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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

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All Episodes

30:04

David Bowie and why we need him more than ever. Paul...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/11/06

David Bowie’s significance just keeps expanding and the look and sound of him never age. Paul Morley has been gripped from the start and his new book ‘Far Above The World’ explores the many reasons why. These among them …… Labyrinth, YouTube and the new ways people discover Bowie… why he’s a figurehead of a vanishing world… dressing up for radio interviews… his almost fatal relationship with America and the 1971 promo tour that was his ‘On The Road’… Haddon Hall and his first key collaborators…

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27:02

‘Bob Dylan is my father’ - and why Sam Sussman is...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/11/05

Sam Sussman’s mother Fran had a year-long love affair with Dylan when he was working on Blood on the Tracks – she’s mentioned in Tangled Up In Blue – and they met again in 1990. What she told him about that relationship is mapped out in the book he’s just written, Boy From the North Country, along with the firm belief that he’s Dylan’s son. Imagine how that must feel. This extraordinary conversation takes a number of turns and these are among them …… Norman Raeben’s art class where Dylan was trying

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34:38

Thompson Twins’ Tom Bailey had a ‘manifesto for...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/11/04

Tom Bailey’s been based in New Zealand for the last 30 years, making records, DJing and avoiding British winters. He tours the UK in 2026 playing the Thompson Twins’ greatest hits and looks back here from Auckland at the first shows he ever saw and played, all this high in the mix …... dance music and the British Invasion of America… the inspiring delights of Some Kind Of Mushroom, his local record shop in Chesterfield… seeing Blodwyn Pig, Edgar Broughton and Principal Edwards Magic Theatre when he

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45:48

Cowbells, maracas, gongs, castanets – classic...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/11/03

The raw ingredients of this week’s news gently diced, simmered and served as a nutritious broth. And flavoured with the following …… why Lily Allen’s divorce album doubled the value of her house… how can you play real living people as fundamentally bad after Steve Coogan’s ‘Lost King’ court case?… the cowbell on Honky Tonk Women, the guiro on Gimme Shelter, the tambourine on classic Motown: Richard Pite gives a percussion demo… Kraftwerk, 10cc, Coolio, George McCrae – more records that sound unique…

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34:59

Paul Young – “Big in the ‘80s! What lucky bastards we...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/10/25

Paul Young was the bassist in a pub band playing Led Zeppelin and Patto covers ‘til his solo soul and blues slot launched him as a singer. He’s still touring nearly 50 years later, just back from filling Mexican stadiums with Rod Stewart. And next May launching his acoustic ‘Songs & Stories Tour’ in theatres, intercut with film clips and hoary old tales from the battlefield. He looks back here at ……Smash Hits cover shoots and Rewind package tours: “what a glorious time the ‘80s was”… the soul

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52:50

Rock stars we envy, Madonna as a sister-in-law & the...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/10/05

Steering the supercar of enquiry round the rock and roll racetrack with the occasional stop for a tyre change. Foot-to-floor moments this week include…… why are the British so hung up about posh pop stars?… the 10-second moment of his stage routine that Springsteen must find addictive… the flaming bra, the flying dress, the human horse: Lady Gaga’s most OTT entrances.. would YOU want Madonna as a sister-in-law?… Fleetwood Mac, the Grateful Dead, the Bee Gees: bands the NME said were finished in

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32:18

Bowie, Boy George and the rise of the riotous Blitz...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/10/03

London’s Blitz club in 1980 had a huge impact on the way the decade looked and sounded, the launchpad for Boy George, Spandau Ballet, a new age of electro-pop and many writers, designers and photographers. The author and broadcaster Robert Elms was one of its cornerstones, “a place for people who’d outgrown the 20th Century”. We talk here about his book ‘Blitz: the Club That Created the ‘80s’ with all of this on the dancefloor …… the Blitz Club rules, “unspoken until Steve Strange spoke them”. And

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39:07

The Prince story by 200 people who knew him - and...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/10/01

Prince’s commercial peak was Purple Rain but John McKie thinks Sign O’ The Times was his creative masterpiece and tracked down over 200 collaborators, girlfriends, “Prince whisperers”, assistants and admirers to piece together the story of its construction (without allowing himself to use the word “genius”). Which leads us up some colourful, spot-lit alleys, among them …… “a man in suspenders playing funk”: why a disastrous support slot on the ‘81 Stones tour was pivotal moment… Mozart/Salieri

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56:40

Danny Thompson’s bass adventures, Dylan’s women, TV...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/09/28

News, rants, theories, stories and assorted old hokum which this week stumbles into …… Kate Bush, Thunderbirds, Tim Buckley, the Blind Boys of Alabama … the magical bass adventures of Danny Thompson (and the time he headlined over the Beatles)… how Claudia Cardinale wound up on the sleeve of Blonde On Blonde… would Roxy Music have made it if their albums had been released in brown paper bags?… how TikTok is destroying the “superfan”… do late night TV hosts need us more than we need them?… Boris

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26:17

Thea Gilmore on Joan Baez, Jake Thackray and Dave...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/09/24

We’ve always liked Thea Gilmore who once crossed America with Joan Baez in a pre-Election campaign tour and has released 21 albums (“I’ve got musical ADHD!)”. She looks back here at the first shows she ever saw and played which involves …… a deep dive into Jake Thackray – “Last Will And Testament still makes me cry”… spotting her dad in the crowd in the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival movie and why “My dad treated Dave Pegg’s dog” jump-started her career…… what Joan Baez did on their pre-Election

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44:44

Alex's star-studded week in Hollywood

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/09/15

Having disposed of the surprising history of pop stars who posed for Playboy, discussing whether the universe really needs another album called "Play", come up with a couple of nominations for Best Album Title Of All Time, we hear about Alex's experiences seeing Oasis in the midst of 90,000 who have never been to Manchester and how he "used the force" to get some face time with Jack Black and Dave Grohl.Find out more about how to help us to keep the conversation going:

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37:17

Maddy Prior of Steeleye Span drove Rev Gary Davis...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/09/02

Maddy Prior – folk royalty, an absolute hero of ours – is touring with Steeleye Span again this autumn 66 years after they started, a life someone should make into a movie. She talks to us here about her undimmed love of live performance and …… when the height of your ambition is a £3 ticket to Blackpool Pleasure Beach… “Rod Argent, the first boy I ever kissed”… her fox-fur-trimmed Lambretta when a teenage mod… the night Steeleye Span showered their audience with £4,000… seeing Acker Bilk, Chris

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37:33

Debsey Wykes of Dolly Mixture wants you to read her...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/27

Debsey Wykes was in Dolly Mixture, one of the very few all-girl groups in post-punk London, a time when bands with charisma won the battle for attention and you promoted singles on the back of a truck. Her memoir Teenage Daydream perfectly captures a slice of late ‘70s life, the thrill of playing the pub circuit and trying to storm Radio One. Along with …… the agony of re-reading teenage diaries… being supported by U2 then watching their “annoying” ascent… Girls With Electric Guitars and why rock

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33:31

Tanita Tikaram - from ‘girl with guitar in bedroom’...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/20

Tanita Tikaram’s second gig had an audience of three – one paying customer and two concert promoters. When one of them wanted to talk to her afterwards she said, “sorry, I’ve got to get the train home.” She was 17. In this podcast she tells us the story of the one of the fastest career ascents on record which stops off at …… an open-mic night with a girl who cut up newspaper – “what happened to her?”… Basingstoke alumni –Tanita Tikaram, Jane Austen, Liz Hurley …… ignoring Wham! in favour of Suzanne

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33:03

Bob Mould remembers Hüsker Dü, Sugar & that guy with...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/19

Bob Mould, whose records with Hüsker Dü had such impact on Nirvana and Pixies, is back on tour again, both solo and with a band. “I’ve built this tiny soap box - and if you don’t like it, it’s been nice knowing you!” He talks to us from San Francisco about …… March 30 1979: “the day that changed my life”… over-refreshment on the bus to see Rush and Aerosmith, aged 16… the influence of Hüsker Dü on Nirvana, Pixies and My Bloody Valentine – “it’s a game of hot potato. YOU take this sound now!”… seeing

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1:01:54

Comedy records, TV gold & have Oasis and Coldplay...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/17

Damping down the wildfires of rock and roll news this week we focus on the following …… Oasis, Taylor Swift and Coldplay and the new age of Winner Takes All… did Bob Dylan write a song with Gene Simmons, advertise lingerie or appear on a telethon with Harry Dean Stanton?… movies that need making eg the Molly Drake Story, the Rock And Roll Mitford Sisters (Pattie, Jenny and Paula Boyd)… surely what makes the rock business ‘unfair’ are the people spending the money on it?… is the Golden Age of TV

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33:13

Brian Protheroe on the eternal life of his 1974 hit...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/15

Paul Weller has just covered it on his new album. Morrissey played it to Noel Gallagher who took the idea and ran with it. What explains the enduring appeal of a record that stalled at number 22 all those years ago? Actor/musician Brian Protheroe doesn’t know but he’s certainly grateful that it’s being reissued once again. His story takes us back to:…the days when young musicians hitch-hiked to London…the way the sun shone on the day “Sgt Pepper” came out…when Soho was a village and an out of work

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46:18

Terry Reid, the man who really invented Led Zeppelin,...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/11

Other, weaker podcasts may take the summer off. Not this one.…the story of Jerry Garcia’s alligator strat, Paul McCartney’s violin bass and the instrument Peter Frampton thought had gone forever…the long story of Terry Reid, who turned down Led Zeppelin, and the golden afternoon when he was the most charismatic figure in roc…the real reason why you wouldn’t have wanted to be at Keith Richards’ place on that day in 1967…why there’s nothing more boring than hedonismMick Jagger’s 1967 affidavit is

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42:45

Peter Ames Carlin on the record that made Bruce...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/07

word-podcast-798-peter-ames-carlinFriend of the pod and chronicler of the careers of Springsteen, Paul Simon and REM, Peter Ames Carlin has heard all the recordings that went into the album which was Springsteen’s last chance saloon and spoken to the people who were there to put together the story of how it was all done.….the lucky break that came when the boss’s son went to a Springsteen show….the man who played on Bruce Springsteen’s greatest record and then left….how Springsteen learned that the

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39:58

Jah Wobble - 40 hilarious unedited minutes...

Word In Your Ear ·

2025/08/07

Jah Wobble - touring in October - is outstanding company and rattles on here like a steam train, sparking off at tangents in a brilliant, barely steerable monologue with a crackling cast of characters. It’s not often a podcast gets a visitor mid-recording who says, “I’ve put more poison in - but the good news is, there’s nothing in your traps!” Here you will find …… an afternoon with Anthony Hopkins… the time Ginger Baker got the wrong dessert - “a bowl of rhubarb went flying”… East End violence:

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