Music and politics have always been linked together. As noticed by the latest US election with rapper Kanye West running and getting some votes. There are countless lawsuits between politicians and musical artists about the use of their music and political leanings.
Kanye wasn’t the first musician to run for office and he probably won’t be the last. Plenty of musicians have run for a political seat. For example, Sonny Bono of Sonny and Cher fame was mayor of Palm Springs and then went on to the House of Representatives. Blur Drummer Dave Rountree was elected as councillor for Norfolk in 2017. Motown legend Martha Reeves of Martha and the Vandellas was elected in Detroit as a controversial city counsellor in 2005.
There was one musician however who started the trend. He helped bridge the gap between musicians and politics in his unique way. He broke so many boundaries in music and politics in the 1960s that we take for granted to this day. The man is Screaming Lord Sutch, 3rd Earl of Harrow and on what would’ve been his 80th birthday the Beat Marches On to 10th November 1940.
Screaming Lord Sutch didn’t have a hit single. He didn’t capture the hearts of teenagers like The Beatles or the Rolling Stones. He may however have been a great inspiration to great names in music. Long before Marylin Manson, Alice Cooper or even Genesis, Sutch was the first pop singer to use props and be a male wearing make-up on stage. Instead of the standard pop acts of the time just standing around occasionally gyrating the hips there or standing out beyond the microphone during an instrumental break, Sutch lurked around the stage screaming into the crowd. He turned a concert into a show.
Lord Sutch, born David Edward Sutch, changed his name by deed poll in the 1960s even though he didn’t have any nobility claims. Inspired by American musician Screamin’ Jay Hawkins of “I Put a Spell on You” fame and by the horror films and props of the era Sutch started to create his on-stage persona of Screaming Lord Sutch.
In 1961 Lord Sutch and his backing band the Savages released his first single, ‘til the Following Night, which is very rock and roll based after a few screams and the imitation of a windy night as much as the technology would allow at the start. The single didn’t get much radio play and didn’t chart. Not many of his singles had much radio play with subjects like Jack the Ripper, Purple People Eaters and Dracula it is possible the singer was before his time. He was so tired of the radios not playing his music that he formed his own: Radio Sutch after the success of the pirate radio station Radio Caroline.
He continued to release singles throughout the 60s and 70s helping some young budding musicians along the way. Richie Blackmore (Deep Purple, Rainbow) Jimmy Page and John Bonham (Led Zeppelin) Jeff Beck (the Yardbirds, Jeff Beck Group) Noel Reading and Mitch Mitchell (the Jimi Hendrix Experience) and Keith Moon (The Who) have all featured on his recordings.
Sutch’s on-stage reputation started getting bigger throughout his career with the props he used. Comes on stage in a coffin, masks of monsters for the song ‘She’s Fallen in Love with the Monster Man’, Vampire fangs for ‘Dracula’s Daughter’ or fake knives for his most popular song ‘Jack the Ripper’. Nothing like this at the time was being done.
With the reputation Sutch gained through his early musical career, it seemed the next step he took was very left field, even for him. He decided to go into politics standing for the National Teenage Party in by-elections during the 60s and 70s to a little cult following gaining a few votes here and there.
By 1981 Sutch had enough of a following to create his political party and the Official Monster Raving Loony Party was born. Admittedly the party was tongue in cheek to a serious Conservative government at the time. With Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher being nicknamed the Iron Lady, you can see why.
The Loony Party captured something with the British public. The policies the party came up with gave politics a sense of humour in a severe political climate. The Cold War tensions were starting to rise, strikes throughout so many different industries and the Falklands War was just on the horizon so hearing initial policies like heated toilet seats for the elderly was the comic relief that was needed.
Although the Party has only won one seat in its history and that was unopposed, they influenced a new generation of satirical electoral candidates. Do you think we would have people such as Count Binface and the Cookie Monster run for election in the PM’s constituencies before the Raving Loonies did it?
As the 80s turned into the 90s the popularity of the party waned. It reached its high point in 1990 when the party managed to put a rival party out of business. The Social Democratic Party to be exact.
Not to bore a lot of you with political history but a little bit is needed here to set the scene. The Social Democratic Party was formed in 1981 by rebel Labour members who didn’t like the way the party was going. By 1988 the majority of the Social Democrat party had allied with another party called the Liberal Party and gave us the party we know today as the Liberal Democrats.
However, a few of the SDP members didn’t like the coalition and stayed on. Being very right wing the party vowed to, if elected get Britain out of Europe. Something we’ve heard before, right? By 1990 the SDP came head to head with the Raving Loonies leader Lord Sutch in a by-election and lost to him. The Loonies didn’t win the seat either, but the stiff-upper-lip politicians of the SDP knew it was the end when they were beaten by Lord Sutch’s party.
From then on not much was heard about the Official Monster Raving Loony Party. They stood in an election here and there, but they went away quietly. Well, they still didn’t go away completely they still hold a party conference every year and have a party manicfesto (yes, the c is supposed to be there) with policies about Brexit, Covid and other recent political subjects. It’s worth reading if you get the chance.
By the end of the 90s with the settling down of the political party and fewer recordings, the limelight was fading away from Lord Sutch. With his mother dying in 1997 he went into a deep depression which unfortunately the singer succumbed to and committed suicide in 1999 aged 58.
The legacy left by Screaming Lord Sutch is one that most can only imagine. The influence he had in not one, but two different subjects is something to be admired. He may not be the one with the hit singles or the most votes but it helped realise that it doesn’t matter what you do, you don’t have to do it the normal way. Whether it is performing on stage or standing for a by-election in wherevershire you don’t have to do things in the way it was done before. The proof of this is the fact that the Raving Monster Loony Party is still going on 21 years after his death and there are musical acts still looking to shock the audience.
The Beat Marches On is a music blog written by Jimmy Whitehead. Jimmy has been blogging for three years specialising in Sports (especially American Football). If you want to follow Jimmy on Twitter: @Jimmy_W1987
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If anyone reading this would like to read more about this story, the sites used for research were:
and a YouTube video of a biography of Screaming Lord Sutch
If you want to see the Monster Raving Loony Party Manicfesto then the link is here:
https://www.loonyparty.com/about/policy-proposals/
If you want to request a story for The Beat Marches On blog, then you can contact jwhiteheadjournalism@gmail.com. We cannot guarantee that the story will be published but will be considered.