Dreamscape | The Toyah Willcox Fansite

More info on the forthcoming V&A Club To Catwalk exhibition, in which Toyah’s ‘Thunder In The Mountains’ sleeve will be included, is now available at Toyah’s Official Website.

Celebrity Ghost Stories UK: Bio: Sunday 9th June: 00.00am
Sue Cook reveals creepy encounters with a malevolent nutcracker and a UFO, Toyah Willcox speaks of a spooky apparation, and Alex Fearns discusses sinister sounds he caught on tape.

‘Live At Kings Place’ by Weekend Guitar Trio, Toyah & Jan Bang was released yesterday on CD and Download.

The six songs on the album were recorded in London in February 2011 and each is co-written by Toyah.

Tracklist: 1. Let’s Make A Bomb, 2. Don’t Even Try, 3. Break The Mould, 4. Toyah Bang, 5. How A Group Is Born, 6. Boredom Is A Killer.

• Listen to samples and download the album here (at a very reasonable $7)

A Toyah fan and supporter of many years is promoting unsigned bands with gigs in Brighton, and also paying tribute to Toyah’s impressive 35 year live career with the name of the nights.

Calling them The Live Music Zooberon and Zooberon Calling!, fans of Toyah and IEYA will no doubt identify the link immediately.

Numerous unsigned bands and up-and-coming singer/songwriters are already gaining followings thanks to Zooberon and the music nights are quickly becoming the place to check out great new music in and around Brighton.

The story of Toyah’s star, by the King’s Heath Walk Of Fame, just uploaded to You Tube.

The first episode of The Older Woman is now available to listen to at BBC iPlayer. It will remain online until early next Friday morning.

Episode Two airs next Thursday morning/afternoon and very early Friday morning.

The Older Woman: BBC Radio 4 Extra 
Thu 30th May: 7am & 5.30pm/Fri 31st May: 5.30am
Episode 2 of 6. Can Roy impress Jane by joining a green pressure group? Meanwhile, Pavarotti appears in his dreams with some invaluable advice. Stars Zoe Wanamaker, Martin Clunes and Toyah Willcox. From January 1993.

There’s a new update to Andrew’s website, In The Fairground: Andrew York’s Arternative Universe. View his latest fantastic Toyah creations by clicking below.

A celebration of women is how singing and stage star Toyah Willcox describes Hormonal Housewives, which is proving a smash-hit in UK theatres.

The show is written by husband and wife team Julie Coombe and John McIsaac and the Spring tour sees them cover 67 theatres with the Wycombe Swan as the last stop.

The pop icon stars in the comedy alongside writer Julie, and former Hollyoaks actress Sarah Jane Buckley. Toyah said: “We play ourselves and it is a celebration of women and we talk to the audience. It is naughty comedy and Chaucerian.”

• Continue reading at the Maidenhead Advertiser.

According to “Live Music Review”, the 2005 edition of Mayhem has just been added to iTunes.

Trevor Bolder, best known for being David Bowie’s bassist during the legendary Ziggy Stardust era, died on Tuesday.

“Trevor was a wonderful musician and a major inspiration for whichever band he was working with. But he was foremostly a tremendous guy, a great man”, Bowie wrote on his official website.

Toyah, a huge David Bowie and Ziggy fan, also paid tribute to Trevor, via Twitter, yesterday. The tribute, along with others from Bowie, Pete Wylie, Gary Kemp and more was included in a Hot Press news report yesterday.

• Visit the Hot Press website to read all the tributes to Trevor.

Exploring the joys of being a woman

Women of a certain age, with a handful of men in tow, turned out in force for Hormonal Housewives at the Palace Theatre, Newark, on Saturday and had a belly full of laughs.

The show, written by John McIsaac and Julie Coombe, saw her, Toyah Willcox and Sarah Jane Buckley, dress in pink outfits to talk about what makes them tick and what annoys them in life.

All three women, including Toyah on a pair of pink crutches, were hilarious from start to finish and did not mind poking fun at themselves as well as each other.

• Continue reading at the Newark Advertiser.

These Safari Records photos were recently on sale at ebay. The photos aren’t rare these days but as Safari promos they are quite unique. This was possibly the only time Safari released photos that promoted Toyah as an actress (in The Corn Is Green).

Incidentally, The Corn Is Green airs very early tomorrow (and also in June) on True Movies.

The Corn is Green: True Movies 2: Friday 24th May: 1.00am
The Corn is Green: True Movies 1: Thursday 6th June: 1.00am
Academy Award winner Katharine Hepburn stars as a schoolteacher determined to help the people of a turn-of-the-century Welsh mining town. With Ian Saynor, Bill Fraser, Patricia Hayes, Anna Massey, Artro Morris, Dorothea Phillips, Toyah Willcox, Huw Richards, Bryn Fon, Dyfan Roberts and Robin John. Directed by: George Cukor (1979).

A reminder that the first episode of, the 1993 radio comedy/drama, The Older Woman airs tomorrow at 7am and 5.30pm on BBC Radio 4 Extra.

You can listen to the 30-minute programme live online or at BBC iPlayer post broadcast.

Just as the series was about to air in 1993 Toyah told ‘Radio Times’: “I don’t regard the different things I do as seperate careers. I’ve always combined music with acting. All my work makes different demands on me, and that keeps me interested.”

Toyah tweeted earlier this week: “I’m thrilled BBC RADIO 4 EXTRA is repeating comedy series THE OLDER WOMEN with myself, Zoe Wannamaker, Martin Clunes details at my homepage“.

The Older Woman: BBC Radio 4 Extra: Thursday 23rd May: 7am/5.30pm
The Older Woman: BBC Radio 4 Extra: Friday 24th May: 5.30am
Episode 1 of 6. Local hack journalist Roy Hitchcock tries to win the heart of his former teacher. Stars Zoë Wanamaker, Martin Clunes and Toyah Willcox, with David Troughton and Nicky Henson. (A BBC Radio 4 Extra debut). The Older Woman is written by Tony Bagley.

• Here are a couple of Radio Times clippings from when The Older Woman originally aired in January 1993. (Thanks to Anthony Lewis)

• Daily Mail: David Bowie’s biggest fans reveal all: Five unique people, five remarkable encounters with Ziggy Stardust are revealed for the first time in a new TV film: Robert Fripp 1977. (Click below to view a larger scan – Thanks to Lärwi)

• Dangerous Minds: Cute Couple Alert: Robert Fripp & Toyah Willcox on ‘All Star Mr & Mrs’: They’d only just met a second time in 1985, but within a week, Robert Fripp asked singer/actress Toyah Willcox to marry him. They did so on Robert’s 40th birthday in 1986, when the pint-sized “force of nature,” to hear him describe his wife, was 28. That they are still very happily wed decades later…

• BBC Radio Bristol: Read a full transcript of Toyah’s recent interview on Laura Rawlings’ show at The Toyah Willcox Interview Archive.

• Song Of The Day (Facebook): Happy birthday to singer Toyah Willcox (The Humans, Toyah, Sunday All Over the World), born today in 1958, in Kings Heath, Birmingham, England.

• Leamington Courier: Toyah returns to tackle the mayhem of housewife life on Leamington stage: After a successful year of causing mayhem and mania at theatres across the UK, the Hormonal Housewives are back and stopping in Leamington this weekend.

• Lancashire Evening Post: Blame it on the hormones: Popstar turned TV presenter and actress Toyah Willcox is coming to Lancaster with smash hit girlie show, Hormonal Housewives. Plus a round up of the region’s theatre shows, performances and events.

• Learn to Paint with Dermot Cavanagh, Teaching Toyah Willcox at Glen Carr Lake, Sligo: Just re-uploaded to ‘You Tube’, this originally aired on BBC2 in September 2001 as Awash With Colour. It features incredible scenery.

Toyah’s appearance at the Isle of Wight’s Jack Up The 80s two day festival has now been officially confirmed. She will play on Sunday 11th August.

• Further info on this festival at the ‘Jack Up The 80s’ website. Visit the Official Toyah Gigs page for details on all confirmed upcoming live dates.

Toyah also guested on Mark Punter’s show on ‘BBC Radio Essex’ yesterday afternoon. The interview is available to listen to at BBC iPlayer until next Monday afternoon.

Toyah talks about Hormonal Housewives, goes into detail about the show and says it’s “one of the most enjoyable jobs” she’s ever had. She also speaks briefly about her early acting career, still singing, the origins of her name, appearing on Have I Been Here Before? and Minder.

• The interview begins at approximately 1hr 5minutes into the show and runs for around nine and a half minutes. Listen here.

Just uploaded half a dozen short clips of Toyah from various TV shows, mostly from the very early 2000s: FBI, Through The Sunroof, You Dancin? I’m Askin!, Scotland Today… and more. These include a very brief clip of Toyah in rehearsals for Picasso’s Women at the Edinburgh Festival in 2000 and Issey Miyake speaking about the outfit Toyah wore on the cover of her single ‘Don’t Fall in Love’. View these at Dreamscape’s You Tube channel.

Toyah guested on Vic Minett’s show on ‘BBC Radio Coventry & Warwickshire’ yesterday afternoon. The interview is available to listen to at BBC iPlayer until next Monday afternoon.

Toyah talks about the Hormonal Housewives (and mentions her brother came to see the show and loved it), Willyfred and her love of rabbits, her past career, as well as current events.

• The interview begins at approximately 1hr 38minutes into the show and runs for around seven minutes. Listen here.

A few screen caps of Toyah looking utterly amazing when she guested on Russell Harty’s BBC2 show in March 1983. Other guests were Willie Rushton and Janet Street-Porter in a programme looking back at celebrities’ school days. Toyah’s former teacher also made an appearance. View a clip from the programme by clicking on the caps. (Thanks to Andi)

As always, thanks for the music, memories and mayhem. Best Wishes… X

• Cake: A birthday cake for Toyah from John and Carl of Burslem Cake Fairy & Tea Rooms.

• Runcorn & Widnes Weekly News: 1980s stars to join Tatton Picnic Concert line-up: Three special guests have been announced for this year’s Tatton Park Picnic Concerts 2013. The event will see 80s superstars Howard Jones and Toyah Willcox joining the Saturday’s headliners The Human League.

• All Star Mr & Mrs: The full appearance has now been uploaded to ‘You Tube’.

• Southern Daily Echo: Show of the Week – Toyah Willcox in Hormonal Housewives: It’s the show for women everywhere, starring 80s pop superstar Toyah Willcox.

• Bucks Free Press: It’s No Mystery: Toyah was included on the cover of BFP last Friday.

• The Quietus: Changeling: Alison Moyet Interviewed: Another example of your career is that you haven’t opted to go on any 80s package tours, stuck between Bucks Fizz and Toyah. (You have to love Alison, she won’t be manipulated into slagging off other artists no matter how much a journalist tries!!)

• Scotsman: On This Day: Birthdays: Toyah Willcox, singer and actress, 55.

• The Astrologer: The Astrologer Daily: May 18th, 2013: And finally happy birthday to Tina Fey, Toyah Willcox and Chow Yun-Fat.