Scotpop

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... If you’re interested in what it’s like for new artists in Scotland today, then you’ve come to the right podcast.

Emma Dunlop’s been there, done that - and even got the (real) scars to prove it. Now she’s back – and starting all over again. This interview offers a fascinating glimpse into the challenges and opportunities for new acts in Scotland today.

In the interview we discuss Emma’s inspirations, from French pop stars to Scottish legends. Emma also talks me throu...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... It can't be easy being Teenage Fanclub. One minute Nirvana's Kurt Cobain is on every radio station in the US describing you as the best band on the planet; the next your label boss is having a pop.

One of the greatest myths about Teenage Fanclub – and one perpetuated by the man who signed them to Creation Records – is “they didn’t want to be big”.

“It’s a Glasgow thing of wanting to be cool rather than big,” Alan McGee once told me. “There was a...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... As he prepares for the release of his highly anticipated standalone novel The Heights, Sir Ian Rankin joins me on the podcast this week to talk about the state of music in Scotland.

As anyone who has read Ian's Rebus books will know, his writing is peppered with Scottish music references – from characters called Burchill to in-jokes about Mogwai, from tributes to folk heroes to homages to his own Cardenden punk band The Dancing Pigs.

We also discuss the fragility behind some of Sc...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... 25 years after the death of Stuart Adamson, secret recordings of his first band the Skids are emerging. They were recorded in Edinburgh in 1977 11 weeks after the band formed, with all songs written by Stuart, who died in 2001. What can they tell us about this mercurial talent?

On this week’s Scotpop podcast I’m joined by Awrite Records founder and ex Skids roadie Clive Ford to talk about those early days of the Scottish punk legends.

Clive also explains how he got his hand...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... In the summer of 1981, Altered Images exploded on to the post-punk scene in the UK in a blaze of chutzpah, charm and chiseled cheekbones – and that was just the boys. That posters of the band’s frontwoman Clare Grogan were already pinned on bedroom walls following her breakthrough performance in Bill Forsyth’s classic growing-up movie Gregory’s Girl the previous year seemed to seal their fate as the nation’s favourite new band; even the London-based, hypercritical NME loved their brilliantly bright pop tunes and street-urchin antics. (W...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... Everyone loves a music business survivor – and few have survived the vicissitudes of the exploitative music business quite like this week’s guest.

Dumped by his friends and former Friends Again bandmates when they decamped to form Love and Money in the mid-80s, Chris Thomson thought he had had weathered that perfect storm with a new Phonogram record deal. Until it was pulled. (The more observant listener may hazard a guess at who may have been behind that particularly ruthless move.)

Undeterred, he l...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... As anecdote-tellers go, few can match Davy Henderson. This week’s podcast picks up where we left off last time with the Scottish cult hero talking about his band Win, which he formed after splitting Edinburgh-based act Fire Engines.

If you heard the first part, you’ll know Davy called time on Fire Engines after he accepted a publishing deal – with an advance of £2,000 – from Pop:Aural label boss Bob Last. As Davy candidly explained in last week’s interview, the split – and the way he handled it...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... From sonic adventurers Fire Engines and Win to industry-baiters Nectarine No. 9 and The Sexual Objects, Davy Henderson remains one of Scotland’s greatest cult heroes. Yet the story of the Edinburgh-born raconteur – who grew up living next door to the Bay City Rollers and BCR-nearly rans Bilbo Baggins in Clermiston – has never been fully told. Until now.

Davy's also back with a new band, Bubbles, featuring guitarist-about-town Douglas MacIntyre and former Orange Juice and Josef K legend Malcolm (now Dr) Ross – so it's the perfect time to...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... With a mop of wavy blonde hair, a voice melding the best bits of John Foxx and Bryan Ferry and a canon of critically acclaimed tunes, Steven Lindsay was destined to be a pop star.

The Big Dish, the band he formed at the Glasgow School of Art in the mid-80s, toured with Scottish heavyweights Big Country and Lloyd Cole and the Commotions and came tantalisingly close to cracking the Top 30 with hook-laden singles Prospect Street and Miss America

Yet without that...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... Erin Reidy joins me this week to talk about life in Brontës, who have built a steady buzz since bursting on to the Scottish scene in 2022 with their double A-side debut single, featuring life-affirming indie anthem First Hand Arrogance. (It’s a track I included when compiling the best 45 singles from Glasgow acts for Record Collector; yes, it’s that good.)

Several line-up changes – and a critic-flooring, self-titled debut album later – the tight-knit four-piece are once again on manoeuvres, a mini-UK tour scheduled for later thi...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... This is the second and final part of the interview with Bruce – and this week the mood and conversation take a turn: to pressure, alcoholism, depression and the death at 43 of the guitarist who, in Bruce’s own words, “made an amazing sound that I loved”.

It’s October 1984 and Margaret Thatcher is in No 10 Downing Street, overseeing the most destructive deindustrialisation policy ever inflicted on the UK. The industrial heartlands of central Scotland are particularly hard hit.

Not that you’d know it from a To...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... There’s, rightly, been a lot of attention on Stuart Adamson in recent months with the publication of another biography on the Skids and Big Country legend and news of a forthcoming documentary that will hopefully bury for ever the image of the band as merely “bagpipe guitars and checked shirts”.

For now, though, it’s time to hear Bruce Watson’s side of the story – and it’s not always an easy listen.

Success, failure, alcoholism, suicide, redemption and resurrection all feature in a 45-year c...

The podcast that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music ... The Beta Band. Big Country. The Skids. Friends Again. The Rezillos. The Bluebells. The list of recently reformed Scottish bands goes on and on.

As fans, we’re excited to have these bands back, of course, but having worked on music business magazines for 15 years, one thing I learned was promoters and venues like safe bets. Increasingly, with record sales collapsing, the music business is the live music industry.

Yet as more and more bands who had their heyday in the 70, 80s and 90s...

Thrilled that Mike joins me on Scotpop this week.

After finding new fans with the soundtrack of the latest hit Netflix show Something Very Bad is Going To Happen, Mike and co are finally getting the attention they deserve so there’s lots to talk about.

He joins me just days before the band tour Australia to discuss everything from humping gear up three flights of stairs at Terry Pilley’s infamous Barclay Towers studio in Edinburgh in the late 70s to what it feels like to blow up on TikTok today.

He also...

Before he was a successful author with books such as bestsellers Straight White Male and Oh Brother, Irvine-born writer John Niven, the special guest on Scotpop this week, ran with the London A&R pack in the 90s.

He joins us to talk about turning down Coldplay and Muse because he “didn’t think we needed a couple of more Radioheads” and how he used his time in the music industry to write Kill Your Friends and The Battle, the recent stage production that captured the rivalry between Blur and Oasis as they fought it out for the co...

In the mid-80s, the London-based music industry was, says Love and Money’s James Grant, this week’s special guest, “awash with cash”. As bands such as Orange Juice, Simple Minds and Altered Images racked up Top 10 hits, much of it flowed north to Glasgow.

One of the “jangletastic” acts perfectly placed to capitalise on the A&R stampede to the city were James’ first band Friends Again, fronted by Chris Thomson, now of The Bathers.

This week’s episode offers a fascinating glimpse into the life of one of the most underrated songwriters in the UK today...

Be honest now; if I were to say to you “Scottish punk rock in the 70s”, what would you think? If you replied the Skids, The Rezillos, The Jolt, The Valves, Johnny and the Self Abusers - maybe Matt Vinyl and the Decorators - I’d probably think, “Yep, that’s about it”.

But if you shot back with The Exile, 8 Miles Out, Ths Zips, The Drive, The Pencils, The Trendies, The Hormones – Scotland’s first female punk band – or the brilliantly named Beez Neez I’d think either, A, you were in one of these bands, or, B, you’ve read C...

You can listen to the Top 10 songs in Episode 3 at this playlist.

Following on from last week’s episode on the evils of the music business in the 80s, this week’s show jumps a decade and features Douglas MacIntyre, one of the most likeable record company bosses you’re ever likely to come across.

As he prepares to wind up his label, Creeping Bent, after 30 years, he joins Scotpop to talk about working with artists such as The Leopards, Adventures In Stereo and Spacehopper. He also tells us about raising more than £50,000 for Down’s Syndrom...

You can sign up here for the new Scotpop newsletter on ⁠⁠Substack featuring extended shownotes, behind the scenes info, Scottish music news stories and the hottest new bands.

Shownotes

In John Niven’s engaging music business novel Kill Your Friends, loathsome A&R man Steven Stelfox slashes and burns his way through a 90s music industry awash with cash, cocaine and conmen; if Stelfox had been operational in "the biz" a decade earlier he would've been eaten alive by a breed of major label record executive who would think nothing of remixing one of the world’...

You can sign up here for the new Scotpop newsletter on ⁠⁠⁠Substack⁠⁠⁠ - featuring extended shownotes, behind the scenes info, Scottish music news stories and the hottest new bands.

Shownotes

In this debut episode I’m delighted to be joined by Sir Ian Rankin, one of Scotland’s most successful and best-loved writers.

Ian’s Rebus novels have sold more than 35 million copies worldwide and it was a great honour for me personally when he wrote a brilliant introduction to my own book, Stuart Adamson – In a Big Country, the critically acclaimed biography of the Skids and Big...

I've spent the past 30 years listening to musicians, bands and artists tell brilliant stories about Scottish music; now you'll be able to hear – and watch – them too. Follow now on Spotify and never miss an episode.

You can sign up here for the new Scotpop newsletter on ⁠⁠⁠⁠Substack⁠⁠⁠⁠ - featuring extended shownotes, behind the scenes info, Scottish music news stories and the hottest new bands.

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If you've just discovered this podcast you're probably thinking "who, what, when, why now?"

Well ... it's a show that celebrates the past, present and future of Scottish music with journalist, author and broadcaster Allan Glen who interviews the bands, songwriters, musicians, filmmakers, record label bosses and writers who create the best Scottish pop because Scottish pop is brilliant just now.

Here's a quick introductory episode; Episode 1 featuring an interview with Sir Ian Rankin is out April 2.

You can sign up here for the new Scotpop newsletter on ⁠⁠⁠⁠Substack⁠⁠⁠⁠ - featuring extended shownotes, behind the scenes info...