Toyah Willcox
| Toyah Willcox | |
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Willcox performing in 2014
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Toyah Ann Willcox |
| Also known as | Toyah |
| Born |
18 May 1958 Kings Heath, Birmingham, Warwickshire, England |
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| Years active | 1977–present |
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| Website | www |
Toyah Ann Willcox (born 18 May 1958) is an English singer and actress. In a career spanning more than thirty years, Willcox has had 8 Top 40 singles, released over 20 albums, written two books, appeared in over forty stage plays and ten feature films, and voiced and presented numerous television shows.
Between 1977 and 1983 she fronted the band Toyah, before embarking on a solo career in the mid-1980s. Her biggest hits include "It's a Mystery", "Thunder in the Mountains" and "I Want to Be Free".
Willcox was born in Kings Heath, Birmingham. Her father Beric Willcox ran a successful joinery business and owned three factories. Her mother Barbara Joy, née Rollinson, was a professional dancer with whom he fell in love after seeing her on stage in Weston-super-Mare with Flanagan and Allen, and married in 1949. Barbara had to give up her career after giving birth to Nicola (b. 1950) and Kim (b. 1953), Willcox's older sister and brother, respectively. Asked why her parents might have called her so, Willcox said in a 1981 interview: "I don't know, they won't tell me, but it's definitely my birth name. There is a town in Texas, called Toyah, and Toyah in Red Indian means 'water'. My parents deny that's where they got it from".
Willcox was born with a twisted spine, clawed feet, a clubbed right foot, one leg two inches shorter than the other and no hip sockets. Because of this she endured years of painful operations and physiotherapy. Her physical condition was a cause of difficult times at school. "When I was bullied at school, it was coz of my character. I was a weak child, I was incredibly small. I had a speech impediment, I was the perfect bait for bullying. My dad took me out the back and taught how to punch the hell out of someone and from then on I was never bullied again", Willcox recalled.
Years later she described her relationship with her mother as complicated, saying she "hasn't hugged her mother since she was 12 and can't see it ever happening". However, later she gave much credit to her parents. "I've never gone hungry. I never suffered lack of money in any way. Not because of my parents, anyway. They wanted the best for me, like all parents do for their children. They wanted me to have a very good education, to be a polite child, to be taught good manners and have a future", she recalled in 1980. Willcox remembered that until aged seven she was very close to her mother, if only for being very ill and having to be taught how to walk and talk. Then Barbara had another child, a daughter called Fleur, who died. "When she came home from hospital there was a bit of a distance between us. It was never talked about again", Willcox remembered. At the launch of her autobiography in 2000, the singer said: "We had a very violent relationship together. I was the violent person. And I didn't want her to kind of suffer by the book and I hope I represented her very well. Coz she really was a wonderful woman with a child from 'hell'." In another interview of the time, Willcox said: "My mother taught me how to walk, she was one that was trained to give me the physiotherapy to straighten my own spine so twice a day we would go through this routine. So she was disciplinarian in my life from a very – well right from when I can remember. So it was natural she was the first person I should rebel against. And I regret that our relationship was very often violent. And [now] I feel very strongly towards my mum that she sacrificed everything to give me the freedom I have today."
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