In reverse, a list of those people I admire, think are cool, or have influenced my life in a positive way:
10. MAX CLIFFORD
An evil puppetmaster who has the entire UK press in his grasp. He can make or break celebs in the UK with ease and is responsible for many of the biggest stories to be uncovered in the UK for decades. I very much admire anyone who can have such control over the media, especially considering the humble roots that he came from.
Here he is being interviewed by another of my heroes (but not quite enough of one to make my Top Ten), Louis Theroux:
Only reaches #10 on my list as his autobiography went on a bit too much about how much of his time he devotes to charity but doesn’t like to speak about it too much, while avoiding the most interesting gossip that I hoped to get from it.
9. RICHARD BRANSON
No introduction really necessary for him. As a serial entrepreneur myself, Branson has to be my role-model. he has been spectacularly successful, however, whereas I have been spectacularly unsuccessful. Bastard. Reading biographies about him, a lot of his success was down to luck (and a friend of a friend of a relative of his told me that he got his seed capital from being the biggest dopedealer in his school). But, generally speaking, he is one very, very clever guy (well actually he is just a clever guy who hires even more clever guys than he is in the important things in business like looking after the money, which is the bit I always screwed up on).
Here he explains part of the secret of his success:
Would have made it higher up the list if it were not for his terrible dress sense and the tackiness of some of his PR stunts.
8. ALBERT FINNEY
In 1960, with the release of Saturday Night, Sunday Morning, Albert Finney was Britain’s answer to James Dean – a handsome true working class hero n this gritty classic from the days when Britain still had a film industry. So fucking cool.
Here is the trailer:
If he had been killed tragically shortly after as did James Dean, then he would have become a true British icon. Unfortunately though he lived and became fat and ugly and made some very average movies afterwards and so he can only get to #8 on the list.
7. CHRISTOPHER PRICE
Christopher Price was the host of a showbiz gossip show called Liquid News that ran on the satellite channel BBC Choice. I’ve never been terribly interested in showbiz gossip, but the very camp, roly-poly Price had such a sharp wit that it made for compulsive viewing. His natural and irreverant style reminded me of another of my TV heroes, Ray Cokes, who presented MTV Europe’s ‘Most Wanted’ during the Nineties.
I was sure that he was destined for greater things (well, that was a fact, as he was due to fulfill the gay dream of covering the Eurovision Song Contest) when he died from some infection at the age of 35. I don’t know why, but this upset me quite a lot at the time.
Here are a few clips of him (but not any of the best bits that I can remember from him):
6. TONY COLMAN
In the past few years, I’ve really gotten into drum and bass – particularly ‘liquid funk’ or ‘fast soul music’. In this sub-genre, there is one label that stands head and shoulders above the others, and that’s Hospital Records, founded by Tony Colman. I can’t think of any other label that has a roster of acts without there being a single duff one.
But Tony Colman is more than just a record label owner, he is also a talented song-writer, producer and musician, recording as London Elektricity – one of the very few drum and bass acts that can actually play live.
In this clip, he explains how it’s done:
I think he is as old as I am too, which makes me feel less like a weirdo.
5. CHARLIE BROOKER
I’ve aways been a fan of The Guardian – not for the news, which I can get on TV with moving pictures – but for its G2 section. I particularly loved the writing of its TV critic, Charlie Brooker, who has such a cruel wit to him that I’m amazed that they are allowed to print it.
I particularly enjoyed his Screenwipe series on BBC4 which had me laughing out loud from start to finish. I only managed to catch two episodes and must try and find the rest of them.
Here’s his take on US TV:
4. THOMAS HEDMAN
This name won’t mean much to most people as he is no celebrity. He was my boss when I was marketing videos for a living. He took a big gamble on me – a scruffy young kid with no qualifications at all, let alone any in marketing, whose only prior experience had been as a glorified secretary. I rewarded him by working 12 hours a day, seven days a week for the best part of half a decade. He helped me by giving me practically carte blanche to do whatever I wanted with as much of the company money as I needed. And I made sure that his investment was recovered manifold. This freedom allowed me to learn the ropes of running a business – what was and wasn’t possible. If it wasn’t for him, I’d probably just ended up as some worker-drone for some giant corporation rather than having enjoyed the up and downs and madness of being self-employed ever since (apart from a brief stint working for one different boss who turned out to be a complete tosser).
Thomas Headman
He left the company not long after I did. The magic had gone for both of us. Since then he has been a film producer of some medium-budget movies.
3. BENJAMIN DISRAELI
I’ve always been interested in history, although not particularly the Victorian Era, even though it was when Britain was at the height of its powers. Benjamin Disraeli always seemed like a really cool character though – or at least the way our usually dull history teacher described him. He seemed like a young ‘Glam Rock’ kind of Prime Minister. He was a prolific writer of fiction as well, having the great quote “whenever I want to read a good book, I write one”, which I can definitely agree with. Under his leadership Great Britain truly was great.
I can’t remember much else about him, other than that I named my first dog Ben after him when i was 16 – so I must have been really impressed with him back then. I could read up some more about him on Wikipedia but I can’t be arsed.
Here’s a picture of him in his ‘young dandy’ phase:
Benjamin Disraeli
2. LENNY BRUCE
Someone else that I should know more about considering that he’s one of my top three heroes according to this is Lenny Bruce. All that I know about him, I learned from the 1974 movie, Lenny, starring Dustin Hoffman. And I don’t think I even saw the whole film either.
He seems to me to be the father of modern alternative comedy though – offensive and shocking to some people; absolutely hilarious to others. It seems amazing in this day and age that he could be convicted of obscenity just or the word ‘cocksucker’.
Like all the best heroes, he died young at 40.
Here’s a short documentary about him:
I find that comedy tends not to date very well. It doesn’t sound very funny today, but it’s the influence he had on future comedians that makes him such a hero.
1. JOHN PEEL
But head and shoulders above all other heroes has to be John Peel. For UK readers, he needs no introduction but, for readers fron anywhere else, John Peel is the grandfather of alternative music in the UK. He started off in the late-sixties heavily into the hippy scene and then his musical tastes developed over time – always ahead of the curve.
He was ahead of my curve as well. When listening to his show, I often thought a lot of the stuff he was playing was horrendous shit. Then six months later, I thought they were the best things ever. He was an institution on UK’s Radio One, lasting for a couple of decades, I believe, while other favour of the month DJ’s only lasted for a few years or so before drifting off into obscurity. Which was completely justified.
John Peel has made me feel comfortable in the fact that it can be possible to be seen to enjoy music designed for a much younger audience without feeling like some embarrassing old weirdo just trying to ‘be down with the kids’. Some of my friends in Riga used to call me ‘Peely’ and that was as great a compliment as I could ever hope to achieve.
Like most of the other heroes, he died too soon, an event that again upset me greatly, but assures him a place in immortality, even though I am sure that he would still be considered a legend even if he lived until he was 80.
Here is one of many tributes to him:
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November 3, 2008 at 1:58 am
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