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PODCAST

Rock"s Backpages

Barney Hoskyns, Jasper Murison-Bowie, William Pike

Tales from the world"s largest archive of music journalism: entertaining interviews with luminaries such as Neil Tennant, Billy Bragg, Pamela Des Barres, Gary Kemp, Vashti Bunyan, Midge Ure, Nick Hornby and Robyn Hitchcock. Thoughtful and informative conversations about all aspects of popular music history, interspersed with clips from exclusive audio interviews that date back to the mid-"60s. The RBP podcast is hosted by Barney Hoskyns and William Pike and co-hosted & produced by Jasper

music music history

All Episodes

77:58

E236: Nik Cohn and Ben Ratliff on Corner Boy +...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/09/28

For this episode we invite the legendaryNik Cohnto join us from upstate New York to discuss his extraordinary career and his brilliant new bookCorner Boy. Also joining us— from New York City— is the book's editorBen Ratliff, himself the author ofan acclaimed 2007 biography of John Coltrane.We start by asking Nik about the epiphanic teenage moment he discovered rock'n'roll in Derry, Northern Ireland, before jumping forward to his earlypop writing forQueenin the mid-'60s. Along the way, Ben

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75:52

E235: Tony Fletcher on Jamming! + The Jam + U2 audio...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/09/14

For this episode we're joined in Hammersmith by the much-travelled Tony Fletcher as he returns to his homeland to promote his new bookPOW! When UK Punk Went Pop, 1980–84.We begin by asking our guest aboutJamming!, the fondly-remembered fanzine he launched in South London at the tender age of 13. He recalls the huge impact ofthe Jamon his adolescent life and the friendship withPaul Wellerthat grew out of his passion for the band. After discussing howJamming!evolved into a proper monthly magazine —

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73:12

E234: Mitchell Cohen on Dolly Parton + The Lovin'...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/09/01

For this episode we're joined by veteran music scribe and A&R manMitchell Cohento discuss his long career and his brand-new book.We start in the Bronx of Mitchell's youth and hear about the impact on him of local heroDion DiMucci. From there we take the D train down to mid-'60sGreenwich Villageand relive our guest's discovery of the scene he chronicles inWake Me, Shake: New York City, the '60s & the Pop-Rock Youthquake. After celebrating the belovedLovin' Spoonfulwe turn our attention to their

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82:48

E233: Brian Cullman on Sandy Denny + John Martyn +...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/08/17

In this episode, we invite the marvellousBrian Cullmanto join us onscreen from a French farmhouse in the Dordogne.The author ofHow to Prepare for the Pasttalks us through his fascinating "travels in music and time" from New York City to North Africa via his writing forCrawdaddy,MusicianandThe Paris Review. Beginning with his boyhood in midtown Manhattan, Brian recalls his ecstatic discovery of pop radio andWBAI's Bob Fass; his befriending of the lateLillian Roxon; and his teenage immersion in

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67:37

E232: Tim Page on his Pulitzer Prize + Judee Sill +...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/08/03

In this episode we're joined by special guestTim Pageto trace the arc of his career fromreviewing James Chance & the Contortionstowinning the Pulitzer Prize.In a conversation that's as entertaining as it is erudite, Tim recalls his teenage discovery ofRolling Stoneand the subsequent influence of rock criticism on his singular brand of classical music reviewing. After touching on the 1967 documentaryA Day with Timmy Page, we hear about hisjourney as a critic fromNew York Rockerto theWashington Post

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47:58

Episode 231: Geoffrey Cannon on the '60s + the...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/07/20

In this episode we invite the pioneeringGeoffrey Cannonto reminisce about his stint asThe Guardian's rock critic between 1968 and 1972.Commencing with the pop baptism of his first hearingFrankie Lymon & the Teenagersin a Horsham record booth in 1956, our guest talks us through his early work forNew SocietyandThe Listener— including his prescient reviews of albums bythe Velvet Undergroundandthe Mothers of Invention. He also explains how the 1969 Granada filmJohnny Cash at San Quentincame

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70:49

E230: Simon Reynolds on shoegaze + dream pop + Jay-Z...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/06/22

Acclaimed author Simon Reynolds joins us in Hammersmith to discuss his latest book. A journey through the many bands and scenes he wrote about between 1984 and 1994, Still in a Dream gives us a chance to ask our guest about shoegaze, C86 and the book's autobiographical threads. Clips from an early 2000 Jay-Z audio interview by Dorian Lynskey prompt a general discussion of the hip hop superstar whose debut album Reasonable Doubt turns 30 this week. Jasper and William then wrap up the episode with

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75:50

E229: Funk special with Lloyd Bradley + Betty Davis...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/06/08

In this episode we welcome Lloyd Bradley back to Hammersmith to discuss his monumental new tome Funk Is Its Own Reward.We ask our guest about what he describes as "Black America's second great cultural revolution" before learning of his own first awareness of funk as a new musical form. After we consider the parts played in the movement's evolution by James Brown, Earth Wind & Fire and Kool & the Gang, we get to George Clinton's Parliament-Funkadelic, whose mind-blowing "P-Funk Earth Tour" of

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82:42

E228: Maureen O'Grady on Rave + Pet Sounds + Miles...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/05/26

In this episode we're joined by a legend of '60s pop journalism to discuss her days at Rave magazine and her friendships with the stars of that swinging decade.Maureen O'Grady talks about the lucky break that brought her to Boyfriend magazine and her long friendship with the great Penny Valentine. She recalls her early interviews with the Beatles and the Rolling Stones before we digress into the role the UK played in hailing the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds as a game-changing masterpiece. Plus we ask

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74:47

E227: An LGBTQ special with Barry Walters + a Grace...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/05/11

For this episode we're joined all the way from San Francisco by Barry Walters to discuss his new history of LGBTQ music. And in our first recording since the retirement of Mark Pringle, William Pike becomes an official co-host of the RBP podcast...Barry reflects on his upbringing in Rochester, N.Y., his move to New York City, and his early writing for the Village Voice. We then hear about his years as pop critic for the San Francisco Examiner and the inspiration of gay disco icon Sylvester. Along

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74:04

E226: A Liverpool special with Penny Kiley and Paul...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/04/13

For this episode we're joined by not one but two very special guests to talk about one of the great music cities.Penny Kiley is the former pop columnist for the Liverpool Echo, contributed regularly to Melody Maker and has just published the superb memoir Atypical Girl. Paul Du Noyer, meanwhile, wrote beautifully for the NME in its glory years and edited both Q and MOJO; he is also the author of 2002's exceptional Liverpool: Wondrous Place. We ask our guests about everything from the

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66:32

E225: Adele Bertei on New York's No Wave scene

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/03/30

In this episode we welcome back the marvellous Adele Bertei — five years after she first guested on our show — to talk about her amazing new book No New York.Beginning with a definition of the postpunk sub-genre "No Wave", the former Contortion recalls her experience of living in Manhattan's perilous East Village in the late '70s and playing organ behind the unhinged James Chance. She also pays tribute to the many fearless women who "shaped the scene", first and foremost the formidable Lydia

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65:15

E224: Jimmy McDonough on Neil Young + Gary Stewart +...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/03/16

For this episode we invite the very entertaining Jimmy McDonough to join us — all the way from Portland, Oregon — and discuss his career as "the king of the crazy biographers".Our guest explains how he moved (back) to New York from Indiana in the '80s and how he got his foot in the door at the Village Voice with a 1988 profile of country singer Gary Stewart, the subject of his new book. We then hear about the long and painful saga of his extraordinary Neil Young biography Shakey (2002) — and his

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63:53

E223: AOR Special with Paul Rees + Boston audio...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/03/02

For this episode we welcome former Q/Kerrang! editor-in-chief Paul Rees to RBP Towers to discuss his riveting new book Raised on Radio: Power Ballads, Cocaine & Payola.An oral history of AOR (or Album-Oriented Rock), Raised on Radio gives us an eagerly-awaited chance to enthuse about an oft-maligned genre we all happen to adore. The conversation takes in most of AOR's major practitioners, from Kansas and Toto to Journey and Survivor, and incorporates clips from John Tobler's 1979 audio interview

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77:43

E222: Jeff Walker & Kim Gottlieb on Tom Waits + Gram...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/02/16

For this episode we're joined — all the way from Laurel Canyon — by the husband-and-wife tag team that is Jeff Walker and Kim Gottlieb(-Walker). Married for 53 years, Jeff and Kim have worked in diverse capacities in the music business and talk about their experiences over those five-plus decades.We start with the couple's work together on monthly freesheet Music World, focusing on their 1973 encounters with Tom Waits and Gram Parsons (plus a 15-year-old Cameron Crowe tagging along). After audio

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62:48

E221: Phast Phreddie Patterson on the world's biggest...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/02/02

In this episode, we talk to Fred Patterson, aka Phast Phreddie, about his work at the ARChive of Contemporary Music, plus his own magazine Back Door Man and his band Thee Precisions.Beginning with his early musical life teaching classes with Don Waller at UCLA's Experimental College, we hear about how he named Back Door Man after a Howlin Wolf song and wanted to cover "hard core rock n roll". Phreddie remembers how different it was working with R. Meltzer compared to Lester Bangs, who both

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68:02

E220: Bob Stanley on Saint Etienne + Connie Francis +...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/01/19

Content warning: This episode contains discussion of rape (40:37–42:20). In this episode we ask Bob Stanley about his career as a writer and member of the beloved Saint Etienne, whose swansong year this is. We start with Caff, the '80s fanzine which set out the eclectic pop aesthetic that underpinned Saint Etienne, proceeding from there to Bob's memories of life on Melody Maker in the late '80s and early '90s. A clip of our guest's erstwhile MM colleague Simon Reynolds talking about Saint

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86:46

E219: Thurston Moore on free jazz + Sonic Youth +...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2026/01/02

For this episode we're joined by Sonic Youth legend Thurston Moore to discuss his new book Now Jazz Now: 100 Essential Free Jazz and Improvisation Recordings, 1960-80.We start by recapping on the story our guest told in his acclaimed 2023 memoir Sonic Life. In the course of the conversation about his early musical life in Florida and Connecticut we hear a clip from Steve Roeser's 1994 audio interview with him. Discussion of early influences such as the Stooges takes us back to Thurston's stint in

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98:57

E218: James Brown on Sounds + NME + Loaded + the KLF

Rock"s Backpages ·

2025/12/15

For this episode we're joined in our Hammersmith HQ by James ("The Hardest Working Man In Show Business") Brown.The former NME star and founder of "lads' mag" progenitor loaded takes us back to his Yorkshire boyhood in Headingley. He recalls his parents' record collection, the first gigs he attended as the class "smart-arse" at Lawnswood School... and his acclaimed '80s fanzine Attack On Bzag! Our guest's account of how he came to contribute to Sounds leads to clips from the late Andy Gill's 1991

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79:06

E217: Susan Compo & Derek Ridgers on punks, goths and...

Rock"s Backpages ·

2025/12/02

In this episode we welcome not one but two wonderful guests to RBP Towers. Susan Compo and Derek Ridgers have been trans-Atlantic pals for decades and first met on a FourFourTwo assignment to interview and photograph the L.A.-expats "soccer" team Hollywood United.Starting with Susan's punk years in Southern California, we hear about her memories of seeing the Sex Pistols live in Dallas and Tulsa in January 1978. She also talks about her trip to London the year before, prompting Derek's recall of

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