He went on to play with numerous bands during his schooldays[7][8] On leaving art college, Drake took a telesales job where he met punk singer/trumpet player Little Sue.

The sound engineer for the concert was Tim Smith, otherwise known as the leader of the Kingston-based band Cardiacs, a rapidly developing cult act with a taste for complex compositions.

It was initially available from the fan club and at Cardiacs gigs, and was eventually released on CD in 2002 by Tim Smith's label All My Eye and Betty Martin Music.

Drake's compositional role in Cardiacs had increased by the time of the recording of the On Land and in the Sea album in 1989, for which he co-composed four songs – "I Hold My Love in My Arms" (featuring music he'd originally written at the age of fifteen), "The Duck and Roger the Horse", "Mares Nest" and "The Everso Closely Guarded Line".

He has, however, maintained his links with the band, playing support slots and guesting at various live performances as well as appearing as a guest player on the Heaven Born and Ever Bright track "Helen and Heaven".Despite leaving Cardiacs, Drake remained a member of the "Mr and Mrs Smith and Mr Drake" project, which by 1991 had been renamed the Sea Nymphs and had recorded enough material for a new album.

[8] The band gigged in London regularly (with notable shows at the Royal Albert Hall and Ronnie Scott's) and released an album called Son of the Great Outdoors on Grapevine Records in 1996.

Drake has professed "great affection" for this band, which gigged frequently (especially in clubs around the Camden area of London), and recorded three songs which remain unreleased.

[8] (Sharron Saddington and Craig Fortnam were later to marry and to form the cross-disciplinary chamber music ensemble North Sea Radio Orchestra, to which Drake would contribute.)

On leaving Nervous in 1997[7] Drake joined country-rockers Wood (a country rock band led by singer-songwriter James Maddock).

By the late 1990s Drake had composed a very large number of original piano pieces, which Tim Smith then encouraged him to write lyrics for.

As gig offers came in Drake put together a live band with a somewhat shifting line-up, the set list depending on which musicians were available.

Hi-Fi World called it "a beautifully crafted album of mature, powerful and moody pop songs",[10] while Q Magazine's Tom Doyle commented "(Drake's) frenetic piano-playing inspired Blur, and here the ex-Cardiacs keyboardist turns his own '60s-refracted take on British art-pop: one part Robyn Hitchcock, one part a deeper-voiced Robert Wyatt."

All of these were original Drake compositions, although inspirations included classical composers such as Debussy, Rachmaninov, Paderewski, Prokofiev and Hindemith as well as jazz, Walt Disney films and Edward Lear.

John L. Walters reviewed Yews Paw in The Guardian, describing it as "piano miniatures whose 'light classical' veneer peels back to reveal a tough musical heart.

[12][13] Since 2004, Drake has been involved with North Sea Radio Orchestra, the chamber ensemble led by his former Lake of Puppies colleagues Craig and Sharon Fortnam.

[8] He also played keyboards for Slowdive/Mojave 3 singer Rachel Goswell[7] on her debut solo album Waves Are Universal and the accompanying tour, as well as working with The Loose Salute (another Mojave 3 spin-off project).