| Toyah's back and means
business. She's as vivacious and enthusiastic as
ever but determined to move away from her old
image. "I don't like
gimmicks," she states, "because
eventually you become one. It's false security.
I'm searching for a kind of critical acclaim and
quality I've never had.
The 'image'
thing has alienated an audience from my music
that I would dearly like to win over."
Does this mean
Toyah 'the rebel' is finally going to conform for
the sake of mass appeal?
"I
couldn't even try to be utterly normal
because I'm not," she grins. "I want
people to see the real me. In the past I've
wasted time posing, now I just get on with it.
I'll never be a lovey-dovey girl - there'll
always be a sting in my tail.
"I've
spent four years being zany, portraying the
outrageous punk, and I'll always be wild. When
the doors are closed I strip off and run around
the house naked screaming like a banshee."
LOVE
Toyah's blunt
honesty is intriguing and sometimes disturbing.
Her new single 'Don't Fall In Love', released
after a lengthy absence from the charts and a new
record company deal, reveals a dramatic change in
lyrical content.
She no longer
recounts nightmarish fantasies but ventures into
that much used and abused emotion - love.
"For me,
love is what wars were fought over. Women
are what wars were fought over. They are the
controllers through time, oppressed because they
are so sexually powerful and threatening. Men
only lock up what they're afraid of."
So underneath
all the powder, paint and peroxide, is Toyah a
closet feminist?
"To be a
feminist you don't have to resort to looking and
behaving like a man," she exclaims. "You
see these really beautiful women with men falling
at their feet. If they had half a brain they
could be real rulers, but they always end up as
slaves to man.
"I'd like
to see women being more subtle - like the black
widow spider, attracting the males and then
attacking..."
|
In the 'Don't Fall In
Love' video Toyah appears as a sophisticated
temptress which, considering her views on image,
does seem a little contrived. "We chose a dress that was really
wicked," she enthuses with a mischievous
gleam in her eye. "It was made of
rubber and took three people to get me in it."
WAR
This will
doubtless attract unwelcome attention from the
weaker sex, something Toyah's not averse to...
"When I
was doing Trafford Tanzi, I had to wear a
skin-tight leotard and soon found out that men
were coming to see it because they got off on
watching a woman fighting a man. It was perverse.
There I was, making a wonderful political
statement for women, and the dirty raincoat
brigade just lapped it up."
In future,
Toyah doesn't see her career following one
particular path.
"I'm
terribly fickle," she admits. "I've a
total addiction for everything I do - until I get
bored. I thrive on spontaneity and I've got to
keep moving.
"I'd love
to be able to produce and direct a film and when
I'm very old and rickety, I intend to write a
fantastic book which either makes people cry or
shit themselves... I'm interested in psychic
research and developing the sixth sense.
"Most of
all I want my voice to mature and get rid of the
lisp. When I see myself on the screen and hear that
voice I cringe... no wonder people want to
strangle me!"
Number One
Magazine - May 1985
|
REBEL WITH A CAUSE