Mike Rutherford had to rely on his wife to remember many key moments in his life when he was writing his book.

The 63-year-old musician - who is a member of Genesis and Mike + The Mechanics - is about to release his memoirs 'The Living Years' and he admits he needed Angie, his spouse of 37 years, to provide lots of stories for the tome.

Speaking at a party to celebrate the launch of the book at One Alfred Place in London on Tuesday night (21.01.14), Mike said: ''The book really started with 60 or 70 stories of key moments in my life and I must thank Angie, because I can't write very well as you can probably tell and she really put in a lot of effort and you can hear her voice in it ... The other thing with Angie is I've spent all my life doing this and all the bits I forgot she remembered!''

Mike was inspired to write his book - which comes out on January 23 - after discovering the unpublished memoirs of his late father Crawford Rutherford, a Royal Navy Captain, in a trunk in the attic above his studio.

The 'Over My Shoulder' hitmaker was fascinated by the similarities between his early life and his dad's and then the dramatic change in their paths when they reached their 20s.

Explaining his inspiration for writing the book, Mike explained: ''I had no plans to write a book but in the attic above my studio my father's trunks lay for many years unopened, about three years ago I opened them ... In my father's trunks were his unpublished memoirs. So I'm sitting there with them in front of me and I thought, 'This is a legacy I should address.' Then I got the photographs from his trunk and I made an album - on the left hand side was dad and the right hand side was me. For the first 20 years it's the same photographs, football teams, sport and then at 20 suddenly he's in active service, on a ship as the guns are going off and my photographs are of me with long hair and a double-necked guitar in a rock band.

''I had a fascination for many years of the generation change. Until the 60s young men aspired to become their fathers, after the 60s they aspired to be anything but their fathers. That big left turn is a big part of what the book is about.''

Mike + The Mechanics are celebrating their 25th anniversary this year and are marking the milestone by releasing two albums, compilation 'The Singles 1985-2014' and 'Living Years 25th Anniversary Deluxe Edition', and are heading out on a UK tour which kicks off on February 12.