Steve Allen confirmed on his show this morning that Toyah will guest on In Conversation with Steve Allen this Sunday on LBC. The programme can be listened to live, online at the station’s website.
Toyah will talk about her career, marriage, Hormonal Housewives and having a “bionic hip”.
LBC 97.3: In Conversation with Steve Allen
Sunday 24th February: 6am
Steve Allen talks in depth to celebrities about their lives.
• Toyah tweeted a photo of herself and Steve, taken on Wednesday when she visited LBC to record the interview. (Photo © Toyah Willcox)
There is now less than a week until Toyah’s episode of Ramblings airs on BBC Radio 4.
The programme was recorded at the end of last month when Clare Balding and Toyah visited Croome Park.
Ramblings: BBC Radio 4: Thu 28th February: 3.00pm
Ramblings: BBC Radio 4: Sat 2nd March: 6.00am
Toyah Willcox. Clare Balding joins notable and interesting people on a walk through the countryside. Episode 4 of 6.
• Browse all of Dreamscape’s Ramblings news here.
A new interview with Toyah, by This is Sussex, focusing on the forthcoming Hormonal Housewives tour.
Actress and 80s punk pop star Toyah Willcox has done it all.
In a career spanning 30 years she has had 13 top 40 singles, recorded 20 albums, written two books, appeared in more than 40 plays, starred in ten feature films and presented TV programmes as diverse as The Good Sex Guide Late, Watchdog and Songs Of Praise.
Now in her fifties, Toyah still has her rebellious and independent streak – and plans on bringing this to the stage next month when she performs at The Hawth. She will be part of an all-female cast in the show Hormonal Housewives.
• Continue reading at This is Sussex.
A very big Thank You for all the great feedback for Andrew’s new website: In The Fairground: Andrew York’s Arternative Universe. The site has been extremely busy since launching on Monday night and the response has been 100% positive. I can tell you that Andrew is thrilled and is very happy that so many are seeing and enjoying his work. The site will be updated with new art as and when Andrew creates it so do please add it to your favourites. There will also be a “Links” page added to the site soon. Visit by clicking below.
Tons of activity for the Hormonal Housewives, in the second week of their rehearsals.
• Toyah has tweeted a couple of photos from the rehearsals: “dear ray, the only man on the Hormonal Housewives tour has decided he needs a bigger pair of balls :-)“, view photo here, and “Ray had the balls 2 wear a Playboy t-shirt 2 rehearsals….now he’s knackered! :-)“, view photo here.
• A new article on Hormonal Housewives by Cheshire Today: Toyah Willcox and Julie Coombe to star in Hormonal Housewives at the Liverpool Empire: The irrepressible Hormonal Housewives are back this spring with a second national tour, stopping at the Liverpool Empire for one night only on 10 April 2013.
• A new interview with Toyah, focusing on Hormonal Housewives, by This is Sussex: Toyah Willcox is going to pull no punches. Toyah explained: “It’s a sketch show with three acts and we play ourselves in between. It’s a comedy, and it’s not political – but it is very rude and naughty.
• Leas Cliff Hall, Folkestone have a Hormonal Housewives competition: (Be quick, it closes at Midday today!!) We are giving away 10 pairs of tickets to come and see Hormonal Housewives at the LCH on Saturday 9 March 7:30pm! For your chance to win email your name and contact details to folkestonemarketing@theambassadors.com by 12pm today. The lucky winners will be picked at random and contacted after the closing date. Good Luck!!
• Keep updated with all the official Hormonal Housewives news at Twitter and Facebook.
A third remix of a classic Toyah song, this time ‘Jungles of Jupiter’ from Anthem, has been made available by Tom Leon.
First it was “Awake’n Dreams: Alan Parsons Project vs Toyah Willcox” (using ‘Pop Star’), then “Let Me Go (Here It Comes Again 2012 Remix)”, and now TOM LEON brings us “Jungles Of Jupiter (Tom Leon and Toyah: Sad Android Extended Version)”.
Completely unofficial and, as with Tom’s previous mixes for “private and promotional use only”, it’s interesting to hear Toyah’s songs being experimented with. Not everyone will approve, as these are of course regarded as classics, but Tom doesn’t do anything too drastic with them!
The track is also included on the album ‘Quantam Sequences 2013’
• Listen to ‘Jungles Of Jupiter (Tom Leon and Toyah: Sad Android Extended Version)’ here. View more details about Tom’s album here.
• View info on the previous Toyah remixes by Tom Leon in our past news posts.
Toyah will be guesting on a future edition of In Conversation with Steve Allen, which airs on LBC (London’s Biggest Conversation), the 24/7 talk radio station.
The programmes air as two 30-minute double-bills each Sunday morning between 6 and 7am. LBC can be listed to live online (no “Listen Again” function but you can purchase podcasts of previous broadcasts for £2). Steve tweeted earlier this week: “Lovely Stephen mulhearn is doing heart brekky this week so he dropped in, such a nice guy, and toyah really good fun. Now giving blood, yuk“, so it appears that Toyah’s interview has now been recorded. No info on the airdate yet. (Thanks to Paul Johnson)
• Hull Daily Mail: How acupuncture has helped Toyah finally get a good night’s sleep: Toyah Willcox has tried everything from sleeping pills to herbal remedies to enjoy what many of us take for granted – a normal night’s sleep. “When I was young I just regarded not sleeping as a fantastic way to pack more into my days. I always reasoned that life’s so short, it seemed crazy to waste it sleeping,” she says.
• Weekend: Toyah tweeted a photo of the cutest rabbit in Britain on Monday… who just happens to be perusing Gloucestershire Echo’s ‘Weekend’ supplement from Saturday, with Toyah on the cover!
• Top 10 Toyah 2013: The recent song vote fan poll has now closed and the results are in… View the full Top 10 Toyah songs, as voted by Toyah fans at Facebook, at The Toyah Willcox Interview Archive. (Thanks again to James & Lärwi)
New to Dreamscape’s Gallery: The full collection of “Intergalactic Ranchhouse” and “Toyah Fan Club” photos, which originally accompanied the regular newsletters, mailed out to fan club subscribers between 1980 and ’86. There are also a few pre and post-fan club photos included too. (Thanks to Andi Westhorpe for the IRH/TFC collection. Thanks also to Paul Lomas)
The new Official Toyah Newsletter. Register here.
Join the official Toyah mailing list to receive receive Breaking Through, an e-mail newsletter and regular bulletins containing gig announcements, release news, links to buy Toyah products online and exciting exclusives direct from toyahwillcox.com.
A round-up of recently confirmed gigs means you can plan seeing Toyah live in concert and there will be news on any upcoming tour merchandise in the pipeline. Can you hear it……. breaking through.
• Sign up to the newsletter before 31st March and gain access to a previously unreleased exclusive track. There were 40 sign ups last night in the three minutes after the mailing list was announced on Toyah’s official webspaces!
Toyah is also interviewed by Worcester News. This was published yesterday.
‘I feel so much better, – I have more energy, my brain’s more alert’
“When I was young I just regarded not sleeping as a fantastic way to pack more into my days. I always reasoned that life’s so short, it seemed crazy to waste it sleeping,” she says.
But eventually it turned into a “nightmare”, raising her stress levels and making her vulnerable to worry.
She’s talking at her London home – she also has a home in Pershore – about the tricky path which has now led to a transformation in her sleep – and it’s thanks to acupuncture.
• Continue reading at Worcester News.
A new interview with Toyah, this one from the Manchester Evening News, published online on Sunday.
Sweet dreams at last for Toyah Willcox: ‘It’s a wonderful release from a life-long problem’
Singer, songwriter and actress Toyah Willcox battled chronic insomnia for years, but she tells Gabrielle Fagan how her life has been transformed
Toyah Willcox has tried everything from sleeping pills to herbal remedies to enjoy what many of us take for granted – a normal night’s sleep. From the age of 14, the 54-year-old has suffered from chronic insomnia, surviving on as little as four hours of sleep a night – a couple of hours after midnight and only two more between 7-9am.
• Continue reading at the Manchester Evening News.
In The Fairground, Andrew’s website, is now live: www.toyahart.co.uk – We hope you like it!
Fragments, a new blog series by Craig Astley, is sure to be an interesting read for Toyah fans over the coming months, as we head towards the 30th anniversary of the ‘Love Is The Law’ album and ‘Rebel Run’ UK Tour. Craig met Toyah for the first time during the tour back in 1983 (before he was even 5!!)
I Was A Child Toyah Fan…….
2013 marks something of a milestone for me. It is thirty years since an exciting thing happened to me as a child. A child who was a pop music lover and devoted fan of Toyah.
• Continue reading at Fragments: Toyah Tales From Now & Then.
• Saffron cites Toyah as an influence again in another new interview: Spark Sunderland: Republica: Back & Ready To Go: “Singers like Toyah and Siouxsie and the Banshees, they’re quite individual front women you know. They were like the first of their kind; their look the way they sang and the lyrics.”
• Wales Online: Hannah Jones: There’s nothing wrong with dyeing your hair: Once upon a time, I copied Toyah Willcox. I went about pretending to have a lisp – I don’t think Ebbw Vale was ready for a 10-year-old lumper prancing around in a home-made ra-ra skirt and answering “It’s A Mystery” whenever I was asked a question. The best thing about my Toyah years, though, was discovering the joys of back-combing and bleach.
• This is Gloucestershire: A new Toyah interview was included in the Gloucestershire Echo’s ‘Weekend’ magazine on Saturday: Singer and actress Toyah Willcox tells us how she finally managed to beat her insomnia. (Only available in the magazine)
• BBC America: Check out Toyah’s page in BBC America’s Doctor Who section.
The pre-launch publicity for In The Fairground is gathering pace… Seriously though, Andrew York’s new website, featuring fantastic art created from Toyah’s history of visual imagery, will be online soon. Thanks for all the great feedback so far. (Fun promo photos by Andrew)
A new syndicated Toyah article, published by numerous online news resources, including the Press Association and the Belfast Telegraph.
Toyah Willcox has revealed she suffered from chronic insomnia for 40 years, until she tried acupuncture.
The singer, songwriter and actress, who’s released more than 20 albums, took sleeping pills for a time in her twenties but disliked feeling sluggish and drowsy.
“I was trying to be creative and write and perform, which was impossible when I was on those. I gave them up very quickly,” she said.
Last year, Toyah, who will star in a three-month tour of the sketch show Hormonal Housewives, became anxious about the potential health risks arising from her insomnia and so tried acupuncture.
• Continue reading at the Belfast Telegraph.
Celebrity Fantasy Homes: Watch: Thursday 21st February: 1.00pm
Celebrity Fantasy Homes: Watch +1: Thursday 21st February: 2.00pm
Celebrities hunt for a new home. Gaby Roslin helps punk-pop princess Toyah Willcox search for a second home, in Richmond upon Thames, with a budget of £650,000.
Coming soon to the Information Superhighway (ooooh I haven’t heard anyone call the internet that for years – retrotastic!) a shiny new Toyah-related website: IN THE FAIRGROUND | Andrew York’s Arternative Universe… Can anyone hear me out there?
It’s the second instalment of Dreamscape’s new Keeping Up With The Hormonal Housewives. There are now just 18 days to go until the tour begins, with the first show at The Churchill Theatre, Bromley.
• Toyah tweeted this week: “Started Hormonal Housewives rehearsals! Very funny! Very rude! Absolutely no phone reception @ venue….heaven” and also “Down deep in the bowels of churchill theatre, bromley, rehearsing HH. world could end we wouldn’t know!!!!”
• The Hormonal Housewives have been tweeting and facebooking over the last couple of days too, keeping everyone updated. View their Twitter and check out their Facebook.
• Get your tickets for the first week’s performances: Churchill Theatre, Bromley (5th March), Regent Theatre, Ipswich (6th), Corn Exchange, Kings Lynn (7th), Gordon Craig Theatre, Stevenage (8th) and Leas Cliff Hall, Folkestone (9th March).
I’ve always wanted to see a Manga-esque version of Toyah, Here’s my attempt.
