Shows / Word In Your Ear
Word In Your Ear
Mark Ellen and David Hepworth have been talking about and writing about music together and individually for a collective eighty years in magazines like Smash Hits, Mojo and The Word and on radio and TV programmes like "Rock On", "Whistle Test" and VH-1.Over thirteen years ago, when working on the late magazine The Word, they began producing podcasts. Some listeners have been kind enough to say these have been very special to them. When the magazine folded in 2012 they kept the spirit of those…
Episodes
Word In Your EarWithout John Mayall … no Cream, Fleetwood Mac, Status Quo or Led Zeppelin?
Passing the baton of discourse on the rock and roll racetrack, our Olympian hosts sprint in the following direction … … watching Toumani Diabaté play in the…
Word In Your EarBest album sleeves, what’s ruined singing and pop as ‘empowerment porn’
Once again the ping-pong ball of conversation is batted across the rock and roll net and these are the scores on the doors … … how to wreck the national…
Word In Your EarWho is Lawrence and why did Will Hodgkinson write a whole book about him?
There’s something romantic about glorious failure and Will nails it perfectly in ‘Street Level Superstar: A Year With Lawrence’. Over 40 years plagued by bad…
Word In Your EarBackstage at Live Aid, the first Knebworth and bands that don’t get on
Employing controversial VAR technology, we re-examine various events on the rock and roll pitch and suggest a new perspective. Those key moments include … ……
Word In Your EarHow Joni Mitchell joined the boys’ club and why we don’t need a comeback – by Ann Powers
Broadcaster and music writer Ann Powers lives in Nashville and grew up listening to Kate Bush and Blondie. The siren call of Blue sparked a life-long and…
Word In Your EarTwist And Shout? Spiral Scratch? Corey duBrowa celebrates the best and rarest EPs ever made
The first EPs appeared in the late ‘40s and ‘50s (Frank Sinatra, Elvis) hitting a magical sweet spot between the album and the single and they’ve cast a spell…
Word In Your EarWhat songs should be longer or shorter?
The rock and roll ballot-box is stuffed with votes and the exit polls suggest how this week’s debate might play out. Along these lines … … is there still such…
Word In Your EarDylan Jones – Clegg’s women, Hague’s pints and “the wiring behind celebrity culture”
We’ve known Dylan since the days he was editing i-D, Arena and GQ and he’s been a regular on our podcasts talking about his books on Live Aid, the ‘80s, David…
Word In Your EarHappy accidents, whooping at gigs and why the album review star system doesn’t work anymore
In which we hoof a few balls round the rock and roll pitch and try to stick some in the net. Extracts from the live match commentary include …. … “Whipping…
Word In Your EarPop football chants, Reg ‘Reg’ Snipton sings Joni Mitchell & the tale of John Lennon’s watch
The two-man tandem of curiosity wobbles its way down the rock and roll cyclepath pausing here to admire the view … … “We’re captive on the carousel of…
Word In Your EarOnly Clare Grogan knows how it feels to burst onstage from a giant birthday cake
Clare Grogan, a regular on our podcasts and rarely off the cover when we were at Smash Hits, is on tour again with Altered Images and playing festivals in the…
Word In Your EarThe wit and charisma of Kate Bush by Graeme Thomson: going too far makes you what you are
Graeme is an old friend of the podcast. We’ve talked to him in the past about his books on Phil Lynott and John Martyn. ‘Under The Ivy: the Life And Music of…
Word In Your EarFor the love of Françoise Hardy, Ben Sidran and the TV comedy Twenty Twelve
Among the logs tossed on the conversational bonfire this week to combat mid-June’s British winter you’ll find …… ‘I Managed Van Morrison’ and other films…
Word In Your EarStewart Lee knows the rigours of ‘animal costume work’ and why great comedy is about shock
Stewart Lee – beloved writer, columnist and stand-up - was on the podcast in 2022 talking about the first records he bought, immensely funny and fascinating…
Word In Your EarHow Springsteen went “six deep”, fictional rock hacks and who’s more conservative than Liam Gallagher?
You’ll always find us in the kitchen at parties, near the hoppy summer ale and sausage rolls and, and this week discussing … … he hasn't changed his look or…
Word In Your EarJon Savage - Dusty’s wig, Bowie’s bombshell and how gay pop culture changed music
“I thought Dave Davies of the Kinks was a girl. When I discovered he was a boy, that’s when I got interested.” Jon’s an old friend of the podcast and the…
Word In Your Ear“Abba’s success is more about us than them”: Giles Smith looks back at a 50-year love affair
Giles was 12 when he watched Abba win Eurovision in 1974 and was instantly besotted – and thus required to spend the next 20 years wrestling with The Love That…
Word In Your Earthe Architect of Mod: how Peter Meaden restyled and launched the Who - by Steve Turner
Peter Meaden was a key figure in the Mod movement. He changed the world view of Andrew Loog Oldham, which shaped the early Stones, and he managed the Who…
Word In Your EarGreat album trilogies, suing Madonna and "the pantheon of psychedelic heaviosity"
This week the conversational Super-Trouper of Enquiry lights up the following …... why care when "rock critics get it wrong"? ... the dreadful death of the…
Word In Your EarThe spectacular Dead & Co, songs performed backwards & happy birthday Diamond Dogs!
Tuning into this week's rock and roll soundwave to filter signal from noise, we cranked up the volume on the following ...... 'Zuma Nester Rock' and the…
Word In Your EarWhy They Might Be Giants now perform an entire song backwards
They Might Be Giants – old school fiends John Flansburgh and John Linnell – have been making elliptical, funny and adventurous records for over 40 years and…
Word In Your EarGuy Chambers - writing with Robbie, a tangle with Bowie & half a bagel with Paul McCartney
Guy Chambers was a teenager in Liverpool and at John Lennon’s old school - "same headmaster, Mister Pobjoy". He remembers the Beatles, Queen, Abba and Jesus…
Word In Your EarAlan Edwards, pop PR – ‘Bowie was like King Arthur and the Spice Girls like the Pistols’
We’ve known Alan Edwards since the days when we’d ring him for a quote from Blondie or the Stranglers in the late ‘70s and he’s still one of the key figures in…
Word In Your EarRock’s image-makers, men on dancefloors and why bands can’t act like bands anymore
This week’s items slapped on the rock and roll barbecue and lightly grilled include … … why Eurovision will never avoid political controversy. … when AI does…
Word In Your EarPaul Carrack has seen it all – beat, soul, prog, pub rock, pop & the perfect ‘slow burn’ career.
We’ve followed Paul Carrack for 50 years, a big hit single – How Long – when he was with Ace, 19 albums, countless sessions (the Smiths, Eagles and Pretenders…
Word In Your EarNige Tassell was so obsessed with Dexys he’s tracked down all 24 ex-members
Nige Tassell used to go to school in full donkey-jacket-and-woolly-hat ensemble to express his boundless devotion to Dexys Midnight Runners. Forty years later…
Word In Your EarWhy Nick Mason’s “cottage industry” band plays just early Pink Floyd
Missing being on tour and exasperated by internal disputes, Nick Mason set out to tour small-scale venues with his band Saucerful Of Secrets in 2018. They’re…
Word In Your EarLet It Be revisited, the wisdom of Steve Albini and a woeful tale about Steve Marriott
We were at the Curzon Mayfair on May 7 for the premier of the rebooted Let It Be in all its burnished finery and came away with a ton of things to unravel…
Word In Your EarThe genius of Little Feat, the Man with the Twang & pop’s greatest scandal in the making
We stuck a few coins in this week’s Wurlitzer and these were the tunes that got played … … when records became all about sound not songs. … Fonzworth Bentley…
Word In Your EarSteve Diggle of the Buzzcocks remembers the day “a terrible beauty was born”
Steve Diggle met Pete Shelley when the Pistols played Manchester in 1976 and the Diggle-fronted Buzzcocks are now on a world tour that began in Mexico and…
Word In Your EarRock snobbery, the seven wives of Gregg Allman & the greatest solo on a pop record
This week’s theories, rants, ruminations, recollections, weak gags and free and frank exchanges of view alight upon the following … … is pop music now all…
Word In Your EarHarold Bronson of Rhino Records kept a 40-year rock and roll diary…
File this under ‘right place, right time’. Harold Bronson was a teenager in mid-60’s Los Angeles and saw every act imaginable. Then wrote for the Daily Bruin…
Word In Your EarThe “amniotic throb” of modern pop, the eternal life of the Top Gear theme and the Blue Nile’s lucky break
With Mark Ellen in foreign parts David Hepworth and Alex Gold light cigars, pass the port in the correct direction and discuss…..…..the fact that there is only…
Word In Your EarHollywood Babylon, the inspired gimmickry of Catch A Fire and the luck of Ron Wood
We lobbed the feathered arrows of enquiry at the rock and roll dartboard this week and these got the highest scores … … rock stars v the new league of the…
Word In Your EarNeil Tennant remembers life “with dyed red Bowie hair and clattering platforms”
Neil’s an old friend from our days back at Smash Hits in the early ‘80s. The first Pet Shop Boys demos were played on the office tape machine, though he was a…
Word In Your EarRichard Thompson – “you know it’s time to go when the audience starts throwing chairs”
Richard Thompson first appeared onstage aged 14 playing Beatles covers in a school group “so bad we were pelted with pennies”. Sixty years later his range of…
Word In Your EarNeil Tennant remembers the pop press and “the last great era of forward-looking songs"
Neil’s an old friend from our days back at Smash Hits in the early ‘80s. The first Pet Shop Boys demos were played on the office tape machine, though he was a…
Word In Your EarThe Stones’ clothes, our love affair with Abba & rock’s most appalling spectacle
We lobbed the cracked wooden ball of enquiry at the rock and roll coconut shy this week and a few choice items dropped off their perch, among them …… was Kate…
Word In Your EarBig Characters we have loved and why the Clash wouldn’t last ten minutes in 2024
We’ve applied our celebrated sheep/goats separation technique to the rock and roll pasture and shepherded the following into this week’s pod … … Beyoncé and…
Word In Your EarHow Paul Cook broke into Hammersmith Odeon to see the Who, Slade, Queen & Alex Harvey
Paul Cook’s post-Pistols band the Professionals were once, rather surprisingly, on the cover of Smash Hits - “the pinnacle of our success!” – and they’re…
Word In Your EarSharleen Spiteri saw Joe Strummer onstage and thought “that’s what I want to be”
exas are touring in the autumn and she talks to us here about what’s required to make it all look easy, a conversation that includes … … why working in a…
Word In Your EarAlbum sleeves as lifestyle statements and 5 seconds that made Phil Manzanera a fortune
The all-seeing telescope of truth scanned this week’s rock and roll heavens and noticed a few patterns emerge, among them … … the real story of the writing of…
Word In Your EarPhil Manzanera Part 2: an insider’s guide to Roxy Music (and a great Bob Dylan story)
Phil Manzanera – who thought “every day in the band felt like Christmas” – has just published his memoir, Revolución to Roxy, and talked to us about it in…
Word In Your EarPhil Manzanera’s enviable life in Roxy Music and beyond
Phil Manzanera – whose relatives include a Colombian pirate, a spy and an Italian opera musician - has just published his memoir, Revolución to Roxy, and…
Word In Your EarFish is bowing out to become a Hebridean shepherd. What’s he learnt in 45 years onstage?
Fish has announced a Farewell Tour in 2025. “I’ve been there, done that and sold the t-shirt.” He’s moving to a croft on a remote Scottish island with nesting…
Word In Your EarThe extraordinary story of Steve Harley’s greatest hit
Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me) was a slow-paced, vicious dirge about the band members who forsook and betrayed him which magically evolved into what…
Word In Your EarGreat divorce albums, Powerpop snobs and dark tales of 1999
Various items set off the alarm in the rock and roll bag-check this week and were hauled back for closer inspection, among them … … when did records first try…
Word In Your EarStephen Fall’s reviewed 3,333 of his albums. Buy the book!
Stephen Fall wrote reviews of his records, one a day, to make him a better listener. A decade later he published them in a book so colossal that we drop it on…
Word In Your EarIt’s Arthur Brown, the god of hellfire … paging Health & Safety!
Arthur Brown – enduring psychedelic godfather – is out on tour again 57 years after first performing Fire in a flaming metal crown. He’s nearly 82. This is the…
Word In Your EarSuzi Ronson - Bowie’s stylist - knows why rock and roll is all about hair
Suzi Ronson was working in a hairdressers in Beckenham in 1970 when a Mrs Jones dropped in for a shampoo and set talking gaily about her son, “an artistic boy…
Word In Your EarHow the Beatles invented pop video and acts we love who always sound the same
Nutritious items on the rock and roll tasting menu this week include … … the curious life of Tom Verlaine, his grocery cart and his 50,000 books. … was March 9…
Word In Your EarIs social media killing pop music? And where have all the bands gone?
Caught in the piercing super-trouper of perusal this week … ... the BRITS 2024, a howling embarrassment. … Medieval Beatles! She Came In Through the Privy…
Word In Your EarFor Henry Normal comedy is like “sugar and salt”
Henry Normal set up Baby Cow Productions with Steve Coogan, co-wrote the Royle Family, Coogan’s Run and Mrs Merton and produced Gavin & Stacy and Red Dwarf…
Word In Your EarSteve Howe of Yes tells a few tales from topographic oceans
Steve Howe talks to us from the old house and studio in Devon where they rehearsed ‘The Yes Album’ in 1970. He’s been recording there for 54 years and is part…
Word In Your EarThe evergreen record that’s 50 years old & Jeremy Thorpe at a hippie commune
As this week’s rock and roll steeplechase thunders out over the jumps, the following runners and riders make it past the post … … “First he changed music. Then…
Word In Your EarRichard Coles has faced every audience imaginable, one armed with pea-shooters
The Reverend Richard Coles is back on tour with his ‘Borderline National Trinket’ show and talks to us from his home in Sussex where he’s “the only person in…
Word In Your EarFor Jah Wobble driving tube trains was even more thrilling than playing Glastonbury
Jah Wobble - aka John Wardle - wrote ‘Dark Luminosity: Memoirs of a Geezer’ in 2009. It’s just been reworked, expanded and republished and it’s well worth…
Word In Your EarSteve Wright and other great radioheads, McCartney’s bass & the non-profits of Python
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…
Word In Your EarMax Décharné reboots the golden age of the Teddy Boys
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…
Word In Your EarGuy Garvey remembers the Grumbleweeds in panto, Santana fantasies & a song nicked from Roy Castle
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…