Dr Robert Biography

Dr Robert first came to international prominence as singer/ songwriter with eighties Pop band The Blow Monkeys. He was born Bruce Robert Howard on May 2nd 1961 in Haddington, Scotland, and misspent his teenage years in Australia. This was the late 1970s, and Robert's first musical experiences were as a busker at Sydney Harbour's Circular Quay. From there, he decamped to Darwin, enlisting with local Punk Band "Exhibit A".

A return to Britain in 1981 saw the formation of The Blow Monkeys. The band made their recorded debut on the tiny independent imprint, Parasol, in January 1982, and supported its release with extensive gigging in London, eventually securing a residency at the dearly departed Moonlight Club in Hampstead. The band's idiosyncratic pop songs secured a record deal with RCA, inked in July 1983. The Blow Monkeys debut long player, "Limping For A Generation" was released the following year, produced by Jam/Style Council sound manicurist Pete Wilson.

"Animal Magic" was the band's second album, released in May 1986, and achieved the much sought after breakthrough. It contained the massive worldwide hit, "Digging Your Scene", which burst into the Top Ten singles listings both in Europe and the USA. Amongst the albums many gems was a duet with bizarre Jamaican toaster Eek-A-Mouse, entitled "Sweet Murder". Such duets were a portent of things to come.

By January 1987, the band considerably consolidated their status with the irresistible single, "It Doesn't Have To Be This Way", which peaked at the number five position in the UK top ten. March of that year saw the release of the band's third album, "She Was Only A Grocer's Daughter", and achieved silver sales status on release. Produced by American Michael Baker, it featured "Celebrate (The Day After You)", a glorious duet with Chicago Soul/Funk legend Curtis Mayfield. If the album title was a thinly-veiled reference to the then British leaderene, Margaret Hilda Thatcher, then the duet made explicit what much of the UK would have felt had she been ousted from power in the 1987 election. However, the BBC banned the single from broadcast because of a perceived anti-Conservative lyrical theme. Undeterred, the band further underscored their political affiliations by joining the Red Wedge tour later that year.

The band's next album, "Whoops! There Goes The Neighbourhood" was a thematically linked collection written in response to the aforementioned Prime Minister's notorious pronouncement, "There's no such thing as society" Contained within its grooves was another collaboration, this time with soul diva Kym Mazelle, entitled "Wait". This earmarked the band's status as pop innovators, not only by embracing political themes but also by seeing the potential in dance/pop crossover, at a time when the whole dance scene had yet to go "overground". This experimentation would achieve its full fruition on the band's last album, "Springtime For The World". In the meantime, RCA released the band's "greatest hits" collection, "Choices", in 1989, the album going "gold" on release.

"Springtime" was an eclectic and unusual album, which, despite confusing both record company and music critics, has retrospectively become revered as an innovative record, perhaps some way ahead of its time. It contained the Balearic classic, "La Passionara", and "Be Not Afraid", a duet with Algeria's primo Rai exponent, Cheb Khaled. The track gave the band a profile in such rarely-charted pop places as Pakistan and North Africa. The band split late in 1990, after nearly ten years together.

By 1992, Dr Robert had relocated his young family to a remote cottage in Oxfordshire, and set to work on a new project with percussionist Benny Staples, formerly of The Wooden tops. He formed his own label, Artbus, and released a limited edition Electro/folk single, under the name Starjuice. Staples returned to his native New Zealand in 1994.

"Realms Of Gold", Robert's first solo album was licensed to the Pony Canyon label in Japan in 1994. Two tracks were released as limited edition 7" singles on the Heavenly label in the UK, before the Permanent Records label picked up the UK licence on the album, releasing it in January, 1996. The single taken from the album, "The Coming of Grace", received heavy airplay. "Realms of Gold" featured contributions from the likes of Rhoda Dakar (formerly of The Specials), Marco Nelson (Young Disciples), and Paul Weller. Weller returned the favour after Robert had played bass on hits such as "Changingman", and contributed to his breakthrough albums "Wild Wood" and "Stanley Road", also accompanying him on bass for one tour.

Dr Robert's second solo album was entitled "Bethesda", named after the village in North Wales where it was recorded, and was released exclusively in Japan in October 1995. It was recorded in seven days with Oasis drummer Alan White. It has subsequently become a collector's item. "Other Folk", an album of cover versions and three original songs, was released in May 1997. Recorded and mixed in just four days, it includes material by the likes of Tim Hardin, Fred Neil, Bob Dylan, and Marc Bolan. The album was released on his own Artbus label, after the unfortunately named Permanent Records went bust.

Later that same year, Robert worked as producer on the Beth Orton/Terry Callier duet, "Dolphins", and also the track "Pass In Time" for Beth's "Central Reservations" album.

After moving back to his childhood home of East Anglia, he set about writing a collection of songs inspired by and based upon his experience of the Flatlands, a mythic landscape of fen tigers, marsh men and giant skies. Released on 24th May 1999, Robert says of it: "It's about a mood as well as a place. There are some things that can be depressing - the homogenised high streets, theme pubs, small town paranoia. But there is also rare beauty there - the magical light, the enormous sky, the bleak magnificence of it all, and of course, the people - the fen folk with their ancient tales and stoic resistance. To me, this land has a mythic quality - it's our Deep South, Mississippi, Louisiana, Spalding, Boston! It's got magic -and we all need our myths and magic." The album is Robert's most assured solo set thus far, and shows a greater maturity in his songwriting craft whilst maintaining his always high propensity for melodic richness. Although it was recorded at a relatively makeshift studio at his home, it lacks nothing in terms of production values, and the "home cooked" feel earmarks it as a heartfelt and personal project.