Robert Fripp and Toyah Willcox — known as Toyah & Robert — caught up with NME backstage at Glastonbury 2023 to tell about the future of their successful Sunday Lunch series, plans to hit the road, and how they handle hateful comments.
Since starting off the series as a bit of light-hearted relief during the pandemic, no one was more surprised by the sudden momentum than the couple themselves. Now, over three-years since they began Sunday Lunch, the duo have ventured out of the kitchen taken the show to the stage.
The latest of which included a debut slot at Glastonbury 2023 this weekend, where they delivered their brand of classic rock covers on the Acoustic Stage. Shortly before they took to the stage, they had a quick catch-up with NME…
NME: Welcome to Glastonbury! Let’s start by taking a look back to when you first started Sunday Lunch. Did the response catch you off guard? It seemed to get a lot of momentum very quickly…
Toyah Willcox: “It did surprise us. We were going for about eight months and it was growing and growing and growing. It started with one very simple post: 28 seconds of us jiving. Within five minutes it got about 100,000 replies from across the world. At that point, we realised that we’d posted something that basically cheered people up who were alone in lockdown.”
“NME almost championed us in a way, and what we loved about NME was they were linking the songs we were covering with the actual artists, and it had a phenomenal effect. Judas Priest wrote to us and said, ‘Thank you so much’ and we’d given them the best tour publicity they could have had when we covered ‘Breaking The Law’. They loved it!
Did it resonate to a different audience to what you were expecting?
T.W: “It did start purely to make people laugh and to put two fingers up to a virus. Then, we realised that if we did classic rock [covers] it crossed more divides in a really good way.”
“It crossed languages. It crossed countries. It crossed cultures. We were reaching a much broader audience by purely using classic rock.”
Robert Fripp: “For me, there’s nothing old about classic rock. It’s alive in the moment. So if you are looking at The Beatles, for example, the present moment is 60 years so far… Metallica may be 30 years. The point is classic music is available in this moment and it is alive if we wish to participate and be in the moment with it.”
What was it like embarking on your recent spoken word tour?
R.F: “It reached almost no one if we are going by statistics!”
T.W: “But thanks to social media it’s reaching more…”
R.F: “Still very, very few indeed, dear. If you are looking at best sellers and high statistics, not many at all. But that’s not an issue… the number of people in the audience has no relevance.”
“If we look at Toyah & Robert, we have many, many, many more views and the post and comments are very interesting. Two of my favourite ones came from [our appearance at] the Isle of Wight festival last Sunday. One [was about] being the eldest guitarist on stage said: ‘Is he embalmed?’ The other one was: ‘Is he alive?’
“Well, to that I would say ‘If the embalming was good, I would seem to be alive. So obviously if someone thinks I’m not alive, then the embalming has failed.’”
T.W: “They were joining in the humour!”
R.F: “Actually the two quotes were not offered in the spirit of goodwill or encouragement!”
How long do you see Sunday Lunch running for?
T.W: “That’s such a good question. We’ve actually been picked up by a world agency and we have decided that we’re going to give them a set amount of years.”
R.F: “I figure I’ve got until I’m 84 to rock out…”
T.W: “I think that’s enough time. I will not allow my husband to carry luggage, carry equipment past 81.”
R.F: “Let me put it another way. My wife is hoping that I don’t die on stage. But from my point of view, if I die on stage, probably the best place to go!”
T.W: “At the moment our social media numbers are growing. So as long as those audiences are there and that kind of pull is there, we’ll keep going. But I will not watch him do anything that makes his health suffer. At the moment though, he is utterly remarkable, his playing is remarkable.
R.F: “Yes, it’s true. I’m godlike when I step upon the stage.”
You’re set to take Sunday Lunch on the road for the first time later this year – what can we expect from the shows?
R.F: “Expect nothing!”
T.W: “The whole idea is people come and they have a really memorable night. It’s rock’n’roll, but it also has our energy and our humour… Basically, I’m keeping my clothes on and we are doing fantastic rock music.
“Another bit of news that’s happening is we’re being courted by TV at the moment. We’ve got about three ideas in the very embryonic form that we should be shooting next year.”
R.F: “It seems that Toyah & Robert are becoming popular, not purely musically…“
T.W: “Just as old codgers!”
Robert, how would you say that your time performing with Toyah is different compared to your time with King Crimson?
R.F: “Toyah & Robert is the first time I have seriously engaged with the classic rock repertoire. I’ve also been playing in the C Pentatonic tuning since 1985. Since King Crimson is not currently touring, I can focus on learning how to play in E for the first time in 35 years.”
T.W: “Having been married for 37 years and seeing the amount of practice [he] needed daily, I’m kind of happy that Robert now has a chance to just enjoy rocking out without this incredible weight of the responsibility of King Crimson music on his shoulders. He can just have fun on stage.”
While we’re here at Glastonbury and looking back at your earlier discography, we have to discuss another artist who had a strong tie to the festival: David Bowie. Are there any new artists that you think the Starman would have been into?
T.W: “That’s a fantastic question. There’s so much talent around, and there’s always new talent discovering Bowie for the first time. I think there’s some absolutely genuine talent out there, [for instance] Wet Leg, they’re fabulous and they’re just creating their own genre and their own places in music history.”
R.F: “David would know who was hot and who was about to appear before anyone else. We live in Middle England, so the live music that comes to town tends to be an older generation… but Bowie would always know.”
Following their slot at Glastonbury 2023, Toyah & Robert have numerous more festival appearances lined up. Their upcoming tour, ‘Toyah & Roberts Sunday Lunch Live!’ kicks off later this autumn. Find dates and remaining tickets here.
Glastonbury 2023 concluded on Sunday (June 25) with performances from Elton John, Queens Of The Stone Age, Blondie, Phoenix, Thundercat and many more.
Find news, reviews, photos, interviews and more from this year’s Glastonbury here.
