Dreamscape – Toyah Willcox Fansite

Toyah – Anthem
Deluxe Reissue (Cherry Red)

This is, of all the Toyah reissues this far, also recommended to the casual fan. It contains just as much challenging ‘meat’ as the previous albums, but with the familiar hooks which will help less seasoned travellers navigate the truly fascinating outposts. Unreservedly recommended.

With this 2CD/DVD set, the deluxe Toyah reissue campaign from Cherry Red reaches 1981 – with an amazing four releases having spanned the previous two years from 1979. Anthem, the third studio album, was both the mainstream breakthrough and simultaneously an album which almost didn’t get made. Following the previous year’s live album Toyah! Toyah! Toyah!, the band (which we must remind ourselves, was itself named ‘Toyah’, in much the same way as ‘Alice Cooper’ was originally the band name as well as the frontman) fell apart, leaving just Toyah herself and creative lynchpin guitarist Joel Bogen. A short-lived band was assembled but quickly fell apart again after not really working out, and it seemed as if Toyah, the band, might be done. Toyah herself almost became the full-time vocalist with the band Blood Donor, who had the original version of It’s A Mystery in their repertoire, but after a few demo recordings that didn’t come to fruition. Nick Tauber, recruited as producer again after his work on the live album, pulled together a new crew along with Bogen, comprising bassist Phil Spalding, keyboardist Adrian Lee and future Saxon drummer Nigel Glockler. The new line-up recorded and released the four-track EP Four From Toyah early in 1981, with It’s A Mystery as its lead track, and the record’s unexpected massive success ensured they would not look back from that point on.

• Continue reading at Velvet Thunder. See more reviews of Anthem and other releases here.

• Toyah At Home: We Play Machines at Epcot Centre – Watch… • Robert At Home: Episode 9 – Watch… • Objects Of Desire: The Toyah Edition 3 – Watch… • Toyah & Robert’s Sunday Lunch – feat. Chesney Hawkes – Mr Brightside – Watch…

Press for Toyah & Robert’s Sunday Lunch – This week covering The Killers, with Chesney Hawkes guesting. (Image © Toyah Willcox)

• NME: Watch Toyah Willcox and Robert Fripp cover The Killers with Chesney Hawkes: Their latest edition of ‘Sunday Lunch’ sees them take on ‘Mr Brightside’ with a special guest – Continue…

• Brooklyn Vegan: Watch Toyah and Robert Fripp cover The Killers’ “Mr Brightside” with Chesney Hawkes – Continue…

• Guitar World: Robert Fripp and Toyah recruit Chesney Hawkes for his second Sunday Lunch guest spot – for a hilarious performance of The Killers’ Mr. Brightside: Watch the unlikely trio take on a stratospheric pop-rock classic – Continue…

• Turn Up The Volume: Toyah & Fripp With Some Help From Mr. Brightside Chesney Hawkes: Just when you think that Toyah & Fripp can’t top their most hilarious moments anymore, the fabulous YouTube stars come up with this new Sunday Lunch performance that made me burst out laughing – Continue…

• DGM Live: Toyah & Robert’s Weekend – Continue…

Toyah, on the Anthem Tour 2022, at Bristol Fleece on Thursday 29th September. The set list included the following songs from Anthem: We Are, Pop Star, Jungles Of Jupiter, Obsolete, It’s A Mystery, Demolition Men, Marionette, I Want To Be Free. Click on the photos below for larger versions. (Thanks to Ian | Photos © Ian Davis)

Punk princess and cult actress Toyah on the Isle of Wight filming new short film

Filming took place in Freshwater and Ventnor with women in the top four roles; writer, director, producer and actor

As reported by News OnTheWight back in August, punk princess and cult actress Toyah has been on the Isle of Wight this week, filming in Freshwater Bay and on Ventnor beach.

She stars in a new short film called ‘Weightless’ produced by Ventnor resident Rowena Amos and her film company, 9 of Cups Productions.

It is written by Lewes based playwright Louise Monaghan, previous winner of the coveted Papatango Theatre prize and directed by Lois Norman who is known for her award-winning art-house work and stories from female perspectives.

• Continue reading at On The Wight.

Toyah in Ventnor and Freshwater for new short film Weightless

Punk princess and cult actress Toyah has been visiting the Isle of Wight this week, filming in Freshwater Bay and on Ventnor beach.

She stars in a new short film, Weightless, produced by Ventnor resident Rowena Amos and her film company 9 of Cups Productions.

It is written by Lewes based playwright Louise Monaghan, previous winner of the coveted Papatango Theatre prize, and directed by Lois Norman who is known for her award-winning art-house work and stories from female perspectives.

The film has a host of well-known Isle of Wight names attached to it, stills photographer Gianpaolo Mario Giancovich, musician JC Grimshaw, and Angelina Grimshaw working with the crew on costumes.

• Continue reading at Isle Of Wight County Press.

Toyah, on the Anthem Tour 2022, at Leeds Brudenell on Saturday 24th September. Thanks to Sharon for these great photos. Click on them for larger versions. (Photos © Sharon Dickson)

Toyah Thunder Mountain is a unique, official collection of 500 incredible illustrations as NFTs. Now available to purchase with Crypto currency. A collaboration with Chalkstar NFT.

• Click below for further info and a helpful how-to guide.

• Toyah At Home: The Anthem Specials: Part 3 – Watch… • Robert At Home (and Away!): Episode 8 – Watch… • Objects Of Desire: The Toyah Edition 2 – Watch… • Toyah & Robert’s Sunday Lunch – It’s Officially The One & Only – Watch…

Press for Toyah & Robert’s Sunday Lunch – This week covering Chesney Hawkes (with Chesney Hawkes). (Image © Toyah Willcox)

• NME: Toyah Willcox and Robert Fripp enlist Chesney Hawkes for ‘The One And Only’ cover: This edition is labelled an ‘interlude’ as Fripp is currently on tour – Continue…

• Brooklyn Vegan: Watch Toyah & Robert Fripp cover Chesney Hawkes’ “The One and Only” with Chesney Hawkes – Continue…

• Guitar World: Robert Fripp and Toyah recruit Chesney Hawkes for the latest ridiculous installment of Sunday Lunch: Fripp lets Hawkes handle guitar duties on a Surf Green Fender Tele while he gets bread rolls batted off his head by his wife. Yes, really – Continue…

• DGM Live: Toyah & Robert’s Weekend – Continue…

A montage from the Anthem Tour 2022 at Epic Studios Norwich (16th September). See/hear a full version of Pop Star from the same gig here. (Thanks to Julie and Tony)

Join Toyah for a deep dive into the music and stories and your questions answered in the third of three new specials dedicated to Anthem. As the classic Gold-certified selling album receives its long-awaited remastered, expanded and deluxe release, this special celebrates the songs, the images and history in style. Enjoy much-loved songs, rarely seen footage plus and an extended selection of your questions answered by Toyah as she goes behind the music.

• Toyah At Home – The Anthem Specials: Part 3 premieres on Saturday 24th September, 11am at Toyah’s Official You Tube channel & Facebook. (Image © Toyah Willcox)

80s Stars – Then & Now!: NOW 80s: Monday 26th September: 1pm
Where are they now? Classic hits, followed by some recent songs – Including Pet Shop Boys, Kylie, Toyah, The Stones, Gary Numan, The Pretenders, New Order, Rick Astley & T’Pau!

Toyah’s ‘Anthem’ gets the super deluxe treatment, and never sounded so good!

It’s a mystery why Toyah was never eternally enormous. But the thunder in the mountains has never sounded so good.

Toyah / Anthem
Cherry Red (3-CD, 1 DVD, 2-LPs, 1-45rpm Box Set)

This is it – the big one, both in commercial terms and, compared to previous releases in Toyah’s reissue series, packaging, too.

Anthem was Ms Willcox’s fourth album, but it was home, too, to her greatest single hits yet – and if you only need one super deluxe early ’80s album, this might well be it.

Disc one here is the original album; disc three is a DVD stuffed with promos and TV appearances; discs two and four add in the outtakes, demos, remixes, backing tracks and live cuts. Including the nine bonus tracks appended to the album itself, and four more on tucked away elsewhere, there’s some 40 largely unreleased performances to get your teeth into. Plus the album on picture disc, a 12-inch mini album and a four track 7-inch EP. Which can, if you wish, be slimmed down to a simple 2CD + DVD package, or reduced even further to a gold colored LP of Anthem alone. In every guise, Anthem shines brightly.

The most confident sounding of Toyah’s early albums, if not the most unexpected (that remains her debut), Anthem was the sound of Toyah finally finding her direction. The songs are generally stronger than before, the band is definitely tighter, and her voice feels more controlled, without losing an iota of its original idiosyncrasy.

• Continue reading at Goldmine. Browse more reviews; of Anthem, Toyah! Toyah! Toyah!, Posh Pop, The Blue Meaning, Sheep Farming In Barnet, Posh Pop Tour, Give Them Wings, and much more, in Dreamscape’s Reviews News Archive.

Toyah / Live at the Rainbow
First time on DVD and CD/LP

Toyah Live at the Rainbow was issued on VHS back in 1981 (and later on laserdisc) but now gets the full reissue treatment with remixed and remastered audio on vinyl and CD as well as a DVD with restored visuals.

The concert was in February 1981 at London’s iconic Rainbow Theatre and includes a performance of ‘It’s A Mystery’. Such was that single’s success (it reached number four as part of the ‘Four From Toyah’ EP) it prompted a gig upgrade from the Lyceum Theatre to The Rainbow.

Live at the Rainbow was originally a 12-song video, but on CD it has been expanded with with seven additional tracks, all previously unheard and unreleased; restored exclusively for this release. These include ‘Bird In Flight’, ‘Mummies’, ‘Computer’ and ‘Love Me’. Three of these seven songs are in mono because the original multi-track masters could not be found. The coloured blue vinyl edition doesn’t include the mono tracks and is therefore a 16-song offering.

• Continue reading at Super Deluxe Edition.

This new article, published by The Reprobate Press, is more of an opinion piece on Toyah rather than just a review of Anthem, but an interesting read.

WITH CHARM AND CHANCE: TOYAH’S ANTHEM REVISITED

Looking back at Toyah’s magnificent 1981 breakthrough album and its dystopian, rebellious sci-fi concepts.

Back in the 1980s, when teenage musical tribalism was at its height, stepping out of your lane was simply not the done thing. Yet for many of us, the strict divisions that split punk from metal from pop and all points in between seemed increasingly ludicrous and arbitrary, as much based on what a band or performer looked like as on their musical output. I rather threw all that aside very early into my teenage musical fixation. After all, bands themselves – especially what we now call classic rock but what at the time was often dismissed as old farts* – were sneered at for chasing trends, sometimes with good reason but often unfairly in retrospect. There was nothing wrong with developing and experimenting with your sound, and those artists who managed to escape the sneering by remaining defiantly art rock – Peter Gabriel, say – were just as likely to be making albums that were nothing like their past work and, in retrospect, very much of their time.

This preamble leads us to your author’s curious fascination with Toyah, who was – depending on which period of her career in the 1980s you were talking about – seen as a punk or a pop star. I’ve already made the case that she was neither, at least musically at the start of her career – the ‘pop star’ dismissal by former punk admirers has a bit more credibility as her career shifted towards kid’s TV appearances, increasingly less arty record covers and more radio-friendly singles, but we could make that particular accusation against many performers. Once Toyah had a couple of hits – which we’ll come to shortly – then she was unavoidable, and as a teenager with a fascination for the terminally uncool worlds of prog, art rock and industrial music, there was something that drew me to her.

• Continue reading at The Reprobate Press.

A new interview with Robert Fripp, including mention of Toyah and You Tube/Sunday Lunch…

Robert Fripp Lightens Up
No one expected to see the leader of King Crimson dancing in a tutu on YouTube. In a rare interview, the guitarist explains “an entirely different trajectory.”

• Continue reading at The New York Times.

Toyah’s Sack The Stylist?! Top 30: NOW 80s:
Thursday 22nd September: 9am
Pop legend Toyah brings 30 memorable videos featuring a cavalcade of clothing calamities from superstars including Visage, Five Star, Divine, Cher, The Jam, Bananarama, Dead Or Alive, Bucks Fizz, ABC, Depeche Mode, David Bowie, Madonna, Adam & The Ants, A Flock Of Seagulls, Roxy Music, Kajagoogoo, Duran Duran, Grace Jones, Su Pollard, Toyah herself and more in this crazy countdown! See the full Toyah’s Sack The Stylist?! Top 30 playlist here.

Carol Decker’s 30 Rock Chicks!: NOW 80s:
Thursday 22nd September: 10pm
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)

Congratulations to Toyah. Anthem returns to the Official UK Album Chart, exactly 40 years after it left – in 1982, after spending a year on the chart.

Anthem placed at #33 today, following the reissue of the album on Deluxe and Super Deluxe formats, giving Toyah her sixth charting album in the past four years.

Anthem is also high up in numerous other charts, including #1 on the official Independent chart, #6 on the official Physical chart, #6 on the official Sales chart, #6 on the official Vinyl chart, #61 on the official Download chart and #6 on the official Scottish chart. Anthem also places at #29 on the official Record Store chart. Great stats! As with Posh Pop last year, if the Album Chart was, as it used to be, a sales chart, Toyah would certainly have another Top 10 album!

• Chart Stats: Toyah has now had six albums on the Official Charts in the past four consecutive years: In The Court Of The Crimson Queen (2019) #74, Sheep Farming In Barnet (2020) #99, The Blue Meaning (2021) #59, Posh Pop (2021) #22, Toyah! Toyah! Toyah! (2022) #72, Anthem (2022) #33.

• Official Charts: See this week’s full Top 100 Album Chart – Continue reading…

• Official Charts: And finally, a remastered reissue sees Toyah’s Anthem re-enter the Top 40 (33). The record originally peaked at Number 2 upon its release in 1981 – Continue reading…

• Official Charts @ Twitter: British icon Toyah’s 1981 record Anthem re-enters the Top 40 this week – Continue reading…

• Cherry Red Records @ Twitter: Congratulations Toyah on her Top 40 charting place for the deluxe Anthem reissue! – Continue reading…

• Anthem: Click to buy the album on 2CD+DVD, Colour Vinyl or Super Deluxe. (Update: The Anthem Super Deluxe box set is currently out of stock)

• Official Charts: See Toyah’s full charts stats on the Official Chart – Continue reading…

• Dreamscape: Browse our “Toyah On The Official Charts” news archive…

Join Toyah for a deep dive into the music and stories and your questions answered in the second of three new specials dedicated to Anthem. As the classic Gold-certified selling album receives its long-awaited remastered, expanded and deluxe release on Friday 9th September, this special celebrates the songs, the images and history in style. Enjoy much-loved songs, rarely seen footage plus and an extended selection of your questions answered by Toyah as she goes behind the music.

• Toyah At Home – The Anthem Specials: Part 2 premieres on Saturday 17th September, 11am at Toyah’s Official You Tube channel & Facebook. (Image © Cherry Red)

** Toyah Willcox and the Toyah team wish to extend condolences to the Royal Family, and respect the dedication HRH Elizabeth II showed her country during her unprecedented reign. This special was filmed before the news of the sad death of Her Majesty the Queen.**

The celebrations for Anthem‘s 40th (+1) Anniversary continue with the opening gig of the Anthem Tour, taking place this evening at Epic Studios, Norwich. The album has just been released on 2CD+DVD, Gold Vinyl and Super Deluxe Box Set, with great reviews and hopes for a good chart placing later today (Official Charts, 6pm). Click below to browse all the tour dates and ticket links.

The first series of The Older Woman, the six-part radio drama which was originally broadcast in 1993, is currently airing again on BBC Radio 4 Extra.

Toyah plays Elsa, alongside Martun Clunes and Zoë Wanamaker as Roy and Jane in this excellent, and slightly surreal, drama by Tony Bagley. Toyah also performs the theme song to The Older Woman.

The series, produced by Paul Schlesinger, also features David Troughton, Geoff McGivern, David Holt, Keith Drinkel and Melanie Hudson in a variety of roles.

The Older Woman: BBC Radio 4 Extra: Tuesday 27th September: 9.30am
The Older Woman: BBC Radio 4 Extra: Tuesday 27th September: 4.30pm
The Older Woman: BBC Radio 4 Extra: Wednesday 28th September: 4.30am
Episode 4 of 6. Roy tries to impress Jane with some campaigning local journalism. Stars Zoe Wanamaker, Martin Clunes and Toyah Willcox. From February 1993.

Who Won Wot? 1980 – 1989: NOW 80s: Friday 16th September: 12pm
From Smash Hits “Most Unwanted Person of 1980” to the Brits “Best Group” of 1989 – Mark Goodier’s 10 hour marathon of 80s award winners lasts nearly as long as the Oscars. (The first artist played from 1981 is Toyah, with the Thunder In The Mountains video. Mark said: “We begin 1981 with a 4ft 11 pop star who had the biggest hair of the entire decade, here’s the Most Fanciable (as voted by Smash Hits magazine readers) Toyah Willcox with Thunder In The Mountains“).