs such as One in Ten, Kingston Town, Red Red Wine and Rat in mi Kitchen, but has always stayed as Robin from Birmingham, playing in a band with his mates.

He and the band are getting ready for a 45th anniversary tour with Soul II Soul, playing to arenas across the region, including the Resorts World Arena in Birmingham on November 9, 2024, but the 68-year-old said while the band was excited for the tour, it was just part of a busy 18 months.

He said: "The tour is just a very small part of the next 18 months, which is of global touring as that it what we do every time we have a new album, but we're also a recording band and we love getting into the studio and making new music.

"We don't ever want to become a cabaret act where we just play our old hits, so we love getting into the studio and, more than that, we love getting out and playing it all around the world and getting the stamp of approval from the fans."

The band hit the big time in 1980 with the release of the Signing Off album, which stayed in the UK Album charts for 71 weeks and eventually went Platinum.

Robin said the idea of the band, which was named after the ID card required to claim benefit money in the 1970s, was to play music they loved and do it as a career, but he said he couldn't have imagined how quickly it took off.

He said: "We probably dreamed that we could be the biggest band in the world, but I don't think we actually thought that was ever going to happen.

"We took ourselves very seriously of course and we weren't just doing it for fun as the idea was to do it as a career and we knew we had abilities and we had a good sound.

"We knew that just from the first time we played in public, as the reaction we got was phenomenal and it happened very quickly for us as we gathered a following, got a reputation and had record companies looking at us and wanting to make a deal.

"We didn't really have time to think about it and kind of felt like a surfer, just going with it."

UB40 came along at the same time as the Two Tone movement, which introduced bands such as The Specials, Madness, The Selector and The Beat, although Robin said UB40 decided not to be part of what he described as a "revivalist thing".

He said: "We saw them as a revivalist thing, mixing ska and punk together, whereas we saw ourselves as a reggae band and we weren't into playing ska, so we steadfastly refused all the offers from Jerry Dammers for us to join.

"He'd say to us 'why don't you just do a single on Two Tone as it will be guaranteed for the charts as it will get played', because Two Tone songs did at the time, but that was probably how seriously we took ourselves as we didn't want to just be flavour of the month.

"We didn't want to be thought of as a ska band and we also had our own interest from record companies, so we have the luxury of picking and choosing what we did."

The band has been a consistent part of the music scene over the last 45 years, performing at events such as the Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday concert at Wembley Stadium in 1988, Live 8 at Hyde Park in 2005 and Live Earth in Johannesburg in South Africa in 2007.

Robin said part of the appeal was the hit songs the band had amassed over the years and said that while the band would play some of the newer songs on the tour, he knew the fans were there to hear the hits and the band were happy to play them.

He said: "You'll hear songs such as Kingston Town, Red Red Wine and Can't help falling in love with you as these are the tunes we play every night because they are the tunes that people know.

"Even a casual fan who has just bought a ticket will expect to hear the songs that they know and love and we play them every time.

"Of course, we like to play a couple of new tunes from the new album and maybe resurrect a few that they might not have heard for a while to mix it up, but we will play the hits as that's what people expect.

"I know that if I paid money to see a band, I'd expect to hear their hits and play the tunes that made me love them in the first place."

UB40 have a place in music history, particularly in the UK where only Queen and the Rolling Stones have had more top 40 singles than them, which Robin said was a great position to be in.

The band also enjoyed a memorable appearance at the closing ceremony of the 2022 Commonwealth Games, with Robin saying it was a proud moment for the band, as well as congratulating the city on putting on such a good show.

He said: "The fact that it was a massive sporting occasion and Birmingham was hosting more than 70 countries and territories was phenomenal and we did a brilliant job.

"Birmingham does tend to do a brilliant job of most things and it was just great to see that we can host such a big event, so it was great fun and just another great advert for our home town."

That appearance saw the band perform Red Red Wine, a performance enjoyed by the 30,000 people in Alexander Stadium, as well as those watching on the big screen at Victoria Square in the centre of Birmingham, with a video on social media catching everyone singing along to the song.

Robin said that while the band had achieved international success and toured the world, they had never forgotten where they had come from and remained boys from Birmingham, even returning back to the city for a new recording studio at Digbeth Loc Studios, the new studios being created by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight.

He said: "We're not just proud of where we have come from, we are a product of where we come from as I don't think we could have existed as a band without being a group of lads growing up in inner city Birmingham, surrounded by the music that became reggae in the late 1960s.

"We were surrounded by it and fell in love with it, so it just became the music we wanted to play, so we are thankful to the city for helping us be a product of our environment.

"We've got a studio at the moment in Coventry, but that's very underground and quiet and more of a demo studio, but Steven is going to be building state of the art as he wants to attract movie producers, so it's great to be able to move back into Birmingham and have our headquarters and mass storage all in the same building and that's down to Steven."

The line-up of the band has changed over the years, with original members Ali Campbell, Astro and Micky Virtue leaving and saxophonist Brian Travers dying from cancer in 2021, but the current line-up of drummer Jimmy Brown, Robin Campbell, bassist Earl Falconer and percussionist Norman Hassan retains the link to the beginnings of the band.

Robin said the introduction of Matt Doyle as singer in 2021, replacing Robin's brother Duncan, who retired due to ill health after a stroke, brought a youthful vigour to the band.

He also said the process for bringing him in hadn't been too difficult, considering his relationship to one of the band members.

He said: "We've worked with him for years as he was in band called Kyoko, who supported us on shows and they also recorded a collaboration with us, so I always remember thinking this kid can sing and was really good.

"When Duncan had the stroke and had to retire, I just went straight to Matt and offered him the job and he just happens to be in the family as he's Norman's nephew and has been a fan for years, telling me about sitting in the back of his parent's car and singing along to the songs.

"A lot of them were recorded before he was born and he's only 31, but he loves the band and material, particularly the old stuff, which is why UB45 contains some of the classics re-recorded with him singing as we want people to hear how good he sings the old stuff.

"Also, half of that album is new material and songs he wrote and he also co-wrote Champion, the Commonwealth Games theme, with me, and he's just full of so many ideas and enthusiasm and it helps to reinvigorate us as we might all be in our 60s, but we're having a ball."

As the band gets ready to take on a full arena tour with Soul II Soul, as well as a homecoming show at Moseley Park on Sunday, August 27, Robin said the band meant everything to him, providing a lifetime of achievement and experiences he couldn't have imagined.

He said: "It's given me a life I never thought I would have had as, if I hadn't been doing this, I'd probably have been working in a factory and retired by now, but it's given me and my mates an incredible life.

"It's been a whole life of travelling the world, meeting incredible people and doing something we love for a living, so UB40 really is my whole life.

"Soul II Soul will be great on the tour as well as they are playing with us at the homecoming show in Moseley Park at the end of August and we asked them if they'd like to tour with us as they are such an iconic band and I can't wait to hear them on tour.

"To be able to come to Birmingham is amazing which, for a lot of bands, can be a bit of a miserable audience, but has never been anything other than a party for us and it doesn't matter how man people are there, it'll be a party as they are not just fans, they're also family and friends."

UB40 play Resorts World Arena at the NEC on November 9, 2024, with Soul II Soul in support.

The band also play Moseley Park in Moseley on Sunday, August 27. To find out more, go to moseleypark.co.uk.