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Word In Your Ear — Music
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 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.

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Copyright: © Word In Your Ear

Latest Episodes:

Andy Earl’s memories of photographing Prince, Madonna and Johnny Cash May 05, 2026

Show notes

Andy Earl helped create the new dawn of colour photography in the ‘80s pop video age and went on to shoot a series of unforgettable portraits, album sleeves and magazine covers, many featuring in his new exhibition in Bankside Yards, London. He looks back here at some of his subjects and the analogue days when you flew halfway round the world for the right light and backdrop and every prop in the picture was real. Along with …

… that controversial BowWowWow shoot and how he got the job

… Johnny Cash in a cornfield near Melbourne and the dogs he called “Hell” and “Redemption”

… Duran Duran (and a mysterious nun) in Sri Lanka

… “my job was to create a look”

… why the age of digital photography brought a loss of control

… the Robbie Williams Life Thru a Lens “law court” shoot

… “he couldn’t have been more eccentric”: Prince in Monte Carlo and the confiscated camera

… Pink Floyd’s Delicate Sound of Thunder for Hipgnosis: where Dali met Magritte

… “in Monument Valley with a truckload of giant prosthetic eyeballs”: the Cranberries’ Bury the Hatchet cover

… how covers changed when the CD arrived

… and Madonna opening the hotel window and inhaling the sound of screaming fans: “I just need my hit!”

Andy’s show at Bankside Yards runs from May to August and is free to enter. Details here: https://banksidelondon.co.uk/events/andy-earl-x-bankside-yards/

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

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Talk Talk, a deep-dive tale of mystery and imagination May 04, 2026

Show notes

Talk Talk made just five albums, all written and recorded unconventionally and no-one’s entirely sure how they did it. And in the last two decades of his life Mark Hollis released only 92 seconds of music. Lifelong admirer Graeme Thomson explores the band’s endless mysteries in his memoir ‘In Another World: the Four Seasons of Talk Talk’, and looks back here at the last hurrah of the days of studio extravagance, which includes …

… why Traffic in 1967 was the Mark Hollis Holy Grail

… “25 per cent of him never appeared above the surface”

… the Talk Talk ‘human sampling’ method – eg a few seconds of Danny Thompson, Steve Gadd or Larry Klein woven into the mix

… “music made with the blindfold on”

… the ‘80s press reaction to Mark’s eulogies about Miles Davis, Stockhausen and Shostakovich

… where you can hear Talk Talk in the music of Kate Bush

… making records the way Kubrick made films

… head music: how Spirit of Eden suits the rebirth of headphones

… band lynchpin Tim Friese-Greene, producer of the Lion Sleeps Tonight!

… what unlimited time and choice does to a studio bill

… and the 92 seconds of music he made for the Kelsey Grammer TV series Boss.

Order ‘In Another World: the Four Seasons of Talk Talk’ here: https://www.simonandschuster.co.uk/books/In-Another-World/Graeme-Thomson/9781917923613

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

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The Clash, the Cramps and Penny Kiley’s teenage punk diaries May 01, 2026

Show notes

Penny Kiley moved to Liverpool in 1976, ran into punk rock and “became the person I’d never been allowed to be”, as vividly remembered in her memoir, Atypical Girl. It’s a moment of liberation mapped out by records, nights at Eric’s and the big personalities in the city’s Second Coming, the beat she later covered for Melody Maker. She looks back here at some unconquerable moments, among them …

… the impact of Marc Bolan and David Cassidy - and later Patti Smith, Siouxsie, Pauline Murray and Poly Styrene

… punk’s “bad taste aesthetic” and the clothes she wore

… boomtown Liverpool in the late ‘70s – “everyone had a film script or a demo tape”

… how Boy George stole Pete Burns’ act

… the Clash, Talking Heads and the Ramones at Eric’s

… why her book is “like an historical novel about the way journalism changed”

… first reviews, front covers and life as Melody Maker’s Liverpool correspondent, “which could be awkward with friends in bands”

… Orange Juice and the ground-breaking NME C81 tape

… and the adjustment to the ‘80s – “the Royal Wedding, Live Aid, Duran Duran, yuppies, a decade where I didn’t feel I fitted in”

Order a copy of Atypical Girl here: https://birlinn.co.uk/product/atypical-girl/

https://www.waterstones.com/book/atypical-girl/penny-kiley/9781846976919

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

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Van Morrison’s agent writes crime fiction as the music business sleeps Apr 29, 2026

Show notes

In the 70s Paul Charles wrote lyrics for an Irish prog band. Now he writes mystery novels. Inbetween he’s been agent for Tom Waits, Nick Lowe, Van Morrison, Hothouse Flowers and many others and has forgotten more about live shows than most of us will ever know. Here he talks about:

•⁠ ⁠hearing the Beatles for the first time through the family radio

•⁠ ⁠meeting Tom Waits in a queue at Tower Records in Hollywood

•⁠ ⁠why he likes to watch the way bands take the stage

•⁠ ⁠the changes he’s seen in the live music landscape

•⁠ ⁠why everybody suddenly wants to tour

•⁠ ⁠what will change about ticket prices and what probably won’t

•⁠ ⁠why the artist doesn’t want to see his agent in the bar after the show

•⁠ ⁠what it’s like when Jackson Browne plays you his new record

•⁠ ⁠why his latest McCusker mystery is called “Hi Love, You Just Dropped Your Glove”

Order “Hi Love, You Just Dropped Your Glove”: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B0GTC3M9CW/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

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Can the Michael movie reboot Jacko? & how social media changed festivals Apr 26, 2026

Show notes

This week’s news stories charge out onto the pitch but which are heading for promotion? In the running at the final whistle …

… “a ghoulish, soulless cash-grab”: the multiple disasters in the making of the Michael biopic

… how spectacle is replacing music

… which do we prefer, the truth or the myth?

… did Steve Reich re-invent music?

… when the Dalai Lama appeared at Glastonbury

… how does it feel to perform to a sea of non-clapping motionless mobile phone users?

… the remodelling of Coachella

… “producers are in the business of creating of high-profile communal rights”

… Vilma Jaa: “like Sandy Denny making music with Massive Attack”

… how festivals are all about special guests and social media

… the 1974 Diana magazine quiz: “how tall is Alvin Lee?”

… 20 year-old Word in Your Ear podcast unearthed!

... plus Luciano Berio, Slow Club and “the bawdy harridan and her jive muse”.

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock'n'Roll going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

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Andy Kershaw & Dylan’s jar of jam plus the things people do to get gigs Apr 19, 2026

Show notes

Be glad for the pod has no ending! Now in our 20th year and, this week, ruminating fondly on the following …

… the “underhand” selling of Geese

… Morrissey’s absurd whinge about the Salford Lads Club photo

… Jay Leno’s $50 ruse to get comedy gigs

… when bands “didn’t even know what a hotel was”

… radio sessions in Andy Kershaw’s flat

… what’s the point of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame?

… when has any aspect of the entertainment business EVER been “fair”?

… “Four eyes, one vision!” Elvis Costello busking in Park Lane

… the great Supremes records after Diana Ross

… Focus, 10cc, Devo, Zappa, the Shadows and other musical dead-ends

... Ronnie Wood and … Beverley Knight?

…. “Shove off, Phil Collins! And have you got your Barley Sugars?”

… and birthday guest Stephen Lambe about why Focus are largely forgotten.

Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock'n'Roll going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The story of Wild Thing and whatever happened to World Cup songs? Apr 13, 2026

Show notes

Take your protein pills and put your helmet on as we voyage to the far side this week to take a picture of …

… the Kanye West & Wireless ding-dong

… Springsteen with Tom Morello, Pet Shop Boys with Johnny Marr: the fine art of the ‘special guest’

… when Time Magazine invented Swinging London

… Gregg Allman and the judge’s wife

… Fake Plastic Trees! Pressure Drop by the Clash! Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)! Politicians trying to be hip

… a primal howl from the Troggs written by the son of a golf professional from Westchester County (Chip Taylor RIP)

… why all bands should have ‘membership’ gigs

... Back Home! This Time We’ll Get It Right! Are we still making World Cup anthems?

… never drive a car listening to the Mahavishnu Orchestra followed by the Sun Ra Arkestra and Trout Mask Replica

… plus birthday guest Chuck Loncon is listening to every record he owns.

Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock'n'Roll going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

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No Sex Pistols in Manchester? ‘No Smiths, Nirvana, indie rock.’ Discuss! Apr 10, 2026

Show notes

Howard Devoto and Pete Shelley read a review of the Sex Pistols in February 1976, borrowed a car, drove to London, asked the NME where they’d find the band and were told ‘try a sex shop in the King’s Road’. The events that followed changed both the culture of Manchester and the course of rock history, a story mapped out in David Nolan’s excellent ‘I Swear I Was There’, a book as much about the audience as the band. His theory: “If the Pistols hadn’t played the Lesser Free Trade Hall … no Buzzcocks, Joy Division, Factory Records, ‘indie’ scene, Smiths, Fall, Nirvana, Blur, Oasis, Radiohead or Prodigy.’ As the 50th anniversary looms, he talks to us here about …

… those who claimed to be there and the ones who actually were

… the contrast between myth and reality

… the letter Morrissey sent the NME: “Maybe the Pistols will be able to afford some clothes which don't look as though they've been slept in”

… punk metaphor: Howard Devoto asking a tailor to narrow his trouser legs and being told, “there’s no going back”

… North/South crowd violence: “a battle with a gig breaking out in the middle”

… the three reels of home-movie and the photos that turned up 36 years later

… Sister Rosetta Tharpe, ‘Judas’ at the Free Trade Hall, Stones In The Park and other landmark Manchester moments

... the pioneering impact of Granada TV

… “if you look at Manchester now, its media, its skyscrapers, its cultural prosperity, none of that would have been happened without those Pistols gigs”

… “Sheffield would have admired them, Manchester thought: we can do better!”

… and various bit-part players – Tony Wilson, Peter Hook, Paul Morley, Jordan and Jon the Postman.

Order ‘I Swear I Was There’ here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Swear-Was-There-Pistols-Manchester/dp/1786060159

Book promotions at Walthamstow Rock & Roll Book Club, London - 25 May (link below); Nudie, Manchester – 28 May; Central Library, Manchester - 11July: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/david-nolan-i-swear-i-was-there-tickets-1985356197832?utm_experiment=test_share_listing&aff=ebdsshios&sg=0713ff5cbb20ee739ec0a8803927c4228f74fda0c5bac9785b11548a1e5b7c04ba91c0af5267ba677dfafa61163636f97633016b86ba8be02a78ecdb7f234740f0be4f90136c5fd636905d294b

Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock'n'Roll going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Keith Moon story is a movie in waiting, both a comedy and a tragedy Apr 10, 2026

Show notes

The life of Keith Moon can be seen as Animal from the Muppets or as a dark, psychological odyssey. And the two co-exist in Tony Fletcher’s magnificent ‘Dear Boy’, first published in 1998, never out of print and now ‘remastered’ with new pictures, updates, epilogues and a foreword by Mandy Moon who “has to keep reminding myself this person was my father”. Tony looks back here at events along the way, many of which now seem unimaginable. Among them …

… fact versus fiction: his fudged birthdate, his hidden marriage, the Roller in the swimming-pool

… Tony’s meeting with Moon two months before he died

… the letters to his wife Kim when touring America

… Mel Gibson, Mike Myers, Jason Schwartzman, all once in line to play Keith onscreen

… “I killed a man”: the terrible incident with his chauffeur

… the legs in the bath, the head in the bed, the loudspeaker in the bushes: the punchline of all his pranks was “someone’s going to suffer”

… “working-class rock stars who conquered the world like pirates without a map”

… would things have been different if he’d been hailed as a pioneering drummer?

… the times he met Larry Hagman and Oliver Reed

… do book publishers look down on drummers the way musicians do?

… to Golders Green with Viv Stanshall in German uniforms and an open-topped car: #DifferentTimes

… and a sad and telling moment on the Stardust film shoot.

Order copies of ‘Dear Boy’ here: https://omnibuspress.com/products/dear-boy-the-life-of-keith-moon-omnibus-remastered?_pos=1&_psq=dear+boy&_ss=e&_v=1.0

Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock'n'Roll going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

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The shameless age of Britpop in ‘the wildest year of the 90s’ Apr 08, 2026

Show notes

Dominic Mohan saw Britpop on the inside from the showbiz desk of the Sun in the days when it sold 4.5m copies, a series of heated memories recorded in ‘1996: My Backstage Pass to the Wildest Year of Britain’s Wildest Decade’, a lost age of hedonism, stupidity, drunkenness and creativity. He makes a compelling case in this very funny and colourful podcast which stumbles into …

… the advice David Hepworth gave him when he was 16

… Euro 96 and headlines you couldn’t run now

… how the deaths of Kurt Cobain and John Smith changed the picture

… doorstepping Phil Collins’ ex-wife

… the wreath for Noel Gallagher “the fat dancer from Take That” sent to the Sun

… Cool Britannia and that brief love affair between music and politics

… on the dancefloor at the Labour Conference with Mo Mowlam, John Prescott and Chris Evans

… Knebworth 1996, the perfect marriage of alternative music and club culture with a £250,000 bar bill

… the debt Pulp, Oasis and Blur owe Ray Davies - “less the Godfather of Britpop, more a concerned uncle”

… is it hard to identify a new zeitgeist when people don’t congregate as much?

… the ‘reverse-ferret’ from American culture towards bespectacled blokes from Sheffield

… the shameless age before people public apology

… how the post-Spice Girls TV talent shows soaked up the budgets and column inches

… and Madonna dancing with Dennis Hopper.

Order copies of ‘1996’ here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/1996-Backstage-Wildest-Britains-Decade/dp/B0FZBZHPNR

The Barbican Show curated by Dominic: https://www.barbican.org.uk/whats-on/2026/event/1996-a-celebration-of-the-wildest-year-of-britains-wildest

Help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Help us to keep The Longest Continuous Conversation In Rock'n'Roll going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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