Interview: Darryl Bullock

Darryl Bullock is a Bristol based writer, and author of The World’s Worst Records: An Arcade of Audio Atrocity Vols 1 and 2. His new book is the first complete biography of ‘world’s worst opera singer’ Florence Foster Jenkins, also the subject of a film starring Meryl Streep (above).

Most music writers want to turn readers on to the records they love. How did you become a cheerleader for bad music?

It goes right back to my first proper job, as a 16-year-old, working for HMV. I was in charge of buying the 45s we stocked, and each week a rep from some company or other would come in with a handful of singles desperate for me to promote them in-store. Many were absolute rubbish – things like The Singing Sheep – and I began to collect the worst (or the funniest) of them. Then Rhino in the States put out a couple of albums called The World’s Worst Records and I was hooked. In 2007, whilst working as a freelance writer, I started the World’s Worst Records blog – initially just for a bit of fun. I had no idea I’d still be writing it almost a decade later and that it would spawn a couple of books.

Music quality is generally seen as a matter of taste. What makes a performance or recording truly, objectively awful?

For me it has to be sincere. Any fool can make a novelty record, and most novelty records are completely disposable and don’t really interest me. A truly bad record usually has someone involved – the singer, the songwriter or the producer, for example – who thinks that they are producing something worthwhile. It should be funny without trying to be funny.

Are you interested in documenting bad music for its own sake, or is telling the stories behind it what drives you?

I like the research aspect, the uncovering of the stories behind the records and sharing that information with people. I want people to appreciate the humour that I find in bad music, but I also want them to now something about the people behind the discs. Very few of these people are out and out losers: they are genuine people with a need to create something. Luckily most of them appreciate the exposure. 

Is I Want My Baby Back by Jimmy Cross really the worst record of all time?

It’s subjective, isn’t it? The listeners of the Kenny Everett show certainly thought so, but I Want My Baby Back is more of a novelty. I’d probably champion Philosophy of the World by The Shaggs, or X&Y by Coldplay as the worst album of all time, perhaps Christmas on the Moon by Troy Hess as the worst single.

Your latest book is a biography of Florence Foster Jenkins. What marked her out for in-depth study?

Simply that it hadn’t been done before. I heard that Stephen Frears was making a movie about her back in 2014 and so started to write an article (originally for the Sunday Times) about her life. The article didn’t come off, but I was approached by a publisher who wanted to know if I could turn it into something book-length.

While researching the book you spoke to members of the singer’s own family. Were they happy to help?

Yes: there’s a lot of misinformation out there, and everyone I talked to was keen to put some of that right. It wasn’t hard to convince them that I was genuinely interested in telling her real story, rather than sensationalising it or playing it for laughs. I’m really touched that many of the people I interviewed have been back in touch to tell me how much they liked the book.

Florence eventually became famous in her own time didn’t she? Is there a lesson there for people whose music careers never took off?

She was known in music circles in and around New York for a few years before her death, but it wasn’t until her records became available to the wider public in 1954, ten years after she died, that the cult of Florence really started. Again she was absolutely sincere in what she did and doggedly determined that she could and would sing. I guess the lesson has to be about self belief; ignore the critics and create your own noise.

There was a huge discrepancy between her self-image as a great artist, and her public image as a figure of fun. Did that bother her?

Not particularly. She was definitely aware that some people were laughing at her, but she put a lot of that down to jealousy and carried on regardless. I think that a lifetime of mercury poisoning helped!

She’s also the subject of a film written by Stephen Frears, and starring Meryl Streep. Why all this attention for a terrible musician who’s been dead for 70 years?

It is odd that this has all happened at once: as well as the Meryl Streep film there’s a new documentary about Florence being released later this year, and last year Marguerite, a French film telling a fictionalised version of the Florence story was released to great acclaim. Why now? Maybe people are fed up remaking the same superhero film ever couple of years? The film is full of humour, pathos, glamour and nostalgia; it’s good old family entertainment.

I hear you’re working on something new. Please tell us it’s another bad music book!

I’ve just started work on my next book, and it is not bad music I’m afraid – although again I guess that is subjective! It covers the influence of LGBT musicians on the history of recorded music, from the pre-jazz years right through to the present day, with the working title Do You Come Here Often? The title comes from a song by Telstar producer Joe Meek, who had been persecuted for being gay and killed his landlady and then committed suicide in 1967. Probably not a lot of humour in that! I’m leaving bad music alone for a while, although I still post a couple of tracks on the blog every Friday.

Florence Foster Jenkins: The Life of the World’s Worst Opera Singer is published by Duckworth Overlook. For more bad music visit worldsworstrecords.blogspot.co.uk

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