John Shuttleworth/Graham Fellows (The Big Thread)

[TJ]

This 'Big Thread' is devoted to John Shuttleworth, and the many and varied other alter egos of Graham Fellows. Please post favourites bits, rarities and opinions. And did *anyone* out there tape John Shuttleworth & Friends or Brian Appleton's Christmas Singles?


Basic Shuttography


Radio

The Shuttleworths (Radio 4, 1993-2003)
The Graveyard Shift (Radio 1, 1993-1997)*
Europigeon (Radio 4, 1994)
Alan's Big 1FM (stand-in presenter for two shows, Radio 1, 1994)
Shuttleworth's Showtime (Radio 1, 1994)
John Shuttleworth And Friends (Radio 1, 1995)
John Shuttleworth's Open House (Radio 4, 1996-97)
Radio Shuttleworth (Radio 4, 1998-2000)
Brian Appleton's Christmas Singles (Radio 4, 2003)
Brian Appleton's Unofficial Multimedia Lectures (Radio 4, 2005)
John Shuttleworth's Open Mind (Radio 4, 2006)

*I've included this because he guested on it so often. Other shows to feature occasional Shuttleworth appearances include Loose Ends and Jonathan Ross' Radio 2 show.


Television

Saturday Zoo (Channel 4, 1993)
At Home With Vic & Bob (B BC2, 1993)
Edinburgh Nights (BBC2, 1995)
500 Bus Stops (BBC2, 1997)
Europigeon (BBC2, 1998)


Records

A very simplified list, with singles that later ended up on compilations, reissues etc missed out, as well as the official releases for The Shuttleworths/Radio Shuttleworth.

True Love Stories (as Jilted John, 1978)
Love At The Hacienda (as Graham Fellows, 1985)
Swimming With Sharon (1987)
Seven Songs By Sunset (1992)
Y Reg (1996)
The Yamaha Years (1997)
The Shuttleworths Series 2 (1997 - listed here as it features non-broadcast material)
The Best Of Shuttleworth's Showtime (1998 - may include non-broadcast material)
Shuttleworth Live (2000)
Blue John (2001)
One Foot In The Gravy (2001)
My Turn To Be Poorly And Other Forgotten Classics (as Brian Appleton, 2004?)


Films, Videos etc

One Foot In The Gravy (2001)
It's Nice Up North (2006)

He also apparently made some educational videos for schools as John Shuttleworth - anyone know any more about this?


Books

500 Bus Stops (1997)
John Shuttleworth's Honed Lyrics (2001)

[benthalo]

Television additions. I remember Yorkshire/ITV running a special in about 1998 where John and Ken visited Sheffield's music museum. I've never seen a copy of this on trade lists since and hate myself for not grabbing it at the time.

On that note, I imagine he made a thousand appearances on Yorkshire's evening show Calendar. I've only found one though. I have silly numbers of Loose Ends appearances but don't know what's currently doing the rounds on that score.

Also, there was a talent show for Granada only called Shuttleworth's Showtime (13/12/92)  which is notable for Jon Thomson doing the voice of Ken Worthington, plus guest appearances by Barry Cryer and Jenny Eclair. Largely painful but a brilliant title sequence.

I did compile a Shuttleworth clips disc a while back, which I know Darrell ended up with. That included my best copy of the talent show plus all of the Saturday Zoo spots, mostly from off-airs, plus his spot on the untransmitted pilot from December 1992.


Shuttleworth also guested on At Home With Vic & Bob (26/12/93) singing The Christmas Orphan. That was on the compilation DVD too.

I've got the Christmas Single special. Not great. Also, Appleton did a short series for Channel 4 in 2002 called Elvis Lives!

Plenty more I'm sure, but I'll post later.

[benthalo]

Brilliant Martin Parr song here by the way:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/arts/frontrow/frontrow_20021008.shtml

Stuff I've got knocking around:

LOOSE ENDS
14/04/01 (does The Fleece Song as I recall)
13/08/05 in Edinburgh
24/09/05 in Hull
24/12/05
and one last month, 13/05/06 I think.

MARK RADCLIFFE
03/10/96 (brilliant live session for Y-Reg EP which I distributed ages ago)
04/08/05 (now on Radio 2)
10/04/06
There's another edition with Dave Tordoff, but I'd have to trawl through discs to find it. Sorry, but I'm not always in the habit of listing guests when I catalogue discs.

I've made a couple of live recordings of Appleton, one at Edinburgh in 2001 (similar stuff on My Turn To Be Poorly) plus a London show with Tordoff as support.

[benthalo]

Me again.

If I have a proper dig at home, I should be able to find a very early mention of John Shuttleworth in the NME, when David Quantick interviewed him about Pigeons In Flight c.1987. There's a photo too, but it is a small news item so don't get too excited.

[Ray Le Otter]

I saw a Shuttleworth show at the Blackpool Central Pier in 1993/4 (as part of a terribly ill-conceived Comedy Festival), definately after the "Saturday Zoo"-era, where the audience numbered about 30 people, despite which (or maybe because of ) it was absolutely magic.

"Up & Down Like A Bride's Nightie" is still a fave.

Didn't do "Catch The Fox" though.

(Come to think of it, I forgot about him doing Brian Appleton on the Belle & Sebastien tour in 2001 - better than the main act IMHO).

[mwude]

I'm not sure where I picked this following clip up from but it's John performing on 'The Lilydrome' which was apparently: "Recorded in a working men's club in Blackpool where Lily [Savage] compered a variety show" and broadcast on ITV 11/03-22/04/95.
John Shuttleworth live at the Lilydrome.

The Shuttleworths Series 2 (1997 - listed here as it features non-broadcast material)

Featuring my all-time favourite Shuttleworth song '3 men in a van' which was only apparently included as they ended up with "spare tape - several minutes in fact" on one side of the cassette.  There's another non-broadcast song on there in which John claims to drive a V-reg Chrysler Sunbeam, perhaps his mode of transport before the days of the Austin Ambassador.

[Partridge's Love Child]

I've got the songs from his recent appearance on Mark Radcliffe, but I'm moving house at the moment so lordy knows when I'll be able to transfer them to mp3.

[TJ]

Didn't do "Catch The Fox" though.

Something that I've always wondered about this song - it's routinely described as 'controversial', but is this simply an in-character Shuttleworth assessment of the piece, or is there some weird backstory about Fellows writing and performing it (presumably not in the Shuttleworth guise) back when 'The Fox' was on the loose, and subsequently getting flak from the tabloids?

[Ray Le Otter]

Didn't do "Catch The Fox" though.

Something that I've always wondered about this song - it's routinely described as 'controversial', but is this simply an in-character Shuttleworth assessment of the piece, or is there some weird backstory about Fellows writing and performing it (presumably not in the Shuttleworth guise) back when 'The Fox' was on the loose, and subsequently getting flak from the tabloids?

I think the former, if I recall the original Saturday Zoo performance. Don't remember anything about Fellowes performing this song around the time of "the Fox".

[mwude]

Sleeve notes on the 'Blue John' album say:

Catch the Fox [1986]
A huge favourites [sic] at early gigs, but after singing it on Channel 4's Packin' Em In in 92, a few viewers failed to see the funny side, I decided it might be wise to rest the song for a while.  Curiously, I wrote it way back in 1984 before Shuttleworth even existed, as a parody of an earnest community bobby, and only later gave it to John to sing.

So it seems like it was still controversial enough in 1992 for people to 'fail to see the funny side' although it doesn't state whether that's in terms of making official complaints or just having a go at Fellows during / after the show.

[benthalo]

By the way TJ, I've just realised that your radio list is missing Brian Appleton's History Of Rock & Roll, a series for Radio 4 in 2001.

Fellows was interviewed as himself for Top Ten: One Hit Wonders (C4, 22/01/00) in which Appleton put in an appearance as I recall, performing My Turn To Be Poorly.

"What did you just call me?" Still my favourite line in any Appleton song.

[TJ]

By the way TJ, I've just realised that your radio list is missing Brian Appleton's History Of Rock & Roll, a series for Radio 4 in 2001.

Blimey. I must have missed that series altogether!

[benthalo]

BBC7 have aired it since, so I expect it'll show up again.

[benthalo]

One Foot In The Gravy (1991)

Shot in 2001.

[TJ]

One Foot In The Gravy (1991)

Shot in 2001.

Slip of the keyboard!

[LeboviciAB84]

Three times?

[Pinball]

Give the guy a break! :-)

[benthalo]

Quite. It was only the first time anyway, which I realised just after posting. Wish I'd never mentioned it now...

[Gavin]

By the way TJ, I've just realised that your radio list is missing Brian Appleton's History Of Rock & Roll, a series for Radio 4 in 2001.

Blimey. I must have missed that series altogether!

Episode One - Eight Miles Low

http://www.sendspace.com/file/g69em9

[TJ]

Nice one - cheers Gavin!

[Entropy Balsmalch]

John performing on 'The Lilydrome' which was apparently: "Recorded in a working men's club in Blackpool where Lily [Savage] compered a variety show" and broadcast on ITV 11/03-22/04/95.

Indeed it was - The Layton Institute - I used to live opposite it.

I went to many of the shows, but can't remember if I was actually at this one.

[TJ]

The Shuttleworths Series 2 (1997 - listed here as it features non-broadcast material)

Featuring my all-time favourite Shuttleworth song '3 men in a van' which was only apparently included as they ended up with "spare tape - several minutes in fact" on one side of the cassette.  There's another non-broadcast song on there in which John claims to drive a V-reg Chrysler Sunbeam, perhaps his mode of transport before the days of the Austin Ambassador.

As I don't think they ended up on the later CD version, here's said extra songs: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=A6TPGN2L

[TJ]

Alan's Big 1FM (stand-in presenter for two shows, Radio 1, 1994)

I'd imagine that these are pretty rare, so they're going in the CaB Soulseek room. Same drill as usual - if you download 'em, it's on the condition that you then megaupload/rapidhare/whatever them on this thread.

Is Shuttleworth's Showtime also quite rare?

[Darrell]

As I don't think they ended up on the later CD version, here's said extra songs: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=A6TPGN2L

There actually wasn't any later CD version - series 4 and the specials compilation are the only Shuttleworths that have actually graced CD.

[Sadness]

Fancy hearing my take on "You're Like Manchester"? It come's Graham approved.....!!

http://www.myspace.com/pugwalsh

[mwude]

Is Shuttleworth's Showtime also quite rare?

I doubt it as I've got a copy that I must have downloaded either from soulseek or a torrent site.  I would put it on megaupload but that requires remaining connected to the internet for more than an hour at a stretch and that rarely happens with this shit-awful wireless connection.

[Pilf]

Shuttleworth's Showtime has just been up on that well known UK torrent site and I got them. Before that I'd only got the compilation tape that was officially released, as TJ mentions in the first post.

If no one does it first I can certainly upload those and post them here. I'm absolutely mad on Shuttleworth so I have loads of stuff around on old tapes. I've got the Brian Appleton History of Rock and Roll shows that were mentioned somewhere. That might be a bit longer as I'll have to find those on old tapes and convert them.

[benthalo]

Is Shuttleworth's Showtime also quite rare?

Which one - TV or radio? I doubt either are to be honest.

[TJ]

Shuttleworth's Showtime has just been up on that well known UK torrent site and I got them. Before that I'd only got the compilation tape that was officially released, as TJ mentions in the first post.

Did the tape contain any new material?

[Pilf]

Shuttleworth's Showtime has just been up on that well known UK torrent site and I got them. Before that I'd only got the compilation tape that was officially released, as TJ mentions in the first post.

Did the tape contain any new material?

No, not that I can remember. It's just a 'best of' compilation of some of the regular features and guests, and obviously without any of the music.