Phill Jupitus - Career

Career

During his five years at the DHSS, Jupitus began writing political poetry and drawing cartoons in distracted moments. He quit his employment there in 1984, hopeful of a career move into the music industry.

Using the moniker Porky the Poet, he became associated with Anti-Fascist Action and the ranting poetry scene alongside fellow acts Kool Knotes, Swift Nick and Attila the Stockbroker and approached local bands to offer himself as a support act for their tours:

I thought it looked easy, I was very cheap. If you got another band to support you, there are probably four of them and roadies and managers. But me — I just turned up and read poems.

— Phill Jupitus,

Both Mark Lamarr and Sean Hughes, with whom he appeared on Never Mind the Buzzcocks, also started their careers as performance poets. Jupitus toured the student scene of colleges, universities and student unions supporting bands such as Billy Bragg, The Style Council and The Housemartins.

He supported Billy Bragg once more on the Labour Party sponsored Red Wedge tour in 1985: "In the early 80s, I got involved with Red Wedge, in which Neil Kinnock got various bands to stage concerts for Labour. The reason I got involved was 20% because I believed in the cause, 30% because I loved Billy Bragg, and 50% because I wanted to meet Paul Weller".

After Red Wedge, he found it difficult to get other bookings due to the decline of political poetry as a mainstream art. He joined indie record label Go! Discs as a runner, which had signed Billy Bragg and other bands, such as The Housemartins.

Bragg has since said: "We ended up managing to get him a job at Go! Discs, which was brilliant. I was concerned that the cut-throat nature of the record business would make him jaded — underneath that rhino exterior there is quite a sensitive person — but that was before I realised that he was going to come back and do gigs again. Working at Go! Discs got his confidence up."

His performances of two of his poems, "Beano" and "Nobby", were included in the 1986 album Not Just Mandela (released on Davy Lamp Records, with all proceeds going to the Anti-Apartheid Movement) alongside tracks by Billy Bragg and Attila the Stockbroker amongst others.

Jupitus became press officer and compere for The Housemartins (appearing in the music video for "Happy Hour" in 1986), using the role to continue being front of an audience, whilst also taking support slots for other artists. During this time he worked as a warm-up act on the Channel 4 TV show The Show. He quit working for Go! in 1989 and fell back on his poetry and compering to try and gain a foothold on the London comedy circuit.

He conceived and directed the Brit-nominated video for Billy Bragg's track "Sexuality" in 1991 and wrote a parody version about bestiality. He also made an appearance alongside R.E.M. in Bragg's "You Woke Up My Neighbourhood" video and on Searchlight magazine's 2006 "Hope Not Hate" campaign tour with Bragg, singing the parody. He has also appeared numerous times at the Glastonbury Festival acting as DJ and compere in The Left Field tent.

Jupitus also produced the music video for Kirsty MacColl's 1991 single release "All I Ever Wanted" from the album Electric Landlady. He appeared at her tribute concert in 2002 as compere and also sang "Fifteen Minutes", one of her songs.

He began hosting his own show on BBC GLR in 1995, a regular job that would last until 2000. After which he embarked on his first stand-up tour of the UK, Jedi, Steady, Go, performing the Star Wars story in a comedic fashion.

Jupitus performed at the Reading and Leeds festivals in 2008. In October 2009, he joined the West End cast of Hairspray, playing the role of Edna Turnblad at the Shaftesbury Theatre. He joined the 2011 tour of Spamalot, playing the role of King Arthur.

Phill was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Essex in South Essex College's congregation ceremony in Southend on 30 September 2010 in recognition of his achievements.