Craig David has seen how quickly artists come and go. The British R&B singer burst on the scene at 18, providing the vocals for the Artful Dodger's garage hit Re-Rewind ( The Crowd Say Bo Selecta!).
His debut solo single, Fill Me In, topped the charts when he was a year older, making him the youngest solo male artist to reach No1 in Britain. The album it came from, Born to Do It, sold 7.5 million copies worldwide as hits Seven Days and Fill Me In made him a star in the US too.
For a time, everyone wanted a piece of David; the squeaky clean, smooth-voiced singer, DJ and MC was hailed as the cream of a new generation of British musical talent. Sting sang with him; Bono and Elton John praised him.
Then it started to go wrong. After he controversially left the 2001 Brit Awards without a gong - despite being nominated in six categories - his breakout hit came back to haunt him. British comic Leigh Francis, also known as Avid Merrion, used the Bo Selecta! refrain as the name of his sketch comedy television show. Worse, he lampooned the singer with a rubber-faced caricature - complete with trademark beanie and neatly trimmed goatee - with the catchphrase, 'I'm Craiiig Daaavid,' delivered in an exaggerated Yorkshire accent.
The spoof hit the singer, who actually hails from the southern English port city of Southampton, hard. It came as he was struggling to match his initial success, even though his records continued to sell in the millions. Strangers would mimic Francis' jibe in the streets and the media, already fixated on rumours the singer was gay or a virgin (he has always maintained he is neither), used it to portray him as the prince of uncool.
'It damaged me for a while,' says David, who will perform at Hitec in Kowloon Bay next week to promote his greatest hits album. 'It developed a cult following and I didn't have any control over what people thought of me. I almost became a caricature of myself.
