Jah Wobble
| Jah Wobble | |
|---|---|
Jah Wobble in 2005
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | John Joseph Wardle |
| Born |
11 August 1958 Stepney, London, England |
| Genres | Post-punk, experimental rock, dub, world, alternative rock, electronica |
| Occupation(s) | Musician |
| Instruments | Bass guitar, vocals, keyboards, drums |
| Years active | 1978–1984, 1986–present |
| Labels | 30 Hertz, Island |
| Associated acts | Public Image Ltd, The Human Condition, Jah Wobble's Invaders of the Heart, The Damage Manual, Chinese Dub Orchestra |
| Website | jahwobble |
| Notable instruments | |
| Ovation Magnum bass,Fender Precision Bass,Yamaha BB | |
John Joseph Wardle (born 11 August 1958), known by the stage name Jah Wobble, is an English bass guitarist, singer, poet and composer. He became known to a wider audience as the original bass player in Public Image Ltd (PiL) in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but left the band after two albums. Following his departure from PiL, he went on to a successful solo career, continuing to the present. In 2009, he published his autobiography, Memoirs of a Geezer. In 2012, he reunited with fellow PiL guitarist Keith Levene for Metal Box In Dub and the album Yin & Yang. Since 2013 he has been one of the featured pundits on Sunday morning's The Virtual Jukebox segment of BBC Radio 5 Live's Up All Night with Dotun Adebayo.
Wardle was born in Stepney, East London, His father, Harry Eugene Wardle, worked as a postman, while his mother, Kathleen Bridget (née Fitzgibbon), was a school and County Hall secretary. Wobble grew up with his family in Whitechapel's Clichy Estate in London’s East End. He is a long-time friend of John Lydon (Johnny Rotten) whom he had met in the 1970s at London's Kingsway College. The two formed half of the group of friends known as "The Four Johns", along with John Grey and John Simon Ritchie (later known as Sid Vicious). Jah Wobble acquired his stage name through the drunken, mumbled version of Wardle's name by Sid Vicious, which Wobble kept because "people would never forget it".
In his early life and career, by his own admission, Wardle was given to occasional bouts of aggression, exacerbated by heavy drinking and drug use. Resultantly he ended up living in a squat with John Gray in West London, whilst Lydon and Vicious formed The Sex Pistols. With admittedly large "builders hands", he had experimented with the guitar, but found playing bass a more connected and whole body experience, influenced in part by admiring Bob Marley’s and The Wailers bassist Aston "Family Man" Barrett on stage in 1975. Wardle was as critical of his friend Vicious's bass playing as John Lydon, and had hence played in experimentation sessions with Lydon. After burning all the possessions of his squat-mates, they left him alone there with a mattress, a headboard and his Music Man-copy bass.
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