The Tracks Of My (Lockheed Martin) Years

For those of you outside the UK, we have a radio show here where people share the songs that formed the soundtrack to their lives. This month, I take on the role of Chief Executive for Lockheed Martin UK and also celebrate 20 years with the company. Those who know me understand that music is an essential part of my life and so I thought I would share some songs that hold special memories of these two decades. I hope you enjoy them, each one is a live version which always makes them better!

Back in 2001, I joined LM to work on the capture of the UK Military Flying Training System, but 2005 we had created the Ascent team with Babcock and were ready to submit our bid, part of which was a video and I wanted to have a brilliant soundtrack instead of the usual corporate "musak" that underpins these kind of things. So with some persuasion done, we obtained permission to use "Take Me Out" by Franz Ferdinand, we went on to win that competition and every time I hear this on the radio it takes me back the moment we played this out at the win party! Here they they are performing this track on Letterman back in 2005.

By 2010, I was criss-crossing the Atlantic every month in my role working for Lockheed Martin Aeronautics between London and Fort Worth. Now you can't be a regular visitor to Texas without learning to love a little Country music. During one of these trips, I ended up sitting next to Annie Clements, who was the bass player / backing vocalist for Sugarland. We got talking about our shared passion for music of all styles and she graciously invited me to one of the Sugarland shows in Dallas a few months later. I got to meet the band and we returned the favour by hosting them in London the next year for some sightseeing and afternoon tea. Here's their awesome two drum parts "Incredible Machine" very appropriate for LM Aero with the lyric "feels like I'm flying, wings made of light"...

By 2012 I was working in the Netherlands at our commercial training center. The amount of travel was intense as I was also setting up subsidiaries in Seoul, Korea and Sao Paulo, Brazil - lots of flights = lots of new music and I discovered The 1975 who are now one of my favourite bands of all time. The City was the first track I ever heard from them and it got played a lot. I got into the habit that this went on every time we started a takeoff roll - stunning performance with great audio - turn it up loud ;-)

In 2016, I was back with the UK Military Flying Training System as Managing Director of Ascent, that summer Kate and I were invited to the US Ambassadors 4th July party - they had Bastille playing live and it was the start of an absolute love for this band - incredible band that we have seen play several times since. This is them that same summer at Radio 1's Big Weekend.

So what sums up my last four years in our Rotary and Mission Systems business and looks forward to the next challenges. Covid-19 has dominated our lives and so many people have been lost too soon. It has changed the way we live and work, changed the way artists make music and perform. This is a beautiful ensemble from the "Live Lounge Allstars" taking an incredible Foo Fighters track to another level with the diversity of a huge range of artists... It's always a motivation when I hear:

"I, I'm a new day rising, I'm a brand new sky to hang the stars upon tonight"