"....so you don't want that part in 13/8 then?"

At the back, hidden behind a mass of gleaming drums and cymbals, you still can't miss him. The nifty double drum pedal work that brings to mind a champion dancer and ladies, you know what they say about good dancers!

It is rumoured that he never practices. It's rumoured that he practices twenty eight hours a day. It's rumoured that other drummers have hung their heads in despair and burned their sticks having experienced his playing. It is rumoured that the band threatened to burn his sticks and hang him after one particularly strange night, but they have all kissed and made up now.

Paul Stuart Fletcher was born in Brinsworth, South Yorkshire. The third son of a draughtsman father and a mother who was a caterer, Fletch first sat at a drum kit aged four when his brother Philip, thirteen years older, was forming a band in the family home. "I remember vividly the exhilaration I felt playing those drums" explains Fletch. "I felt natural behind the kit and from then on sneaked in to my brother's bedroom to play when no one else was around". Fletch quickly mastered the rudiments, surprising family and friends with his enthusiasm and skill. "I enjoyed performing to others even as a child".

Fortunately his parents were supportive of his passion and encouraged his playing. When Fletch was eight his father bought him a second hand red tortoise-shell Carlton drum kit. "From then on I knew that I wanted to be a professional drummer. Nothing else really mattered, I would even forget to eat!" Lessons began with John Lee, a well respected local tutor who taught Fletch to sight read. Invitations to gigs in pubs and clubs with a variety of bands began when when Fletch was only twelve! By the age of fifteen Fletch was already semi-pro and at eighteen he left school to become a full time musician. An early apprenticeship in the tough pubs and clubs in the north of England instilled in him a strong disciplined approach to his work and a sound understanding of what it meant to be an entertainer. "I did everything from '50s rock and roll to function bands wearing a dickie bow!"

Buddy Rich and Carl Palmer were the first drummers that made an impact on Fletch. Other early influences were Billy Cobham and John McLaughlin's Mahavisnu Orchestra, Terry Bozzio and Frank Zappa. Listening to jazz rock led Fletch to the jazz master drummers; Grady Tate, Elvin Jones, Gene Krupa, Joe Morello, Art Blakey and Steve Gadd. Later, Weather Report's Jaco Pastorius inspired him hugely, "a troubled mind with soulful intention". Other performers that made an impact were Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Art Tatum, Jimi Hendrix and Jeff Beck.

More recently influences include JoJo Mayer and his band Nerve based in New York. An urban sound that mixes old style techniques with modern drum 'n' bass grooves. Most recently Racid Taha's French Algerian band with it's synthesis of North African Rai, hip-hop and punk has "invigorated" Fletch.

Fletch's drums are protected by cases from

and he uses Meinl cymbals provided by Drum, Torquay