Ian’s Old Muckers #3: Terry Day

“I started at Walthamstow during Ian’s third year, I think, 1962. In October 63 we started at Royal College of Art. I was into abstract but my work was reality based, car dumps, crashes, landscapes. There was a disused motorbike they had thrown out by the entrance. I lugged it in, cleaned it up and painted it. All the brown-coats lugged it back out and I lugged it back in. Ian was into the dolly birds, Laurel and Hardy, 6B black pencil drawings. I have one in the attic.”

“When we got to the Royal College we were a bit of a double act. We would operate. What we shared was the infinite thing, drumming. ‘Come and see these drums.’ That always was our bond, there was no competition, a double stroke roll was what he wanted to hear. Ian loved the social thing, but for me it was music. Anonymity didn’t exist for Ian. I didn’t want minders round me, but Ian needed one.”

“Ian only became a magnet when he set up the group [Kilburn and the High Roads], not before. He was a partial magnet or a provisional magnet at Canterbury when he was teaching. As soon as he started the second phase, he became a full magnet. Put it like this… Ian wouldn’t have had a lot of social visitors prior to the second phase of Kilburn and the High Roads. He would have friends but not a lot of people around him. Thereafter his social magnetism increased, from Wingrave onwards. With the Kilburns, as soon as Dave Robinson entered the game Ian became a magnet. He enjoyed being famous. He may have had a period where he had to get used to it, but he enjoyed it. He wanted it. But when you get to the top of the mountain it takes it out of you. From stepping out onto the street with anonymity – the musicians might know who you are – but the difference is, as soon as you’ve got a face, people are watching you.”

As told to Will Birch, March 2004. Photographs: Terry with Humphrey Ocean looking on by Terry Lott, Ian and Terry courtesy of Terry Day.

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Ian writes a rock'n'roll love letter

As readers of 'The Definitive Biography' will know, Ian dated American girl-about-scene and future legendary punk roots photographer Roberta Bayley when she was hanging out in London in the early 1970s. Roberta had yet to establish her credentials as New York’s leading pictorial chronicler of the early Ramones, Blondie and Television, and Ian was some years away from pop stardom, but in the autumn on 1973 their stars were in the ascendent. Roberta listened to Charlie Gillett’s BBC Radio London show ‘Honky Tonk’ and also worked part-time at Let It Rock, the Malcolm McLaren / Vivienne Westwood boutique in the Kings Road. It was on Gillett’s radio show that Roberta first heard about Kilburn and the High Roads and, with McLaren, went to see the band.

‘I would read through the small ads in the back of the music rags every week,’ Malcolm told me. ‘Primarily for the purpose of looking for pop cultural events that might in some way intrigue me… Kilburn and the High Roads… the idea of calling yourself after the name of a street obviously intrigued me.’

Roberta eventually came face to face with Ian at a Kilburns gig at the City of London Polytechnic in September 1973. They became close friends for a brief period until Roberta had to return to her native America. She had no idea that Ian would bombard her with letters over the next five years. Those letters reveal the inner workings of Ian’s often tortured brain as he patiently awaited success, knowing all the time that he had the musical goods, if not the best method of delivery. However stylish and amusing Kilburn and the High Roads might have been, the band’s musical fragility and ever-changing line-up impaired their chances of commercial success. When Ian wrote the above letter in May 1977, in which he complained about being ‘skint’ and on the ‘rock dole’, he had just found the musicians who would become the basis of the Blockheads and was about to record his breakthrough LP New Boots and Panties!! For Ian, stardom and financial reward were just a few months away.

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Ian Dury invents 'Oxfam Chic'

As evidenced in this 1973 picture, the Kilburns bought most of their clothes from charity shops, resulting in a wide array of previously-enjoyed overcoats that shaped the group's early image. Ian amusingly described this as 'Oxfam Chic' and said, 'Yeah, we got into a lot of gear that was old, because it was nicely made.' Here we see Ian around the time that the Kilburns were first treading the boards on London's pub rock circuit. Photograph by Mick Hill.
Read more about the early days of Kilburn and the High Roads in 'Ian Dury: The Definitive Biography' (Sidgwick & Jackson) Out now!
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Ian winds up, Ian winds down, Bristol 1974

This great photograph was taken by Alain Le Kim, minutes after a sweat-soaked Ian Dury came off stage at Bristol Granary Club in 1974 where he appeared with Kilburn and The High Roads. In the audience was Ian's art college tutor and mentor Peter Blake, who spent most of the set in front of the stage, mesmerised by Ian's performance. 'Ian would wind people up,' recalls Blake. 'At one point he tried to get the other Kilburns to throw the man who ran the Granary Club off the balcony!'

Photo copyright Alain Le Kim

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Announcing a 'fab' new book about Ian Dury

My biography of Ian Dury is due to be published in 2010, a year that marks the tenth anniversary of Ian's death and also sees the release of 'Sex And Drugs And Rock And Roll', a biopic starring Andy Serkis.
I felt compelled to write Ian's biography shortly after completing 'No Sleep Till Canvey Island - The Great Pub Rock Revolution'. During my research for that book I met with Ian a number of times, primarily to talk about the pub rock era. My extensive interviews with Ian form the backbone of my new book with valued contributions from scores of interviewees including Peter Blake, Humphrey Ocean, Denise Roudette, Charlie Gillett, Dave Robinson of Stiff Records, Malcolm McLaren, members of Kilburn and the High Roads and the Blockheads and Sophy, Jemima and Baxter Dury.
I will be writing here about the evolution of the biography and its path to publication, hopefully with some interview snippets and photographs.