Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
A performer spanning pop, art and acting, best known as frontman of The Blockheads and for his controversial stance on disability, including his hit 'Hit Me Wit
On the island
Eight records
I'd never heard of the guy before, Bobby Charles. And I just love this song.
Dean Martin was one of my dad's favourites and my mum loved Dean Martin very much and I can remember my dad singing this all over the place.
I got given a a wind-up gramophone when I was about fourteen. And the first record was obviously mi mum my mum's favourite one, 'cause it was Frank Crammett singing uh Abdullah Boob al Amir, and uh I I can remember all the words to this day.
The voice, the song and the visuals uh together combined and my brain exploded, my heart explo and this is the B side. to Bebopalula, his first major massive single. And Woman Love is I believe it's quite rude, but nobody knows what he's talking about.
And one day I heard this record by Taj Mahal. And we listened to nothing but Taj Mahal for a whole year we were writing together, New Boots and Panties. And this particular song, well it says it for me anyway, music keeps me together.
The Naughty Lady of Shady Lane
Well, this is my beloved Alma Cogan. In in the Kilburns we used to sing Twenty Tiny Fingers... and one of the ones we sang was The Naughty Lady of Shady Lane, which has got a kind of edge to it.
M. Peebles, perfect song, perfect voice, perfect arrangement and It's pretty perfect.
Ramblin'Favourite
And they made a record called Change of the Century, which we we had in our flat in the sixties. We used to know this off by heart. And the bass solo, which we're gonna hear, is where Chas and myself It stole the idea for sex and drugs and milk and roll.
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:30It's true you're not one of the Disabled Lobby's favourite people, isn't it, Ian? Do you go out of your way to upset?
Uh no. Um, things that are run by people who know what they're Running it for. In other words, if it everything like that was run by people who were disabled, I think I'd probably have a different attitude.
Presenter asks
2:24Why didn't they like [Spasticus Autisticus] then?
We don't use the word spastic anymore. because it became a kind of swear word or or a racist word. But... I I I felt upset hearing or reading people using that word. Without really even knowing what it meant, and using it as a way of describing a dance or something. I did it as a war cry really, as a as a as a shout.
Presenter asks
3:23How surprised were you that you became a pop star?
I wasn't that surprised because I think it's really it's all down to what you write on your table at home. If you've written a good song it will jump off the table, go out in the street, get a taxi and go down Tim Pan Alley. I make a living for you.
The keepsakes
The book
The Macmillan Dictionary of Art
Jane Turner
I'd like, if possible, please, to have the Macmillan Dictionary of Art in all its thirty four volumes ... That would keep me going.
The luxury
A digital eight-track recording studio with solar panel
Well my luxuries would be a working item ... I've got an eight track studio ... I'd need a solar panel on the top to make it work, presumably, and that would keep me happy forever.
Presenter asks
3:50When you walk out onto a stage, when you are disabled as you were, when you do have the stick and so on, did it make you more aware of yourself?
Not at all. I I was once accused in a a place called the Nashville, which was a a a music pub. Somebody came up to me afterwards and said, You're putting that on. I said, no, I'm not, I'm hiding it. And about two years later, I met the doctor and he said, I love the way you disguise it. So, either way, I I just walk the middle the middle line. I don't really think about it at all.
Presenter asks
10:51By the time you were five, you'd been seen by three psychologists. What was the problem?
I think I refused to go to school. I don't actually remember seeing the psychologist, but my mum. was a fairly br she totally brilliant mother. She steamed into me from a very early age and uh taught me to read before I went to school. So that I think by the time I went to school I was I didn't want to go there. I I didn't see the point.
Presenter asks
11:25When and how did you contract polio? What happened?
Again, this is conjecture, but I went with my friend Barry. We went to South End and went swimming. Or going the pool and um I was at my granny's about eight weeks later, six weeks later. And I got ill. And they thought at first it might be meningitis, I think, and they gave me a lumbar punch. They took me to the hospital. And it turned out to be polio.
Presenter asks
22:58What did you hate about [being famous]?
I hate the fact I didn't have a moment to myself. I hate the fact that every minute was spent doing interviews blagging myself or blagging this and blagging that. That if I stood at Oxford Street in Arusha, I'd get mobbed. I never wanted that... I suddenly kind of became a prisoner of the fact that I had a bad leg. just because I couldn't walk briskly away.
“If you've written a good song it will jump off the table, go out in the street, get a taxi and go down Tim Pan Alley.”
“I can't run for buses, but I don't really mind missing a few buses.”
“I've been accused of philosophy, I've been accused of poetry, but I'm not guilty of either. My attitude is to go out. Slam those boards as hard as possible, and try and sing in tune.”