You Make Me Feel Like ... CYCLING! Leo Sayer is making more than chart-topping tracks in Sydney, Australia with his rekindled love for motion on two wheels. The ever fascinating and energetic pop icon commuter speaks with kiticon about bikes, planes and his early adventures as a graphic artist.

Kiticon:    What bike are you riding at the moment?

Leo Sayer:    I’m riding a current model Trek 7.9 FX road bike with a slick silver frame. My first preference was a Marin bicycle, I would no doubt have bought one if my local Sydney dealer was a stockist. Marin is a very cool bike make from California. The guy who used to design Marin bikes was also a famous rider, known to have made the first butressed frame bike. I had one of those, in silver, with a really rigid frame that was a dream to ride.

Kiticon:    The colour silver has a special significance to you, Leo, doesn’t it?

Leo:    Yes, like the name of my company and my first album - “Silverbird” - it has always made me feel good to have silver things. In fact, Silverbird was a song title that I wrote with this in mind. In the garden of my house, I used to see planes flying over my head. Back in the 40’s and 50’s, airplanes were clad in aluminium and often not painted underneath (painting the whole plane would make it quite heavy to fly). When those planes flew high enough in the sky, I could see the sunlight reflecting off the silver side of the plane, glowing in the sunset, like birds in silver gliding over me. I would watch the planes everyday, dreaming that one day they’d take me away to far away places. I always knew that I was born with traveling shoes. Living next door to a private airfield (the Shoreham Airport in Sussex) full of silverbirds, I aspired to fly everywhere and it was at this airport where I took my very first flight.

Kiticon:    Where did this first plane take you?

Leo:    I was 19 years old. I had a job after school as a graphic artist. As it was incredibly expensive to print photographs in those days, it was easier to print in litho so ink+wash drawings were very popular. An airmapping company (Meridian Air Maps) put me on board this beautiful silver bi-plane, the De Havilland Dragon Rapide (pictured, right), to do some illustrations for their company brochure. Like Google Map today, someone would take aerial photos of developments, coastlines etc from this plane with his big camera, looking out on the floor of the plane with the sliding door open and the gusting wind blowing up at us. I was strapped to the ceiling of the plane the whole time, doing sketches of the camera man and the two guys in the cockpit. The plane landed where it took off and then I went to do more sketches of the plane and how the guys did their work on board. I learned a lot from this experience, not only did the drawings make the company’s business more credible, I also had the chance of a lifetime to start my endless journey.

Kiticon:    Speaking of journeys, what do you remember about your first bicycle experience?

Leo:    Oh I must have been very young! Mind you I did not use any supporting wheels lol! I shared a bike with my brother who’s 3 years younger. We lived in a fantastic house adjoining a hospital, where my father worked, there were no cars except for the occasional ambulance. Thoughts in my head were dreamlike. I felt totally free to think and to be myself. Riding my bike’s associated with freedom, being under my own power, and a complete link between brain and pedal. Walking was the next best thing, just not as fast! The bicycle was my first form of escape before I got to drive cars and fly etc.

Kiticon:    Growing up, was there anything that you’d look forward to when riding your bike? What do you think about riding bicycles today?

Leo:    Definitely bike and football! I would reach the football ground quicker on my bike. A weird thing happened from 16-17 onwards when all I wanted to do was drive around in a car - the bike thing seemed to drift away. Lately it has made a real come back for me, I’m even advising people to buy certain bikes that I have researched on the Net! I am even thinking of buying a Mezzo folding bicycle. I think it’s very cool that I can do this when I’m now 60 years old and getting back on the bicycle! The fact is, bicycles have always been there in our lives, until we run out of energy. It really is a cycle. It comes back to you.