Word In Your Ear

Mark Ellen, David Hepworth and Alex Gold

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 podcasts alive in regular Word In Your Ear evenings in which they spoke to musicians and authors in front of an audience.  Over these years they've produced hundreds of hours of material. As of the Current Unpleasantness of 2020, they've produced yet hundreds of hours more with a little help from guests kind enough to digitally show them around their attics such as Danny Baker, Andy Partridge, Sir Tim Rice and Mark Lewisohn. For the full span of the Word In Your Ear world, visit wiyelondon.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  1. Mark Lewisohn and why writing the real Beatles story just got harder

    1 HR AGO

    Mark Lewisohn and why writing the real Beatles story just got harder

    Mark Lewisohn began his Beatles’ trilogy in 2003, the first volume appearing ten years later. He’s hoping the second, Turn On, which covers 1963 to 1966 and every recording session, might be ready by 2031 and working “nine days a week to achieve it, assembling a framework and then sliding it together”. Further good news – his lecture about their life in 1962, Evolver62, is now available on film! “No matter how deep you dig, there’s gold there”. He talks to us here about …   … how you research such an infinite subject and know when to stop   … the one-in-a-million coincidence in the story of I Saw Her Standing There   … the attractive world of telegrams, postage and showbills from the days “when the Beatles were still like us”   ... how AI has muddied the waters and misinformation (like “Woodbine’s Boys”) becomes established fact   … “people are reshaping the Beatles’ story as what they want to believe”   … those perilous moments when their career seemed in the balance   … the Beatles v Shakespeare and which has the greater agency   … the Lewisohn work schedule - “6am til bedtime, nine days a week”   … the “rank amateurs” Decca signed the year they turned down the Beatles   … James Brown’s invented spat with Beatles and the struggle to separate fact from fiction   … Paul’s private battle with Nik Cohn   … and the US merchandise disaster, “a book in itself”   https://www.marklewisohn.net/   Order Evolver:62 on these links: UK https://amzn.to/4bP7bGS US and Canada https://apple.co/46m6L7x https://bit.ly/4qsUXHy https://bit.ly/45SSvTu https://amzn.to/4pXf4gL DVD https://bit.ly/3Zap37F And copies of the Tune In book here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beatles-All-These-Years-Tune/dp/1408705753/ref=asc_df_1408705753?mcid=3bbe6ad2416f31d59786d0f169b18876&th=1&psc=1&tag=googshopuk-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=697210774528&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=7934131385361801281&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9072502&hvtargid=pla-525100023999&psc=1&hvocijid=7934131385361801281-1408705753-&hvexpln=0&gad_source=1   Tune In (trade edition): https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beatles-All-These-Years-Tune/dp/1408705753/ref=sr_1_1?crid=Z5U3TCUCHL4Y&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.iARC_o0NanHFRSyWD51V1iwunMv6f4RVXwczxRVhEfk.HhdP2t3MG4xUMoVQHwdVFQUL7a9gWFWI-jjw6pvwhNw&dib_tag=se&keywords=lewisohn+tune+in&qid=1771317358&sprefix=lewisohn+tune+in%2Caps%2C99&sr=8-1&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.95fd378e-6299-4723-b1f1-3952ffba15af   Tune In (Extended special edition): https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beatles-These-Years-Extended-Special/dp/1408704781/ref=sr_1_2?crid=Z5U3TCUCHL4Y&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.iARC_o0NanHFRSyWD51V1iwunMv6f4RVXwczxRVhEfk.HhdP2t3MG4xUMoVQHwdVFQUL7a9gWFWI-jjw6pvwhNw&dib_tag=se&keywords=lewisohn+tune+in&qid=1771317358&sprefix=lewisohn+tune+in%2Caps%2C99&sr=8-2&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.0fa28f01-6fca-4422-af4e-d52d5ad71bfe Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    49 min
  2. The Skids, Big Country and the unsettling story of Stuart Adamson

    24 FEB

    The Skids, Big Country and the unsettling story of Stuart Adamson

    Stuart Adamson co-founded the Skids and Big Country but was profoundly ill-suited to the spoils of his success. Author Scott Rowley unpacks his passage from Dunfermline to Nashville and Hawaii to get a sense of his demons and what drove and inspired him. He talks to us here about his compelling new memoir ‘Stay Alive: the Life and Death of Stuart Adamson’ and touches on …   … hints of troubled family life in his early lyrics and the shadows of his father and grandfather   … that famous three-word review: “More crusading porridge!”   … the guilt of his success when he returned to his Dunfermline roots   … why learning to sing is unwise!   … how Big Country were saved by Steve Lillywhite and the resentment about their being sold as a pop group   … Nick Drake, Sinead O’Connor … “people who should never have been given a record contract”   … insurmountable friction with Richard Jobson   … how Nevermind made the old rock landscape look outmoded   … “guitars that sounded like bagpipes!” and other hoary old clichés   … “empty, breast-beating, bombastic!”: the rigours of the rock press consensus   … and how Big Country nearly played Live Aid.   Order ‘Stay Alive: the Life and Death of Stuart Adamson’ here: https://www.simonandschuster.co.uk/books/Stay-Alive-The-Life-and-Death-of-Stuart-Adamson/Scott-Rowley/9781917923538 Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    46 min
  3. Keith & Chuck, Bowie & Tina, Frank & Elvis and what we learnt from rock’s joint ventures

    18 FEB

    Keith & Chuck, Bowie & Tina, Frank & Elvis and what we learnt from rock’s joint ventures

    Some shared stages. Some made records and films together. Some had love affairs. Matt Thorne is fascinated by stars’ collaborations and what they reveal about them. He talks here about 14 musicians who collided and the discoveries he made in the six years spent writing ‘Famous: Ego, Envy and Ambition in Pop, Rock and Hip-Hip’, with all this high in the mix …   … Frank Sinatra’s ‘Welcome Home Elvis’ TV Special and how threatened he felt by rock’n’roll   … “Chuck Berry thrived on tension in exactly the way Mark E Smith controlled the Fall”   … what you’ll find in Lou Reed’s archive at New York’s Library for the Performing Arts   … McCartney at “the showbiz event of the year”, January 1968, at a rare low ebb in the Beatles’ fortunes   … the mystifying One Trick Pony where Paul Simon inexplicably chose to play a failure, and his comic turn on Saturday Night Live   … Bowie’s and Tina Turner’s TV ad and love affair   … what Chuck Berry tried to hide about his studio trickery and the “psychological terrorism” of what played on his TV sets   … “all musicians are obsessed with the idea that they’re on the way out”   … why a book like this would have been impossible 30 years ago   … and Dave Stewart’s vision of Lou Reed as a piece of pasta on a motorcycle.   Order copies of ‘Famous: Ego, Envy and Ambition in Pop, Rock and Hip-Hip’ here: https://www.waterstones.com/book/famous/matt-thorne/9781474616386 Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    42 min
  4. Boston, Def Leppard, bad hair & the golden age of rock radio

    17 FEB

    Boston, Def Leppard, bad hair & the golden age of rock radio

    Paul Rees fell in love with AOR when it began with Boston in 1976, the polished, ramped-up hits that were briefly the music of the American heartland. His book ‘Raised On Radio: Power Ballads, Cocaine & Payola – the AOR Glory Years 1976-1986’ remembers the age when records were launched via car stereos, their eternally appealing sound and the preposterous lives of the people who wrote and played them – Bon Jovi, Pat Benatar, Asia, REO Speedwagon, Don Henley and Toto among them. “It’s happy music,” he points out. “Music that makes you raise a quizzical eyebrow.” In the mix …   … the original AOR sound: “Led Zeppelin hard rock with Eagles harmonies and a stratospheric high-tenor voca|”   … the absolute power of producers like Mutt Lange (a man raised on radio jingles)   … Pat Benatar, the former married bank clerk who wanted to be Robert Plant in a leotard   … “AOR stars were all salesmen who talked in quotes”   ... the many reasons Don Henley fired people on a whim    … Def Leppard’s vision of America built on AOR and cowboy movies   … “Chicago and the Tubes never played on their records”   … “he ended up butterball-naked in a cocaine threesome sting with two disguised police women”   … the producer who had his trout pond realigned as he couldn’t work looking at a garden that wasn’t symmetrical   … the story of Toto’s Africa: “tape loops strung round chair-backs and a quick flick through a geography book”   … “if this record’s a hit I’ll run naked down Sunset Boulevard”.   Order a copy of ‘Raised On Radio: Power Ballads, Cocaine & Payola – the AOR Glory Years 1976-1986’ here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Raised-Radio-Paul-Rees/dp/1408721112   Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    35 min

About

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 podcasts alive in regular Word In Your Ear evenings in which they spoke to musicians and authors in front of an audience.  Over these years they've produced hundreds of hours of material. As of the Current Unpleasantness of 2020, they've produced yet hundreds of hours more with a little help from guests kind enough to digitally show them around their attics such as Danny Baker, Andy Partridge, Sir Tim Rice and Mark Lewisohn. For the full span of the Word In Your Ear world, visit wiyelondon.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You Might Also Like