Dreamscape – Toyah Willcox Fansite

Bill Rieflin, of Minstry, REM, Swans, The Humans, King Crimson and many other great bands, would have been 60 today.

Happy Birthday Bill, we are thinking of you. Click below for a special video clip by Don Gunn. Click here for a tribute from Magnet Magazine, and here for another video, by Steve Ball.

Last Saturday’s episode of Toyah At Home featured two archive performances: The timeless Obsolete from Anthem and Slow Descent from the Toyah & The Humans album Strange Tales.

Click below to watch/rewatch ep 14, in which Toyah reveals Cherry Red Records’ website crashed last weekend when everyone attempted to pre-order Sheep Farming In Barnet on CD and Vinyl.

Out now digitally, 21st Century Schizoid Man from Toyah & The Humans. This is the final recording the late Bill Rieflin collaborated on with Toyah. Click below for download and streaming links.

Great News! The Noise In Your Head box set by Toyah & The Humans, released on 3rd July, has entered the Sales Top 100 at number 29 and the Independent Top 50 at number 6 on The Official Charts, published yesterday. Click below to see Toyah’s tweet. (Photo © Toyah Willcox)

• Browse our recent, Toyah related, Official Charts news posts.

Toyah reveals the final vinyl by Toyah & The Humans, Live At Scala London. The album features Robert Fripp as guest human with Toyah, Bill Rieflin and Chris Wong. It’s out now on translucent purple vinyl (as are We Are The Humans (orange vinyl), Sugar Rush (olive vinyl) and Strange Tales (red vinyl). Click below to watch. (Screenshots from a video that is © Toyah Willcox)

Toyah gives a sneak peek at the first ever vinyl release of the Toyah & The Humans album Strange Tales. Pressed on translucent red vinyl, the album was released yesterday. Click below to watch. (Screenshots from a video that is © Toyah Willcox)

A digital deluxe version of Toyah & The Humans debut album, We Are The Humans, was also released today. See download/listen links here or click below for direct link to Amazon.

Happy Humans Day! – Toyah & The Humans Day to be more specific! The Noise In Your Head box set is released today, as are the albums We Are The Humans, Sugar Rush, Strange Tales and Live At Scala London. All on gorgeous colour vinyl. Click below to see Dreamscape’s second “Releases” feature page of 2020, focusing on Toyah & The Humans.

Toyah unwraps the first ever vinyl pressings of We Are The Humans (translucent orange vinyl) and Sugar Rush (translucent olive vinyl). Both of these are released tomorrow. Click below for links to all Toyah & The Humans new releases. (Screenshots from videos that are © Toyah Willcox)

Get ready for Noise In Your Head. Toyah & The Humans new retrospective five-disc box set – three studio albums, live concert CD, live concert DVD + 40-page booklet – is released this Friday. Pictured below is the regular box set (without signed print) which is still available to order here. Watch Toyah unbox the set by clicking here.

Toyah unboxing her second box set release of 2020 – Noise In Your Head by Toyah & The Humans. The retrospective set, which looks yet again fantastic, is comprised of four CDs, a DVD and comprehensive information booklet. The set is dedicated to, the late, Bill Rieflin. Click below to watch the unboxing at You Tube. (Screenshots from a video that is © Toyah Willcox)

Toyah tweeted and instagrammed yesterday that she had just received her Toyah & The Humans Noise In Your Head box set. Please click on either of those links to see the photo. Toyah’s second box set of 2020 is released on 3rd July and can be pre-ordered by clicking below.

Great news! The Signed Box Set version of Toyah & The Humans’ Noise In Your Head – An Amazon Exclusive – is available again to order. This will no doubt be very temporary so get yours while you can! **Update – It’s Sold Out again**

Seriously amazing. Seven minutes of magnificence! We miss you Bill.

The Limited Edition Amazon Exclusive edition of Toyah & The Humans’ Noise In Your Head box set sold out in just a few hours of being available to order yesterday. This included a signed print “from one human to another” by Toyah. The edition of the box set which doesn’t include the print is still available to order online.

NOISE IN YOUR HEAD is a 4 CD + DVD box set released 3 July 2020 that brings together the complete works of Toyah & The Humans.

The box set contains four albums (‘We Are The Humans’, ‘Sugar Rush’, ‘Strange Tales’, ‘Live At Scala London’) and six bonus tracks, including home demos and the previously unreleased track, 21st Century Schizoid Man. It also includes a DVD featuring a previously unreleased 90 minute concert, and four promo videos.

A strictly limited edition exclusive Amazon version includes a postcard print signed “from one human to another” by Toyah Willcox.

PRE-ORDER AMAZON EXCLUSIVE SIGNED EDITION
PRE-ORDER THE BOX SET

The Humans were Toyah, her musical director Chris Wong and multi-instrumentalist, the late Bill Rieflin (drummer for King Crimson and latter-day REM, as well as Ministry, the Revolting Cocks, Lard, KMFDM, Pigface, Swans, Chris Connelly, and Nine Inch Nails).

Toyah put the ensemble together in 2007 for the birthday celebrations of Toomas Hendrik Ilves, president of Estonia, a country already dear to Toyah.

As Toyah explains in her note in the 40-page booklet, “I was very keen to work on an idea where mid-range frequencies didn’t cancel out the natural space of the voice. Always having been in love with the bass I wanted to create a trio of just my voice and two basses, allowing power, prose and top line melody to dominate the audio spectrum. The Humans were to be music stripped bare.”

WE ARE THE HUMANS, released in 2009, features “Noise In Your Head”, “Quicksilver” and “Is It Wrong”. The CD now includes four bonus tracks: a cover of “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’” featuring Robert Fripp, and three of Toyah’s original home demos, demonstrating her original concept for the ensemble.

SUGAR RUSH (2011) features “Sea Of Size” and “Small Town Psychopath” and Guest Human throughout, Robert Fripp. The bonus track is a version of “Small Town Psychopath”.

STRANGE TALES (2014) album features “Get In Your Car” and now closes with a previously unreleased 7 minute version of the King Crimson classic, “21st Century Schizoid Man”.

LIVE AT SCALA LONDON is the first full 16-track release of an entire 2010 concert at London Kings Cross’ Scala venue, including the encores of “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’” and “Purple Haze”. Guest Human Robert Fripp features throughout.

On the DVD, LIVE AT TRADING BOUNDARIES is a previously unreleased 90-minute, 21-song concert filmed in April 2015. Also included are four promo videos, issued on DVD for the first time.

All discs feature faithful artwork on facsimile wallers and a lavishly-illustrated 40 page booklet featuring annotation written by Toyah herself. Also featured is an essay on the period covered by the box by Toyah’s official archivist and compiler of this box set, Craig Astley.

The box set is dedicated to Bill Rieflin, who sadly passed away on 24th March 2020. Recorded in summer 2019, “21st Century Schizoid Man” was only recently mixed and is one of Bill’s last completed recordings.

Sarcastically and affectionately, Bill referred to this anthology as The Humans’ Greatest Hits. Bill exchanged with Toyah this March, as included in her online tribute to him, that “We made good things together. Some of my best work ever.”

These look gorgeous! Following the fantastic solo Toyah vinyls earlier this year, come four Toyah & The Humans vinyls. All four vinyls are also released on July 3rd 2020. Click below for order links.

The three studio albums by Toyah & The Humans – We Are The Humans, Sugar Rush, Strange Tales – make their vinyl debut on 180g heavyweight coloured translucent vinyl. Strange Tales now closes with the previously unreleased 7-minute 21st Century Schizoid Man, the last track Toyah and Bill Rieflin recorded together.

The full 2010 concert album Live At Scala is released for the first time in its entirety, featuring a cover of Purple Haze alongside songs that later appeared on Sugar Rush but were not yet recorded at the time of the gig.