PETE WAY
August 7, 1951 – August 14, 2020
The bass-wielding, shape-throwing co-founder of UFO, Waysted, Fastway and latterly his own group the Pete Way Band has died at the age of 69. Way’s Facebook page posted that he had “sustained life-threatening injuries in an accident two months ago but fought hard until finally succumbing to those injuries”. His wife Jenny later revealed that Way fell down the stairs at their house in Bournemouth, and on admission to hospital was put in a medically induced coma. “The first night [the doctors] told me he wasn’t going to make it,” she told a radio interviewer. However, eventually he regained consciousness. By that point, Jenny reveals, “he didn’t know who I was, or who [his beloved] Aston Villa were”.
“I thought Pete would outlive all of us,” UFO drummer Andy Parker comments sadly. “I can’t imagine a world without Way.”
Never a man to turn down a party or an opportunity for high jinks, Pete Way was married six times. He lived several lives in one. His bass-playing style, songwriting ability and explosive stage presence marked him out not only as a colourful individual but also as a hero to a future generation of bass guitarists.
Born in Middlesex, Peter Frederic Way tolerated school. “I gravitated to the kids who were there to be caned,” he later admitted. He and guitarist Mick Bolton formed The Boyfriends, and then in 1968, with the addition of Andy Parker and rookie vocalist Phil Mogg, Hocus Pocus were born.
“We had a place in Bounds Green,” Mogg recalls. “Pete and I shared a room and a bed. It was so cold that we wore our clothes at night. We got day jobs to finance the band. I had my gig as a carpet layer, but Pete lasted just three days pumping gas at a petrol station.”
Renamed UFO,
