Harri Kakoulli

Harri Kakoulli (born 17 December 1959), sometimes spelled Harry Kakoulli, is a British musician, best known for being the original bass player for Squeeze from 1975 to 1979.

Early life Kakoulli was born in Deptford, South London to a Greek family.

Career In 1973, Kakoulli, his sister Zena, and Peter Perrett formed the band England's Glory together, and recorded an album that wasn't release upon completion, before disbanding in 1974.

Kakoulli joined Squeeze in 1975, after the band had struggled on finding a bass player. He played on the bands first two studio albums, and their first two big hit songs, "Cool for Cats" and "Up the Junction", both songs peaking at number 2 in the UK charts in 1979, however Kakoulli was fired and replaced by John Bentley in March 1979, before the release of either single and the Cool for Cats album; Kakoulli appears on the back cover of the album. His reason for departing Squeeze has never been made official, however the bands website previously claimed that he left "to pursue his disco muse".

In 1980, he released his first solo album, Even When I'm Not; the album, mastered by George Peckham, is mostly-independent, apart from a few guitar and drum tracks by session musicians including Hamish Stuart and Kevin Armstrong. From 1981 to 1982, he played in the band True Life Confessions, that included John Dummer from Darts.

Kakoulli is now a solo artist and producer, and has worked in making world music since the mid-1980s. He has produced albums for The Ukrainians, Jackie Leven, and Jocelyn Brown, and has worked with Sunny Ade and Talvin Singh, and claims to have released over two-thousand singles, five-hundred of those under his own label, HKO records.

In a 2014 interview with John Bentley, his replacement in Squeeze, he said that Kakoulli came "out on top in my book" out of all of the bands former bass players. One of Harri's favourite bass players was Rick Danko of The Band.

Personal life Kakoulli's younger sister was musician Koulla Kakoulli, who died in 2018. His brother-in-law is Peter Perrett, who has been married to his sister Xenoulla since 1970.