Fine China: T’Pau singer Carol Decker on the staying power that turned hit ’80s anthem into a classic

Few frontwomen in the ’80s burned as brightly as flame-haired pop star Carol Decker.

As the voice of T’Pau, she gave us hits like China In Your Hand and Heart And Soul.

Decades after her Top Of The Pops heyday, Carol is still belting out these classics, and will do so again at Party In The Palace in Linlithgow this summer.

Carol, now 67, was always candid about both the highs and lows of her life.

On the one hand there were private jets, opening the Brit Awards in front of Bono, and having thousands of fans belt her songs back at her night after night. On the other, though, was the darker side of fame.

“I wore short skirts in the ’80s, I had great legs,” said Carol, on a Zoom call from her home in Henley. “I still have great legs!

“I remember once as I went to get out of the car this photographer dropped to his knees to get an upskirt shot.

“A lot of paparazzi were parked outside my house in North London, hiding behind the cars, so that when I came out in my curlers with a fag in my mouth to get the milk off the steps, they could get that shot.”

The crime of “upskirting” is now illegal in Scotland, England and Wales.

Carol also faced journalists in the ’90s, an era when brash, rude interviews were in fashion. One in particular, on live television, sticks with her to this day.

“The first words out of his mouth were: ‘Why do you wear your skirt so short? Is it to take everybody’s minds off the fact that the music’s crap?’

“I’ve never forgotten these things. And it hurt. These days, I’m not important enough any more for the big press to bother with me, so they leave me alone! And happily most of the people I speak to now are really nice!”

Carol is the rare celebrity who recognises and appreciates her time at the top. Fans turn out in droves to see her and fellow pop legends play music for nostalgic purposes rather than break new barriers. She’s not going to play avant-garde jazz and, coming from the ’80s, an innovative decade in its own right, nor does she want to.

Carol first joined a nostalgia tour alongside Paul Young, Kim Wilde, Go West and China Crisis in 2001 and “hasn’t stopped since”. The appetite for these tours has lasted longer than the ’80s, she points out.

“To me it’s fantastic because, if you’re not Bob Dylan, this is a short life and a merry one. You have to come to terms with the fact your glory days are probably over,” she ponders.

“But then also give yourself credit for the fact that, in a very tough business, you have had a handful of hits. Some people still like to see me, and hear me sing, and that’s nothing to be embarrassed about. I’ve come to terms with it, and become proud of myself.”

© Ian Dickson/Shutterstock

The ’80s, she believes, were a time when pop music was still raw, but was without the slick and carefully managed marketing so common in the 2020s.

New Order, Heaven 17, Boy George, Bon Jovi, Cyndi Lauper, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Prince,” she says, rhyming off names of her contemporaries. “All with different styles and personalities. And the pop songs stand the test of time, the production has stood up. We had the first computer, first mobile phone, movies like Wall Street, Top Gun and Back To The Future. Every step back then felt monumental whereas now it perhaps feels a bit incremental.

“These days somebody tells you there’s a new app on your phone where you can see the surface of Mars. You look at it for two seconds then forget about it…”

China In Your Hand topped the UK singles charts in 1987 and Carol was no pop starlet at the time, having just turned 30.

“It was a long time coming for me, maybe it was different. I lived in Shropshire, you know?” she laughs. “There were just cows, hay bales. There was no music scene. It wasn’t Manchester!”

Some celebrities react poorly to the attention, and Carol, with sniffy interviewers and creepy photographers, would be forgiven for being one of them. Yet perhaps being 30 when she made it to the top gave her a broader perspective.

“I absolutely loved it. You got upgraded on flights all the time. You got the best tables, people came up to you in the street to tell you that you were great. What’s not to like?

“We opened the Brits at the Albert Hall. I remember Bono and The Edge looking down from the balcony, leaning down to watch us. And I’m thinking: ‘I’m in. I’ve made it.’”

Carol and her bandmates even had occasional use of a private jet. Not that, she says, they’re all they’re cracked up to be.

“We were doing the equivalent of the German Top Of The Pops,” she recalls with a cackle. “I have to say we only took private jets because of scheduling reasons, we weren’t like Meghan Markle or anything! We jumped on this plane and there was loads of champagne, so we were chucking it down our necks. And then I needed the toilet but there wasn’t one. All the boys were peeing in bottles, but I couldn’t because my aim isn’t that good. Private jets aren’t as nice as you think. I nearly exploded…”

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Carol lives with husband Richard, and has two adult children, Scarlett and Dylan. At home she has a gym where she works off her excess tension.

“It’s really good for you as a woman post-menopause,” she says. “This is not sexy, but it’s good for your bone density to lift weights.

“It also sorts my head out. When we had lockdown, I could have won an Olympic medal. I was in the gym every morning, making sure I didn’t kill my family.”

Like many these days, Carol is open about cosmetic procedures and is booked in to see a surgeon the day after our interview.

“I’m having it done at 10.30 tomorrow morning!” she adds. “I don’t do it massively, but I’m 68 in September, and I’m getting a little bit wrinkly.

“You can’t fight age, some of it is just going to happen. I do baby botox and this wonderful surgeon knows exactly where all the muscles are, so I won’t look like a frozen tambourine.

“I don’t mind a little tweak, sometimes I look in the mirror and think I look knackered. But there are things you can do about it now. As long as you exercise discretion, and don’t overdo it. I’m down with a little freshening up. Never go full tambourine…”

Anthem is Robbie’s cup of tea

Carol was holding a tea cup belonging to then-partner and T’Pau bandmate Ronnie Rogers’ mother while doing the washing up in the 1980s.

She felt a lump at the bottom and held the china mug to the light to see an image of a young woman on the base. So was born one of the great ’80s power ballads still beloved to this day.

Carol has, she says, lost count of the number of times she’s sung it.

“We did a show last night and it was so hot and I was singing China In Your Hand, and all I was thinking was: ‘Oh, someone open a bloody window!’

“But I don’t even have to sing it, the crowds sing it back with such enthusiasm.

“Robbie Williams was on the radio last week talking about China In Your Hands. He said it was an anthem for the ’80s. He knows a thing or two, I was so flattered.”

Despite having hits on both sides of the Atlantic, T’Pau eventually split in 1992. “One American critic wrote, after the big impact of Heart and Soul, that T’Pau didn’t amount to much because Carol Decker wasn’t quite good looking enough.

“I shed a few tears about that sort of thing. There was some horrible stuff, but my abiding memory was just how lucky I was.

“It wasn’t always pleasant, but I was lucky.”

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See Carol Decker at Party At The Place at Bonnytoun Farm, Linlithgow on August 2. For tickets visit partyatthepalace.co.uk