Carol Decker’s 30 Rock Chicks!: NOW 80s: Friday 8th May: 9pm
T’Pau’s Carol Decker brings a bit of Heart and Soul to a countdown of ’80s ladies who like to rock! With Joan Jett, Tina Turner, Stevie Nicks and Pat Benatar. (as well as Toyah via the Thunder In The Mountains video)
Great news! The Signed Box Set version of Toyah & The Humans’ Noise In Your Head – An Amazon Exclusive – is available again to order. This will no doubt be very temporary so get yours while you can! **Update – It’s Sold Out again**
What a bargain this is – The Invasion Planet Earth DVD has been reduced to just £3 by Amazon. This may not last long. The DVD includes a Making Of documentary, deleted scenes, commentary + Toyah’s Step Into The New World promo video. Invasion Planet Earth is a really enjoyable two hours of sci-fi.
Seriously amazing. Seven minutes of magnificence! We miss you Bill.
Quatermass: Talking Pictures TV: Tue 19th May: 9pm
Chapter One: Ringstone Round. Quatermass (John Mills), now living in retirement in Scotland, travels to London in search of his granddaughter, Hettie Carlson, who has gone missing. He is shocked by the scale of the urban collapse that has struck the city – law and order has broken down and marauding gangs terrorise the litter-strewn, decaying streets. The fall of civilization has been general across the world. Appearing as a guest on a television programme covering the “Hands in Space” project, a joint space mission between the United States and Russia, Quatermass is horrified when the two spacecraft are destroyed by some unknown force.
Astronomer Joe Kapp, another guest on the programme, invites Quatermass to join him at his home in the country where he and two friends have constructed two radio telescopes. At the radio telescope site, Kapp’s colleagues report that they detected a powerful signal at the exact time of the incident in space. Quatermass is intrigued by the behaviour of a group of hippie-like youngsters known as the Planet People, who are travelling to various neolithic sites (about 5,000 years old) from where they believe they will be transported to a better life on another planet.
Quatermass suspects Hettie has joined them. Along with Kapp’s wife, Claire, Quatermass and Kapp follow a group of Planet People to a stone circle of megaliths, Ringstone Round. As they watch, the Planet People assembled inside the circle are bathed in a bright light and disappear, leaving only a residue of white dust behind..
This episode originally aired on 24th October 1979 on the ITV network and was watched by 12.4m viewers in the UK.
The 1979, four-part, mini series Quatermass (also known as The Quatermass Conclusion or Quatermass IV) is airing weekly from Tuesday 19th May. Stars John Mills, Simon McCorkindale, Barbara Kellerman, Ralph Arliss, Rebecca Saire, Toyah Willcox, David Yip, Alison Dowling.
• Talking Pictures TV is An Archive Film & TV Channel. Available on the following platforms/channels: Freeview 81, YouView 81, Freesat 306, Sky 328 and Virgin 445.
The Limited Edition Amazon Exclusive edition of Toyah & The Humans’ Noise In Your Head box set sold out in just a few hours of being available to order yesterday. This included a signed print “from one human to another” by Toyah. The edition of the box set which doesn’t include the print is still available to order online.
Two unicorns in unison! It’s the Unicorn Bolero Sunday Lockdown Lunch. (© Toyah Willcox)
Jools Holland: BBC Radio 2: Saturday 16th May: 8pm
Toyah is Jools’ guest! Join Jools Holland for the first in a new series where he and a guest explore the Later… archive, picking out some favourite moments and discussing some of their favourite artists along the way. Kicking it off is singer, songwriter & actress Toyah, who picks the likes of Bryan Ferry, & Muse, as well as discussing her work and career.
“Later…with Jools Holland” is the UK’s favourite music TV programme, with an archive that stretches back 25 years full of amazing performances by legendary artists. This series – and its companion shows on BBC2 – is the first to properly explore this remarkable heritage, bringing back to BBC airwaves a treasure trove of musical delights!
NOISE IN YOUR HEAD is a 4 CD + DVD box set released 3 July 2020 that brings together the complete works of Toyah & The Humans.
The box set contains four albums (‘We Are The Humans’, ‘Sugar Rush’, ‘Strange Tales’, ‘Live At Scala London’) and six bonus tracks, including home demos and the previously unreleased track, 21st Century Schizoid Man. It also includes a DVD featuring a previously unreleased 90 minute concert, and four promo videos.
A strictly limited edition exclusive Amazon version includes a postcard print signed “from one human to another” by Toyah Willcox.
PRE-ORDER AMAZON EXCLUSIVE SIGNED EDITION
PRE-ORDER THE BOX SET
The Humans were Toyah, her musical director Chris Wong and multi-instrumentalist, the late Bill Rieflin (drummer for King Crimson and latter-day REM, as well as Ministry, the Revolting Cocks, Lard, KMFDM, Pigface, Swans, Chris Connelly, and Nine Inch Nails).
Toyah put the ensemble together in 2007 for the birthday celebrations of Toomas Hendrik Ilves, president of Estonia, a country already dear to Toyah.
As Toyah explains in her note in the 40-page booklet, “I was very keen to work on an idea where mid-range frequencies didn’t cancel out the natural space of the voice. Always having been in love with the bass I wanted to create a trio of just my voice and two basses, allowing power, prose and top line melody to dominate the audio spectrum. The Humans were to be music stripped bare.”
WE ARE THE HUMANS, released in 2009, features “Noise In Your Head”, “Quicksilver” and “Is It Wrong”. The CD now includes four bonus tracks: a cover of “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’” featuring Robert Fripp, and three of Toyah’s original home demos, demonstrating her original concept for the ensemble.
SUGAR RUSH (2011) features “Sea Of Size” and “Small Town Psychopath” and Guest Human throughout, Robert Fripp. The bonus track is a version of “Small Town Psychopath”.
STRANGE TALES (2014) album features “Get In Your Car” and now closes with a previously unreleased 7 minute version of the King Crimson classic, “21st Century Schizoid Man”.
LIVE AT SCALA LONDON is the first full 16-track release of an entire 2010 concert at London Kings Cross’ Scala venue, including the encores of “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’” and “Purple Haze”. Guest Human Robert Fripp features throughout.
On the DVD, LIVE AT TRADING BOUNDARIES is a previously unreleased 90-minute, 21-song concert filmed in April 2015. Also included are four promo videos, issued on DVD for the first time.
All discs feature faithful artwork on facsimile wallers and a lavishly-illustrated 40 page booklet featuring annotation written by Toyah herself. Also featured is an essay on the period covered by the box by Toyah’s official archivist and compiler of this box set, Craig Astley.
The box set is dedicated to Bill Rieflin, who sadly passed away on 24th March 2020. Recorded in summer 2019, “21st Century Schizoid Man” was only recently mixed and is one of Bill’s last completed recordings.
Sarcastically and affectionately, Bill referred to this anthology as The Humans’ Greatest Hits. Bill exchanged with Toyah this March, as included in her online tribute to him, that “We made good things together. Some of my best work ever.”
These look gorgeous! Following the fantastic solo Toyah vinyls earlier this year, come four Toyah & The Humans vinyls. All four vinyls are also released on July 3rd 2020. Click below for order links.
The three studio albums by Toyah & The Humans – We Are The Humans, Sugar Rush, Strange Tales – make their vinyl debut on 180g heavyweight coloured translucent vinyl. Strange Tales now closes with the previously unreleased 7-minute 21st Century Schizoid Man, the last track Toyah and Bill Rieflin recorded together.
The full 2010 concert album Live At Scala is released for the first time in its entirety, featuring a cover of Purple Haze alongside songs that later appeared on Sugar Rush but were not yet recorded at the time of the gig.
Catch up with Toyah & Chris Wong’s special live event from earlier today. This included the World Premiere of new track 21st Century Schizoid Man, a Bill Rieflin Tribute and a Live Q&A.
Join Toyah & Chris Wong for a special live event 11am, Sat 2nd May on Twitter (or Facebook). World Premiere of new track 21st Century Schizoid Man, Bill Rieflin Tribute, unseens videos, Live Q&A – ask your question using #askToyah – Click below for further details.
Toyah’s info-packed new blog is available to read at toyahwillcox.com.
Candy Wars: Britain’s Favourite Sweets 2020:
Channel 5: Sunday 10th May: 6.15pm
Confectionery-loving celebrities crunch and chew their way through the public’s chosen top 20 goodies, while reminiscing about sweet TV adverts from times gone by. One lucky competition winner heads to a factory to invent her own sweet, there’s a visit to the world’s oldest sweet shop and one of the UK’s top competitive eaters tries to break a marshmallow-eating world record.
Featuring Janet Ellis, Kim Woodburn, Angela Griffin, Basil Brush, Ninia Benjamin, Justin Moorhouse, Catherine Tyldesley, Rosemary Shrager, Toyah Willcox, Samantha Giles and Duncan James.
