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The Afterword #84: The Hepcast

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Twang welcomes Word founder David Hepworth to the pod, apologising for the scruffy surroundings after the glitz of the mighty Word magazine recording suite. The Hep is in fine form, and we have an enjoyable wander through his career touching on some less known facts, the new book and his other current activities. Twang admonishes the great man for not popping in for a cup of tea and stresses the warm welcome which awaits…



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  1. Always find Mr Hepworth to be an engaging talker. His books ain’t bad either.
    He’s gradually supplanting Gambo as the “go to” bloke when anyone music related croaks
    The Afterword – it’s all his fault

  7. Enjoyed that, thanks! Interesting to hear the Smash Hits and Q war stories, and how he brought his magazine editor nous to bear on the book designs. I am almost exactly the same age as Heppy (born in 1950), so I find we do have a lot in common….except for the bit about being a successful writer, obviously….

  8. Nice work Twang…interesting to hear Hepworth’s take on The Word and why it was clearly a lot more fun for us readers than it was to be the publisher….so I can forgive him giving this place a swerve.

    But where did that Barney Hoskyns quote about Mojo “atoning” for the none-more Swingorilliant Smash Hits come from? What, would he have preferred Smash Hits put “real music” like James Taylor and The Eagles on the cover instead of Madness and Bananarama? If so thank heavens for Hepworth, Ellen, Hibbert, Black Type and all their poptastic pals for making the 1980s fizz.

    • Well you see I never read Smash Hits because I thought all those bands were shit, so I understand BH’s point, but that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be a magazine about them for people who like them, and nor should ME/DH feel ashamed of making a good magazine about awful bands. I don’t hold SH with any reverence whatsoever however.

      I really recommend that book we discussed BTW, the Paul Gorman one. Dirt cheap on Amazon Marketplace these days.

      • Different era I guess.
        Smash Hits was perfect for me and the generation growing up in the early 80s and also particularly up to the mid 80s it had quite a broad range of music. Indie, Ska, Punk, , Reggae and Dance acts got coverage as well as Duran, Wham and Spandau. The key was it never talked down to readers, it was very funny, and it wasn’t afraid to poke fun at, as you say, some of the more ludicrous popstrels. Nobody was above being asked “Have you ever been sick in a gumboot” or “does your mother play golf”.
        It was only as good as the Pop on offer though so by 87 as Pop Stars were replaced by Soap Stars and the excruciatingly dull likes of Bros and Johnny Hates Jazz held sway it went into decline….

          • I wasn’t reading any music mags at all when Smash Hits was going.
            By then I’d given up my NME addiction for it having become extremely boring and po-faced.
            I mistook Smash Hits for the teen trash it lampooned and never ever opened a copy. It wasn’t until Word came along that I started actually reading music mags again. In between I used to buy the occasional Mojo or Uncut or whatever for the coverdiscs, but often I’d bin the magazines unread because the articles just didn’t appeal to me.

          • My sister is on the Rule of Three podcast this month talking about her deep love of Smash Hits (I am referenced as the surly elder brother NME reader) where she worked as a subeditor for a while (long after the Ellen/Hibbert imperial era)

    • Not participating in places such as this seem fair enough to me. Talking bollocks about music is what he does for a living. I might be getting paid whilst I write on here, but I’m not paid for what I write here.

      I recall outlining why most of us posted under pseudonyms to him at a Mingle – his name is his “brand”, so anything he posts becomes an extension of his work. The rest of us hope the people we work for don’t find out who we are. Joining in here would be the ultimate busman’s’ holiday.

  9. Great stuff, @Twang. Can we get Mark Ellen next?

    In fact, this could be a nice ‘occasional series,’ – Kate, Jude, Andrew H, etc reminiscing about their careers, but also talking about what they’ve been up to since The Word, how the writer’s world has changed and how on earth they make a living.

      • That would be fab. I would love to hear about Kate’s musical journey, career path, and what she enjoys listening to now. I would also like to know what she thinks of #Metoo in music industry and the strategies she used to fend off all the “rock stars” she went to interview who might have hit on her, because I always wondered if , as a ‘cute young blonde’ turning up for interviews in various places, she may have faced that a lot.

        Enjoyed the Hepcast very much too. “I like all kinds of things for different reasons” – who could disagree with that?!

        • Absolutely – Kate and Fraser are on my list to interview at some stage. I spoke to Nige Tassell around Christmas time and currently transcribing that one. Looking forward to listening to the latest podcast – thoroughly enjoyed the Pencilsqueezer one.

    • I’d be interested to hear from Fraser. Not only his insight to keeping the old blog running so smoothly but also his take on the whole Classic Rock sale / collapse / revival.

  12. And excellent interview @Twang I still find him a bit annoying, but I doubt he cares about that. When I moved to London getting the NME a day early (at Enfield Town station) was also unbearably exciting for me.

  13. Thanks @twang – that filled the walk between voting and reaching work this morning perfectly. It’s easy to see why he is less sentimental about The Word than some of us when is was clearly a job of work, and when it was failing financially despite his and the rest of the team’s best endeavours he had no choice but to pull the plug.

  14. I never thought there was any animosity about closing The Word magazine but it was the speed at which the blog was shut down that annoyed some people. Unless I’m mis-remembering it there was no opportunity for anyone else to step in, hence the Afterword. Perhaps that was logistically impossible, however.

    • I think Hepworth just wanted to put the whole thing behind him, not surprising when you consider that he’d probably been kept awake at night by the finances for a couple of years. IMHO, the magazine wasn’t as good as it had been, possibly a reflection of money being tight and it was probably the right decision to pull the plug.

    • It would have been costing them a tidy sum for hosting etc so they needed to shut down sharpish, it stayed up a couple of weeks . I recall there was some discussion between the rescue commitee about the site with Fraser, don’t think it was logistically possible for him to hand everything over to us, he’d custom built the thing so he’d have ended up unpaid tech support for a while. We also discussed with him about somehow archiving the old content, but that didn’t work out either, to be fair Mr Lewry had other priorities like finding himself a new job.

  15. Enjoyed that Twang. You are really getting the hang of this podcast malarkey!

    So what do we think his next two books will be about? Must be running out of headings. As much as I enjoy and hang on his every word, there’s only so many ways to say how good stuff was between 1960 and 1985 ish.
    Maybe Live Aid will feature.

  16. I’ve only just listened to the podcast. Like many, I was surprised about his lack of affection for the mag but he’d been thru a few hadn’t he? And unlike Mark Ellen he did participate in quite a few threads.
    He is certainly on a roll with the nostalgia book thing. And a contract for 3 more! I wonder if he actually listens to any new music these days. I’d be surprised if he did.

    • There was chat on another thread recently about studying literature being a sure-fire way to kill an existing love of reading. I remember DH saying in a podcast that having to listen to and review 30+ new albums every month was not exactly the dream job that most of us would think it is, not least because Most Records Are Average, and having to find something interesting to write about them can be a struggle.

      Imagine suddenly being liberated from that to listen to only the music you want to hear, like the rest of us?

  17. I mean no disrespect to the Hep by this, but a few chapters into his last book (the one on rock stars) I realised I’d reached maximum Hep – I felt I just didn’t need or want to read any more of his essay-length pop pieces on a theme. I gave the book to a charity shop. His essays were always the first thing I went to in ‘The Word’ back in the day – brilliantly constructed, insightful ideas and entertaining turns of phrase, really ‘crafted’ pieces of writing, with a particular Hepian schtick. But I’ve found that this schtick over the course of whole books is less agreeable.

    Not a criticism of Hep – he does what he does well and I’ve no doubt his understanding of his market is keen: compact essay-chapters for middle-aged blokes to read in one go. For me, though, I can continue to admire his craftsmanship – and read his Radio Times columns etc – but opt to spend my time with different forms of books on music.

      • I’ve read one and a half of his books – got halfway through the rock stars one and just lost interest. The trouble I have with them is that I’m never sure who he thinks his audience is. Are they the people who already know this stuff and just want to have it fed to them in a different way, or people who are curious to read about a golden era of popular music they missed out on? Sometimes he seems to writing for one, and at other times for the other. Overall, though, for me there just aren’t enough laughs with Heppo. The great thing about Mark Ellen’s one book – Rock Stars Ate My Life (or something like that) was that he just took the piss out of himself and everybody else. I LOL’d throughout, apart from his dismissal of Golden Earring as clog-wearing ne’re-do-wells.

        • I spoke to Mark Ellen after the Wordcast event for DH’s book at Foyle’s.
          I asked him if he’d forgiven Roy Harper and gone to see him on his (supposedly) final tour. This was not long after the London gig.
          Mark wasn’t aware of the tour, but said he regretted that chapter and thought he’d been too harsh on RH.
          Unfortunately I couldn’t develop the conversation as another guy, ignoring me, interrupted and engaged Mark in a new conversation.

  18. I enjoyed the podcast, but was I really the only one who thought that his statement about female singer-songwriters vs. Joni’s Blue was absolute BS? Dumbest thing I’ve heard all year.

      • What I heard wasn’t so much him only feeling sorry for them, but more like “what’s the point of female singer-songwriters making any more albums when Blue already exists and they can never better it”. Which annoyed me for many reasons: I personally don’t like Joni Mitchell, taste is subjective so another album will be to me what Blue is to him – it’s not like Joni’s experiences are the universal female experience, so the more different voices out there, the more women can recognise their own experiences and feelings. And how about all of the sub-par Dylans out there, or inferior Beatles? Should they also give up trying?
        Perhaps (hopefully) he didn’t mean it that way, but that’s the way it sounded and why I was annoyed!

        • I’m probably conflating what he said in the book and what he said then. But Blue (IMHO) really is a definitive masterpiece.

          To your last point, to the Hep, probably!

          I think the point is there’s no point copying Joni or the Beatles as they have written the book, it’s finding a new angle and many of the followers don’t, they just copy.

            • There may be a thread in that. Definitive masterpieces that render the rest of the genre pointless. Rock – Sticky Fingers, Pop – A Hard Days Night, Rock & Roll – Elvis Presley, Soul – Otis Blue, Reggae – Live!!, Jazz – Kind Of Blue, Dubstep – Untrue, Disco – We Are Family, Punk – Never Mind The Bollocks, Ambient – Thursday Afternoon. And so on.

              Reductive and not to be taken seriously. I think part of the problem with TheHep is that he always seems earnest. I’m sure he has his tongue in his cheek sometimes but I can’t really tell when.

        • I don’t think that he feels other female singer-songwriters shouldn’t bother.
          I know he has affection for many.
          It’s thanks to DH and his Bloody Good Records programme that he presented on the much missed and lamented GLR that I got introduced to the music of Mary-Chapin Carpenter, Rosanne Cash, Shelby Lynne and Kelly Willis to name but four.
          I recall that the introduction to MCC came through an interview he had with Nancy Griffiths, where he would ask (as he did with others) for things like first record bought, a song you wish you’d written and others I can’t recall. Nancy selected MCC as one of her choices and that came to be one of the major turning points in my musical appreciation.
          I disagree with him over Van Morrison. So many of his albums from the 80s like Common One, Poetic Champions Compose etc are nothing like an attempt to recreate Moondance.

          • Part of the Hep’s USP – which I mean literally, as selling books is naturally the end goal here – is that he doesn’t say ‘I really like this record, but it might not be for everyone and there are plenty of other acts that are similar that you might prefer’, but instead says ‘This record by this artist is THE BEST OF ITS KIND and here’s why. No other record/artist in this area is worth bothering about.’

            The Hep understands that this sort of definitive statement makes for a feisty debate and gets people talking about his views – just as we’re doing here – and whatever the underlying theme may be.

            The truth is very simple: there are lots of records and lots of artists and we all like different stuff – we like what we like, and may not like whatever someone tells us we have to like (because it’s The Best). Music appreciation is entirely subjective.

            David’s books and essays are generally all based around a thesis, and he argues well. He could certainly convince me through his style of presenting information and ideas that ‘Artist X is the Most Influential Artist of Year Y’, but he could never convince me that ‘Artist X is The Best’. Such a thing doesn’t exist.

            In fact, there’s a theme for another of his books: ‘Why The Beatles Are Not The Best’.

            • I think this is a perceptive analysis Colin. I’m intrigued by who reads his books, and who they are aimed at. Hep often adopts a slightly lofty ‘I know best’ tone, which I find off-putting. Clearly, he’s hugely knowlegable in the field, and his views deserve respect. But by taking such a definitive stance – removing all the nuance and complexities of music appreciation – all the things we love on here – it seems like he is trying to reduce great art to a template. And it’s a transpatently artificial exercise. As you say, there is no definitive rock album, just as there is no definitive Brexit, and I can’t help feeling that his whole approach
              somehow diminishes the subject he is trying to celebrate.

              Having said all that, I like him, and I’m looking forward to hearing him on this podcast. Thanks to those who made this possible.

              • There are two massive great clues on his book cover.
                1) Title: Nothing Is Real
                2) In the cover blurb: “…sweeping statements about pop”

                If what he says in his books gets you hot under your collar, that is your problem and not his.

              • Yes, I agree with what you say, Mart – it’s a construct that he invites us into, to be told ‘Here’s my view, and here’s why I’m right’. I’m not knocking that approach per se – and often he has terrific insights or connections to tell you about along the way.

                For me, his ‘thing’ was brilliant in monthly essay form but more is less, I feel – like seeing a conjuring trick once and thinking ‘Wow! Clever and entertaining’ to then seeing variants of the same conjuring trick repeated umpteen times in a row, when you’re left thinking ‘This is becoming a chore…’ And worse, you can see the architecture of it, see behind the curtain, anticipate where the rabbit is, and know what the punchline will be.

                Like Mike says, David lays it out there in plain view – ‘sweeping statements about pop’ etc. Good luck to him.

                • Actually, on this ‘definitive view’ theme I’ve just remembered a review of my John McLaughlin book ‘Bathed in Lightning’ (I can’t remember where) where the writer said something like ‘Harper wants us to believe that ‘Birds of Fire’ is the pinnacle of all recorded music’. I had to smile at that – that ‘wants us to believe’ bit. What I had said, in a small-font footnote on page 500 or thereabouts, was that ‘if I were to express a personal view, ‘Birds of Fire’ is the pinnacle of 20th century music, but other opinions are available’, or something like that.

                  The fact that a reviewer picked up on that (heavily caveated footnote aside) and used up review space with it probably endorses Heppo’s favouring of sometimes outrageous definitive statements or themes in his books/essays – they are, literally, headline grabbing. And headlines mean people are talking about what you’re selling, and hopefully buying it.

                  Maybe if I’d titled the book ‘John McLaughlin: Why he’s the pinnacle of all music’, I’d have sold more books 🙂

  19. Just catching up with a sizeable backlog of stuff on the AW and elsewhere and was delighted to stumble across this. Well done Twang and everyone else involved in bagging this interview with the pop-culture writer that I’ve most enjoyed reading in my lifetime, as well as being of course someone very close to this site.

  20. It was said that it was hard to get a handle on his tastes from the LP choices in the book, but he’s not listing favourites necessarily. With the Roxy debut, he’s talking about the package overall. He focuses on the cover in particular, the concept, it’s originality. He says something like he’s not sure if the music is up to much.

  21. I can enjoy his books but with Uncommon People I kept thinking oh come on! that’s not true, it wasn’t really like that. For me there’s an aspect at times that is excused as his schtick, my problem if I don’t like it, whereas I see it as a flaw, a weakness. No problem with a proposition like 1971 as best year. It’s a reasonable opinion if you are just talking vinyl LP record, which I think he is, and the pieces about the records are well done.

  23. As a slight aside, I recently listened to the audio book version of the latest book. In the chapter about comedy records I was expecting the whole thing to be leading up to the genre dominance of Monty Python albums in the 70’s. He didn’t even mention them. (he might have done, I do nod off occasionally with audio books!)

  24. I enjoyed listening, and would point out that DH can write perceptively on other subjects. He has an entertaining column in The Radio Times on … um … radio; and for anyone in journalism/publishing he has a regular piece on magazines, all sorts, in business mag InPublishing.

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