About The Cathodes

The Cathodes are a four-piece synth-pop band from the Tameside area of Manchester in the United Kingdom. The band are influenced by the melodies and sounds from the 80s with a small dash of the 60s thrown in. Although a relatively new band, all members have extensive past experience playing both live and recording.

During 2019-2020, the band had been trying to find a suitable name and finally settled on 'The Cathodes' on 21st March 2020, two days before the first UK COVID-19 lockdown. This came after a glance at the band's musical equipment and in particular, the guitar amplifier which contains vacuum tubes or valves. In a valve, electrons flow from a heated cathode to an anode and likewise, music flows like electrons from The Cathodes.

Members (past and present)

Dave Forward started writing songs in the late 80s and joined local band - Landing Party as a keyboard player. By the mid-90s, Dave had opened up his home studio to a number of local bands and with guitarist - Jon Dean, received some interest from a number of record labels as well as Kennedy Street Management. As part of his collaborations, he was briefly signed to independent record label "Synthetique" and remixed a track for Stress Records in 1996.

Barbara Verrall joined Dave as a keyboard player in the early days of the band and also provided some backing vocals. Barbara left the band in March 2024.

Paul Cargill Paul Cargill has been working as a sound engineer, or to be exact, as a Senior Sound Supervisor with the BBC for many years. He's collaborated with many artists and bands in the course of his work, as well as working on various dramas, with a range of mixing that includes everything from Kylie Minogue to Choral Evensong to A Question of Sport! He has played bass for several bands and has extensive live experience across a range of venues, from The Glastonbury Festival to the local Charlesworth Village Club, where he met Dave and Barbara (the band's original keyboardist) at an 'open mic' evening run by Dave Townson.

Dan Hadley was the drummer with Delphic, an alternative dance band signed to Polydor and based in Manchester. The band released their first single “Counterpoint” in April 2009 and were shortlisted for the BBC Sound of 2010. Dan has also toured extensively across Europe and the USA. As well as appearing at Glastonbury, he has also performed at various festivals such as T in the Park, Reading and Leeds Festivals and Creamfields. Dan joined the band in 2022.

Jules Whettam joined the band in 2024 as a keyboard player. Being the son of post-romantic composer Graham Whettam, he has always had music in his life and went on to study further at The Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester.

How the band started

In 2011, Dave was asked by Pat Rowbottom from his previous band, Landing Party to join "Glossop Club Acoustic" and perform a few acoustic songs. In 2015, an opportunity came to support singer/guitarist Rob Barnes from Derbyshire based blues rock band Cold Flame performing some of the original songs he had written during the 80s and 90s at a small gig at Charlesworth and Chisworth Village Club. While that was a success, Dave also wanted to include keyboards at later events. Barbara Verrall joined Dave and in 2016 supported Rob Barnes again at another event in Charlesworth.

In 2017, Dave and Barbara went along to an open mic night organised by guitarist David Townson and met bassist Paul Cargill who would later join the duo. The band would then go on to play at a number of open mic nights and a couple of music festivals. However, at this point they still didn’t have a name.

The band name

The Cathodes officially came up with the band name on 21st March 2020, two days before the first lockdown here in the UK. This came after a glance at the band's musical equipment and in particular, the guitar amplifier which contains valves (or vacuum tubes if you're in the USA). In a valve, electrons flow from a heated cathode to an anode.

Radio and Television

The band's first radio play was from Marco van den Brink, one of Dave's old work colleagues on The Online Station in 2020. That soon expanded to a large number of independent stations around the world. In addition, the band can sometimes be heard on one of the UK's fastest growing commercial stations - Boom Radio.

The Cathodes have appeared a number of times in the Heritage Chart presented by former BBC presenter - Mike Read and can highly recommend following this chart show. The new chart can be heard via Internet radio at 5pm each Sunday via Heritage Chart Radio, Spectrum On Air, or Regency Radio. The Heritage Chart TV show goes out with the latest episode every Sunday from 7pm from the website, also from Talking Pictures TV, KKDJTV, XPTV1 from the Canaries, across Europe, USA & Canada every week. For more information on the chart and to vote for any bands including ourselves, please go to heritagechart.co.uk.