‘BBC Hereford & Worcester’ have rejigged a recent Toyah BBC radio interview, mixed in lashings of great Toyah songs as the soundtrack, and added it to their “BBC Introducing…” page last night. Toyah talks ‘The Changeling’, the tour, the supernatural, punk and more.
Songs played: Be Proud Be Loud (Be Heard), Brave New World, Don’t Fall In Love (I Said), I Want To Be Free, Rebel Run. Running Time: 7m 38s.
The full Sky Trax Toyah Special. This aired in 1985 around the time of the release of ‘Don’t Fall In Love (I Said)’. It’s a great programme, hosted by one of Toyah’s biggest supporters in the 80s, Peter Powell. This was a one-hour show with Toyah talking about her career, including Glitter, Jubilee, Katharine Hepburn, Quadrophenia, the early live gigs, 1981 and a lot more. Sky Trax was a music show, with a variety of hosts including Radio 1 DJs, covering music from all over Europe. It aired on ‘Sky Channel’, Europe’s very first satellite channel (which began as a cable channel in 1982) and was renamed ‘Sky One’ in 1989. View larger caps here.
• Toyah was mentioned in the ‘Funnel Of Love’ blog post, on Sunday 1st April, about the recent BBC2 documentary series The Tube: “The hawk is called Toyah after Toyah Willcox. ‘Aw bless’ or ‘ew groce’, depending on your view on naming birds after women. Considering Ms Willcox’ affection for strange headwear with feathers it’s probably totally appropriate”. View here.
• View a fantastic ‘flickr’ gallery of photos, by ‘Sanctuary Music’, of Toyah live at the HMV Institute, Birmingham last April on one of the first dates of the ‘From Sheep Farming To Anthem’ UK tour.
• Toyah Playlisted: ‘Don’t Fall In Love (I Said)’ is included in Dark Night of the Soul with Julie (3 April) on WFMU, and ‘Ieya’ (The Blue Meaning original) in the Ian Fairholm Special (2 April) on Phoenix FM. (Thanks to Sarah)
One of the pioneers of fashion make-up artists… from Biba, London in the seventies, to an international career in the 1980s and 90s, Régis Huet was one of the first make-up artists to use make-up as art and some of his creations are extraordinary, and extraordinarily beautiful.
In 1985 Régis worked with Toyah on the promotional imagery for the ‘Don’t Fall In Love (I Said)’ single and the album ‘Minx’.
The look was striking but subtle and, ironically, far removed from his more outlandish and experimental earlier work. Imagery that certainly inspired some of Toyah’s most adventurous early 80s visuals.
Régis eventually made Sydney, Australia his base where he worked on the first issue of ‘Australia Vogue’ among many magazines.
• The Toyah Willcox Interview Archive: There’s now a full transcript of Toyah’s ‘ne1fm’ radio interview, which aired yesterday, at the Archive – Visit here…
• Birmingham Mail: Music Memories: Midlands gigs and UK pop charts from October 15, 1983: Also hitting stores this week 30 years ago was Toyah’s new album Love Is The Law. A tour was on the cards for Toyah but for the moment the Birmingham punk singer was in France filming a TV adaptation of John Fowles’ short story The Ebony Tower, alongside Sir Laurence Olivier and Greta Scacchi – Continue reading…
• Brum: Toyah briefly mentions Brum in the above ‘ne1fm’ interview so now is as good a time as any to post a link to this page dedicated to the BBC series, full of facts and trivia – Visit here…
• Those We Left Behind: Post Apocalypse XXVI – Toyah and Post Apocalyptic Skater Chic in ‘Rebel Run’ and ‘Love is the Law’ (1983): Looking for all the world like she had rocked up in some Italian Post Apocalypse ‘epic’ (The New Barbarians, 2019 After the Fall of New York, Exterminators of the Year 3000 etc), this is Toyah, in 1983, promoting her single ‘Rebel Run’ and the accompanying album ‘Love is the Law’ – Continue reading…
• Twitter/Instagram: Keep up to date with all things Love Is The Law & More by following Toyah at Twitter and Instagram. There’s sure to be updates from Toyah during the tour.
• Titania Girl!: Personally I don’t think so but there are a few people (mainly on Twitter) of the opinion that the lovely Sheridan Smith looks sort of Toyah-esque as Titania in the new production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, currently playing at the Noel Coward Theatre in London’s West End. (NB: Toyah has also played Titania, as well as Hippolyta and Hermia in various productions of the play). View the photo here…
A preview of tomorrow night’s The Women Of Doctor Who special, airing on ‘BBC America’, is now available to view at You Tube. Guests discuss the character Donna Noble, including a brief clip of Toyah.
Click below to watch and here for larger versions of the screen caps. There’s also another, shorter, preview trailer. View that here (This doesn’t feature Toyah).
Revisit the Tenth Doctor’s beloved companion Donna Noble in this exclusive sneak peek at BBC America’s All New Special The Women Of Doctor Who. Don’t miss the World Premiere, Saturday Aug 11 at 9/8c. Who’s the greatest woman of Doctor Who? Vote here!
NB: Toyah may also have guested in last week’s The Science Of Doctor Who. I’ll let you know when I’ve watched it. If she does it probably means she will be appearing in all four specials.
