Pop: The History Makers with Steve Blame

Mari Wilson is one of Britain’s most distinctive pop stylists — a singer who turned retro glamour, wit, and musical intelligence into a career entirely her own. Rising to fame in the early 1980s with hits including Just What I Always Wanted, Cry Me a River, and Wonderful to Be With, she became instantly recognisable through her iconic beehive image and sharply defined pop persona.

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But Mari’s story reaches far beyond chart success. She later sang with Stan Getz, toured with Ronnie Scott, appeared on stage with Soft Cell, and built a richly varied career spanning theatre, cabaret, and live performance. She also played Dusty Springfield in Dusty The Musical, a fitting role for an artist so closely associated with sophisticated pop and torch-song drama.

More than a decade after Pop Deluxe in 2016, Mari now returns with her forthcoming album Girl About Town, led by the single Good News, proving once again that style, individuality, and great songs never go out of fashion.

Good News, her brand new album - Girl About Town was out on the 4th of September 2026.

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More information at www.mariwilson.co.uk

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Tom Bailey joins me to discuss the rebellion, curiosity and creative experimentation behind the Thompson Twins—one of the defining British pop groups of the 1980s.

With their distinctive fusion of pop, new wave, percussion and synthesizers, the Thompson Twins achieved major success on both sides of the Atlantic with songs including Hold Me Now, Doctor! Doctor!, Love on Your Side, Lies, You Take Me Up, Lay Your Hands on Me and King for a Day.

They also appeared at Live Aid in Philadelphia, joined by Nile Rodgers on guitar and Madonna on backing vocals.

In this conversation, Tom reflects on the band's extraordinary journey, breaking America, his approach to songwriting and production, and the spirit of curiosity that has defined his entire career. We explore how his travels in India transformed his outlook on music and life, eventually leading to the formation of his Indo-Western fusion project Babble, before later embracing electronic music with International Observer and returning to the stage as Thompson Twins' Tom Bailey.

Today, alongside performing the Thompson Twins' greatest hits, Tom continues to celebrate a lifetime of musical exploration, including material from his solo album Science Fiction.

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Thompson Twins' Tom Bailey will perform the Thompson Twins' greatest hits across the UK in September 2026, with special guests Blancmange, led by Tom's longtime friend and fellow synth-pop pioneer Neil Arthur.

Tickets are on sale now:
https://www.alttickets.com/thompson-twins-tom-bailey-tickets
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Some artists become part of the soundtrack of a generation. Clare Grogan managed to do that before she was twenty.

As the singer of Altered Images, she helped create some of the most distinctive and joyful pop music of the early 1980s. Songs such as Happy Birthday, I Could Be Happy, See Those Eyes and Don't Talk to Me About Love combined infectious melodies with a sense of individuality that set the band apart from their contemporaries. At the same time, Clare became one of the defining faces of her generation through her starring role in the classic film Gregory's Girl.

More than four decades later, those songs continue to resonate. New audiences continue to discover Altered Images, while those who were there the first time around have never forgotten them.
Now Clare is preparing for a special UK tour celebrating Altered Images' landmark debut album Happy Birthday. Marking the album's 45th anniversary, the tour will see Clare and her band perform the record in its entirety for the first time, before returning for a second set featuring many of the group's biggest hits. The tour shines a spotlight on the album that launched one of Britain's most distinctive pop careers and remains one of the defining records of the post-punk era.

In this conversation, Clare looks back on growing up in Glasgow, discovering punk, forming Altered Images with fellow members of the Siouxsie and the Banshees fan club, the whirlwind years of chart success, working with producers Martin Rushent, Mike Chapman and Tony Visconti, balancing life as both a pop star and actress, and why these songs continue to connect with audiences more than forty years after they were first recorded.

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From Glasgow schoolgirl to pop icon, from Gregory's Girl to Happy Birthday, this is the story of an artist whose work remains as fresh, vibrant and relevant as ever.

Tour Dates
11 September 2026 Picturedome Holmfirth, UK
12 September 2026 Town Hall Birmingham, UK
13 September 2026 Lowther Pavillion Lytham, UK
15 September 2026 Band On The Wall Manchester, UK
16 September 2026 The Grove Newcastle, UK
18 September 2026 The Factory Live Worthing, UK
19 September 2026 Phoenix Exeter, UK
23 September 2026 St Lukes Glasgow, UK
24 September 2026 Old Fire Station Carlisle, UK
25 September 2026 Liquid Rooms Edinburgh, UK
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Carl Miller is a veteran tour manager and rock-and-roll raconteur whose memoir Backstage Chronicles offers an unfiltered look at the legends and loopholes of touring. As the author and compiler of the book, Miller draws from his decades of experience on the road—working with major figures such as Cat Stevens, Ginger Baker, and Iron Maiden.

Through vivid, funny, and occasionally shocking stories, he shares backstage escapades, of him and friends, including Stevie Wonder driving a tour bus, getting stuck in a lift with Steve McQueen, and losing £75,000 of Led Zeppelin’s money, among many others

Beyond the anecdotes, Backstage Chronicles also paints a picture of how touring culture has evolved, and a look at what was really the wild west of rock n roll, which makes Spinal Tap feel real.

If you'd like to get the book it's available through amazon online.

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Iain McKell is a distinguished British photographer and filmmaker celebrated for his powerful portraits and social-documentary work, particularly his chronicling of British youth subcultures since the late 1970s.

His prints will be exhibited in the upcoming show Blitz – The Club That Shaped the 80s, which opens on September 20th and runs until March 29th, 2026 at the Design Museum in Kensington, London.
Alongside the exhibition, he's published a monograph titled New Romantics under the imprint Little Acorn Press, featuring portraits I made in 1980 at the age of 22.

Every Tuesday, the Blitz Club played out its weekly scene, and he would attend with invitation cards in hand. He handed them to people who caught my eye, inviting them to a Thursday afternoon pop-up studio he set up at the Orangery in Holland Park. To his delight, many came, including Vivienne Westwood, Billy Idol, and George O’Dowd, to name just a few.

The result is a rare and intimate documentation of a dynamic cultural movement as it was just beginning to emerge.

Born in Weymouth, Dorset, in 1957, Iain began his photographic journey at 19 as a seaside portraitist while studying graphic design at Exeter, before moving to London in 1979 to devote himself fully to photography

His early self‑published book, SUB CULTURE (1979), spotlighted the Mod and Skinhead revivals and led to opportunities photographing Blitz Kids in 1980s London, Madonna’s first magazine cover, and other influential editorial work in i‑D, The Face, and L'Uomo Vogue.
McKell is perhaps best known for his decade‑long immersion in the world of New Age Travellers—documenting a modern nomadic subculture through his book The New Gypsies (2011) and exhibitions across London, Paris, Milan, and New York.

His other notable books include Fashion Forever: 30 Years of Subculture (2004) and Beautiful Britain: Photographs from the 1970s to the Present (2012) McKell’s approach is both empathetic and unromanticized: he immerses himself in the lives of diverse communities to produce honest, poetic visual narratives that explore themes of rebellion, identity, and belonging
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