John Otway & Wild Willy Barrett
Otway and Barrett’ s hit Anniversary Tour
On the road again celebrating 50 the years since their hit single Really Free entered the charts, this magnetic bond still holds. Still loved for their total in-yer-face originality, the contrast between the deadpan humour of Barrett and mad onstage antics of Otway are hilarious to watch.
John’s lyrical genius is ably complimented by Willy’s outstanding musicianship (he seems to play almost every stringed instrument known to man, plus a few hybrids of his own making, including the Bagpuss!). For any Otway/Barrett virgins out there who don’t know what to expect, be prepared for everything from bare-chested theremin playing to ‘wah wah wheelie bin’ as the duo perform that one hit and and some of their 40 near misses: an amazing and irreverent performance by two master entertainers.
JOHN OTWAY
Dr John Otway (he received an honorary degree from Oxford) has performed over 5,000 gigs since first launching himself in Aylesbury, building a sizeable cult following of amazingly loyal and adoring fans. He has released 15 albums (six with Wild Willy Barrett), sold out The Royal Albert Hall and headlined the London Palladium. His self-made biopic Otway theMovie: The Story of Rock n Roll’s Greatest Failure premiered in Leicester Square, was shown at Cannes, voted 2nd best film of 2013 by Guardian readers and is still popular on Netflix. He has also written two volumes of his autobiography. His song Beware of the Flowers was voted the nation’s seventh favourite lyric in a BBC poll.
WILD WILLY BARRETT
Wild Willy Barrett is an English experimental musician and multi-instrumentalist known for virtuoso fiddle and guitar skills, ability with a great number of stringed instruments, playing slide guitar with a whole raw egg (known as egg-necking) and his ‘wah wah wheelie bin’;. He has performed alongside musicians as varied as Bert Jansch, John Renbourn, Gordon Giltrap, Ralph McTell, George Hamilton IV, Madness, Steeleye Span and reggae legends Sly and Robbie. More recently, Willy has been focused on the all metric Plucking Banger, an instrument co-designed with Rob West in order to perform Willy’s original concept of ‘metric music’. As a skilled instrument maker, woodworker and carver Willy has produced some highly unusual furniture over many years.
