It's Only Rock n Roll with hosts Phil Blizzard & Russell Mason
"It's Only Rock and Roll" goes beyond the spotlight to reveal the fascinating stories of the unsung heroes who made rock's greatest moments possible. From groundbreaking concerts like Pink Floyd in Moscow during Glasnost to Wham performing at the Great Wall of China, this podcast captures a special time in music history through authentic, unfiltered conversations.
Co-hosts Russell Mason and Phil Blizzard bring complementary perspectives – Russell from his years touring and promoting, Phil from interviewing countless music legends throughout his broadcasting career. Together, they're creating a relaxed, nostalgic journey through an industry populated by unforgettable characters (many known only by their colorful nicknames).
Future episodes will feature tour managers, production crews, artist managers, record producers, and the legendary "liggers" (backstage gate-crashers) who defined an era. These are the people who witnessed it all – the near-disasters averted, the bizarre requests fulfilled, and the moments of brilliance that audiences never saw.
It's Only Rock n Roll with hosts Phil Blizzard & Russell Mason
"It's Only Rock and Roll" preview with Phil Blizzard & Russell Mason
Phil Blizzard & Rusell Mason introduce their new podcast exploring the world of rock and roll touring from the 1980s onwards
The two Co-hosts bring complementary perspectives – Russell from his years touring and promoting, Phil from interviewing countless music legends throughout his broadcasting career. Together, they're creating a relaxed, nostalgic journey through an industry populated by unforgettable characters (many known only by their colorful nicknames).
"It's Only Rock and Roll" goes beyond the spotlight to reveal the fascinating stories of the unsung heroes who made rock's greatest moments possible. From groundbreaking concerts like Pink Floyd in Moscow during Glasnost to Wham performing at the Great Wall of China, this podcast captures a special time in music history through authentic, unfiltered conversations.
Future episodes will feature tour managers, production crews, artist managers, record producers, and the legendary "liggers" (backstage gate-crashers) who defined an era. These are the people who witnessed it all – the near-disasters averted, the bizarre requests fulfilled, and the moments of brilliance that audiences never saw.
Subscribe now for your all-access pass to rock and roll history, told by those who were too busy making it happen to fully appreciate it at the time.
Available wherever you get your podcasts – because after all, it's only rock and roll... but we love it!
Listen to "It's Only Rock and Roll" on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Spotify, Deezer, and YouTube.
It's Only Rock and Roll is a Phil Blizzard Radio Production - for your production email philblizzardmedia@gmail.com
Well, welcome to an exciting new podcast. It's only rock and roll and we love it. I'm Phil Blizzard and co-host, and the guy behind this project is Russell Mason. So, russell, tell us what it's all about.
Speaker 2:Well, it's just really. I spent a decade touring around the world in rock and roll with different bands Many you might know, many you might not know, and a lot of. Obviously I have a lot of contemporaries who likewise spent many decades. I moved on into another era but I'm very nostalgic about that time and it was a very special time in rock and roll and there's lots of great stories and lots of great characters, and some are still with us and some, unfortunately, are not.
Speaker 1:You say rock and roll, but it's broader than that. Give us an idea of some of the bands you toured with around the world.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, Tom Jones Wham, George Michael, Randy Crawford, Meat Loaf, Black Sabbath, yeah all that lot of people there, duran, duran, all that lot.
Speaker 1:So huge experience of touring with these big, big global names around the world. So what can we expect on the podcast series? Who are we going to be inviting on board for special guests?
Speaker 2:Well, I think there are some very interesting aspects. Obviously, the big show production now is quite a thing, and there are people I'd really like to invite on who are involved in the big show production. They're not artists, they're not performers, they're people who actually put it all together, which is quite interesting to have a look behind the scenes. And these people have as many funny stories and things that happen on the road and you know shows that nearly don't happen that you never hear about.
Speaker 1:All these sort of things as well as artists and others. It's going to be a fascinating insight, as you say, behind the scenes. I'm sure there's going to be some amazing stories about, as you say, what happened and perhaps what didn't happen, and also some of the quirkiness about some of the stars and what they asked for.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, oh yeah, we'll what didn't happen and also some of the quirkiness about some of the stars and what they asked for. Oh yeah, oh yeah, we'll definitely have a look at riders. If you don't know what a rider is, it's, it's the artist requirement. In the dressing room there's some very interesting, bizarre ones, which I'm sure are drug, drug induced in some cases, just total madness in other cases I was going to say some which are really, really elaborate, numbers which are a bit on the banal side.
Speaker 1:I remember one lady wanted a Well, no one chap wanted his carpet a certain kind of brand, so we won't say who that is at the moment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:Well, you mentioned a few names there and from my side I've been lucky to interview quite a few of those names you've mentioned in my sort of broadcasting career. And I mentioned in my sort of broadcasting career and I'll just say that it started when I was at college, really in many ways, my interest in live music, with being involved in social entertainment, being a social secretary and we booked bands like the police when they were in the very early days 50 pounds for one night at the poly, and, and another which comes to mind was annie lennox and day stewart, when they were known as the tourists.
Speaker 1:You know they were, that's what I remember. Yeah, they were stopping off with us on a fr night for a big gig on Saturday. They just wanted their petrol money paid. So like 50 pounds, brilliant, like that, yeah, so brilliant. And then on to uh, the bigger names. Uh, I'll pass crossed in in the Middle East when you were promoting bands and bringing in bands and the opportunity to interview a lot of uh, big names from, uh, from the likes of you mentioned Randy Crawford and Rod Stewart and Tom Jones, of course, and some interesting stories about him. So, russell, I mean you've got a wealth of knowledge inside, information and experience. How did you get into this business?
Speaker 2:Well, I left college early. Like you, I was social set and you know booking bands and stuff no one as elaborate as the police and, uh, the tourists like you were talking about. But I was very interested in live music. I remember, you know, at college going to see dr feelgood in leicester, leicester de montfort hall, and the buzzcocks were supporting them and, yeah, just starting to get into that stuff. But when I left college I just headed for london, not really knowing what I was to do.
Speaker 2:I went to work in a restaurant and it was a volunteer restaurant through the church and they used to have volunteers come and all sorts of people would come and help wash up and all that stuff. And I learned to cook there and all sorts of things and I even cooked for the Galloping Gourmet, graham Kerr, if anyone remembers him, who came in there one day. And I met through that a family and their daughter was about my age and she had a bit of a drug problem which I helped her with, and her father was very influential and very wealthy and he promised me a job in any industry I wanted to go in. So I said, well, let's have a go at a commercial estate agency. I just picked something and, lo and behold, in the next five minutes I was sitting in front of the managing partner of one of the top commercial estate agents in London.
Speaker 2:But when I went there I didn't know anything. Of course, I was just there by influence and so they gave me the shitty jobs, basically to go out and do property inspection reports up in North London, in King's Cross, and I came across a very interesting guy in Market Row called John Henry who had six-month by six-monthly leases and I gave him a bit of inside information. I used to go up there because he used to have rehearsal studios and the police used to rehearse there. I saw I saw, yes, rehearsing there, and Adam and the Ants at that time and I was just. I used to spend more time up there than in the office and always pretending to do an inspection report. And I got very friendly with him and in the end, look, they're not going to renew your lease, but with my little knowledge now in a commercial estate, I'll find you a new place if you can teach me the rock and roll business.
Speaker 2:And he said OK, you got a deal. I said after two weeks, if you don't think I'm doing good, you know that's fine. So I left that job, which I hated, went to work for John Henry loading trucks, cleaning out rehearsal studios, learning about, you know, amplifiers and all that stuff, and eventually I did actually go to work for him and that's that's how I got into the music business and eventually live touring. One day I went into the office at John Henry's and they said oh, tom Jones's offices has called you and asked for you to go on tour with them by name. I said well, I don't know anybody, but it turned out that somebody had seen me set up a drum kit and I'd helped them at the Hammersmith Odeon.
Speaker 2:You know they were trying to get ready for a Dionne Warwick gig and I helped them and he just remembered my name and the next time he went on tour they said do you want to bring someone with you? And he said yeah, this guy Russell, this guy Russell, john Henry's. So that's how I got actually amazing. It's all about being in the right place at the right time, or the wrong place at the wrong time, whatever.
Speaker 1:Whichever way you interpret, it sure, the right place at the right time, and you mentioned John Henry, though, one of the big names when it comes to logistics, shall we say, of getting bands across the globe and a big fleet of those uh branded wagons, lorries with, yeah, john henry on the side remember seeing those a lot of different events and gigs. Yeah, great stuff, so that was that?
Speaker 2:was it really the first actual band I worked with with john henry? Was the real thing?
Speaker 1:I don't know if you remember that any force, and that was at.
Speaker 2:Luton Sherry's or something it's like. You know they used to have these music clubs.
Speaker 1:They were like disco music.
Speaker 2:And yeah, the real thing was the first one, the glamour, the glamour of it all.
Speaker 1:That's where you did your first gig.
Speaker 2:Great, great band, though you know they were good music, and from there you went to what?
Speaker 1:the Great Wall of China, I think.
Speaker 2:So that's another story on another occasion. Oh yeah, with Wham I went and Pink Floyd in Moscow, which was a groundbreaking event just during Glasnost, when Gorbachev was still in power 10 nights at Olympiysky in Moscow, went on to work with a lot, of, a lot of bands, but but I actually only worked in actual touring for a decade and then I realised that this lifestyle was either going to, it was going to kill me.
Speaker 2:So, I moved more into promotion and promoters, rep and something a little bit more, a little bit more tranquil, and then ended up in the Middle East.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sure, okay. Well, we've got a lot to talk about and lots of these little anecdotes and stories we've be dropping into, uh, the different episodes, with our various guests lined up if we can just get people on.
Speaker 2:Uh, it's a very relaxed look at the industry. What I would say is that when you're in the industry, you're so busy you never really have a chance to to look back and and see the things that you've done and the people you've met interesting people, people who come backstage in the dressing room, you know, uh, famous celebrities who you just saw. Like, oh, can you just get out the way I'm trying to get the band on stage, you know. You know elton john turns up with 20 people and he's like okay, elton, but I really need to get the artist on, you know, and and just stuff like that I gotta mention something there.
Speaker 1:I remember doing an interview with elton john. It's more of a reaction. He did his show big show, a solo show, it was and he came off the stage, jumped onto a buggy and I'm running up this track up behind this buggy, talking to elton john and hanging onto the back of the buggy while he was sat there after his show. It was fun. Yeah, he's doing a run-out. So let me say that this podcast is only rock and roll, but I like it, you like it, don't you?
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 1:It's going to be available on all the major podcast platforms, from Apple, spotify, deezer, and also on social media. So we're looking forward to getting this underway very, very soon. It's only rock and roll, but we love it, we do. We do only rock and roll, but we love it, we do. So that's some idea what you can expect with it's only rock and roll podcast and in future episodes. Planning is going well ahead of the moment. So, russell, who have you got lined up, what sort of genres and what sort of areas of the industry we're going to be looking at?
Speaker 2:we're very excited to kick off with the tour and production management. Obviously that's close to my heart because that's what I did for a decade, decade and a half, and then we'll talk to some artists. I've got some great characters, you know, who have been around a long time and with some funny anecdotes and stories Artist management, maybe some managers of artists, record producers and what's known in the industry as Liggers, which are basically backstage gay crushers, legendary ones, and some industry characters, because there really were and are quite a few characters.
Speaker 1:A lot of these characters had nicknames and we'll be sort of revealing some of those. I expect there's some bizarre ones, aren't there?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, there's some really funny nicknames and famous throughout the industry. Anybody who worked in that time would know these characters. We'll have a good chuckle at that.
Speaker 1:Your nickname at some point will reveal that I'm sure you had a good one. So that's some indication of what you can expect. On it's Only Rock and Roll we like it, we do, don't we? We do. And roll we like it, we do, don't we, we do, we do. Indeed, it's only rock and roll. A phil blizzard radio production available on apple, amazon and garmin, spotify, deezer and all good podcast channels and also now on YouTube. And if you would like to have a podcast production for your organization, do get in touch with me. Drop me an email philblizzardmedia at gmailcom. A Phil Blizzard Radio production.