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. How the album survived and why it satisfies the soul!

    2D AGO

    How the album survived and why it satisfies the soul!

    The album has had 25 years of being hammered by other formats – Napster, iTunes, Spotify, TikTok – and not only survived but thrived. For Keith Jopling it’s the irreplaceable way to hear music and to measure the people who make it. His new book Body Of Work celebrates its battle-scarred trajectory from the beating heart of pop culture to 21st Century affordable luxury, and stops off at …   … growing up in the age of cassettes   … his lifelong devotion to a Police album left on his doorstep   … Adele’s battle with Spotify to get records played in sequence   … how albums are how you calibrate a career, from the Beatles to Taylor Swift   … has anyone ever loved a CD the way they love an album?   … how parents used to despair of their kids loafing in bedrooms listening to records but now try and persuade them to do it   … pictures of equipment: rock porn!   … the swingback to Listening Parties and analogue recording   … records as shining examples of the packaged goods business   … “we need to regain control of our attention”   … and the iTunes launch party and why Smashing Pumpkins thought they’d seen the future.   Order Body Of Work in the UK here: https://www.roughtrade.com/product/keith-jopling/body-of-work-how-the-album-outplayed-the-algorithm-and-survived-playlist-culture   And in the USA here: https://repeaterbooks.com/product/body-of-work-how-the-album-outplayed-the-algorithm-and-survived-playlist-culture/ Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    39 min
  2. David Bowie and the triumph, mystery and struggle of his third act

    FEB 3

    David Bowie and the triumph, mystery and struggle of his third act

    Bowie’s early years have been scrutinised repeatedly but people tend to speed through the last act, from the early ‘90s to his death in 2016. Alexander Larman’s ‘Lazarus: The Second Coming Of David Bowie’ looks at his resurrection and the mystery of his final days in Manhattan in attractively honest detail, a book that’s as fondly critical of his artistic decisions as it’s celebratory. Under discussion here …   … ‘David Bowie was a fictional invention and much of his life an act’   … how wrong so many album reviews turned out to be   … “he liked to be liked and he put a lot of effort into being liked”   … Eno, Tony Visconti, Nile Rodgers, Pet Shop Boys and his endless search for collaborators   … the Lucian Freud incident at the Dorchester   … Scott Walker’s taped message: “I see God in the window”   ... “he trusted in the idea he was a genius”   … the sharp contrast been his public image and private life   … how his Lord’s Prayer at the Freddie Mercury tribute was a deliberate attempt to steal the show   … the piercing question Tin Machine were asked on ‘Wogan’   … and the struggle to find anything sincere in his interviews.   Order ‘Lazarus’ here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lazarus-Second-Coming-David-Bowie/dp/1917923449 Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    39 min
  3. Days with Bowie, Prince, the Stones, Hendrix & the Clash by David Sinclair

    FEB 2

    Days with Bowie, Prince, the Stones, Hendrix & the Clash by David Sinclair

    David Sinclair was a long-running rock critic for the Times, Rolling Stone and many others and now makes records himself. He looks back here at some of the first bands he saw and the extraordinary people he interviewed, which touches on …   … the day Bowie took him to the Hammersmith Odeon to stand on the spot where he announced his retirement   … Keith Richards’ dark side (and what he said about Lady Di)   … interviewing Prince “who seemed like a shadow”   … seeing Free in 1970: “I still think about it. Some bands are like footprints in fresh snow”   … Hendrix on a bill with Cat Stevens and the Walker Brothers when he was 14   … singles he wore out in the days when you had to change the needle   … his theory about the lyrics of Crossroads   … “the Simon Templar of rock journalism”   … the purgatory of being a serious musician when Spotify adds 100,000 new tracks a day   … and the Shadows, the Scorpions, Sting, ZZ Top, David Coverdale and … Millstone Grit.   David Sinclair’s music here: https://open.spotify.com/artist/4oMczlXHj1pt6M4ZNGR14E?si=_9Dx_G_UQ3GifCFGFra07A   To buy here: https://www.davidsinclairfour.com/shop   Tickets to the 100 Club, May19: https://www.solidentertainments.com/100club/index.html Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    1h 2m
  4. Adele Bertei, New York’s art-rock explosion and Eno’s shopping list

    JAN 28

    Adele Bertei, New York’s art-rock explosion and Eno’s shopping list

    Adele Bertei got a Greyhound to New York in 1977 intent on joining a band. James Chance thought she “looked like a pimp” and hired her as the organist in the Contortions, an instrument she couldn’t play. Her memoir No New York captures the most intoxicating times imaginable, the rise of Blondie, Talking Heads, Television, Madonna and her fellow raft of No Wave cheerleaders in pursuit of dismantling music. Highlights include …   … the local priest recommending the Velvet Underground when she was 11   … “imbibe and dream”: her weekend with Lester Bangs   … the rubble-filled New York wasteland of 1977, landlords setting fire to property just to claim the insurance   … the No Wave circuit: crowd violence and singers who either talked or screamed     .. her rivalry with Madonna: “our labels didn’t want people to know we were white”   … the local Cleveland “Rust Belt” - Pere Ubu, Chrissie Hynde, Devo   … why Warhol, Ginsberg and Burroughs seemed laughably outmoded   … Brian Eno’s shopping list   … the power of Tina Weymouth, Patti Smith and Debbie Harry (“sexy but with a snarl”) and why New York’s venues are internationally mythical.   Order Adele Bertei’s ‘No New York’ here: https://www.faber.co.uk/product/9780571386154-no-new-york/?srsltid=AfmBOor2IKVLRyzzZDisLz_8cTGDYIjDXphZVU9Lw5drAd4CdKR1KVhs   Adele with Thomas Dolby on Whistle Test: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ3bGioFCXU Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    36 min
  5. Steve Lillywhite produced the Stones, U2, Siouxsie, XTC - ‘the last leg of the relay’

    JAN 27

    Steve Lillywhite produced the Stones, U2, Siouxsie, XTC - ‘the last leg of the relay’

    Steve Lillywhite first got a foot in the studio door aged 17 making demos for Ultravox and became a producer with credits on over 500 records. He doesn’t have a copy of any of them but kept his Grammys and his CBE. The job involves being a lightning-rod, cheer-leader, editor, finisher and “as diplomatic as Henry Kissinger”. He looks back here from his ‘Lillypad’ in Bali at the milestones along the way, among them …   … “I’d done my 10,000 hours by the age of 22”   ... “If it ain’t broke, break it!”   … when he screwed up as a tape-op: “you only do it once”   … why bands never want to leave the studio   … breakthrough hits with Johnny Thunders, Siouxsie and the Psychedelic Furs   … “there’s been no new technology in the last ten years”   … the radio plugger who heard Sunday Bloody Sunday and said “sounds like a hit but you’ll have to lose the word Bloody”   … “when Mick and Keith weren’t talking they communicated through me”   … why Muff Winwood wanted to fire Larry Mullen   … why producers can’t hear a hit     … Adam Clayton and Nick Rhodes “aren’t musicians”   … “make the drums less Huntley & Palmers!”   … the Wrecking Crew versus the “One-Man Show" production of today    … and memories of making Vertigo, Fairytale of New York and Making Plans for Nigel. Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    54 min
4.5
out of 5
68 Ratings

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.

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