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Tony Fletcher (born 27 April 1964) is a British music journalist best known for his biographies of drummer Keith Moon and the band R.E.M., and also as a show director for the Rock Academy in Woodstock.
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Tony Fletcher (born 27 April 1964) is a British music journalist best known for his biographies of drummer Keith Moon and the band R.E.M., and also as a show director for the Rock Academy in Woodstock.
Born in Yorkshire, England, Fletcher was inspired by the London punk rock movement and started a fanzine as a thirteen-year-old schoolboy which he named Jamming!. Founded in 1977, the magazine began as a school-printed fanzine and in 1978, with the fifth issue featuring interviews with Paul Weller, Adam Ant and John Peel, adopted professional printing and wider distribution. [1] From 1979-84, it was printed and partly distributed by Better Badges. Between 1978-83, Jamming! featured interviews with a range of artists that included Pete Townshend, Aztec Camera, Dexys Midnight Runners, the Damned, Delta 5, the Jam, Bill Nelson, Scritti Politti, the Selecter, the Beat, Dead Kennedys and more.
In September 1983, Jamming! went bi-monthly, and later monthly. Artists featured in this later phase included the Smiths, U2, Billy Bragg, Julian Cope, Lloyd Cole, the Cocteau Twins, Echo and the Bunnymen, R.E.M., the Specials, Everything But the Girl, Madness, and more. In January 1986, after 36 issues, the magazine shut down.
His success with Jamming! led Fletcher to more opportunities, starting with a major published interview with Paul McCartney in 1982. He presented TV programmes, including The Tube , where he interviewed Wham! in 1983, [2] and networked with post-punk figures including Paul Weller and Echo & the Bunnymen, the latter being the subject of his first book, published in 1987.
Fletcher also juggled band and record label management, before moving to New York City in the late 1980s. [3]
Fletcher produced and co-hosted 2019's It's a Pixies Podcast, which broke new ground by unveiling the recording process of Pixies' then upcoming album Beneath the Eyrie before it had been released. [3]
In 2020, Fletcher also launched the fitness and travel podcast One Step Beyond, inspired by spending most of 2016 traveling around the world with his then-wife and 11 year old son. [3]
In New York, Fletcher established himself as a DJ, club promoter and music industry consultant, all the while settling down as a serious scholar of contemporary music history, authoring a guide to the music of the Clash, plus major biographies of R.E.M. and Keith Moon.
With the advent of the Internet in the 1990s, Fletcher returned to topical writing, with his ijamming.net website, adding wine to his musical interests.
In 2010, he published a study on the musical history of New York City in the 20th century.
His biography of the Smiths, A Light That Never Goes Out: The Enduring Saga of the Smiths, was published in September 2012. [4]
On 4 July 2013, William Heinemann published Fletcher's memoir, Boy About Town about his youth in London. [5]
He is currently a show director at the Rock Academy in Woodstock. [3]
Fletcher has two children and was married to Posie Strenz. He lives in upstate New York. [3] He became a vegetarian and later a vegan inspired by the 1985 album Meat Is Murder . [6]
Keith John Moon was an English musician who was the drummer for the rock band the Who. Regarded as one of the greatest drummers in the history of rock music, he was noted for his unique style of playing and his eccentric, often self-destructive behaviour.
Wilson Pickett was an American singer and songwriter.
Echo & the Bunnymen are an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1978. The original line-up consisted of vocalist Ian McCulloch, guitarist Will Sergeant and bassist Les Pattinson. By 1980, Pete de Freitas joined as the band's drummer.
Marquee Moon is the debut album by American rock band Television. It was released on February 8, 1977, by Elektra Records. In the years leading up to the album, Television had become a prominent act on the New York music scene and generated interest from a number of record labels, eventually signing a record deal with Elektra. The group rehearsed extensively in preparation for Marquee Moon before recording it at A & R Recording in September 1976. It was produced by the band's frontman Tom Verlaine and sound engineer Andy Johns.
Lenny Kaye is an American guitarist, composer, and writer who is best known as a member of the Patti Smith Group, led by vocalist and poet Patti Smith.
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The Crucial Three were a short-lived band that existed for approximately six weeks in early 1977. They are nevertheless notable on account of the individual success of all three founding members: Julian Cope formed The Teardrop Explodes and has enjoyed a long and successful solo career as an author, photographer and singer, Ian McCulloch formed the very successful Echo & the Bunnymen, while guitarist Pete Wylie formed Wah! Heat and enjoyed major chart success with "The Story of the Blues". In those early days, McCulloch sang, Cope played bass, and Wylie played guitar. A drummer, Stephen Spence, also joined at some point in their brief life.
Guy Adam Pratt is a British bassist. He has worked with artists including Pink Floyd, Roxy Music, Gary Moore, Madonna, Peter Cetera, Michael Jackson, the Smiths, Robert Palmer, Echo & the Bunnymen, Tears for Fears, Icehouse, Bananarama, Iggy Pop, Tom Jones, Debbie Harry, Whitesnake, Womack & Womack, Kirsty MacColl, Coverdale•Page, Lemon Jelly, the Orb, All Saints, Stephen Duffy, Robbie Robertson and A. R. Rahman. In addition to his work as a session musician, Pratt has been a member of the Australian rock band Icehouse, a founding member of the American rock band Toy Matinee, and is currently a member of the band Nick Mason's Saucerful of Secrets.
"In the Midnight Hour" is a song originally performed by Wilson Pickett in 1965 and released on his 1965 album of the same name, also appearing on the 1966 album The Exciting Wilson Pickett. The song was composed by Pickett and Steve Cropper at the historic Lorraine Motel in Memphis, later the site of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Pickett's first hit on Atlantic Records, it reached number one on the R&B charts and peaked at number 21 on the pop charts.
Ian Stephen McCulloch is an English singer-songwriter and musician, best known as the lead vocalist of the rock band Echo & the Bunnymen.
Grant-Lee Phillips is an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He led the group Grant Lee Buffalo in the 1990s, afterwards launching a solo career. He features as the town troubadour in Gilmore Girls.
"The Killing Moon" is a song by the English rock band Echo & the Bunnymen. It was released on 20 January 1984 as the lead single from their fourth studio album, Ocean Rain (1984). It is one of the band's highest-charting hits, reaching number 9 in the UK Singles Chart, and often cited as the band's greatest song. Ian McCulloch has said: "When I sing 'The Killing Moon', I know there isn't a band in the world who's got a song anywhere near that." In a retrospective review of the song, AllMusic journalist Stewart Mason wrote: "The smart use of strings amplifies the elegance of the tune, bringing both a musical richness and a sense of quiet dignity to the tune."
Ocean Rain is the fourth studio album by the English post-punk band Echo & the Bunnymen. It was released on 4 May 1984 by Korova and reached number four on the UK Albums Chart, number 87 on the United States Billboard 200, number 41 on the Canadian RPM 100 Albums and number 22 on the Swedish chart. Since 1984 the album has been certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. Ocean Rain includes the singles "The Killing Moon", "Silver" and "Seven Seas".
Saint Andrew's Hall is a concert venue located in Detroit, Michigan, which was formerly the meeting place for the Saint Andrew's Society of Detroit. The Shelter lies underneath St. Andrews Hall and hosts various live music acts and DJs. It is known for being one of the first stages on which Eminem performed.
"Panic" is a song by the English rock band the Smiths, released in 1986 and written by singer Morrissey and guitarist Johnny Marr. The first recording to feature new member Craig Gannon, "Panic" bemoans the state of contemporary pop music, exhorting listeners to "burn down the disco" and "hang the DJ" in retaliation. The song was released by Rough Trade as a single and reached No. 7 on the Irish Singles Chart and No. 11 in the UK Chart. Morrissey considered the song's appearance on daytime British radio a "tiny revolution" in its own way, as it aired amongst the very music it criticised.
Gil Norton is an English record producer known for his work with alternative rock bands such as Pixies, Echo & the Bunnymen, Foo Fighters, Tribe, Jimmy Eat World, Dashboard Confessional, Feeder, the Distillers, Maxïmo Park, Counting Crows, Terrorvision, the Triffids, Del Amitri, James, the Feelers, the Beekeepers, Twin Atlantic, General Fiasco, Span, Busted, Bayside, and Intergallactic Lovers.
Better Badges was a London button-badge manufacturer, started in 1976 by Joly MacFie. During the years 1977–1984 it became the leading publisher and merchandiser of 'punk badges' - exporting millions worldwide from their offices at 286 Portobello Road. Better Badges was a major player in the punk and postpunk scenes from 1976–1983 - a pioneer viral marketer, fueling the independent labels' fan-based promotional successes of the time.
R.E.M. were an American alternative rock band from Athens, Georgia, formed in 1980 by drummer Bill Berry, guitarist Peter Buck, bassist Mike Mills, and lead vocalist Michael Stipe, who were students at the University of Georgia. One of the first alternative rock bands, R.E.M. was noted for Buck's ringing, arpeggiated guitar style; Stipe's distinctive vocal quality, unique stage presence, and obscure lyrics; Mills's melodic bass lines and backing vocals; and Berry's tight, economical drumming style. In the early 1990s, other alternative rock acts such as Nirvana, Pixies and Pavement viewed R.E.M. as a pioneer of the genre. After Berry left in 1997, the band continued with mixed critical and commercial success. The band broke up amicably in 2011, having sold more than 90 million albums worldwide and becoming one of the world's best-selling music acts.
The Pitchfork 500: Our Guide to the Greatest Songs from Punk to the Present is a book compiling the greatest songs from 1977 to 2006, published in 2008 by Pitchfork Media. The book focuses on specific genres including indie rock, hip-hop, electronic, pop, metal, and experimental underground. The book is broken down into 9 chronological periods, each period beginning with a description of the music scene before the featured artists, and how those artists changed the music scene. Time described the book as having "42 critics to cover 30 years of music, from 1977 punk to 2006 crunk, and all the starry-eyed, acoustic acts in between."
Sam Rosenthal is an American musician, composer, artist, and novelist. He is the founder and leader of the band Black Tape for a Blue Girl and the Projekt Records record label. He lives in Portland, Oregon with his son and cat. Rosenthal was interviewed in August 2016 for an NPR piece about the DMCA. "It's a really unreasonable expectation," he says, "that I would have the time to chase all day when I should be running a business and making music."
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