Straight From The Desk
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Straight From The Desk
''Straight from the Desk'' is a live album by Ian Dury & the Blockheads recorded on 23 December 1978 at the Ilford Odeon, Ilford, East London. There is little information available about the album, other than what can be heard on the record. During the performance of "Billericay Dickie" the audience break the venue's floor, presumably in excitement causing Dury to warn the audience to mind the hole as an introduction to "Hit Me with Your Rhythm Stick" and mention it repeatedly later in the set. Dury forgets the words totally on "There Ain't Half Been Some Clever Bastards" forcing the Blockheads to carry on playing while he remembers them and gets back in time. Also featured at the concert was a 'Blockheads light' that was presumably a piece of on-stage equipment that falls over and fails to work at the same time Ian Dury breaks his microphone. This can be heard at the start of "My Old Man". Although the set features "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll", lasting over 12 minutes, the son ...
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Ian Dury
Ian Robins Dury (12 May 1942 27 March 2000) was a British singer, songwriter and actor who rose to fame during the late 1970s, during the punk and new wave era of rock music. He was the lead singer and lyricist of Ian Dury and the Blockheads and before that of Kilburn and the High Roads. Biography Early life Dury was born, and spent his early years, at his parents' home at 43 Weald Rise, Harrow Weald, Middlesex (though he often pretended that he had been born in Upminster, Essex, which all but one of his obituaries in the UK national press stated as fact). His father, William George Dury (born 23 September 1905, Southborough, Kent; died 25 February 1968), was a local bus driver and former boxer, while his mother Margaret (known as "Peggy", born Margaret Cuthbertson Walker, 17 April 1910, Rochdale, Lancashire; died January 1995) was a health visitor, the daughter of a Cornish doctor and the granddaughter of an Irish landowner. William Dury trained with Rolls-Royce to be a cha ...
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Barking, London
Barking is a suburb and List of areas of London, area in Greater London, within the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham, Borough of Barking and Dagenham. It is east of Charing Cross. The total population of Barking was 59,068 at the 2011 census.If defined as the Abbey, Eastbury, Gascoigne, Longbridge, and Thames Wards and electoral divisions of the United Kingdom, electoral wards of Barking & Dagenham Council In addition to an extensive and fairly low-density residential area, the town centre forms a large retail and commercial district, currently a focus for regeneration. The former industrial lands to the south are being redeveloped as Barking Riverside. Origins and administration Toponymy The name Barking came from Old English language, Anglo-Saxon ''Berecingas'', meaning either "the settlement of the followers or descendants of a man called Bereca" or "the settlement by the birch trees". In AD 735 the area was ''Berecingum'' and was known to mean "dwellers among the birc ...
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Mick Gallagher
Michael William Gallagher (born 29 October 1945) is an English Hammond organ player best known as a member of Ian Dury and the Blockheads and for his contributions to albums by the Clash. He has also written music for films such as ''Extremes'' (1971) and ''After Midnight'' (1990), and the Broadway play ''Serious Money'' (1987). Early band work Mick Gallagher started his musical career in Newcastle with The Unknowns in the early 1960s. He played with the Animals during 1965, replacing their founding member Alan Price. He moved on to form ''The Chosen Few'', where he played alongside Alan Hull, who later formed Lindisfarne. Other associations include Skip Bifferty, Peter Frampton's Camel and Cochise. In 1977 Gallagher was playing in a band called Loving Awareness, including John Turnbull, Charley Charles and Norman Watt-Roy. Charles and Watt-Roy worked as session musicians with Ian Dury, and when the group went on tour, Gallagher and Turnbull were invited along. This band beca ...
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John Turnbull (musician)
John George Turnbull (born 27 August 1950) is an English pop and rock guitarist and singer. He is currently a member of The Blockheads. Early life and education Turnbull was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland, England, on 27 August 1950. Career He has played in various bands, including Skip Bifferty, The Chosen Few, Arc, Loving Awareness, Glencoe, Nick Lowe, Dave Stewart and the Spiritual Cowboys, Eurythmics, Talk Talk, Londonbeat, Paul Young, Bob Geldof, World Party, Kaos Band and Ian Dury and the Blockheads. He has played and sung on a number of film soundtracks, including ''Get Carter'' (1971), starring Michael Caine Sir Michael Caine (born Maurice Joseph Micklewhite; 14 March 1933) is an English actor. Known for his distinctive Cockney accent, he has appeared in more than 160 films in a career spanning seven decades, and is considered a British film ico .... References External links * * * Theblockheads.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Turnbull, John 1950 bir ...
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Norman Watt-Roy
Norman Joseph Watt-Roy (born 15 February 1951) is an English musician, arranger and composer. Watt-Roy's music career spans more than 40 years. He came to prominence in the late 1970s, during the punk and new wave era of rock music as the bass player for Ian Dury and the Blockheads. He had previously been a member of the Greatest Show on Earth. In addition to his work with the Blockheads, Watt-Roy has been a session musician and has released one solo album. Early life Norman Joseph Watt-Roy was born into an Anglo-Indian family on 15 February 1951, in Bombay, India. In November 1954, the Watt-Roy family, including Norman, his older brother Garth Watt-Roy (born Garth Philip Watt-Roy, December 1947, Bombay, India), and his sister moved to England. They settled in Highbury, North London, where Norman went to St. Joan of Arc Primary School, Blackstock Road. When Norman was 8, the family moved to Harlow, Essex. At the age of 8, he learned a few guitar chords from his father, and ...
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Chaz Jankel
Charles Jeremy "Chaz" Jankel (born 16 April 1952) is an English musician. In a music career spanning more than 40 years, he came to prominence in the late 1970s as the guitarist and keyboardist of the rock band Ian Dury and the Blockheads. With Dury, Jankel co-wrote some of the band's best-known songs including "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll", "Hit Me with Your Rhythm Stick" and " Reasons to Be Cheerful, Part 3". In addition to his work with the Blockheads, Jankel has had a solo career which has resulted in nine studio albums. He has a long list of credits as both a performer and as songwriter. Early life Charles Jeremy Jankel was born on 16 April 1952 in Stanmore, Middlesex. Inspired by skiffle singer Lonnie Donegan, he started to learn how to play the Spanish guitar at age 7, and then went on to study the piano. He attended the boarding school Mill Hill School and became a fan of the American rock, funk and soul band Sly and the Family Stone during his time there. Jankel's fondne ...
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Sweet Gene Vincent
"Sweet Gene Vincent" is a song and single by Ian Dury. Taken from his first solo album ''New Boots and Panties!!'' it was his second solo single and third solo release and is a tribute to Rock 'n' Roll singer Gene Vincent. It was released November 1977 on the single BUY 23 ''Sweet Gene Vincent / You're More Than Fair'' and there was no picture sleeve released. "Sweet Gene Vincent" remained in Ian Dury's set list for almost his entire career, even after other faster paced songs like "Plaistow Patricia" and "Blackmail Man" had been dropped because of the singer's worsening health and was played at his final concert at the London Palladium in February 2000. As of 2007, the Blockheads continue to use the song in their sets. Ian Dury and Gene Vincent Ian Dury was a fan of Gene Vincent since his early to mid teens and claims to have bought every single Vincent produced. In an interview reprinted in ''Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll: The Life of Ian Dury'', Dury says that he first heard ...
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Kilburn And The High Roads
Kilburn and the High Roads were a British pub rock band formed in London by Ian Dury in 1970. The band released one studio album in 1975, disbanding the same year. AllMusic credits the band with being "an undeniable influence on punk and new wave". History Dury formed Kilburn and the High Roads in 1970. The band consisted of Ian Dury as lead vocalist and lyricist, pianist Russell Hardy, guitarist Edward "Ted" Speight (later replaced by Keith Lucas), bassist Charlie Hart (later replaced by Humphrey Ocean and later by Charley Sinclair), saxophonist George Khan (later replaced by Davey Payne) and drummer Chris Lucas (replaced by Terry Day and later by David Newton-Rohoman, who used crutches). The band performed their first gig in 1971 and were regulars on the pub rock scene by 1973. The Kilburns also supported the Who on their ''Quadrophenia'' tour of late 1973. The band signed to Warner Bros. subsidiary Raft Records and recorded an album in 1974 but it remained unreleased w ...
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Pub Rock (United Kingdom)
Pub rock is a rock music genre that was developed in the early to mid-1970s in the United Kingdom. A back-to-basics movement which incorporated roots rock, pub rock was a reaction against the expensively-recorded and produced progressive rock and flashy glam rock scenes of the time. Although short-lived, pub rock was live rock played in small traditional venues like pubs and clubs. Since major labels showed no interest in pub rock groups, pub rockers sought out independent record labels such as Stiff Records. Indie labels used relatively inexpensive recording processes, so they had a much lower break-even point for a record than a major label. With pub rock's emphasis on small venues, simple, fairly inexpensive recordings and indie record labels, it was the catalyst for the development of the British punk rock scene. Despite these shared elements, though, there was a difference between the genres: while pub rock harked back to early rock and roll and R&B, punk was iconoclastic, ...
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Dagenham
Dagenham () is a town in East London, England, within the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham. Dagenham is centred east of Charing Cross. It was historically a rural parish in the Becontree Hundred of Essex, stretching from Hainault Forest in the north to the River Thames in the south. Dagenham remained mostly undeveloped until 1921, when the London County Council began construction of the large Becontree housing estate. The population significantly increased as people moved to the new housing in the early 20th century, with the parish of Dagenham becoming Dagenham Urban District in 1926 and the Municipal Borough of Dagenham in 1938. In 1965 Dagenham became part of Greater London when most of the historic parish become part of the London Borough of Barking. Dagenham was chosen as a location for industrial activity and is perhaps most famous for being the location of the Ford Dagenham motor car plant where the Ford sewing machinists strike of 1968 took place. Following the de ...
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Romford
Romford is a large town in east London and the administrative centre of the London Borough of Havering. It is located northeast of Charing Cross and is one of the major metropolitan centres identified in the London Plan. Historically, Romford was a market town in the county of Essex, and formed the administrative centre of the liberty of Havering before that liberty was dissolved in 1892. Good road links to London and the opening of the railway station in 1839 were key to the development of the town. The economic history of Romford is characterised by a shift from agriculture to light industry and then to retail and commerce. As part of the suburban growth of London throughout the 20th century, Romford significantly expanded and increased in population, becoming a municipal borough in 1937 and was incorporated into Greater London in 1965. Today, it is one of the largest commercial, retail, entertainment and leisure districts in London and has a well-developed night-time econom ...
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