Reasons to be Cheerful: Ian Dury, Kilburn & The High Roads, The Blockheads, Sex, Drugs and Rock'n'Roll

In the summer of 1995 Chris Welch visited Ian Dury at his Hampstead home on two afternoons to talk about the glory days of Kilburn & The Highroads, The Blockheads and their greatest hits. It was an interview which left a great impression on the writer, struck by Dury’s warmth, pride, humour, fragility and inner strength. He was also struck by the power of the dope smoked in the tiny room where Ian ususally did his demo recordings. Dury chatted, joked and reminisced, amidst gusts of laughter and occasional groans at past follies and disappoinments. Eternally brave and spirited, he admitted that he sometimes felt afraid to go outside into the street for a walk, so intimidated was he by a world that rushed by without seeming to care for the frail and unprotected.