and he was away from his family for as long as two months at a time. As the band grew so did his intake, until he was knocking back a pint of spirits, two bottles of wine and countless beers a day. It seems inconceivable that, for several years, nobody but his wife realised there was a problem. "I kept my guard up," he says. "I was quite crafty about how I drank and where I did it. Matt and Dom probably didn't realise how bad it was because I wasn't a nasty drunk. I didn't cause anybody any problems. I just retreated." "For some reason he could still play the bass, even though he was shitfaced," says Howard. "It went wrong literally two or three times in 10 years, which is nothing." Eventually, however, it became unignorable. "He was drinking on stage," says Howard. "I started counting how many drinks he was having during the set and I could see him getting more and more glazed. By the point we came off stage he'd be fucked. It just got too weird." Did they give him ultimatums? "Yeah, a few times. Chris now says things like, I can't believe they put up with me for 10 years. Which is true. I can't believe we did. But we did. I've always believed in band integrity and sticking together. There's something about the fact we all grew up together. We've been together for 18 years now, which is over half our lives."