Chesney Hawkes reveals the unusual connection he has with Billy Ocean
They go way back!
Last updated 7th Apr 2025
Chesney Hawkes joined Ken Bruce at Greatest Hits Radio for Golden Years, where he chose 1984, along with three songs from that year, by Prince, Billy Ocean and Huey Lewis and the News.
While chatting to Ken about his chosen year, Chesney revealed that he and 'Caribbean Queen' singer Billy Ocean have an unusual connection. The singer explained how they were practically neighbours as he was growing up, and he was even Billy's paper boy!
'The One and Only' singer explained: "Back when I was a kid we lived in a little town called Sunningdale and Billy Ocean lived in the next road along from us. And when I was about 14, I was his paper boy."
According to the singer Billy had "all the papers" including the "worst day, Sunday, when the Sunday Times was a size of a brick" but he was a "good tipper"!
Chesney went on to tell Ken how they still see each other occasionally at gigs where they are performing. "I'll bump into him at these festivals, these retro festivals where he's like headlining and I'm on before him or something and he's like, ‘I remember you. You were my paperboy'.”
He added: "Shout out to his lovely wife who was always a sweetheart to me."
Chesney's new album
While Chesney is well-known for his huge debut hit 'The One and Only', he is still releasing music 34 years later, and has just released his new album called 'Living Arrows'.
As Chesney explained: "It's a bunch of songs which is incredibly close to my heart I don't know what happened, I got to a certain age and I started to look back and realised that certain things in my life I just needed to write about. It all just came out Ken!"
He added: "It was a very cathartic, therapeutic time for me writing these songs and as it turns out, there was a few songs on there that really resonated with some people."
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