The Three Questions with Andy Richter - Richard Blade

Episode Date: February 11, 2025

Legendary DJ and TV personality Richard Blade joins Andy Richter to discuss bringing new wave music to the mainstream in the 1980s, his journey from England to Los Angeles, his experiences in film and television, and much more. Do you want to talk to Andy live on SiriusXM’s Conan O’Brien Radio? Leave a voicemail at 855-266-2604 or fill out our Google Form at BIT.LY/CALLANDYRICHTER. Listen to "The Andy Richter Call-In Show" every Wednesday at 1pm Pacific on SiriusXM's Conan O'Brien Channel.

Hi everybody, welcome back to The Three Questions. I'm your host, Andy Richter, and today I am talking to Richard Blade. You know Richard. He's a radio, television, and film personality. He's been around for years. He helped bring New Wave music into the mainstream and was the soundtrack to Los Angeles on K-Rock from 1982 to 2000. You can hear him now on SiriusXM's First Wave, which is Channel 33.

Here is my conversation with the great Richard Blade. Richard Blade, hello. Hi, Andy. How are you doing? We finally made it happen. We have, this is rescheduled a number of times. I think I had to change it, you had to change it. But we finally made it happen.

And here we are. Yeah, you're back in town because you spend your winners in Mexico, which it must be nice. It's lovely, we're down in Salilita. Of course I have a 25% tariff every time I go across the border, but it's great down there. Right, right.

Yeah, and you're a complete beach addict. You grew up on the seaside and you moved to California because the English seaside probably was not, not warm enough for you, right? Yeah. But I did have a shock when I came to California because I came in November.

Yeah. Beautiful weather. I mean, it was like 80 degrees. It sure is gorgeous. And so I went to Malibu because, you know, I grew up surfing badly, but it was on what we called Malibu boards then, you know, eight foot boards.

Yeah, yeah. So I thought, I got to go to Malibu, got to go to Malibu. So I went to the beach and the beach was pretty packed for November. And so I pulled on my Speedos, which, cause I'm from England, we didn't wear the long shorts and I used to be in a swim team. And what year is this? This was the end of 76.

Okay. So I was four years old. Okay. Yeah. And so I pull up my Speedos and I run towards the water and as I'm running towards the water, And as I'm running towards the water, I'm like, it's not quite as blue as it is in the movie. So it was more like brown. But I was used to that, you know, English Channel and all that kind of stuff. And as I hit the water, I was like, oh my God.

It's cold. It was freezing. It was the same temperature as in England. I was like, what on earth happened here? I grew up watching South Pacific. And here I was, it was definitely not the South Pacific. It was not, yeah. And now I know why American guys wear the baggy shorts

because the water was so cold in my Speedo, there was nothing to boast about when I got out. It was terrible. Yeah, you had an innie when you got out of the water. Well, I have to tell you that my first, well, you and I have met, we first met at like a serious XM party, and I was so thrilled to meet you

because you've been a part of my life for ages. And the first time I was, because I grew up in Chicago, and the first time I was, because I grew up in Chicago, and the first time I was aware of you, and I don't remember what the show was called then, but every afternoon there was a syndicated radio, or a video show, every weekday afternoon, I think, correct? Channel 63, it might have been, in Chicago.

Yeah, I don't, it was definitely what they call a UHF channel, which young people don't even know what the fuck that means. Right, right. In Chicago, it was, you know, it was called New Wave Music. Right. You know, there was punk music, but that was a little too, it wasn't too much for me, you know. But New Wave Music, I definitely,

that was the kind of music that my brother and I were into, but it wasn't really being played on the radio. You'd have to take a risk by reading about an album and then going to buy it unheard. Fingers crossed. Yes, fingers crossed. So a show like this show was really rare and exciting. And for some reason, it only came in on one TV in our house, and it was like this little, tiny, shitty portable TV in our sort of nicer living room.

And because it was sort of in a bookcase, I would stand in front of it and watch it most afternoons. And you were the host of it. And there was this guy, this handsome surfer looking guy with the English accent Richard Blade and that was... MV3. MV3. Yep. And what years was that on? That was on, it launched in January of 1983. Yeah. And it went off the air in September of 1983 as a huge hit. It was on in 56 cities. Wow. But the producer had a big problem and couldn't deliver. It was five days a week.

And so after about six weeks, we got rid of the, we had dancers on and live bands. And I remember him calling us in for a meeting into his control room. And my memory is probably exaggerating this, but it felt like something out of Scarface. There was a mound of Coke and a snubnose 38 on the desk. And he said that- In the control room? In his control room office. Wow.

He had a converted giant Chinese dry cleaners. It had been, you know, this lovely people from China had started this big dry cleaning company and then built a bigger building. And he converted it into a sound stage. Wow. And so it was, you know, dedicated just to that one show. So in his control room, he had this snub nose revolver,

this mound of Coke. And he called us in and he said, Hey daddy, cause that was his little vocal tick. Everyone was daddy. Even though he was 15, 20 years older than us. We've been doing research and the research says that the viewers don't like the dancers and they don't like the live bands. So from now on, we're just doing the video clips.

And we knew that was bullshit because it was just a cost cutting. Right. They're cheap. Yeah. Yeah. The great thing is instead of shooting five days a week, we can do it in three hours now for a whole week. And it was like, okay, so then that stayed on and then it started going into reruns. We started putting in the clips that we'd already aired of the bands, Oh, right. Of the dancers and everything and trying to make it somehow work continuity wise

because some of the same dancers would show up from clip to clip in different clothes because one was for week number one, one was for week number five. And finally it went off the air. And then Channel 9 in Los Angeles came back to me about two months later and said, look, we had huge numbers in the afternoon, would you do another video show and we've got reputable producers this time. And so that came back as video one,

but that was only syndicated in about 16 cities. But it was fine, because it was just paid for by Channel 9, so anything else was bonus. Was it, did it just sort of take advantage of, of the fact that MTV wasn't as widespread as it became? Absolutely. Yeah.

100%. Was it because what was the clock always ticking for as soon as MTV became really exploded across the country that it would syndicated video shows would not really? Yeah. The one of the, the only advantage we had was we were a regular TV and So we didn't have to worry about cable. Yeah, and in Southern, California Particularly and in a number of other cities there wasn't much cable penetration Yeah, there was literally only I think three communities in 82 when we started shooting because it aired in January of 83

We did the first few weeks at the beginning of, the end of 82. There's only three communities, one of them which has been devastated by the fires, Altadena, that had cable. You came to Santa Monica, no cable. You came to Hollywood, no cable. So strange that that, in our lifetime,

how much difference there is. I think about, you know, cell phones and just, I used to, you know. Oh, absolutely. The first time I saw somebody using a cell phone in the wild, it was the over the shoulder lunchbox kind, and it was a production designer in Chicago at a paint store that all the studios used.

And I thought, what a fucking asshole. There's a pay phone outside and you're gonna walk around with this, I mean, it's like a cinder block on a shoulder strap with a corded handset. And then the car phones. Yeah, and it was basically the car phone, but just on a shoulder strap. And then, and now just to think like,

well, if my phone runs out of battery for 10 minutes, I'm like, I'm useless. I'm like, how am I supposed to look up, you know, what, you know, Eva Marie Saint, what year she died, you know? I mean, we saw the rise of cable. Yeah. And now we've seen the demise of yes, absolutely. All in one short period of time. Yeah. So same with CDs and things like that. It's, oh, they're here for us to stay. We've got to get a CD and a DVD library. Yeah. And now it's obsolete.

It's all. Because everything is streaming. I have bins of CDs in the shed, you know, collecting dust. Absolutely. ["Can't You Tell My Love's A Girl?" by The C-Side plays.] Can't you tell my love's a girl? You? You did grow up by the seaside in New York. You didn't start there. As a DJ?

No, no, no. As a child. I'm going back. Oh. You weren't born there. No, I was born in Bristol, which was an industrial town and not a good place back then. I hear it's much nicer now. It's been gentrified and all that kind of stuff.

You haven't been back in a while? Not for a while, not since my parents passed away because there's not really anything to go back. Though I do want to go back and visit. I want to see, you know, I haven't been back in England for, I don't know, eight years, 10 years or so. So when I watch the shows that are shot in London, like Black Doves and things like that,

and you see all the beautiful high-rise buildings now, and you're like, wow. But no, I grew up in Bristol, but my father said, look, it'd be a much better life for my sons if we moved somewhere else. And when he was in World War II, he went on leave in Torquay,

which is this town in the south of England. It was away from the bombing of the Blitz and everything. And it was, it's a beautiful little seaside town, the Laguna beach of England. Oh yeah. You say to any English person, Torquay, and you will get one of two answers. The first answer is,

oh, me mum and dad went there on their only moon. Or, oh, that's where they filmed Faulty Towers. Faulty Towers. That's what I was gonna say. To me, that immediately, I'm like, Torquilla, that's Faulty Towers. That's where everyone screams at each other. You know how it came about, right?

Didn't he and Connie Booth stay there? Well, what happened was the first two seasons of Monty Python, the BBC had no money for it. Yeah. And they played it late night on Saturday about 11.30 to dump it. The first season was six episodes long. And they renewed it just because John Cleese

had been so big. He'd been on shows in England that were really popular, Goon's show. Right. That was the week that was. He was the big star. He was the big star. They're trying to keep him happy,

but they had no money. So they couldn't afford all the permits to shoot in London. So they said, find another place to shoot. And so John Cleese and the production crew, Graham Chapman and everyone else found Torquay because Torquay is close to Plymouth, which is a big city, 20 miles away that could double for London. It had the Moors so they could do the countryside things.

It had the beach so they could do the guy coming out at the beginning. And so they shot in Torquay, but they had no money for a hotel. So they had to stay bed and breakfast. And after season two of Monty Python, when it suddenly became huge and then PBS and America made a deal with them. Then the BBC said, okay, you can go and shoot in London. We'll pay for it. But that's what really put Torquee on the entertainment map.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, at the time, was it exciting to have Torquee featured in a show like that? It was, and I- Well, you were already in the States. Were you in the States by then? No, no, I was in Torquee. Oh, you were in Torquee. And I was an extra in in the States. Were you in the States by then? No, I was. I was in Turkey. Oh, you were in Turkey.

I was an extra in two of the scenes. Oh, really? In Monty Python. Oh, my goodness. Which episodes? Because I'd love to see it. One where the Women's the Women's Library Society. Yeah. Play the South African All Blacks. OK. In rugby. Yeah.

And that's the shot at Playmore, a football, actually, a football stadium. Yeah. And I was, at Playmore, a football actually, a football stadium. Yeah. And I was, you know, one of the 20 people on the side just meant to be a mass crowd. You know, right, right, right. Yeah. And then it would cut to the black and white footage of the ladies. Yes, yes, yes. And then I was at the election of for Tang for Tang biscuit barrel.

And that was shot at Old Way Mansion in Payton. Wow. for Tang for Tang biscuit barrel. And that was shot at Old Way Mansion in Payton. And after that, Graham Chapman said to me, could I get a ride home on your scooter? The whole crew couldn't have been nicer. And I look back at it now, and I'm like, why didn't I have a little camera just taking photographs with everyone?

Because what an incredible show. I mean, one of the great comedy shows of all time. Absolutely, and what's amazing is there's only like 12 of them or something like that. Yeah. Like that's one thing why those British comedies are so good is because they don't go on for eight years or 12 years or until the idea is just rung dry like a rag.

You know, I wanna, you were inspired by, and I think it was the children's television show where someone on the show recommended that kids sit down and write out 10 goals. And you wrote these in your book, World in My Eyes, which was your autobiography. And this is what, and how old were you when you did this? I was about 11.

Eleven, and here they are. I want to live somewhere sunny. I want, and number two, I want to swim with the fish in the warm water like Jacques Cousteau. Number three, I want to travel the world. Number four, I want to be famous. Number five, I want to be on television like Blue Peter. Which I, Blue Peter said.

That's the name of the show, yeah. It sounds saucy. Number six, I wanna meet my favorite singers. Seven, I want a beautiful girlfriend. Eight, I wanna be in a movie. And nine, I wanna write a book. And it took you a while, and you knocked them all off. You've done them all.

One by one. One by one. Yeah, a little bit, yeah. And in your book, you describe that it took you a while to come up with number 10 Which ended up being I want to be brave And which is such a great capper, you know, it's sort of Because I was so scared of the British storms that were coming off the channel Yeah, and we had a nice house, but it would rattle the windows

Yeah, didn't have got doublezing at the time, just a single pane. It would rattle the windows and the big English oak trees. You'd see the shadows. And I honestly thought it was like dinosaurs coming. And I thought there was gonna be a T-Rex stick its head through the window and eat me. And I would hide under the covers. And my brother said, you can't do that. He said, you have to face up to your fears.

You gotta be brave, kid. He was seven years older than me. So there was a big gulf between us. And I remember one storm came in and pulled the covers back down and I opened the curtains so I could see that it really was the trees. And I thought, no, I'm gonna be brave.

And that's when I got up and I opened the top drawer and got my list out and I wrote, I wanna be brave. I wanna be brave. Do you still have that piece of paper? I still have that list. That's great. So when mom passed away and I was clearing out the house, it was-

You found it? Yeah, it was still in that drawer. Wow. Yeah, so with a couple of my school boys' diaries. Oh, wow. Yeah. And what's amazing too is like the, just the sort of prescience to know that in order to make the first nine come true, the number, the 10th one has to, has to kind of

hold up. Because the 10th one has to be there first before you can, or I mean, brave, self-aware, collected, you know, confident. And, and you seem to have been able to do that because you really have just kind of step by step followed what you, you started, you got a little transistor radio. And at the time, and this is the, I was unaware of this,

there's no pop music on British radio. No, there was none. We had the Light program, and the Light program was Ray Conneth and Harry Belafonte. Exactly, yeah. And here was the Beatles breaking, biggest band in the world, and nowhere to hear them. Wow.

Nowhere. And that's why the pirates came, The pirate radio, the ships that operated three miles outside of the British coastline. There was one in Luxembourg, right? The huge AM station. Yeah, it was a hundred thousand watts. You couldn't get it during the day, but at night it would come booming in.

And they changed their programming from German and French to just English. And they came in and 208 they were, Radio Luxembourg 208. And everyone listened to Luxy at night. It was, that was it. And so the pirates picked up on that and they, these converted ships with a transmitter

went outside so the coast guard couldn't arrest them except if the storms came and they got blown inside. Yeah, yeah, yeah. them except if the storms came and they got blown inside. And finally, BBC in 1967 said, oh, I guess we should do something about this after all. People seem to like those long-haired boys in Liverpool. And what year was that? That was 67. 67?

Wow. Yeah. August of 67, the BBC changed. And no longer there was no longer the home service, home service being news, the light program, which was music, they became BBC Radio One, Two, Three and Four. And BBC Radio One was pop, Two was the light program,

Three was news and sports, and Four was talk. And it's been that way since now it's expanded. But there was that complete bullshit that they said, we can't have any commercial radio in England because it would interfere with the police and the ambulance radios. Of course, in a complete different frequency. And now there's commercial radio in every single town.

Just like there is in America. But we believe that. You tell the lie enough times and you buy into it. Now is that, when do you start to sort of form the idea, I'm going to be a DJ? Like that that, you know, like first of all, did you ever attempt to play music that much? Yeah, I tried to learn the guitar. I have no talent. Yeah.

No talent to play music. So I don't have the patience. I tried trumpet in school band and then guitar later. And it just, I. That's why I admire musicians so much. And I like the, I love the DJs as well. I love their approach on the air. I love the fact that they were to bring me new music and take me places I'd never been before.

And like you were saying, now I could hear the music before I bought it. Yeah. Yeah. And so I thought, gosh, that's fantastic. I never thought I could do it until I went to college. And when I went to college, I was so lucky because we lived in houses of 13 people. And there'll be four of the first years and then the other nine, says he doing his math in his head, would be a mix of second, third and fourth years. And in my house that I was staying in, we had the captain of the rugby team,

captain of the field hockey team, and the college DJ. And the college DJ was in his last year. And he was not a good looking guy. Very nice guy. the field hockey team and the college DJ. And the college DJ was in his last year. And so I, and he was not a good looking guy. Very, very nice guy, but not good looking. But when he was behind the DJ- Face for radio, I think they call that. Yeah, but when he was behind the DJ console

in the social club, all the girls would come up and hang around him. And I thought, that's a good idea, you know? And so I said to Norm, do you need a hand? Are you carrying your records or anything? Because there is officially, if you look in the Guinness Book of Records, nothing heavier in the world

than a milk crate full of records. There's nothing. So I would help Norm and then helps him set up the gigs. And Norm was on his way out, you know, so he was not, he didn't wanna be a DJ, not a professional one. So he'd say, do you wanna do the first couple of hours and do the warmup?

And I said, sure. And then he quite often not show up, you know, go to the pub instead. So I ended up becoming the college DJ and running the social club and then DJing all over Oxford, all of the 27 university colleges. And it was a great, great way to get in.

And then so when I left, you know, I had two degrees, but I thought, do I wanna do something that I would not enjoy for the rest of my life? Or do I wanna try DJing? Was DJing at that point lucrative? I mean, were you- I was making money, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

I was mobile DJing. I wasn't on the radio, unfortunately. I would have loved to have gotten the radio, but it was a closed shop. It was the BBC. There's eight DJs in the whole country on the BBC. And I wasn't old enough and my voice wasn't like that, you know. And you also had to have a very British accent at the time. That was the Beatles. And I think coming up in a few minutes time, we'll have those jobs who wear those leather jackets the Rolling Stones But first how about something from Brotherhood of Man?

You know and and this is even the guys that had come from pirate radio. Well a few of them were really hip There was one who I adore to this day and I'm thrilled I'm friends with him now. And I don't sue him enough. His name is Emperor Roscoe. He's American. That's a good name. Yeah, he's great. He modeled his style and he admits it on Wolfman Jack.

And he was the biggest DJ in Britain. And he would open for The Who and The Beatles when they were on tour and things like that. But his style was over the top American. It's funny. Hey, it's Roscoe in the house. Every weight hustlers soul on the seat like a sex machine and coming up, baby, we are going to work in some James Brown.

And it was like, wow. Yeah. Yeah. First time very famously that he moved from pirate radio to radio one, there was news every hour, because that was part of the BBC charter. Right. And so Roscoe signed off like that. I'll be back tomorrow to rock you.

So hold on to your panties if you can, because I'll be back in the house. There was this long pause. Yeah. And then the voice came on and said, and now the news in English. And that's how he followed. But Roscoe was fantastic. But he left England in the mid 70s

because his father developed cancer and his father was Boris Pasternak who was a big producer. Oh wow. Yeah, Dr. Zhivago. Dr. Zhivago, sure. And he lives in Northridge now. Oh wow. And he but he gave up his career to to attend to his father. Wow. And you couldn't have been bigger. Yeah. You know, he was Ryan Seacrest. Yeah. Or Dick Clark. Yeah. So fantastic., now after you get out, I imagine you moved to London. No.

Oh no? No, after I left college, Torquay was a hotspot in the summer. Oh, okay. For DJing. Sure, of course. Everyone came down, so. It's the Ibiza of... Absolutely.

So I was DJing a lot of clubs down there. And I was also, because I was captain of the swim team at Oxford, I was working as a lifeguard for the Norwegian and Swedish girls that would come over for a month to learn English. Apparently, there were Norwegian and Swedish guys that came over as well. Right. You don't remember them? I don't remember them, no. If they got in trouble, they can find their own way out of the water. I'm saving the girls. Right, right, right.

They should know better. Yeah. From a rugged place, they should know how to save themselves. Exactly. So during the day, I'm in Speedos with these girls in bikinis, these beautiful young blondes

who are away from home for a month. And of course, when you're an 18 year old girl away from home for a month, all you do is behave yourself. You never misbehave. Exactly. And so I would take them then to my gigs at night

where I was DJing in the clubs and we would dance. And then it was a great time. Yeah. And as the summer rolled down and Torque began to slow down and roll up the sidewalks I would write to these girls that that's before the internet we didn't have email right that's us right nailed them and the girls a lot of the girls wrote back said come over and visit so I thought that'd be a good idea so I went over to

Scandinavia went to Sweden first Gothenburg or Jutteborg as it's pronounced and then went to a little town called Jönköping where this girl's father had a huge farm and I worked for three days as a lumberjack. Oh wow! And I wanted, I was singing Monty Python. Yeah, yeah. I'm a lumberjack and I'm okay. And then I went up to Oslo, Norway and that's where my life changed. Because the girl there,

Tove, took me to a club called the Key Club. And I walked in and it was a great club, beautiful, packed and DJ was behind the booth and he comes on and he goes, okay, welcome to the Key Club. If anyone's ready, we're going to put on some Barry White. He said, he's English. She said, all the good DJs in Norway are English. And they all had to talk between the songs.

Because all the songs were English or American. And so if they came on and spoke in Norwegian and said, Nuvviskaspillen and Maddy Beidtplater, it would have been like taking you out of the mix. So I said, do you know the owner owner so I met with the owner and he said Yeah, I'm looking for a DJ at the weekends And then we're walking out of the club and this guy came up to me And he said I'm an agent and I booked DJs. I heard you talking about that

He said would you do a demo for me if I can set it up? And I said sure I suppose why not with this guy he goes because he won't get your work permit yeah he said you're gonna work for four to six weeks he's not gonna pay you then you get deported he said I'll get your work permit wow and he said I I book a hundred clubs across Europe he said if you want I can send you all over Europe you want to go to Austria you want to go to Switzerland you want to go to Sweden Norway Denmark you tell me you're there he said but you got to go to Switzerland, you want to go to Sweden, Norway, Denmark, you tell me, you're there.

He said, but you've got to get the gig first. So he booked a restaurant, brought in a mobile system, put flyers up around Oslo, free night of dancing, new English DJ, Dick Shepherd, that was my name at the time. And I went in and I thought, God, crank it. And at the end of the night I was hired and that started my two years touring Europe. Speaking of, because your last name is Shepherd,

your born name is British Shepherd. And for a while, I understand, I don't have the details on it, but you were disco dick. I was disco dick. You were disco dick. Yes. Now, was that a punishment? Like, did you get, were you arrested

and that became what the judge sentenced you to? It actually worked at the time until I went to Austria. And I was standing in the DJ booth and this vision in white came up to me. Her name was Taxi and we ended up together for the whole time I was in Austria and we're still in contact to this day.

She read my autobiography and got in touch with me and when I wrote Slapped in Sand, she did the German translation for me. But she came up to me and said, Dubisch nisch dick. And I went, what? She said, Dubisch nisch dick. And I said, no, I'm dick.

And she goes, that's my poster right there. And she goes, in German, dick means fat. And I was like, oh my God. Everyone's coming to see a fat guy, disco fatty. You know? But apart from Germany, it worked well, yeah. Well, were you playing disco music at the time? All disco.

Oh, it was all disco at the time. Disco was breaking. So there were staples that I was playing, like All Right Now from Free, Satisfaction from the Rolling Stones, Back in the USSR from the Beatles, but Van McCoy was coming out with The Hustle, Barry White came out with Love's Theme,

and that was- More, more, more? How do you like it? And your True Connection, yeah, more. How do you like it? And your true connection. Yeah. On the floor. Yeah. Yeah.

So I would mix it all in. The idea was just to keep the people dancing and having a great time. Yeah. So as long as the floor was full and then you would deliberately kind of ease the floor down a little so people could go to the bar because- Yeah. Right. Right.

That's the main deal is sell drinks. but then you got that one record in your back pocket and then when you put that on you see everyone's head go and they race back yeah yeah and so you know I I was pretty good at doing that and so all the clubs wanted me back because they made money and stuff like that and but it was amazing watching disco explode. And I remember putting on Donna Summer, I feel love for the first time and how it just revolutionized the clubs. And then, um, when the Bee Gees came out with you should be dancing.

That was such a massive song. And that was, you know, a year and a half before Saturday night fever. It was actually that song that got them signed with Robert Stigwood to do Saturday Night Fever. But it was a wonderful wild time in my life. And people often say to me, if you could go back in time, what part of the 80s would you go to?

And I go, 75, Bergen, Norway. Where were you? How did your parents stand on this part of your life? You know, you get out of university and then you're traipsing around, you know, picking up blondes and playing music at night, too late at night, you know? Dad was thrilled for me. Yeah.

Dad had wanted to travel the world. Mom didn't like planes and wouldn't get on boats. So if you live on an island, you're screwed. Right. And England, unfortunately, Britain is an island. Right, right. So dad couldn't go abroad. She can't even really go to Ireland. No, she could. So if you live on an island, you're screwed. And England, unfortunately, Britain is an island. So dad couldn't go abroad. She can't even really go to Ireland.

No, she couldn't. And we have Irish roots. Oh wow. Her people are from there and she can't go. I'm working on an Irish passport right now because of everything that's going on. Sure, why not? But she didn't want to travel.

And so dad was thrilled. He was living vicariously through me. And at one point I said, look, come on out and visit me. And mom said, oh, God, do that. Can we do that bridge? And dad said, look, Mary, we'll drive to Dover. We'll wait for the calmest day. If it takes a month, we'll just get a bed and breakfast there. We'll drive to Dover. We'll wait for the calmest day.

If it takes a month, we'll just get a bed and breakfast there. And it's 20 miles from Dover to Calais. It's 26 miles to Catalina. So I'm pushing for space. Exactly. He said, when it's really calm, Mary, we'll take the boat over to Calais. Because what if the boat sinks? Because mum honestly thought that God was watching her her and if she got on a plane, he

would crash that plane. Yeah. If she got on a boat, you know, forget the other people, they had no, you know, God wouldn't care about her. But dad convinced her, he said, look, we'll get on the boat. They went across, went over to Calais and then traveled through Europe and they took their car with them. And then they drove up to Denmark and we had the best time.

I was in Copenhagen with them and they stayed with me. And then we went up to Helsingør, which is just north of Copenhagen. And where Hamlet is based. Absolutely, Elsinore. Yeah, exactly. And I would go, I took them to Castle Elsinore. Yes.

Yeah, it was wonderful. And they loved it so much that the next year they came over when I was DJing in Spain and doing a summer in Spain and they stayed with me there. So dad was like, mom never knew but dad was like, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. But he gave me. Did she ever ever admit that maybe you know her fear was? no. She was a different generation. Yeah. I never heard her say the word sorry in her life. You know, she was born in 1917. Same year as dad, but that was different.

That was more willing to change. Yeah. She was more of the, you know, the old school English, you know, the old school where you get your leg blown off in battle. Yeah. Oh, my God. Don't get your leg blown off in battle. Yeah. And they go, oh my God, don't worry, it's just a scratch. Yeah, yeah. I'll be okay in the morning.

You know, you can never talk about anything that is not perfect. Yeah. You know, and if it is perfect, God forbid you talk about it because everyone will think you're boasting. Right, right. The conversation is limited to the weather.

Yes. So, but dad was a lot more open than that and he was into music. Yeah. So when I came over to America, I had, I was getting, I was on all the record company mailing lists because I was DJing to quite a big audience

in the clubs that were willing to buy records. And so they would send me advanced copies of everything. And when I came to America, dad obviously couldn't send me 40 albums a week, I guess, because he'd go bankrupt in a day. AMA was expensive. But he would listen to everything. And he would pick out one or two of the best ones,

and he would send them over to me. And he'd say, I think you'll like this one. It's a band with a French name, but I think they're English. They're called Depeche Mode. You might want to check them out. And this band, the song is Tears for Fears, Mad World. And I'm not sure about this one,

if it's the name of the band or the name of the song, because they say the words in the song and it's Talk Talk. And he sent me all these and I was able to play them first on K-Rod because they were not even released yet. It was fantastic. But he was my- And it was all due to your, to Reg. To Reg Shepard, yeah.

He would listen to everything ahead of time and then just select the best ones and send them to me. No, you're blessed to have a father with good taste. He was fantastic. He drove me to Newton Abbot Which is seven miles away from Torquay because that's a big station there So I didn't have to change trains Torquay to Newton Abbot little shuttle train sure change He drove me to Newton Abbot on the day. I was going up to London to fly to

America on TWA he drove me there and he he said just your mother couldn't come she's just too upset And I said, I know, but give her a kiss. I told her I love her, and she goes, she knows it. She knows it, and he goes, listen son, you did it in Europe, but America's different. They're a lot bigger over there. He said, so you be careful. And he said, but anything goes wrong.

I'm always here for you, you can come back for any reason. And I was like, I love you, dad. I'm gonna see you over there. can come back for any reason." And I was like, I love you, dad. I'm going to see you over there. Yeah. And he said, I hope so. And he came over twice before he died. So that's great. And he loved it here. Loved it. He loved America. What sort of feathered your landing, you know, like here in the US? What brought you to decide, well, I'm going to go to the States.

You know, enough Europe, I'm going to try it there. Well, I was a kid growing up dreaming of America because all my favorite TV shows apart from Doctor Who were American. Yeah. You know, I love Lucy, Beverly Hillbillies, Man from Uncool, all of that kind of stuff. And it was all America. And my huge hero when I was like six, seven years old, was the same hero that everyone had in Europe and Britain, John Fitzgerald Kennedy. You know, he was the guy who saved the world from nuclear war.

And at the time, England had the third biggest nuclear arsenal on the planet. Now we have the fourth after China, because China's come up. But we knew that if America and Russia went to war, because we're permanent allies with America, the missiles would be landing on us first. Seven years old, we were doing the duck and cover drills.

Like that's gonna protect you from a H-bomb. Right, right. Yeah, this is a good solid desk, son. But so Kennedy was a huge hero of mine. And I thought, wow, if America can make people like Kennedy, then I should think about going to America. Yeah. I always joke that when I was born

and the doctor held me upside down and slapped me on the bottom to make me cry. And he goes, it's the boy, Mrs. Shepherd. My first words were, oh shit, he's got an English accent, you know, wrong country. But America was always in the back of my mind. You always had that, like when you made that list of 10 things, America was part of that. Always, yeah. And when I was in Europe and I'd done all the clubs and I'd gone back to all the clubs I wanted to go back to,

which I loved, I wanted to get into radio and in Austria, in addition to taxi, there was, I got a Friday night show on German radio on Utreich, which is Utreich 3, which is a pop network. And I was there doing it for two months while I was at the club. But I was a novelty act. I was an English speaking guy in a German country.

Yeah. And I thought if I'm going to do radio has to be an English speaking country. And so I put a list together, Canada, America, South Africa, New Zealand, Australia. Yeah. England was not, I didn't want to go back to England because of the weather and everything like that. Well, and it still is, it was still limited. It was still Australia. Yeah. England was not, I didn't want to go back to England. Yeah. Because of the weather and everything like that. Well, and it still is, it was still limited. It was still limited. Yeah.

Yeah. Because, you know, the government runs the radio. Yeah. So yeah, there's not a lot of DJs. Exactly. So I thought I'm going to start at the top. There's nothing bigger than America. Um, you know, biggest country in the world, entertainment capital of the world,

et cetera. And so I looked at the cities and the three cities it came down to were New York, Miami and Los Angeles. And Miami had great weather, didn't know about the humidity and the hurricanes at the time. But it wasn't a really big city. There was outside of South Beach,

there wasn't much going on at the time. Now it's very different. New York had terrible winters on the TV. I would always see it back in winter storms. And Death Wish with Charles Bronson just come out. I was like, I might want to be brave, but I'm not gonna be that brave, no way. So, and LA had Hollywood.

So, I mean, just driving here today is everything I dream of. You know, you see everything, you know, incredible. So I thought, let's try Los Angeles. If I can make it there, that would be fantastic. So that's how I ended up here. And fairly quickly, you end up being a pretty big deal. But not on radio.

Not on radio? No, no, I couldn't get arrested on radio Yeah, I went to every radio station. I took them demos Just before I left England I had two calls from radio stations that were starting up to ask if I wanted to go and interview their Program controller is they hold them there for a a program controller, as they call them there, for an announcer position. But I would have had to cancel my flight,

and I was like, no, I'm too deep in it now. And so it would be an easy way out as well. But here I was rejected by everyone. They all said, you'll never work in this town with that accent. And so I did what I knew I had to do. I went and started working in clubs. Disco was just starting.

And there was hardly any DJs outside of the gay clubs that played disco. The gay DJs were fantastic. I mean, they knew their stuff. But the restaurants that were opening were kind of prejudiced at the time. And it was like, no, we've got a white collar group here coming in. Right.

So I went in and auditioned for the plank house in San Pedro and they hired me on the spot and they said, we can get you a work permit. Cause they had a part of a company called far west services. They had about 160 restaurants. Oh wow. So they knew how to get work permits and everything.

So within four days, I was at the federal building in downtown Los Angeles and filed my papers. And then they gave me a number and they said, okay, go upstairs, get your fingerprint taken, get your photographs taken and they'll give you an appointment. So, and then come back down, give it to us. So I got the appointment and the appointment was for June. And this was in November, this was December the 20th. Yeah. We were closing down for Christmas.

So I went back down, I gave them all my paperwork and the number and that. And I said, this is my, this is my appointment. They go, great. Well, we'll see you in June. So, well, but I'm got a job. Yeah. And they said, yeah, we, you'll, you can work, you know, if you get stopped by the police or anything, because it wasn't ICE at the time. If you, you know, then just give them the number. Just remember you can't commit any felonies. You can make any felonies.

Oh boy. What a damper. Yeah. And you can't use any social services because you can't be a drain on the economy. I said, no, that's fair enough. And I said, well, in that case, I just go ahead and work. And they said, yeah, it's a great area. Just go ahead and work. And then in June, if everything goes right, you'll get your green card. I said, terrific. So should I not pay taxes then?

Because I'm not in the country officially and the guy goes, oh no, you've got to pay taxes. You think we're bad, the IRS will get you out in a day. So pay the taxes and they said, we just look the other way. As long as you've got that number. That's how it was then. And so, and it helped that I had two degrees.

Oh, really? Yeah, because I came in on like a privileged thing. Right, right. As well as having a job and the employer had been looking for more than six weeks for a DJ. And sponsored you. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, yeah. So, you know, I'm very careful. I was actually pulled over one time driving to downtown Los Angeles for going too slow on the freeway. I told him, I said, I'm sorry, I'm just just over here and I'm looking at the lights. The Bonaventure was towering huge at the time. Now you can't even find it. It's so small. 35 floors and the policeman said, well you've got to go above 50. But I'm like, Oh, okay. All right. No problem. Yeah. But, um,

but then in June, I went in for my interview and, uh, walked in and the guy looked at the paperwork and he goes, stand up. You're really tall for a jockey. And I said, no, no, I'm a disc jockey. And he goes, Oh, I'm sorry. He goes, how tall are you? And I said, I'm six, two. Yeah. And he goes, my son's six, two. He goes, he's born the same year as you. And I said, yeah. And he goes, how tall are you? And I said, I'm 6'2". And he goes, my son's 6'2". He goes, he was born the same year as you. And I said, yeah. And he goes, I'll be back. Takes my paperwork, takes the photograph

and the unlaminated green card and walks out. That was my whole interview. I was the same height as his son and you like me. And he came back in, the car was getting laminated. He goes, okay, I'm gonna ask you three or four questions, just formalities, do you plan now or in the future to overturn the legally elected government of the United States?

Let me think about that. Maybe now, no, no, I don't. And that was it basically. And I walked out with my green card. Well, who ends up breaking that stupid, you know, that's, you know, like sort of, well, it's just given, it's a given they can't handle an accent. Right. Los Angeles listeners, who's the first person that says, no, actually, and if you, it's

not so much now, but when I first came here to live in the early, late 80s, early 90s, every, it seemed like every radio ad, like they could not get enough English and Australian accents. And it occurred to me, you know, young actor, I'm like, man, you could come here, especially, it seemed like I would hear a lot of, just like for car insurance companies, Australian voices.

And I just think, if you had a nice voice and you come here with an accent, you know, and I think you probably opened the door for that. A little bit, yeah. But my breakthrough was K-West, which is now Power. But back then it was K-West 106. We're having a contest for the best unknown DJ. Yeah.

You had to send in a 10-minute cassette, and they were a rock station. So I put together a 10-minute cassette and then I finished it with a remix of another brick in the wall from Pink Floyd. So it was like a 10 minute bonus. I said, that was my audition. And just for fun, here's a little remix of Pink Floyd. And I thought that's either gonna sink my ship

because they're gonna go, how dare you take Pink Floyd. Big swing, yeah. But they really liked it. And so I was sitting with my girlfriend in Redondo Beach where we were, I had my little apartment on Perseo de la Playa, and we're listening to the results being read out, and they said, number three, number two,

number one, Dick Shepard. Ah! So I got one, I got $10,000. Wow. And one hour on the air. Wow. And the guy on the air with me was JJ Jackson from oh yeah MTV of course lovely yeah lovely human being and

He I prepared a playlist and he said well, we actually have our own playlist But he looked at mine he goes we play yours. It was all songs. I knew yeah that k-west played It wasn't you know, I wasn't coming in, putting in Barry White or anything like that. Trying to change the format. Yeah, it was 38 Special and Van Halen, stuff like that. And so put it together and Katie was at home, my girlfriend taping the show, but JJ ran four tapes for me, two called Skim Tapes,

which was just me talking and then two seconds of the music. Yeah. And then, cause no program director is going to listen to a whole song. Of course. Cause they got the song. Yeah. And two unskimmed, the full thing. And at the end of the time, we, you know, shook hands and main friends afterwards. And so I sent the tape out of me on K-West to a bunch of stations outside of LA first. I sent it to San Diego, to San Francisco, Bakersfield.

Two days later, I get a call from Bakersfield. And they said, hey, it's Dave Lawrence here, the program director of Magic 98. Would you like to talk? So I came out and met with him and they hired me as the music director and the evening guy. And then I was like, okay, I kind of come from a disco background and you're a hard rock station.

Yeah, that's our logo, Rock of the Valley. Yeah. I said, so what's the criteria for adding music? What do you want me to find? And he goes, okay. He pulls out Ted Nugent, double live gonzo, and he puts the needle in the middle of Wang Dang, Sweet Poon Tang.

And he goes, that's as mellow as we get. So at night, you couldn't place their way to heaven. It was too mellow. You would play that during the day. At night, it was balls to the wall, ACDC, Black Sabbath, Nugent, and Motorhead and bands like that. But I told them when they hired me, I said I'm gonna be here for a year,

and then I'm gonna leave because I can't stay in Bakersfield. I wanna move up in radio. And Dave Lawrence, the program director, he left after six months, went to a station in Texas. And so they moved me to mornings and program director, and we got our ratings, and the ratings were really good for the station. And so then moved me to mornings and program director and we got our ratings and the ratings were really good for the station.

And so then I quit. I said, I'm going back to LA and they said, well, you don't like working with us. I said, no, you guys are fantastic. You're lovely people, but it's Bakersfield. And they said, well, we have a station in San Luis Obispo. And I said, well, San Luis Obispo is a tiny market Bakers feels like 50th in America San Luis Obispo is a hundred and 70th like I'm not going that direction right the other way and they said yeah

But we're gonna get rated for the first time we're gonna Arbitron ratings, which is the be all and end all for radio that's how they know how many people are listening and get the commercial load, et cetera. And I said, no, it's not interested. And he said, we'll fly you out there if you want to see the station. What? You'll fly me out? Yeah, we'll get a private plane, fly out. So I'm like, wow. And it wasn't a jet. It was a little pipe truck. Sure, of course. It's not that far. Yeah, just over the mountains, you know. And we landed in San Luis Obispo. Which is beautiful.

Beautiful, right on the coast. And it's the beginning of summer. And the station was great, good equipment, better than Bakersfield. And I go for a walk through the town for lunch. I'm going to take that for lunch. I'm walking through the town. Every girl in this town is a supermodel. I mean, just ridiculous.

We sit down for lunch. A recurring theme in Richard's life. We sit down for lunch and Mark Driscoll looks at me and he says, you know, we really want you to do it. You'll do mornings and you'll be the program director. And he said, just take us through the ratings period. That's all we want you to do, you know, and we want to, we'd like to come in number two against, um, uh, K-sly, which was this country music monster.

They dominated the central coast. We can get a good number two. That's all we want. I said, and I'm like, my brain is over here and I'm like, can I ask you a question? He said, yeah, well, and I said, all those girls. I said, there's so many good looking girls. And he said, Oh, they're from Carl Polly. So this is a university.

Yeah. He said, these are all college girls. I said, so let me just get this straight. We're the only pop and rock station because it popped during the day, rock and roll in town. And you want me to do morning drive during the day rock in town and you want me to do morning drive and the only station in town that these girls are gonna be listening to is Z93 he said yeah I'm in here baby and so I went to

Z93 and I put together a promotion I went to the local Nissan dealer and I said, give me a Z and we'll give it away on the air and we'll give you free ads for three months. Oh, wow. And we'll talk about you four times an hour. And so they gave us a two year old Z, but it was in, you know, what, what? Close enough. Close enough. It's free.

And so we did this big promotion on the air, winner Z from Z93. And you'd put your sticker on the car and we would announce every 30 minutes, the license plate of the car and you had 10 minutes to call in. And everyone, every time we did it, someone called in, it's my car, it's my car, it's great. So they'd be qualified for the grand prize drawing

at the end of the three months. And so this went on and we just got a good buzz going. We thought we're gonna do it. We'll pull in at number two. We'll pull in at number two. And finally we got to the end of the ratings period. So we did the giveaway that weekend afterwards and fantastic for once the winner was actually in the crowd.

Oh wow. Nothing worse and the winner is Steve Williams. Wow, we'll call him later. Yeah, okay, thanks. Thanks for coming all you people. But he was there and he was thrilled and he got photographs of the press and everything. And then we had that two week wait for the numbers. So I'm doing the morning show and I'm getting towards the end of the show and the phone rings and it's Rogers Brandon is the name of the owner and Rogers, I don't know why the extra S but it's his name because we got the ratings. I'm going to come

in and see you about it. Oh, fuck. Yeah, he was not happy. Yeah. So he came in and I said, do we get number two? And he goes, no, he goes we did not and I said, oh, because we're number one I said what he goes case like got a five. We got a 27 Wow. I was like, holy shit He said I want you to go in the air right now interrupt Harlan show Harlan the wingnut he was on mid days and just say, you're listening to the number one station, the central coast. He goes, the next year is going to be

fantastic for us. I was like, um, for you, I'm leaving. And that's when I headed back to Los Angeles. So I left with those ratings and there was like, we've got good ratings in Bakersfield. Give me a chance. Just give me a chance. I got number one in, in San Luis Obispo.

Hopefully I can do something for you. Yeah. Well, you had to prove that awful accent of yours couldn't stop LA listeners from tuning in. Yeah. Oh my God, get that radio. Now you become, I mean, because today, and you've been working there for like 20 years now at SiriusXM, correct?

Yeah, I started in 2003 and we had 235,000 subscribers. That was it, nothing. And now we're past 30 million. Yeah. I know. And you work for the 80s channel and for First Wave. No, just for First Wave. Oh, just for First Wave now? Just for First Wave, yeah.

Dad, did you work for any other channel on the? I did the Spectrum for a while. And I like the music, but it's not really my style. First Wave, I know the bands, I get to talk with them all the time. I mean, I do a lot of interviews from like today, before I came here, I was interviewing Gary Kemp from Spandau Ballet, his new album.

And then two days ago, guys from Le Mange, the song Living on the Ceiling, I'm up the bloody tree because they're playing at Cruel World and OMD the same day. So I keep in contact with these bands. And so that's really my forte. I mean, I could work for another channel, but I would be... Out of your element. Yeah, I'd be using notes and pretending. I'd rather be real.

What is it about this music that, because you start, you know, you start, you're playing, you know, rock and roll, you know, Stones, Beatles, then you're into disco. But this is the music that, like, this is the music that is Richard Blades music. Everyone you're connected to. And why is that? Why did that happen? And you know. I think a lot of the reason I love it so much

is because I think it stands the test of time. I think the two decades that are really important in music are the 60s and the 80s. And at the time in the 80s, I did not think it was gonna stand the test of time. I thought it was gonna be disposable pop. And I was wrong. I mean, when I do a live gig,

nobody ever asked me for a song from the 90s. I've never been asked for Soundgarden at a gig. But I have been asked for A-ha at every gig, and Depeche, and Duran, and The Cure, and New Order, and the Pet Shop Boys. And people love it, and it's not just 50, 60-year-olds who are asking, kids will come up, and I'm like, I see a 14 or 15-year-old kid

walking towards my little DJ booth if I'm doing a private party for, for dad. And the kid will come up and I'm like, okay, here we go. It's Taylor Swift and DJ Khalid. And he'll come up and go, could you play Taylor Swift? I'll go, sure. And do you have a take on me and Kate Bush running up that hill? I'm like, yeah.

And I'll put on take on me and he'll be out on the floor with all of his friends, boys and girls that age, and they know every single word. And it's amazing how it stood the test of time. If it was just me who liked it, I would say, well, hey, that's just my bag, my thing. But everyone seems to love it. And how many times you put on a TV commercial, I mean, is it GM or whatever right now it's using in excess don't change. And how many times you put on a TV commercial, I mean, is it GM or whatever right now it's using in excess don't change. And when they're driving in the car, you even see on the display,

in excess don't change. That must've been part of the deal to use the song. But the songs are everywhere. Yeah. It's amazing. Yeah. And a lot of these bands are touring. I mean, we'll get to you touring with them right now.

Do you think that the fact that you're English and so many of these bands are English, do you think that there's a tie there that you're sort of like a natural emissary for? Absolutely. Yeah. 100%. I think, you know, K-Rock, when I got into K-Rock in 82, it was on the bubble. It was, it had like a one, three, one one four rating, not very big, but it was bubbling.

People were talking about it. It wasn't me that broke K-Rock, but when I joined K-Rock and I was there to bring in the records that dad had sent me all these new ones as well. It was just a lucky happening that everything came together at the same time. Suddenly, there's this station in LA that's playing mostly British music. We did play American music, Berlin, Go-Go's, Missing Persons,

Sparks, all this stuff. Boingo, Social D. X. Yeah. But there's no, oh, it has to be British. But suddenly, there's a British guy on the air at a station that's playing the music that's breaking right now, which is mostly British.

And a lot of help came from MTV and MV3 because the videos at the time were mostly British because in America, they didn't have that many videos. But in England, we had top of the Pops from 1967 onwards. And if you couldn't play, you know, if you had a hit on Top of the Pops, you were number one for six weeks. They didn't want you in every week

to play out the number one song. They'd say, could you send us a clip? You know, that's what they called them. Could you send us a clip? And so they would make videos. I remember with the doors, riders on the storm, they had a guy from the horse guards parade in the full uniform and the entire video was him

in the rain just trotting through Hyde Park. But it was kind of like, cool. Right, something else to look at. Yeah, but like Rod Stewart did a lot of videos and Elton John did a lot of videos. So when MTV started up, they said, we'll play anything you can get. So there were all these British acts that now

that had already made this thing they didn't even name yet. And all these directors that knew how to do videos. So they were able to get together with Duran Duran and say, we'll do your video for you. Spana Ballet, we'll do it. Culture Club, we'll do it. And they were incredible videos. Of course, America caught up really quick

and you'd see Michael Jackson doing Beat It, or Billie Jean, and then of course Thriller, and wow, Madonna videos. But in the early days, it was the British videos and the British music and being the British guy on the radio, it worked really well. And then our program director, Rick Carroll, after the ratings started to come in and the ratings

for K-Rot went through the roof, he syndicated the format to 15 stations and in each station, an English guy in the morning. Yeah. So it was like, hey. Yeah, yeah. And one of them, a lovely, lovely human being called Steve West in San Diego

Who passed away about three years ago again cancer? He was one of the sweetest guys great talent on the air But he would always say I only got my job because of Richard blade Wow and But he kept his job because of his talent. Yeah, sure You know, he might have I might have helped him in yeah but he kept it because he was great at what he did but Rick Carroll's kind of thought hey if we're playing so much of this music Why not have someone who sounds like right they know what they're talking about. Yeah kind of like when I was in Norway if we're playing

English music and American music have someone who speaks English or between right exactly Now you've also you've written a number of books. Yeah. You've written for television shows, you know, and acted a little bit. Oh, badly, badly. Well, but you know, still. Now, all these things, was this just sort of gravy for you? Or were these all sort of like unmet desires

that you had had before and where, you know, like DJing is nice, but I want a little bit more than that. Well, yeah, no one's asked me that before. That's a great question. I'm a really good interviewer. You are. I went to interview school. There you go, a degree in.

Yes, yes. No, it was something I wanted to do. I wanted to see if I could act. Yeah. I did drama at college for a while. And after working with people like Sarah Jessica Parker and Jamie Gertz and a lot of people like that, I knew I would never be a good actor. I could never get into the character.

I was too busy remembering my line rather than being in the moment. Losing yourself. Yeah, exactly. So, and it's not false modesty, it's the truth. You can tell, you see certain people on the screen and you're just drawn to them. And it's not necessarily their looks,

it's the way they can present themselves and I could never Certainly at the time I could have never gotten into that so right but it's something I wanted to try and something I wanted to do and I Enjoyed hosting I loved doing the TV shows and that because that would just be being me Yeah, not trying to be you know, psycho killer and hunter, right? I was Killed by Fred Dyer. Oh wow. But the book side, I wanted to write my autobiography because I wanted to tell the early years. It's a great read. It's really fun. I've been approached by publishers a bunch

of times asking, would you tell your story of time with Depeche Mode and then how they formed and everything like that? And I'm like, no, because there's a lot of people that are a lot better than me at researching and can tell the Depeche Mode story and then work in a little personal thread. And the same with Duran, I didn't wanna do it. I said, what I'd like to do is tell my story

and all the times I was in Europe touring, where are you going? You know? Yeah, yeah. They didn't want to hear. Yeah, yeah. And then I got approached by an independent publisher who said, my wife's a huge fan.

She thinks you should write a book. And so I tried, I said, let me try. I've never, I'd written a couple of screenplays and had a movie produced, but I'd never written a book. And so I sat down and wrote two chapters, you know, of things I knew I would want in the book. Not necessarily starting out the beginning. Just like. Absolutely.

Absolutely. One was Spandau Ballet. I went on tour with them in Australia, the parade just like yeah. Absolutely. One was Spandau Ballet. I went on tour with them in Australia, the parade tour in 1985 and it was a great time. And so I wrote that one and called it I'll Fly for You, which was a Spandau song. And then I wrote a second one of Music for the Masses of Depeche Mode at the Rose Bowl. And I looked at them and I went, it's not awful. Let me start at the beginning. So I started at the beginning

and I thought I'm gonna write it. Oh, then I read a couple of autobiographies, couple more. My all time favorite autobiography, two favorite autobiographies is My Wicked Wicked Ways by Errol Flynn. And I actually used that line at one point. And then I reverted to My Wicked Wicked Ways. And the other one is The Ranked Man's Son, Kirk Douglas. Oh, yeah. Fantastic. And I liked them because they read like a novel. And I thought when I write it,

I want it to read like a novel. I don't want it to be boring. I want it to be that Susan is reading it in bed and her husband goes, could you just turn the lights off? She'll say, I just gotta start the next chapter because this left me hanging. I wanted it to be like that.

And so the book came out and it debuted number one in America, number seven worldwide. I couldn't believe it. It was crazy, crazy. And I was thrilled about it. And so I started on the audio book, but I'm not in chapter one. The chapter one is what England was like

and my mom giving birth. And so I thought I'm gonna get someone else to read chapter one. And a good friend of mine is the tour manager for Duran Duran. I know all the guys from Duran. And he goes, have John do it, John Taylor. And I'd gone on a book tour with John

to help him promote it. And I went up to a book tour with John to help him promote it and went up to San Francisco with him. So I called him up and I said, would you read chapter one? And he goes, yeah. He goes, I love it. I love it. He said, I'd love your book. He'd read it already. Yeah. He said, I'll come over to your house and do it. So he came over and he sat down and he did chapter one and then I said, thank you so much John. He goes, do you want me to read my other parts? So what, what'd you mean? He goes, well, I'm in the book and quoted.

Yeah. And he goes, I'll read them and do you want me to get the guys to do it too? I was like, holy shit. So then I changed everything because suddenly I went after everybody. Right. And everyone did their own parts. Oh, that's great. And I mean, I sat there with Terry nunn from Berlin. Yeah, and we went through our whole breakup

Scene Wow together and it was like we're both sitting there crying as we're doing boy I know it was it was crazy, but then that was the audiobook and and I I people's Really enjoyed the read and then I thought okay let me try a novel and I'd written a bunch of screenplays that had not gone out never been seen you know because I didn't have a decent agent and so I went to one that was an alternate history one called SPQR which is is a Roman science, what they had on their banners. And I often say, it was the first thing you would see

and maybe the last thing you would see, depending how the Romans were that day. And so I wrote this alternate history one, SPQR, and that did really well as well. And so now I start pulling down all my old screenplays and it's great because it gives you the bones for the novel. For a novel, yeah.

Yeah. And you're not tied to 120 or less pages. Yeah, sure. Which is awful in a screenplay unless you're Martin Scorsese or something like that. Could we do it 109? But then we have to lease these three scenes. Yeah, I know.

Yeah, but so I was thrilled writing the novels as well. So I've done five novels and then four non-fiction books. Is there anything left undone for you? I mean, do you still have things that, you know, feel like, I got to get to that at some point? That's the scary thing. You know, there's a show on Max, HBO, called Hacks. Mm-hmm.

Brilliant show. Yeah, I love it. And yeah, we're three-quarters of the way through season three. And the older actress is in the Lost in a Forest with her assistant. Right. And she says, you know, you could always do that later. And she says, not at my age. There is no later, there's only now.

And for me, there's a movie in process, but it's Hollywood, everyone's got a movie in process. And that's 99% of the time it's bullshit And so I don't ever believe anything until I'm sitting in the seat and it goes dumb. Yeah You know and starts I always used to say I don't believe it until they send a car to pick me up Andy yeah when I sold long lost son, uh-huh. I Did not believe it. We went through the casting and we cast Gabriel Anwar. We found this unknown kid called Chase Crawford who was just fantastic and now you know Gossip

Girl and the boys is brilliant. And then the director said we did a table read and we went through with them and then at the end of the table read this that there was a character in it. I forget his name at the time. It was a nest or something and they changed it later. And the director said to me, he goes, I want you to change a nest of character. I said, okay, because I want him to be about 40, not in his sixties and I want him to be really good looking and Australian and I want him to be really good looking and Australian.

And I want you to play him. And I went, well, good day, mate. But I still didn't believe it. And they were shooting in the Caribbean. I didn't believe it until they sent me the plane ticket. And once I got the plane ticket, I was working at star 98.7 at the time which I hated, my worst time in radio ever and I went to the program director and put plane tickets down and

goes I sold a movie I'm going to be in the movie as well and I wrote it and I'm going to be gone for a month. Okay don't like you anyway you know so she's like don't come back yeah yeah yeah yeah I came back but yeah but I didn't believe it I didn't tell anyone about it yeah but but there's one in process and it's based on no more words oh great the chapter of Terry and I and a huge huge huge producer has picked it up if anyone can make it he can make it great Great. But, you know, it only takes one no. Yeah, of course. Everyone has to keep saying yes every step of the way. Well, fingers crossed. I know. If it does happen, then that would be the icing on the cake. Yeah. So what do you think is the best lesson you've learned or, or, you know, sort of the main thing that you take away from, from the best lesson is something I forgot to put in the

first book. And so I put out an expanded version of world in my eyes, which is also a great doorstop. It's so thick. I looked at it and said, I've got to rewrite War and Peace to make it bigger now. But it's 750 pages now. Wow. I know. I put a hundred more photos in and more chapters.

But after a word in my eyes came out, Krista said, you didn't put in your favorite saying. I went, don't. So I had to put that in. And it was something my father said to me. And it was when I was looking for my first job in Torquay to work in a hotel. And I went to all these tiny little hotels and sleazy little bed and breakfast, seeing if I could get a job. And a lot of them said, yeah, you know, cause a sleazy little bed and breakfast, you know. And I got home, dad, dad, I got these four places. It went, dad looks at me and he goes, why didn't you go to the Imperial?

Why didn't you go to the palace? Why didn't you go to the rainbow? It's because they're too big. They just say no. Dad looked at me and he goes, son, the answer to any question you don't ask. Is always no. He said, so you're the one who's just said no. Yeah.

So you go to those places tomorrow. You go and you ask if you can get a job there. Yeah. And I was like, okay. So Imperial went there, five star hotel Beatles stayed there. No, went to Conway court, incredible view of the Bay. Yeah, you can work here. Oh wow. And that changed my life. Yeah, you can work here. Oh wow.

And that changed my life. Yeah. And I figured, why not? The answer to any question you don't ask is always no. And it served me great on Friday nights in a club with a hot chick, and it's served me great knocking on doors and asking for a job, you know? I mean, you just be nice about it.

Yeah, yeah. You say, no, you know, I'm sorry I think you were single. Right. No, I'm not, okay. Well, that You know, they say, no, you go, oh, you know, oh, sorry, I thought you were single. No, I'm not, okay. Well, that's great, but look, terrific. And, you know, but the same with, why not? Shoo for the moon. It's, well, and I mean, it's also, it's so interesting too, that you had your dad

to inspire you like that, but you also had kind of your mom's fear as a negative example. You had both sides. And I hear it. Yeah. I hear it. You know, I love to swim. I'd like to do distance swims.

When I'm in Mexico, my friend Peter comes down and we do these about mile and a half swims around the headland. And when I do them by myself, I'm swimming and I hear dad going dad going I love swimming with you son because dad was a great swimmer too yeah I hear mom going you have your depth if you go down now you're drowned yeah I hear both voices in my head and it's really really a strange dichotomy right that going on well you listen to the one that's served you, you know? So, let me hit this. You are touring with Howard Jones and ABC through February. Yeah.

Lead singing. Yeah, I'm taking over. I'm gonna teach Howard how to hit the notes. Do you do a DJ set before the show? But I'm gonna do a special DJ set. I don't wanna stand behind the DJ console and wave my hands around and just hit play. Yeah. I previewed what I wanted to do. I had this idea and I previewed it at the House of Blues

on New Year's Eve in Anaheim and ironically I'll be there coming up this weekend and I used video as well. And I did, I came out and talked to the crowd and I said, we're gonna do a history of music. And I talked to them, but I didn't tell them what song I was going into. And people were just like, I'd say, New Wave started not in 1980. It started in the seventies.

No one knows when the eighties really started. I said, for me, it started with two acts, one of them in Germany in 1972. And that act pioneered the use of early synthesizers, early middies and wild stage performances. And so many groups followed them later. Said, but they never broke big outside of Germany because they sang in German.

That group and people were starting going, craft work. And then you hit pocket calculator and you see them dancing around and crazy. And then that stops, you know and play about a minute of it. And I say, if you look at that, you can see Devo in there, the way they're dancing. Yeah, sure.

And you can hear so many bands that were to follow. Yeah, but they couldn't break out. They couldn't be big. So it took another European four years later, a producer by the name of Giorgio Moroder, who came up with the song, but he knew it had to be in English. So he found an American lead singer and they put it together and it was Donna Summer, I Feel Love.

And that comes on and everyone in the room starts dancing. It's crazy. And then I said all across Britain and Europe, this music changed things in people's mind. Suddenly they wanted to play synthesizers. And there was one band in Liverpool in particular that said, this is what we're gonna do. And they bought a synthesizer from a Sears catalog

for 36 months, seven pounds, 99 a month to pay for it and started to play but there was only one club in Liverpool they could play at called Eriks and then they went to Manchester and played the Hacienda and it was there they got signed by Tony Wilson and they put out their first single and the single flopped and they put it out a second time and it flopped They put it out third time it hit the British charts at 99 and then disappeared but the critics had loved it and the audience has loved it and even today the audience has loved it they close all of their sets with this song but people said if this song can't break

then synthesizers are just a fad mm And that song is called Electricity, the band OMD. Yeah, they put that on and people just, oh my God, they're dancing. Yeah, I won't go into I just say the last one I'll say. So if that didn't hit, since we're pushed to the side, punk took over. And then post punk happened. But then in 1979, a kid from London decided he would put down the guitars and pick up a synthesizer and he changed everything again because he hit number one in England, number one in Europe, number one

in Australia and top 20 in America. His name was Gary Newman. Yeah and then Cars comes on and you've got the audience like this. Yeah. It's fantastic. You know I'm walking the stage. Yeah, yeah. And then the video is playing and on the big screen. That's fun. So it's it's kind of a fun presentation. And how long are you be on the road? I'm gonna be on actually they've extended the tour a little because Philadelphia was gonna be the last date on the 28th of February, but it sold out in 15 minutes. So they added a second one.

So much to my wife's chagrin. And so March 2nd, so the second night in Philly. You're updated by autobiography. You mentioned it, World in My Eyes, the expanded edition came out in November, so check that out. And you host Just Can't Get Enough with Richard Blade, Magnificent Seven Mondays, and Theme of the Week all on Channel 33 on SiriusXM, and that's First Wave, correct? That's right. Well, thank you so much for coming in. It's such a thrill, and I'm so proud to know you.

for coming in, it's such a thrill, and I'm so proud to know you, and I will forever be grateful to you and regretful. You invited me to your Hollywood Walk of Fame unveiling of your star, and I was working that day. I was working on a game show, and you know, I gotta pay the bills. You gotta. My wife went, and she was so thrilled to be there.

You would have loved it, because Jimmy Kimmel said something about my name that you would have related to a hundred percent. Yeah. He said, Disco Dick is the worst name in the world. It sounds like something you'd catch off a urinal in Studio 54. Well, Richard Blade, thank you so much for being here. And good luck on tour and thank all of you out there for listening and I'll be back next week.

The Three Questions with Andy Richter is a Team Coco production. It is produced by Sean Doherty and engineered by Rich Garcia. Additional engineering support by Eduardo Perez and Joanna Samuel. Executive produced by Nick Leow, Adam Sachs and Jeff Ross. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Battista, with assistance from Maddie Ogden. Research by Alyssa Grahl. Don't forget to rate and review and subscribe to The Three Questions with Andy Richter wherever you get your podcasts.

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