Word In Your Ear

Pausing occasionally to spark a Senior Service and sink a milk stout, we kick cans down this week’s rock and roll boulevard stopping off at the following hotspots …    … the “Grunge Dripdown”: why Pearl Jam can play 60,000 seaters. … the Elton Line, the Dury Line, the Bragg Line, the Kirsty Line …. What the London Overgrounds should have been called and why. ... how Steve Wright made radio and sowed the seeds of the Fast Show and Stella Street.  … actors who’ve joined the Choir Invisible but live on in voice-over. … is any musician as closely linked to any instrument as McCartney to his Hofner bass? And the mysterious tale of its theft. … J&M Studios (where Little Richard’s Tutti Frutti was recorded) is now a launderette with a jukebox. What became of Olympic, Town House, Motown and Bearsville? … the Radio 2 v Greatest Hits ratings land-grab. … does anyone under 60 still care about Monty Python? … the latest glorious chapter in Taylor Swift and Kanye West’s 15-year “beef”.… “All pop music is Strictly”: what David learnt from his six-year old granddaughters. … the voice of Tommy Vance returns by the miracle of AI. … “an elephant is a horse designed by a committee”. ... plus birthday guest Nick Foreman and why “underrated” is overrated.Subscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content, alongside a whole load more!: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If a film director wanted to flag up incoming violence in the late ‘50s, the camera would fall upon a couple of Teds lurking in the street outside. The teenage Keith Richards remembers razors, bike chains and bloodshed at dance halls and there was an infamous Teddy Boy murder on Clapham Common that plunged the nation into frantic, media-led moral panic. Max Décharné sets out to reclaim the Teds from their “Cro-Magnon, knuckle-dragging cliché” in his new book Teddy Boys and relives this dangerously thrilling rock and roll revolution – the music, clothes, films, press stories, the birth of Ted, Peak Ted, its eventual demise and what’s kept the flame alive since. Things of note include …   … the full effect of Blackboard Jungle on a packed 4,000-seater cinema. ... that poignant sight of an old Ted pushing a pram with a woman with a beehive. … Joan Collins in ‘Cosh Boy’.   … the first UK rock and roll gig, Bill Haley & the Comets at the New Theatre Royal in Portsmouth in 1956.  … the crepe-soled, velvet-collared Duke of Edinburgh, unlikely ’50s fashion icon. … Little Richard, Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis at the London Rock and Roll Show at Wembley in 1972, a key point in the Ted revival. … Malcolm McLaren, Johnny Rotten, Wizzard and assorted Ted torch-carriers. … Viv Stanshall and ‘Teddy Boys Don’t Knit’. … fingertip drapes from Savile Row and how Teds subverted top-end fashion.   … Fleetwood Mac as Earl Vince & the Valiants doing ‘Somebody’s Gonna Get Their Head Kicked In Tonite’. … and how the Beatles and James Bond helped kick the Teds into touch. Order Max’s book here …https://www.amazon.co.uk/Teddy-Boys-Post-War-Britain-Revolution-ebook/dp/B0C3SFMTFHSubscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content, plus a whole load more!: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Guy Garvey and Elbow start touring the UK in May and he looks back here at the first shows he saw growing up in Bury in the ’70s - when his five elders introduced him to punk, prog, folk, soul and Elton John - and proudly admits he still doesn’t know the names of the guitar strings. Look out for … … the secrets of the “Vanity Thrust” and other 21st Century stagecraft. … the time they supported the Stones. … being with the same band members for 34 years and each “wanting to be a different member of Santana”. … what he’s learnt about live performance - “never announce new material”.  … his 6Music show, Guy Garvey’s Finest hour (“one hour too long” – Mrs Guy Garvey).    … the un-PC death of Roy Castle in the Peter Cushing movie Dr Terry’s House of Horrors. … good things about Little Simz. … the time a snowstorm doubled their audience.   … working with the BBC Concert Orchestra – “if it’s Wagner you’ll miss two tea breaks”. … when Paul McCartney turned “Partridge-esque”. … and the possible ‘star guests’ on the upcoming tour. Elbow tour dates …https://www.ticketmaster.co.uk/elbow-tickets/artist/886289 Guy Garvey’s Finest hour …https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0072q60 Elbow are on Radio 2’s Piano Room with the BBC Concert Orchestra on Feb 21…https://elbow.co.uk/bbc-radio-2-piano-room-month/Subscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content, plus a whole load more!: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week the two-man kayak of curiosity tackles the following rock and roll rapids … … when was the last time there was a truly universal hit?  … why Waylon Jennings walked out of We Are The World. ... the story of Everybody’s Talkin’ and Midnight Cowboy. … why the Beatles’ 1964 American invasion was the biggest surprise party in the world and how the Maysles Brothers’ doc became the template for A Hard Day’s Night. … the secret haikus of Wes Anderson. … the best moments in Jaws. ... why Tracy Chapman stole the Grammys.  … how USA For Africa v Band Aid showed a fundamental difference in the British and American character. … the inscrutable world of Spotify royalty payments. … when Lulu, Dusty and Sandie Shaw were re-booted.   … Mojo Nixon RIP, a “corner on two wheels on fire” kinda guy. … Springsteen and Steve Van Zandt’s hair. … “Let me die a young man's death” - Adrian Henri. … plus birthday guest Keith Adsley suggests cover versions in movie soundtracks that are better than the originals – eg Fiona Apple’s Across the Universe, the Gypsy Kings’ Hotel California and the Soggy Bottom Boys’ Man of Constant Sorrow.Subscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content, pus a whole load more!: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We spun the week’s rock and roll roulette wheel and this is where the balls landed …  … why all rock biopics are worth seeing once. … ‘demixing’: we spent ages perfecting records. Now we’re unperfecting them. … the adorable hand-drawn flyer the 15 year-old Robert Plant made for his band Blacksnake Moan 60 years ago – “the weirdest, wildest sound in R&B!” … are all musicians driven by the urge to please their mums? … Pyjamarama, Crazy Diamond, Cigarettesnalcohol and other rock and roll racehorses. … why “The Room” by Fabiano do Nascimento and Sam Gendel is “healing music”. … has anyone been ‘bigger’ than Taylor Swift? And how can she be so universally popular and yet we can go through life without hearing a note of her music? … the Pet Shop Boys at the London Palladium: “we don’t do waving”. … “Something's lost but something's gained in living every day” – Joni Mitchell. … are any possesions more precious than records? ... and birthday guest Kevin Rose recommends the Brian Wilson biopic Love & Mercy – and we talk about Control (Joy Division), Backbeat (the early Beatles), Rocket Man and Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis.Subscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content, plus a whole load more!: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Our piercing Hubble Telescope Of Truth scans the rock and roll heavens to see what new patterns emerge, among them … … running into Rod Stewart at a friend’s funeral. … the priceless spectacle of rock critics dancing. ... Prefab Sprout and the fine art of bathos – “We were songbirds, we were Greek Gods, we were singled out by fate/We were quoted out of context - it was great!” … the best songs about being in a band. … Jackson Browne’s Running On Empty (and its hymn to self-love). … King Kong, the most famous movie of all time - and why, like Jaws and Jurassic Park, the special effects now seem creaky but the drama still holds. … our new pop star category: “dancer-singer”. ... how Tom Hibbert invented a whole new whole method of music journalism (and the only song that could get him on a dancefloor). … “the crack of the backbeat on Vine Street”. … and birthday guest Roger Millington on Heroes by David Bowie, the Archers theme tune and anything else that might make a new National Anthem.Subscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content and much more!: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

 Applying our patent ACME wheat/chaff separator to the rock and roll cornfield, this week’s podcast reaps the following harvest …. … Stray, Budgie, Fat Mattress, Atomic Rooster … ropey bargain-bin fixtures reborn as costly and collectible vinyl classics. … Neil Or No Neil: Let’s Impeach the President, The Lone Ranger And Tonto Fistfight in Heaven … spot the fake Shakey song title. … what they did with the Beatles’ Twist And Shout in the opening sequence of True Detective 4. … the curious tale of the last line in Casablanca plus Dooley ‘Sam’ Wilson and his off-screen piano double.   … when the Dave Matthews Band tour bus tipped 800lbs of raw sewage onto a pleasure cruiser. … why it’s hard to feel nostalgic about online magazines.   … “deep-end record-shop-haunting bores” (like us).   … the first three Robert Palmer albums and their old-school sleeves. … life in the ‘70s without the NME: unimaginable. … when Neil Young was sued for not sounding like Neil Young and John Fogerty for plagiarising his own material. ... and birthday guests Paul Knox and the biggest musical moments on TV, among them Magical Mystery Tour, John Martyn on Whistle Test, the Pistols on So It Goes …. Is this the greatest musical moment on TV?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pKpfs5EK_sSubscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content, plus a whole load more!: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In March Graham Gouldman and 10cc are coming your way and here he talks to David Hepworth about:- seeing Cliff and the original Shadows at his first live show- playing live in the sixties, when a band would plug all three guitars into the same amp- where he keeps his fifty guitars- what’s going on when it all goes quiet on the 10.c.c. tour bus- the songs you have to play for the audience- the ones you play for yourself- what goes through his head every night when he’s standing in the wings- the proper place to put 10 cc in an alphabetical record collectionFull tour dates here: https://www.10cc.world/eventsSubscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free - access to all of our content, and much more: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We stuck a coin in this week’s jukebox of news and cranked up the volume and these were the tracks that got played … … fond memories of Annie Nightingale at Radio One and Whistle Test. … the delicious melancholy of Sunday night pop radio. … how David Gilmour writes songs. … sex, clothes, gangsters: the eternal allure of Bonnie & Clyde. … how the first Police album (including three hit singles) was recorded by a former doctor in a four-track studio above a dairy in Leatherhead for £1,500, and the band’s touching tribute when he died. … the British Library hijack hack. … the fantasy theme of so many ‘60s movies: ‘escape’. … Ridley Scott’s Hovis ad. … Blind Willie Johnson, Chuck Berry … Blodwyn Pig? The five tracks you’d send into space to represent life on earth. … how future wars will be started. … plus birthday guest Sandra Austin on the best use of choirs on records among them Aretha Franklin’s You’ve Got A Friend, Blur’s Tender, the Stones’ You Can’t Always Get What You Want, Roy Harper’s When An Old Cricketer Leaves The Crease.Subscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free! - access to all of our content!: https;//www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jim Gordon played the drums on Wichita Lineman, Good Vibrations, the Byrds’ Mr Tambourine Man and hundreds of other recordings we all own and worked with pretty much everyone including Steely Dan, Tom Waits, Tom Petty, Randy Newman, John Lennon, Frank Zappa and the Everlys. He toured with Delaney & Bonnie and Joe Cocker’s Mad Dogs And Englishmen package and was a member of Derek & the Dominos. He played with a “bounce, a lilt, a boiling undercurrent” that added a whole new melodic dimension and he saw two different worlds from the inside, the studio-based pop factories of the ‘60s singles boom and the big ‘70s tours of the heyday of the rock album. West Coast author and music columnist Joel Selvin considers his supreme talent and ultimately catastrophic story in his new book ‘Drums & Demons: the Tragic Journey of Jim Gordon’ alighting here at various points in detail, among them … … the intersection between “rock and roll and true crime”. … the secret of “a compositional drummer”. … how he started at the top, aged 17, touring with the Everlys and the Rolling Stones. … how Rita Coolidge was robbed of her royalties, twice. … his appetite for fame and recognition at a time when “being a rock star was the most elevated position in the world”.   … why he turned down a Dylan tour.   … the long, tangled evolution of ‘Layla’ and what Jim added to You’re So Vain that transformed it. … and why he was sentenced to 16 years (for the murder of his mother) and ended up doing 38. Order Joel’s book here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Drums-Demons-Tragic-Journey-Gordon/dp/1635768993Subscribe to Word In Your Ear on Patreon for early - and ad-free! - access to all of our content: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.