Giuliano ‘Jools’ Gizzi still remembers Gun’s first time on Top Of The Pops. It was August 1989, and their debut single Better Days had charted. Young Glaswegian upstarts in ripped denim and biker jackets, Gun were in seventh heaven – especially when meeting former Prince &The Revolution stars Wendy &Lisa, who were on the show with their solo hit Satisfaction. “I said to Wendy: ‘Can I shake the hand that’s touched Prince?’” Jools recalls, smiling. “She said: ‘Sure. You can shake the hand that’s slapped him a few times as well!’”
There was a touch of happenstance about this Prince-themed exchange, for Gun’s Better Days had actually been inspired by him. “Yeah, we’d been listening to Prince a lot,” says singer Dante Gizzi, Jools’s younger brother by eight years. “The verse of Better Days owes a lot to Mountains, off his album Parade.”
“It’s absolutely a heavier version of that,” Jools says in agreement. “Plus we tried to make the chorus a bit like Why Can’t This Be Love by Van Halen. Our management had drilled the importance of strong songs into us. We looked to the best for inspiration.”
Prince-meets-Van Halen? Way to go. And if Wendy &Lisa clocked Mountains’ palpable influence on Gun’s first hit, they didn’t let on.
Meanwhile, back in Glasgow, a certain Mrs Gizzi had told half the neighbourhood to tune in to that night. “I think that was when mum
