"I swear from the time we started out until the day I left, it never rained on us once when we played outdoors," declares Wet Wet Wet's drummer confidently.
That note of optimism is commendable, given that the Clydebank band will put that record to the test this Friday, when they play at Glasgow Green. It's a one-off show marking 25 years since they released their first album, Popped In, Souled Out, and a quarter of a century since the foursome started to become one of Scotland's most successful groups.
Now they're rewinding to what Cunningham declares was one of their "greatest victories": a Glasgow Green show on September 10, 1989. It was a performance that he believes gave them some much needed self-confidence.
"It was obvious we'd come from the dole queue when you saw us on Top Of The Pops, as we were jumping about like we couldn't believe it," he says, reflecting on those early days. "People would pat us on the head like we were these nice new guys and we felt inferior to the other bands out there, the big global successes like Phil Collins and Elton John, as they were doing all these big gigs and we weren't. Then we did the same, and it was like a proving ground."
There was no stopping the Wets after that: a further seven albums followed, they topped the charts for 15 weeks with their cover of Love Is All Around in 1994, and frontman Marti Pellow became established not just as a pop singer, but as a star of West End musicals.
Despite the passage of time, Cunningham admits he's most eager to discover whether the band could pull off a new recording, and feels that that, even more than the Glasgow Green gig, will determine the band's future. "The real question at the end of all this is whether Wet Wet Wet can get back into the studio and play something new," he explains.
"There's a few songs written but they haven't been rehearsed with the whole band yet. There has to be something fresh still going on as we're not here to do a nostalgia thing. We need to have a reason to be standing there, and that reason needs to be something fresh and unique."
The affable Cunningham is the one member of the band who's never left Glasgow, and is clearly proud of his roots. Despite leaving the Wets in 1997 (eventually triggering a hiatus that lasted several years), he's equally proud of the band, and admits that taking to the stage with the group offers him a chance to relive his teenage years, if nothing else.
"Whenever anything comes through asking us about a gig, I'm the eager puppy saying. 'Yeah, sure, tell me where and when,'" he says, laughing. "I suppose that's because when I'm playing with the guys it means I'm thinking of being youthful, and thinking nothing bad's ever going to happen. In that way, that's maybe nostalgic or middle-aged. I guess Wet Wet Wet is the equivalent to me of buying a motorbike – it's my indulgence, and I still feel like a kid onstage when I play with them."
The band have all developed other interests, of course. Bassist Graeme Clark brought out his first solo album earlier this year (Cunningham dropped by the launch gig at King Tut's to drum on a few numbers), while Pellow's West End career goes from strength to strength, including a recent run in Blood Brothers. For Cunningham, it's still hard to reconcile the image of Pellow as a suave musical star with the picture he recalls of a shy young boy at school.
"It's absolutely nuts to see him in theatre," he smiles. "It still throws me when I see him chatting on breakfast TV as I'm thinking, 'That's not the guy from Kilbowie Road I know, that's an international success story.' In theatre he's very disciplined – I was talking to someone who had a part in Jekyll & Hyde with him and they were saying that he was a machine, that people might still be learning their performance six months down the line, but he's rehearsed so well that he's set from day one.
"I know Marti takes that as a compliment, but being in a pop band is the opposite – it's not about delivering the same thing every night. It's about spontaneity and changing things. It should be some headless individuals running about on stage, and that's Wet Wet Wet."
There may be nothing but warmth in Cunningham's words about Wet Wet Wet now, but it was a different story towards the end of the 1990s, when he departed the band in a row over royalty payments. It was, he admits, a difficult time, but one that seems to have helped him appreciate things in life much better.
"The day you leave the band is the day the phone stops ringing," he says. "I remember being in London for a meeting with my lawyers and asking, 'How do you get around on the underground?' We took success to its excess – it was like Willy Wonka and the line about 'whatever happened to the boy who had all his dreams come true?' It's bad for that. You don't give a child everything they want, and doing that with an adult is equally destructive. And that's what happened to us."
That means Cunningham recognises how lucky he is now, rather than being drawn back into playing at being a pop star with a glamorous lifestyle.
"There are cities I go to with my kids and there are so many places I never saw with the band because we were caught in the eye of the storm. I appreciate things so much more because of that, as you realise it's not about being a pop star or acting like one. I did try not to lose perspective, but even I, who was considered the sensible one, lost my way."
Wet Wet Wet will play Glasgow Green on Friday.
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