“Next year we are going to tour ‘Love is the Law’, the album which came after ‘The Changeling’, but we are not going to do two tours of that, just one extended tour“…
(Info Source: Toyah Interview @ Penny Black Music)
A few Toyah bits and pieces from ‘Tellurian’, the Toyah Fan Club Newsletter which ran from 1986 until 2001: The Times: A Childhoood. View here. Toyah Willcox, interviewed by Deanish, plus a few ‘Ophelia’s Shadow’ related clippings. View here.
Fuck Yeah Toyah continues to be updated with brilliant Toyah content, including rare photos (howabout this absolute rarity from around the time of the ‘Anthem Tour’, 1981?) and audio.
Tom Leon has uploaded another track to ‘house-mixes.com’ – This one is ‘Let Me Go (Here It Comes Again 2012 Remix)’, a song that was originally released in 1994 on Toyah’s Dreamchild album.
Toyah is one of Tom’s favourite singers. In 1995 he created ‘Awake’n Dreams: Alan Parsons Project vs Toyah Willcox’, two tracks that used samples from the 1981 song ‘Pop Star’. He also put both of these online earlier in 2012. More info on that in our news from April.
• Listen to ‘Let Me Go (Here It Comes Again 2012 Remix)’ by Tom Leon here.
I’ve been thinking of doing some more occasional Toyah songwords/lyrics pages (inspired, of course, by Smash Hits & No.1). A good one to restart with: The magnificent Pop Star from ‘Anthem’. Click below to zoom. More Songwords: The Changeling and Four More From Toyah.
Possibly Toyah’s most iconic song? ‘Ieya’ was, of course, originally released as a single on Safari Records in 1980 and included on the album ‘The Blue Meaning’. It was also re-recorded and released again, as ‘Ieya ’82’, in the Summer of 1982, with Toyah performing it on various TV shows, including Hold Tight and the 6.55 Special. The single even charted. Here’s to the 30th (and 32nd!) anniversary of an absolute classic… Ieeeeeeeeeeyyaaaaaaaaaaaaa!
It isn’t included in ‘The Changeling Resurrection’ set lists, but ‘Street Creature’ – which could/should have been a single back in 1982 – is still a huge fan favourite. Probably the “poppiest” track on ‘The Changeling’ and a song Toyah had an absolute ball performing on Get Set For Summer, Three Of A Kind and Razzmatazz in ‘Summer ’82 (For Michael :))
…Prostitute and Ophelia’s Shadow. Two ridiculously underrated albums (particularly the latter. I mean ‘Ghost Light’ is just… incredible!)
Here I stand on a large chunk of rock
Floatin’ in the piss-pot part of the firmament…
That could almost be a description of certain areas of Facebook. Apparently this site, and myself, have recently been getting bad-mouthed (again?) by some misery or other.
Fuck chuck a buck you… ‘Ghosts In The Universe’, 1988.
Toyah puts it far more eloquently, poetically and succinctly than I ever could :)
Toyah casting her eye over two recent artworks: ‘The Changeling’ by Melissa Mailer-Yates and ‘Crimson Queen’ by Cliff Matthews. Both of these excellent creations are available to buy as prints. View more details of Cliff’s here and Melissa’s here. Read our recent Q&A with Melissa Mailer-Yates here. (Photos © Ian Dunn & Cliff Matthews)
This has always been one of my favourite Toyah TV appearances, especially as there is very little footage from 1982 of live performances of songs from ‘The Changeling’: It’s BBC1’s Get Set For Summer from July 1982. The band perform ‘Castaways’, ‘Street Creature’ and ‘Brave New World’ and Toyah is also interviewed by Peter Powell. View all at Dreamscape’s You Tube playlist. (Thanks to Andi)
The sixth monthly online live track has been added to Toyah’s official website. It’s ‘Masai Boy’, recorded live at The Regal, Oxford in July 2011, on the ‘From Sheep Farming To Anthem’ tour.
Toyah’s official website will be offering visitors exclusive live tracks each month as Toyah’s summer festival/concert dates and The Changeling Resurrection II approach. At the beginning of each month an exclusive live track recorded from Toyah’s extensive 2011 tour dates will feature on the Gigs page.
The live tracks will be available to listen to for a limited time only with a new track replacing it each month. These live tracks are a taster for a special live album release planned for digital release in autumn/winter of 2012.
• Listen to ‘Masai Boy’, live at The Regal, Oxford, here | View news on the previous live tracks here (these are no longer available).
Just uploaded to You Tube. The incredible ‘Blue Meanings’ from last night’s Hare & Hounds gig.
Yet another rare retro Toyah interview. This one is from ‘Rock Star News’ in 1980 and it’s vaguely bizarre. Definitely “of its time” but still an interesting read. Toyah talks ‘The Blue Meaning’, death dreams, her teenage years and more. Click below to read. View all of our recent retro Toyah press articles & interviews here. (Thanks again to Andi)
The fifth monthly online live track has been added to Toyah’s official website. It’s ‘Demolition Men’, recorded live at Ropetackle Arts Centre in October 2011, on the ‘From Sheep Farming To Anthem’ tour.
Toyah’s official website will be offering visitors exclusive live tracks each month as Toyah’s summer festival/concert dates and The Changeling Resurrection II approach. At the beginning of each month an exclusive live track recorded from Toyah’s extensive 2011 tour dates will feature on the Gigs page.
The live tracks will be available to listen to for a limited time only with a new track replacing it each month. These live tracks are a taster for a special live album release planned for digital release in autumn/winter of 2012.
• Listen to ‘Demolition Men’, live at Ropetackle Arts Centre, here | View news on the previous live tracks here (these are no longer available).
Another retro Toyah interview, this one from ‘Zig Zag’ magazine in mid-1980. Alan Anger follows Toyah on the first few dates of the, now legendary, ‘Ieya Tour’. It’s a really interesting read: Last time I did a feature on Toyah was in March. It was based on an interview with Miss Willcox just as she and her band began to take off outside London. Since then, Toyah have been regular chart toppers of the alternative charts, her appearance in Derek Jarman’s film of ‘The Tempest’ has received much acclaim and the band have, by now, completed a UK tour to coincide with the release of the new album, “The Blue Meaning”. Click below to read. (Thanks again to Andi)
• On This Day: It feels like only yesterday but four years ago today the artwork for Toyah’s most recent studio album ‘In The Court Of The Crimson Queen’ was revealed by toyahwillcox.com. Toyah has recently said that she will be working again with Simon Darlow on a new solo album.
• Lytham Proms: Pat Sharp To Kickstart Lytham Proms!!! Toyah plays this festival which takes place between 3rd – 5th August 2012.
• Brian Aris took some incredible photos of Toyah in the early to mid 1980s. One of those shots is available to buy as a signed print.
• A recent screenshot of Toyah is included at the Track 2 website, in their “head & shoulders” section.
• Apparently there have been rumours that this year’s ‘Rock & Bike Festival’ isn’t going ahead! The official festival website says: The show is going ahead, don’t listen to those rumours!! Gates open Midday on Thursday. Toyah comperes on Saturday and guests on a couple of songs with The Sweet too!
Pure speculation, but…
Something that Toyah said in the This is Derbyshire interview (see post below):
Next year I have accepted one of the biggest tours of my career. We are doing 30 dates in the spring and 30 in the autumn.
Could this 60-date tour be marking what will be the 30th anniversary of the fantastic ‘Love Is The Law’ album and the ‘Rebel Run’ UK tour?
I guess we will just have to wait to find out, but interesting all the same.
‘Love Is The Law’ is an album, and Toyah era, that truly deserves to be properly celebrated!
This time exactly 30 years ago Toyah were halfway through ‘The Changeling Tour’. 4th July 1982 saw the band play the first of two nights at Bristol’s Colston Hall before they headed up north and to Scotland. Thanks to Andi Westhorpe for sharing this rare photo from the tour.
Click on the photo for a larger version | Visit Dreamscape’s The Changeling 30 website | View all of our The Changeling Resurrection news, photos and reviews, plus news, so far, on The Changeling Resurrection II. There’s also The Changeling: The Complete Songwords.
Seven years apart and very, very different music and imagery, but both “classic” Toyah – The iconic ‘Danced’, the live version from ‘Toyah! Toyah! Toyah!’ released as a single in late 1980, and ‘Desire’ the album released in Summer 1987 that includes some of Toyah’s best lyrics, showcasing what a fine songwriter she is. Please click on each to zoom.
The ‘Desire’ photo is actually from a 1986 shoot but image/time wise it’s close enough to be associated to the 1987 album! (Thanks to Andrew York for working his magic on the photo)
Two more Dreamscape creations. Toyah has such a rich history of visuals, it’s good to dip into the photos and try to construct something ‘new’ from the familiar images. I never tire of ‘The Blue Meaning’ and ‘I Want To Be Free’ is an iconic single. Click on each to zoom.
Return later today to view FTE‘s Melissa Mailer-Yates interview feature. It’s a great read, with Melissa talking art, her career, Toyah and a lot more! This is also the final Toyah-related feature from me but a great one to finish with… View info on The Changeling prints.
• View FTE‘s other recent features: The Changeling Resurrection Review; Stevie Bray: The Original Toyah Drummer Interview; Toyah: Thru A Photographer’s Eye.
