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PODCAST

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

music music commentary

All Episodes

38:15

No Sex Pistols in Manchester? ‘No Smiths, Nirvana,...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/04/10

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,

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47:09

The Keith Moon story is a movie in waiting, both a...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/04/10

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

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1:06:31

The shameless age of Britpop in ‘the wildest year of...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/04/08

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

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48:30

Who hasn’t had ‘work done’, how to spot AI and the...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/04/06

A seasonal egg-hunt in the rock and roll backyard finds the following conversational confectionary ….. Wild Bill Hickok? Valentino? Bob Dylan’s bizarre new media manoeuvre… Liza Minnelli, Peter Sellers, Harrison Ford, Aaron Paul: people born to play one part… how to spot writers using AI… “dried-up old prune”? Trump’s pot-kettle war against Springsteen… what BBC DJs must think when they see ‘Woo’ Gary Davies in reception… “Neil Young looks like an unmade bed”… when invincible ignorance meets

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38:58

The Clash story mapped by the places they lived,...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/03/27

Paul Gorman, author and curator, has put together fascinating maps of the London haunts of Bowie and the Stones and just published one about the Clash built around key locations in the network that formed them and helped them to flourish. It’s a beautiful thing: buy one and take the walking tour! He talks to us here about …… how an Agit-Prop alternative West London emerged with links to Oz, IT and San Francisco counter-culture… kindred spirits meeting in Rock On, Compendium Books and the dole office

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1:02:35

Scores McCartney still wants to settle, Country Joe...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/03/15

Watering the scented hedgerows of news to see if any green shoots appear. And they do, in the form of …… the most effective protest song ever written… the commendable box-ticking life of Country Joe McDonald… the Timothée Chalamet ding-dong: is it still safe to voice an opinion?… Harry Styles’ 67 dates in just 7 locations: how ‘Destination gigs’ throttle the competition… was Wings a worse name than the Beatles? And McCartney as a shepherd: discuss… what makes a song work as a football chant?... the

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50:14

Shaun & Bez and other Odd Couples we love

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/03/08

Pointing the scanner of inquiry at the baggage carousel of news to see what gets the lights flashing, which this week includes …… we know what’s making Morrissey miserable… bands that can get a whole stadium singing… the rock star who misses the music press most… “a Likely Lads for the rave generation”, anyone?… the speed at which news now travels… Loudon Wainwright and Richard Thompson, Ben Sidran and Boz Scaggs, Paul Whitehouse and Bob Mortimer, Steve Martin and Martin Short … in praise of

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46:55

Albums we bought because we liked the title

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/03/01

Spinning sides at the conversational disco to see what fills the dancefloor, which this week includes …… Jerry Garcia had seven fingers! Brian Jones had seven children! Morrissey worked for the Inland Revenue!… the most terrifying villain in the history of cinema... is pop music becoming inbred?… when Neil Sedaka made records with 10cc (and Abba)… Happy? Get Lucky? Crazy In Love? What was the last hit single the whole world seemed to be singing?… Noddy Holder, Kim Wilde, Robert Wyatt, Gary Numan:

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33:53

How Glenn Tilbrook transformed the life of Squeeze

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/02/25

Glenn Tilbrook wrote an album with Chris Difford about a futuristic nightclub when they were teenagers and, 52 years later, they’ve recorded it and are performing it on the upcoming tour. He looks back here at the partnership that once wrote 200 songs in three years, the first gigs he saw, his recent decision to take control of the group and what’s changed the way they sound. Among the highlights …… what he learnt from watching Radiohead and Doechii… when you walk into a teashop and Tír na nÓg are

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41:53

Keith & Chuck, Bowie & Tina, Frank & Elvis and what...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/02/18

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

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35:20

Boston, Def Leppard, bad hair & the golden age of...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/02/17

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

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1:03:58

Was Bad Bunny at the Superbowl the greatest show ever...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/02/16

After 40 days of relentless rain, you need our little ray of sunshine. And here we all are! Sitting in the rock’n’roll rainbow this week you’ll find …... the Wuthering Heights instagram gold-rush… licensing Foreigner and Lynyrd Skynyrd: when is a band not a band?.. what Michael Jackson asked the Superbowl promoter… one long video for Charli XCX: “if that film was playing in my back garden I’d draw the curtains”… Bob Dylan & Kurtis Blow, Kate Winslet & ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic: a brief history of

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56:32

The genius of Sly Dunbar & Catherine O’Hara plus...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/02/01

A bone-shaking ride on the weekly news cycle, stopping off here to pump up the tyres ….… Springsteen’s Streets Of Minneapolis: it’s not what he said but the fact that he’s said it… “they’re all just Sly & Robbie records but with someone different singing on them”… the price of stadium tickets: if it’s too high, don’t go – but stop complaining!… Catherine O’Hara’s wit and humanity in Waiting For Guffman and A Mighty Wind, and why Home Alone wouldn’t work without her… Melania’s deal with Amazon:

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35:54

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

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/01/28

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…

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54:19

Steve Lillywhite produced the Stones, U2, Siouxsie,...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/01/27

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

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47:48

Who’d be a nepo baby? plus the mystery album that...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/01/25

Scanning the baggage carousel of news to see what sets off the alarm, which this week involves …… Springsteen: why is America’s most American American so quiet about his President on home turf?… the Seven Ages of Nepo: in defence of Julian Lennon, Joe Sumner and Brooklyn Beckham… the Robbie Williams story that gets our goat… why do half the UK music venues make no profit?… the onstage ‘act’ that did 104 minutes non-stop… pre-testing EDM singles on the dancefloor… Four Boys in the Wind! What A Night

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37:15

Simon Nicol of Fairport Convention, back in the van...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/01/22

Fairport tour again in 2026 and are playing their annual Cropredy Convention in August, its 50th year. The rolling Kent landscape behind him, co-founder Simon Nicol looks back at almost six decades in the line-up, the first shows he ever saw and played, why he can’t wait to get back on the tour bus again, and …… the intoxication of live music – “lost in a moment that’s never happened before and won’t be repeated”… Count Basie at the Astoria, aged 7 – “the moulded Turkish ottomans! The massed ranks

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41:40

Miles Hunt of the Wonder Stuff - ‘I’d rather make...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/01/21

Miles Hunt is on tour in 2026 – solo, with Vent 414 and the Wonder Stuff - and looks back here at his 40 years on stage, which involves …… stifling hecklers the John Lydon way: “the exits are clearly marked!”… what percussion does to your ears… “when a tout’s selling your £3 ticket for £50 you know you’ve made it!”… keytars, flat drums, guitars without headstocks: things that are JUST PLAIN WRONG!… seeing Slade at Birmingham Town Hall when he was 10… why the Size Of A Cow was “the moment a lot of

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25:46

Kenney Jones remembers the Small Faces’ masterpiece

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/01/20

Ogden’s Nut Gone Flake is being reissued on Kenney Jones’ Nice Records, along with unheard outtakes discovered when the original master was found in one of his battered old drum cases. He talks to us here – with the compiler Rob Caiger – about the chaotic construction of the Small Faces’ 1968 masterpiece and his mission to “carry on the legacy”. Are you all sitting comftybold two-square on your botty? Then we’ll begin. Among the highlights …… the Thames boating accident that inspired the album…

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39:23

The fabulous Bob Weir and how the Grateful Dead...

Word In Your Ear ·

2026/01/18

A tie-dyed-in-the-wool rock & roll space odyssey to infinity and beyond which stops off this week at …… why the Dead’s music was “like lighting a match in the wind”… Ha Ha Harlem! Rebels Without Applause! – Morrissey song or Lenny Bruce comic routine?… Sting v Sumner & Copeland and what Every Breath You Take makes daily just from streaming… is Oasis “the biggest exchange of money for old rope in the history of commerce?”… rock stars in shorts… John Hartford and his Willie Nelson Sliding

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809 results

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