Word In Your Ear
Mark Ellen and David Hepworth have been talking about and writing about music together and individually for a collective eighty years in magazines like Smash Hits, Mojo and The Word and on radio and TV programmes like "Rock On", "Whistle Test" and VH-1.
Over thirteen years ago, when working on the late magazine The Word, they began producing podcasts. Some listeners have been kind enough to say these have been very special to them. When the magazine folded in 2012 they kept the spirit of those podcasts alive in regular Word In Your Ear evenings in which they spoke to musicians and authors in front of an audience.
Over these years they've produced hundreds of hours of material. As of the Current Unpleasantness of 2020, they've produced yet hundreds of hours more with a little help from guests kind enough to digitally show them around their attics such as Danny Baker, Andy Partridge, Sir Tim Rice and Mark Lewisohn. For the full span of the Word In Your Ear world, visit wiyelondon.com.
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- Update frequency
- every 2 days
- Average duration
- 43 minutes
- Episodes
- 857
- Years Active
- 2007 - 2025
Why we have enough Christmas hits plus the greatest songs about money
Deck the halls with beers and Stoli! The nutcracker of scrutiny was applied to this week’s noisettes of news and the following discussed over a glass of port …
... are a lot of new song catalogues …
Bill Bailey celebrates “the things that make us human”.
The tremendous Bill Bailey is staging “a magical, musical mystery tour of the mind, along with other pressing matters” for 42 nights in London from December 28, a celebration of what makes us human i…
How Al Stewart struck gold, the folk boom and a flat-share with Paul Simon
The 17 year-old Al Stewart played electric guitar in a dance band in Bournemouth in 1963. When he borrowed an acoustic and sang Masters Of War in the break, he heard the sweet sound of applause. The …
‘Mystique is dead’: what Gary Kemp learnt in 40 years of making and selling records
Gary Kemp has been posting reels of his recent visits to old haunts in Soho where he and his early bands used to rehearse, this in the run-up to releasing a third solo album, ‘This Destination’, in …
The afterlife of Hallelujah and the day David sold his old singles
We ran our patent heat-sensing Scrutiniser®️ over the week’s news and here’s what set the bells off …
… are buskers now more expensive live entertainment than Taylor Swift?
… a Dickensian oik in Chap…
The greatest sax solo, YMCA, musical one-night stands and Tom Hanks’ wise advice
Paddling the three-man conversational kayak across the rock and roll rapids this week involved …
… Olive Mess, Candied Yams, Gorilla Biscuits …? Challenging indie act or seasonal vegan recipe?
… the …
How ‘60s pop was sold and the first news stories launching the hits
Joni Mitchell called it “stoking the star-maker machinery behind the popular song”. Every record sent out for review used to come with a press release knocked together by an over-excited PR before te…
The Beatles ’64 movie - one of us loves it, the other doesn’t. Plus Rod’s tweets & Trump’s guitars
Reversing into tomorrow! This week’s news events given a vigorous once-over include …
… what will a Trump guitar be worth in 30 years’ time?
… the average age of a Glastonbury goer and how it sells i…
How R.E.M. changed the game and why there’ll never be another band like them
R.E.M. considered themselves missionaries against the prevailing pop culture – no solos, no old-school stagecraft, no printed lyrics, no lip-syncing, no hard-sell videos, no obvious leader – and mapp…
Fairport, Nick Drake, Traffic and why Island Records was a sumptuous visual delight
Neil Storey worked in the Island press office in the ‘70s and ‘80s and has set out on mammoth undertaking, to compile a series of gorgeous, album-sleeve-sized books telling the story of virtually eve…
Danny Baker - the panjandrum of unstoppable anecdote with a taste of his upcoming tour
Danny Baker, the act you’ve known for all these years, is kicking his legs up again in 2025 on a thundering new theatre tour, ‘Aye Aye! Ahoy Hoy!’ “Dead men tell no tales,” he points out, “so we migh…
The Band Aid recording, the birth of the tape loop and the power of the movie theme tune
This week’s events piled into a pipe and enthusiastically smoked include …
… our memories of being at the Band Aid recording in Sarm studios, November 25 1984.
… why it was the last dance of the ma…
How Toyah & Robert’s kitchen show became an Xmas rock’n’roll ding-dong
One of our rays of sunshine in the dark days of Lockdown was Toyah and Robert’s Sunday Lunch, fizzing clips of the two of them in their Dorset kitchen, him playing off-brand rock and roll, her singin…
John Lydon on the genius of Frankie Howerd, Tommy Cooper and the fine art of Spoken Word
John Lydon is among us in 2025 - with Public Image in May and on his Spoken Word tour in September. Entertainment is guaranteed, as it is in this podcast with Mark where he considers … Norman Wisdom,…
The poshest pop star ever, music in Xmas ads and song lyrics we can still recite
In which we feed the week’s events through our heat-seeking Fun-Filter®️ to see what makes the bell ring. Which includes …
… Richard Ashcroft in the new John Lewis Christmas ad.
… U2 v Coldplay, the …
Robert Hilburn on the lifetime achievement of Randy Newman
He’s written some of the darkest entries in the American songbook but became world famous with a sunny celebration of friendship on the soundtrack of “Toy Story”. Inbetween can be found a staggering …
Peter Perrett of the Only Ones – teenage life, a wondrous return and a 35-year lost weekend.
After many years of invisibility, Peter Perrett of the Only Ones is out, about and on tour again and talks to us here about the first gigs he ever saw and played, which involves …
… what time he goes…
Does ‘celebrity endorsement’ still work? - and how Quincy Jones invented the blockbuster
Things this week that sent the needle into the red included …
… the last dance craze the whole world noticed.
... “Rock stars used to be anti-establishment. Now they ARE the establishment.”
… artwork…
The genius of George Harrison and why he’s still underrated
The most streamed Beatles song – 700 million plays more than any other – is not by Lennon/McCartney but George who, as author Seth Rogovoy points out, is still widely considered “an economy-class Bea…
Ian Broudie of the Lightning Seeds - his Year Zero moment, Imposter Syndrome and seeing the Beatles (aged 7)
Ian Broudie and the Lightning Seeds are about to set out on their 35th Anniversary Greatest Hits Tour – aka “beery parties”. He talks to us here about the first bands he ever saw and played in, which…