In this episode of the podcast, I am joined by Ted Kessler – a music writer who’s lived out the ultimate fan’s journey with Paul Weller.
As a London kid, he spent his pocket money on Jam singles and memorised the lyrics before he even owned the records. After moving to Paris, he’d receive the NME a week late, schooling himself on Weller, The Style Council, and British pop by long-distance.
Years later, Ted found himself writing for the very paper he once treated as gospel. Over decades at NME and Q, he’s interviewed Paul Weller, reviewed his gigs and albums, and – more than once – found himself on the receiving end of the artist’s forthright opinions, including the infamous “get the train to Woking and try it” challenge after a mixed Stanley Road review.
Ted is also the author of the memoir Paper Cuts: How I Destroyed The British Music Press and Other Misdemeanours (which includes a heap of Paul Weller related stories), and To Ease My Troubled Mind: the Authorised Unauthorised Biography of Billy Childish. He also devised and edited My Old Man: Tales Of Our Fathers (which included a contribution from Paul about his dad, John). Ted also co-edits The New Cue, a music newsletter delivered three times a week to subscribers.
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Ted Kessler – Music Writer & Editor – NME, Q, The New Cue – Paul Weller Fan Podcast
Paper Cuts: How I Destroyed the British Music Press and Other Misadventures
Paper Cuts is the inside story of the slow death of the British music press. But it’s also a love letter to it, the tale of how music magazines saved one man’s life. Ted Kessler left home and school around his seventeenth birthday, determined ‘to be someone who listened to music professionally’. Paper Cuts tells how Ted found redemption through music and writing and takes us on a journey alongside the stars he interviewed and the work-place dramas he navigated as a senior staffer at NME through the boom-time ’90s and on to the monthly Q in 2004, where he worked for sixteen years before it folded with him at its helm as editor in 2020.
We travel in time alongside musical heroes Paul Weller, Kevin Rowland, Mark E Smith, and to Cuba twice, first with Shaun Ryder and Bez, then with Manic Street Preachers. We spend long, mad nights out with Oasis and The Strokes, quality time with Jeff Buckley and Florence Welch, and watch Radiohead deliver cold revenge upon Ted in public. A story about love and death, about what it’s like when a music writer shacks up with a conflict of interest, and what happens when your younger brother starts appearing on the cover of the magazines you work for, this is the memoir of “a delinquent doofus” whose life was both rescued and defined by music magazines.
My Old Man: Tales of Our Fathers
If you were asked to write about your father, what would you say? No two paternal relationships are the same. Every experience, every bond, is unique. And whether happy or sad, fond or fraught, the memories and stories we have about our dads stay with us for ever. In this carefully curated collection, a dazzling list of contributors – including Florence Welch, Paul Weller, Nina Stibbe and the sons and daughters of Ian Dury, Johnny Ball, Roy Castle, Leonard Cohen and many others – open up, some for the first time, about their paternal experiences. From the heart-rending to the tragic, from expressions of joyful love to a quick snapshot of a life, these beautifully written pieces are also deeply personal. As universal as it is powerful, My Old Man offers a unique opportunity to reflect on our own relationships with our dads.
A Sound So Very Loud: The Inside Story of Every Song Oasis Recorded
Music journalists Ted Kessler and Hamish MacBain first met Liam and Noel in 1994, when the brothers were playing tiny venues, and have since interviewed them dozens of times, tracking the astonishing success of Oasis as they became one of the biggest bands in the world.
In this comprehensive telling of the Oasis story through their spectacular back catalogue, Kessler and MacBain focus on the enduring power of the music, exploring the tales behind the lyrics and revealing the background to the writing, recording and impact of all the songs, from megahits like ‘Live Forever’, ‘Wonderwall’ and ‘Champagne Supernova’ to the fan-favourite B-sides and deep cuts such as ‘Acquiesce’, ‘The Masterplan’ and ‘Half the World Away’.
With their unique perspective on all things Oasis, Kessler and MacBain bring this story to life in glorious colour. A Sound So Very Loud is a book every Oasis fan needs on their shelves, destined to be as timeless and as moreish as the music itself.
Dancing Through the Fire
Ted Kessler is one of over 250 brilliant contributors to my Sunday Times Bestselling book, Paul Weller: Dancing Through the Fire, which is available now.
Click on the image below to grab your copy now…
