“I became a punk – I hid my Pink Floyd records and I now had an uneasy relationship with the music”: Siobhan Fahey’s lifelong passion for prog is only hinted at in Bananarama’s name

A teen crush gave acclaimed singer and hit songwriter Siobhan Fahey her first prog kick. Then punk happened. But she named Bananarama in honour of Roxy Music, and the Shakespeare’s Sister mastermind will never get over her love of Pink Floyd, as she told Prog in 2009.

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“It’s always about a boy, isn’t it? When I was 14 I had a milk round in Harpenden and there was an older boy, about 16, who I had a crush on. So there I’d be, 5.30 on those freezing mornings in December, waiting to be picked up by ‘Ernie’ and his attractive assistant.

I knew nothing about rock music, but I was obsessed with Tamla Motown and Joni Mitchell, and I was a huge Melanie fan. This boy very quickly turned me
on to Pink Floyd and Roxy Music. To begin with, he lent me the first three Roxy albums, and although I couldn’t get my head round them, I totally fell for them – and I’d be listening to them for the rest of my life.

Then we progressed to the Floyd. They’re in a place way above prog rock. They have a space all of their own. My first taste was Meddle – the whole of Echoes on side B – wow! I would send myself off to sleep with that; utterly fantastic.

And next I heard Dark Side Of The Moon, and although I preferred the trippier aspect of Meddle, I grew to really love Dark Side‘s depth and scope. Sadly, I never got to see Floyd, and by the end of the 70s I was a punk rocker. So that was it, you hid your Floyd records – and I now had an uneasy relationship with this thing called ‘prog.’

Syd Barrett’s The Madcap Laughs was a revelation

My first proper boyfriend was an art student, and he took me to Frank Zappa – but I was bored to tears and fell asleep at the gig. My boyfriend was really angry with me; he’d paid £3.50 for the tickets!

But this same boyfriend took me to see Hawkwind at the Roundhouse, which was amazing: a sound and vision spectacular. I knew the single Silver Machine, which I loved. It was 1976 and here was a prog band that fitted with the punkier things I was discovering.

They were angry, they were krautrock, they were trippy. Even today I would see them again. I hear they have the Angels of Death dancing with them, so I’m there!

Many years later I revisited Floyd. I love the title song from Wish You Were Here very much, and I did a version with my eldest son on guitar as a download from my website.

Then, on holiday in Ibiza, someone started playing Syd Barrett’s The Madcap Laughs, which I’d never explored, and it was a revelation. In my mind, people like him are seers, they’re not mad, everyone else is. They see the truth.”

Jo is a journalist, podcaster, event host and music industry lecturer with 23 years in music magazines since joining Kerrang! as office manager in 1999. But before that Jo had 10 years as a London-based gig promoter and DJ, also working in various vintage record shops and for the UK arm of the Sub Pop label as a warehouse and press assistant. Jo’s had tea with Robert Fripp, touched Ian Anderson’s favourite flute (!), asked Suzi Quatro what one wears under a leather catsuit, and invented several ridiculous editorial ideas such as the regular celebrity cooking column for Prog, Supper’s Ready. After being Deputy Editor for Prog for five years and Managing Editor of Classic Rock for three, Jo is now Associate Editor of Prog, where she’s been since its inception in 2009, and a regular contributor to Classic Rock. She continues to spread the experimental and psychedelic music-based word amid unsuspecting students at BIMM Institute London, hoping to inspire the next gen of rock, metal, prog and indie creators and appreciators.