Spence Fischer-Harrison (vocals)

(formerly Spence Harrison)

Born 1962 in Market Rasen, Lincolnshire. My first single purchased was “20th Century Boy” by T Rex but I had a bit of a thing for David Cassidy. Throughout my school years I learnt to play the violin and then moved on to Trombone and spent 5 years in the Market Rasen town brass band.  I taught myself to play guitar and wrote my first song. It was terrible.

The Punk movement broke when I was 16 or 17 and I was swept along with it. My first ever gig was the Cockney Rejects in Grimsby.  At Southampton University I formed a band with some friends and we called ourselves “The Oilrigs”, we were a popular college band and after learning the songs written by the bass guitarist, I started to write my own and gig with them.

I started my career in teaching and during my first teaching post I joined 2 bands in Hastings.  “The Forestry Commission” was my first where I concentrated on backing vocals and then in “The Rainstation” I took lead vocals and co-wrote the songs (again with the bassist).  On moving to Norwich I joined a band called “More about Me” and started to really experiment with harmonies.  The singer Pete, had an amazing voice and wrote beautiful songs and we gigged in many a Norwich pub.

When Pete moved back to Liverpool, I auditioned for the role of singer in a band heavily influenced by the Cocteau Twins (my favourite band of all time) and wrote songs to the backing tracks composed by the 2 members of the band. “Wish You Would” was composed in this way but I was thrown out of the band for being too much like the Cocteau Twins!  I was gutted but Julian Cator suggested we rope in his brother Paul, acquire a drum machine and hire a bass player Justin and do our own thing – Ivy was born! One of my top singles of all time was Shine’s “Bite the Apple” - the band which Paul had recently been playing guitar for - I still regard that song as the most euphoric love song ever!

The name of the band (Ivy) was simply the name of my mother and it seemed to suit our ethereal sound.  David was then recruited to play drums as we wanted a good live sound.  It really was the most amazing time - touring with the Wedding Present and there was such a buzz around the band.  I met my husband through Ivy – he saw us playing the Arts Centre and then kept coming to gigs until he got drunk one night and started talking to me.

Ivy metamorphosed into Doolittle and Tim joined the band on bass. The name of the band reflected our level of output of new material and also was a nod to the Pixies.  We gigged a couple of times and I seem to remember being pregnant during this time.  Our sound was very “Mazzy Star” and I wrote a batch of new songs - one of which I have since gigged with.

After leaving Doolittle I have carried on doing things on the Norwich music scene. While teaching at Blyth Jex as a dance teacher I managed a band called “Unplugged”, this was really enjoyable and Laura, Nick, Mark, Matty and Simon were happy for me to continue my song writing by offering them songs to gig with.  Nick (on drums) and I were involved in my next musical venture which was a band called “Pillar Lucien” which was much more of a conceptual band as we had a dance company doing contemporary movement and wanted to gig with my friend Zoe painting onto a canvas. The Dance and Art project never gigged but I am still in touch with Andy the bassist and Christie the singer. Nick and Mark and I have carried on supporting each others musical ventures.  After this I got together with my friend Hannah and we put together “Stand by Caroline” – named after her flatmate. Hannah, Ro, Laurie, Matt and Tom and I still rehearse together and we gigged in November 2005 at a Kate Bush tribute gig at the Puppet Theatre.

At the time of writing – the weekend of the 20th January ‘06 gig at the Arts Centre I am excited about the reformation of Ivy.  I am just hoping that we will continue for as long as our audience enjoy our gigs. Perhaps the numerous Ivy offspring will form a band of their own in the future – you never know!