Word In Your Ear

John Otway – self-billed as “Rock And Roll’s Greatest Failure” - has played 5,260 gigs in 53 years, a record possibly only beaten by BB King. There are more this autumn of course. He simply can’t stop. “People buying me drinks and telling me what a good bloke I am? Why would you stop?” We talk to him here about the art of shambling stagecraft and a life lived almost permanently on the road, which...

Peter Hook, bold pioneer of the high, clambering, tune-filled bassline, is touring this autumn with Peter Hook & the Light. We talk to him in Prestatyn - about to deejay at mate’s birthday - about the first gigs he ever saw and played, heavy-handed club owners, tough crowds on dance floors, the world audience for his two old bands and few key moments of a long life onstage, which involves … &n...

A 40th anniversary special with two of its presenters (Hepworth and Ellen) and old pal and TV critic Boyd Hilton who watched on the day aged 18 (“young, pretentious, idiotic”) and reviews the new BBC documentary. We look back at …   … the ways Live Aid changed television – “not about music but spectacle and scale”.   … would the idea of staging it have ever come about in the world of soc...

Ian Anderson is touring again in 2026 and talks to us here about tweed stage-wear, an audience of four, his teenage heroes and the first shows he ever saw and played. There’s all sorts within, including …     … playing his first gig to Catholic schoolgirls at the Holy Family Youth Club in Blackpool – “we emptied the room”.   … queues round the block at the Marquee in 1968 – “th...

It’s Happy Hour in the Rock and Roll Lounge of News and we’re working our way through anything over 40 per cent proof. Which means ice, a slice and ….   … how the F-Bomb lost its impact.   … Mick Ralphs and Lalo Schifrin RIP – and chapeau to "There's A Whole Lalo Schifrin Goin' On’.   … the Blush-o-meter! Album sleeves that’d get you lynched in the 21st Century – and that means you...

Bobby Bluebell remembers the “cuddly duffle-coat friendship” of Glasgow bands in the early ‘80s and the Bluebells’ second act rebooted by the Volkswagen ad. The band are touring again and an even bigger part of the city’s thriving musical community, and he looks back here at the first gigs he ever saw and played, along with …   … singing “When I’m Dead And Gone’ in an old folks home. &nb...

Dennis Bovell has worked his dub magic on everyone from Janet Kaye to the Slits, the Pop Group, Jarvis Cocker and Thom Yorke & Jonny Greenwood – and his own band Matumbi. He talks here about the thrill and freedom of making dub records, his new album Wise Music In Dub – which reworks ‘Pass The Dutchie’, Minnie Riperton and the Stylistics – and how the phone never stops ringing with requests fo...

Rick Wakeman was onstage from the age of five and looks back with us here on a life of live performance – jazz and blues bands, the Strawbs, Yes – and ahead to this autumn’s tour performing King Arthur and the Six Wives of Henry the Eighth. “I wake up every morning, throw off the duvet and – if nothing else has fallen off – have a great day!” There’s more …   ... how it feels when the rock pr...

Chasing the shade and applying Factor 50 in the wilting heat of this week’s rock and roll news turns the conversation to …   … Kneecap v the Prime Minister. … will any openly anti-Trump musician find it hard to tour the States? … the girl who’s listening to all 10,000 of her late father’s albums, one 60-second Instagram reel at a time. … a bottle of Snoop Dogg rosé, anyone?    ...

The Farm are touring again this summer and have just made their first album for 31 years (with the same-line-up). This sparky and wide-ranging conversation with Peter Hooton stops off at the following …   … the advice Mark E Smith gave him when they were interviewed by Select magazine.   … “Suedeheads v Trogs and Greebos”: early ‘70s tribal warfare in Bootle.   … seeing Cockney Rebe...

Carol Decker - another Smash Hits cover star on the podcast! T’Pau are playing dates this summer and autumn and she talks here – hilariously - about life on the ‘80s package tour circuit and the first shows she ever saw and played, which stops off at ….   … does any audience beat a Butlin’s Mid-Weeker on their third pint?   … from Black Mirror to PG Tips: the afterlife of a hit.   …...

As the great Warren Zevon said, ‘Enjoy every sandwich’. The two-man canoe navigates this week’s rock and roll rivulet which sadly entails reflections on a pair of towering musical giants ‘whose legend occupied the space where activity should have been’. Things considered include …   …are you born with genius or does a set of circumstances allow it to flourish?   … the impossible task of...

Liam Gallagher calls Ted Kessler and Hamish MacBain “the Peter Cook and Dudley Moore of music journalism”. Both worked at the NME (and Ted at Q), both interviewed the band many times and have just published ‘A Sound So Very Loud’ which, in the grand tradition of Revolution In The Head, tells the story of every Oasis song ever recorded. They talk to Mark here about …     … why Oasis...

Elkie Brooks was on a package tour aged 15, supported the Beatles and the Animals, made a single when she was 19, joined the jazz-rock Dada, then Vinegar Joe (with Robert Palmer) and has since made 20 albums. She’s now out on her ‘Long Farewell Tour’ and looks back with us here from her home in Devon at …   … supporting the Beatles in ’64 and an audience already screaming for the headliners.&...

Facing down the leg spinners of rock and roll news while trying to wallop the odd shot across the pavilion roof. On the scoreboard this week …   … has there ever been a rock feud as bitter as Trump v Musk?   … what Ray Charles, Taylor Swift and Dave Clark have in common.   … the 30-year golden age music video.   … things Van Morrison can’t forget.   … how some songs about...

Stuart Maconie – broadcaster, prolific author – has a brilliant and original new perspective on the Beatles. His latest book With A Little Help From Their Friends identifies the 100 people who had the greatest impact on their story, from the inner circle to bit-part players – schoolfriends, girlfriends, managers, muses, support acts, advisors and exploiters. It’s immensely entertaining – and revea...

Rob Caiger is one of those special people who turned their teenage obsession with music into a job   … from being the only one in ELO’s office who knew where the old tapes were   … to learning that what it says on the outside of the box isn’t always what’s on the tape   … through embarking on a ten-year project to put out the last Small Faces album from 1970 in its proper form ...

Hoary old tales retold – ideally in an Irish accent - and new ones prized from the giddy carousel of rock and roll news which, this week, features …   … was there a better stage name than Rick Derringer?   … Linda Ronstadt, Ronnie Spector, Sister Rosetta Tharpe and other new biopics under construction.   … genuinely ‘iconic’ rock images – the Ziggy lightning stipe, Johnny Cash at Sa...

Martha Wainwright is a key member of the Wainwright/McGarrigle clan, all of them big favourites of ours. She’s currently on her 20th anniversary tour and looks back here at the first shows she ever saw and played which involves …   … growing up in a folk dynasty in Montreal.     … the sight of Perla Batalla and Julie Christensen, backing singers on Leonard Cohen’s I’m Your Man...

Small boy begins breeding budgerigars in Liverpool, makes enough to buy a drum kit and becomes the power behind Big In Japan, the Slits, the Creatures and Siouxsie and the Banshees. And one half of punk rock’s most famous couples. The immensely engaging Budgie has finally written his memoir, ‘The Absence’, and talks to us from Berlin about …   … are bands only as good as their drummers? &nbsp...

The two-man pedalo of enquiry sets out on the Bank Holiday boating lake of news pausing to consider …     … Florence Welch, Dua Lipa and the rise of the rock and roll book club.   … the 92 year-old that Bob Dylan supported at the Cascades Amphitheatre, Ridgefield.   … the Beatles had 18 drummers!   … the sad end to Billy Joel’s tour schedule.   … is Hollywood dea...

Dylan Jones – writer, former editor of i-D, Arena and GQ - was 15 in 1975 and dressed like Jimmy McCulloch of Wings (“a lot of denim and silk scarves”), a time he thinks had enormous influence on the following five decades. There are many highlights in his latest book ‘1975: The Year The World Forgot’, a lot of them discussed here with David and Mark, including …   … the lasting impact of the...

The Beach Boys’ SMiLE was abandoned by Brian Wilson in 1967 and eventually performed at an emotional gathering of the faithful in London 37 years later. For writer and lecturer David Leaf it became an obsession. He made a documentary about it in 2004 and has just published ‘SMiLE: The Rise, Fall and Resurrection of Brian Wilson’ drawn from detailed conversations with the people involved. He talks...

Slapping the beanburger of news on the sizzling grill of scrutiny and served with relish by Alex Gold and Mark Ellen (David’s in Spain with his bucket and spade). This week’s specials include …   … Springsteen’s unprecedented speech onstage in Manchester about his nation’s “corrupt, incompetent and treasonous administration” and the Dixie Chicks’ career-popping anti-Trump manoeuvre of 2003. &...

Dennis Greaves took a week off from Nine Below Zero in 1980 but otherwise kept his nose firmly applied to the grindstone. They broke up in 1983 when he formed the Truth, who broke up in 1989 when he rebooted the old band. He looks back here at the first gigs he ever saw and played – a world with the attractive scent of spilt beer and tobacco – stopping off at various points, among them …   …...