John originally hails from Coatbridge in Scotland, where he had a guitar lesson at the age of 15 and decided to become a bass player instead. Three months after acquiring a real bass, he found himself playing his first gig in a punk/new wave covers band in front of about 50 women at the Union of Catholic Mothers at the Marion Hall in Coatbridge. John has no concept of the word 'auspicious'.

Having been unceremoniously thrown out of a proto-Hue & Cry line-up a couple of years later - for 'liking a drink', apparently - John underwent a bit of a musical hiatus until an accidental meeting with Mark Hannaway, the singer from his first band The Vikes, led to them forming The Jones Boy with Mark's drummer friend Cammy. After playing a series of gigs around Scotland's Central Belt to the occasional rave review, and recording two demos which were described by the Airdrie & Coatbridge Advertiser as 'quite good', The Jones Boy parted company.

It wasn't until John moved to Leicester in late 1999 that he again took up the bass cudgels, initially for a bunch of chancers called Chico who played one gig at Lamplighters in Leicester and promptly self-destructed. He then formed Kinago with Leicester musician Gary Walkden, who after a couple of line-up changes produced two critically-acclaimed EP's before John was head-hunted by ist in late 2004, following several drunken conversations which he was unaware of in spite of being there at the time.

Originally drafted in as one of a series of guest bassists for the album which would eventually become their sophomore release, King Martha, John set up residence in ist's rehearsal room and refused to leave until he got his money back. He is still waiting.

Sean Connery is 76.