Musician Justin Hawkins is the latest guest on series 10 of the award-winning podcast Fuelling Around.
Hawkins is the lead singer and lead guitarist of The Darkness who had big hits in the early 2000s such as ‘I Believe in a Thing Called Love’ and ‘Christmas Time’ and has since gone on to write and produce for artists such as Weezer and Adam Lambert, as well as having over 600,000 subscribers on his YouTube channel.
He sat down with hosts Jason Plato and Dave Vitty to discuss his career, how he started loving cars and why he wished he’d never sold his Ferrari 328 GTS.
Justin Hawkins on his adoration for the Ferrari 328 GTS
During his chat with the boys, Hawkins detailed how driving a Ferrari 328 GTS felt like real driving compared to other vehicles he has driven.
“I mean you get to this age and you’re as busy as I am because I do several things,” Hawkins began.
“I produce for other people, I write for other people, I tour with The Darkness and write for The Darkness and the YouTube channel and all these things that keep me busy.
“When I turned 50, I thought I wanna do something for me, and years ago I used to be like friends with The Classic Car Club.
“We used to do rallies and we had a lot of affiliations with things. I remember the first time I did the Top Gear run, the ‘stars in a reasonably priced cars’, I remember the Stig saying to me ‘you’ve got a bit of talent here’. And I had never really tried to drive in that way before.
“I did have a Ferrari 328 GTS, which is my favourite car I ever had, I got it really cheap for some reason from a Ferrari dealership and obviously it’s skyrocketed since then. I wish I’d kept it. But I kind of felt bad because I was on the road a lot (touring) and the car was just sitting outside my house in London.
“I was kind of like ‘ah it’s not fair on the car’. So someone from The Classic Car Club was maintaining it for me, but for most of the time it was just sitting in the rain. So I did the right thing for the car and I sold it and I’ve regretted that ever since.
“That’s the one that I think I could still see myself driving. It was the love of my life in terms of cars, it was just amazing.
“It drove like a modern car, but it looked really cool. I can still remember if you get into a Ferrari that’s been sitting outside your house and then you touch the gear stick, it’s cold to touch because it’s basically just like a ball bearing on a stick.
“And it’s like, wow, you know you’re driving. It’s like this tactile vehicle and every experience of it is just like this. I remember the noise and the smell and the temperature. It’s the fact that the plastic buttons on the centre console break off if you touch it. Like the whole thing is just an experience. I felt for me, that was real driving.”
Plenty more episodes of Fuelling Around to enjoy
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