🎤 DAVE HILL
From Slade to a new chapter
At 80, after more than six decades of making music and carrying one of British rock's most recognisable guitars, Dave Hill is doing something remarkable: releasing his first solo album.
For generations of rock fans, Dave Hill needs little introduction.
As the flamboyant guitarist and founding member of Slade, his unmistakable stage presence became part of the visual identity of British glam rock. But behind the costumes, the grin and those instantly recognisable guitar riffs has always been a musician whose life has been inseparable from the stage.
Now, more than sixty years after his professional journey began, Hill is opening a surprisingly personal new chapter.
On 30 October 2026, he releases his debut solo album, Dirty Foot Lane — ten songs looking not simply at where he is today, but at the road that brought him here.
FROM WOLVERHAMPTON TO ROCK HISTORY
Dave Hill's musical story stretches back to the early 1960s.
He began playing with drummer Don Powell before the musicians who would eventually become Slade came together. By the beginning of the 1970s, Slade had found both their name and their sound — loud, direct and enormously catchy rock & roll built for audiences to sing and stomp along with.
What followed became part of British music history.
Slade accumulated an extraordinary run of hit singles, including classics such as Coz I Luv You, Mama Weer All Crazee Now, Cum On Feel The Noize and Far Far Away. Their music would subsequently find new audiences far beyond the original glam-rock generation.
And through it all was Hill: guitar in hand and frequently dressed as though somebody had forgotten to tell him there were limits.
That larger-than-life character became famous. Dirty Foot Lane, however, promises something different.
THE MAN BEHIND THE GUITAR
The new album moves beyond the familiar image of Dave Hill the rock star and towards Dave Hill the storyteller.
Its themes touch on family, ambition, struggle, resilience, mental health, live performance and memories stretching from his early dreams of becoming a musician to international success.
Musically, the record also ventures beyond straightforward rock, incorporating elements of blues, folk and more atmospheric sounds.
That makes Dirty Foot Lane particularly interesting.
After a career so closely connected with one of Britain's most recognisable bands, Hill isn't simply attempting to recreate Slade under his own name. Instead, the album gives him room to tell a story that could only really belong to him.
And its title sits at the centre of that story.
For Hill, Dirty Foot Lane represents something very personal: family, home and the journey that took him from his beginnings to a lifetime in music.
A FAMILIAR NAME BEHIND THE CONTROLS
There is also a wonderful connection between Hill's past and present. The album was produced alongside Django Holder — the son of Hill's legendary Slade bandmate Noddy Holder.
It is difficult to imagine a more appropriate bridge between generations. Long-time collaborator and current Slade member John Berry also contributes to the project, together with producer Rob Childs.
Rather than severing the connection with Slade, Dirty Foot Lane therefore carries part of that history forward while allowing Hill to tell a much more individual story.
TEN SONGS AND A LIFETIME OF STORIES
The album contains ten tracks:
Thanks For The Good Times
Back In The Air Again
Dust My Axe
She Had A Troubled Heart
Sweet And Tender
Fast Train
Only Fools And Horses
Play It To The Crowd
Reasons To Succeed
Dirty Foot Lane
Even the titles suggest reflection.
Thanks For The Good Times almost sounds like someone looking back over an extraordinary career, while Play It To The Crowd points directly towards the environment in which Hill has spent so much of his life.
And then everything ultimately arrives at Dirty Foot Lane.
Not a grand rock-star statement.
A place.
A memory.
Home.
STILL PLAYING IT TO THE CROWD
Perhaps the most striking part of this story is that Dirty Foot Lane isn't a retrospective released by someone who has disappeared from music. Dave Hill is still performing.
Slade continues with Hill on guitar and vocals, carrying music that has survived changing fashions, generations and an industry almost unrecognisable from the one in which the band first found success. That gives his solo debut an unusual perspective.
This isn't simply about looking backwards or closing a career. It is about finding another way to tell its story while the story itself continues. And at 80 years old, that may ultimately be the most rock & roll thing about it.
A SPECIAL SPOTLIGHT FOR DAILY MUSIC PRESS
There is also a personal reason why this particular Artist in the Spotlight means something to Daily Music Press. For DMP founder and independent artist Juan El Grande, Slade has been part of his musical life for decades.
Like millions of fans who grew up with those records, the music didn't simply disappear when the 1970s ended. The songs remained. The memories remained. And Dave Hill kept playing.
That makes seeing him step forward with his first solo album more than just another forthcoming release. It is an opportunity to discover another side of a musician many of us thought we already knew. After more than six decades on stage, Dave Hill still has another story to tell.
This time, it carries his name alone.
Dirty Foot Lane by Dave Hill will be released on 30 October 2026.