Steele back in Short supply: Beat and Fine Young Cannibals founder aims for success hat-trick.(Profile)

Artists who can claim to have followed up initial success with a second hit project are few and far between. Rarer still are those acts who have struck gold three times. David Steele, founder bassist of The Beat and Fine Young Cannibals, is looking to do just that.

Steele is the creative force--the songwriter, performer and producer behind Fried, his collaboration with New Orleans newcomer, Jonte Short, 23, which results in an exceptional eponymous debut album on August 30. Short, in turn, is a superb new voice who draws comparisons with Lauryn Hill, Mavis Staples and Mary Gray.

The daughter of a former professional singer who toured with Boz Seaggs, Short is a veteran of the New Orleans club circuit. She was discovered by Steele after a seven-year search. After his late-Eighties success with FYC, and working with Monie Love and Al Green, Steele had set out to find an outstanding talent for his next project. "I had no idea it was going to take that long," he says. "But it was worth it."

Steele says, "I went everywhere trying to find someone. If I was going to do something else, I wanted to do something amazing. And I knew that to get to the next level, I had to find a voice that would blow people's minds."

Introduced by "a friend of a friend of a friend", he finally met Short almost three years ago. After a delay as she had her second son, the singer returned to continue work on the album.

London has picked up the project through Steele's previous contractual involvement ...