Showing posts with label Tim Butler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tim Butler. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 2, 2026

Update on Tim Butler


Photo by me.

On one of my recent posts about the tour cancellations I mentioned how I saw an article from Variety who stated a representative of The Psychedelic Furs said one of the members had to have surgery. When I saw the article I wasn't sure about it since it's hard to believe anything the media says in this day and age. Well, it turned out Variety was right, because today The Psychedelic Furs posted on social media and they wrote that Tim Butler went through triple-bypass heart surgery and is currently recovering from it. I am relieved to finally hear the news about what happened and I pray that Tim will have a full recovery. Sending all my love and best wishes to him. <3

Sunday, October 22, 2023

Tim Butler Biography


A short biography of Tim Butler was featured in a 1983 issue of The Island Ear.


Tim Butler Biography:

Favorite Food: Japanese
Favorite Color: Red
Favorite Album: Remain In Light (Talking Heads)
Favorite Movie: Halloween 1
Favorite Single: "Love My Way"
Favorite Actor: Dustin Hoffman
Favorite Actress: Chesty Morgan
Favorite TV Show: Fawlty Towers
Favorite Group: Velvet Underground
Favorite Pastime: Sleeping
Biggest Dislike: Eating chicken at gigs

Sunday, January 15, 2023

Self-Written Compositions

Most of the music on the songs by The Psychedelic Furs were composed by several of the band members but the songs that interest me are the ones where the music is written by only one member. I want to talk about the four who were the main composers on some of the songs: Tim Butler, John Ashton, Rich Good, and Paul Garisto.

The idea of this topic came to me recently and I was originally going to do four polls on the PFurs Facebook fan page that I'm on. I would do each one for Tim, John, Rich, and Paul, list the songs they wrote, and people would vote for their favorites. Then after that I would post the results on here, and I thought this would be a fun project to do. Two days ago I did the one for Tim, and after I posted the poll I waited for it to be approved and uploaded. But later that day I found out one of the administrators deleted the poll. I honestly don't know the reason why they did it, but since it didn't work out, I decided to just talk about the songs on here. Oh well, at least I tried...


Anyway, let's begin.




Tim Butler

Photo: Matthew Reeves

Tim Butler was the main composer of (as far as I know) seven songs. Four from Mirror Moves, a b-side, and two from Made Of Rain.


1. The Ghost In You
2. Here Come Cowboys
3. Heaven
4. Like A Stranger
5. Another Edge
6. You'll Be Mine
7. Tiny Hands


As a bonus I will list the Love Spit Love songs Tim composed. He wrote five songs and they were on the first Love Spit Love album.


1. Superman
2. Half A Life
3. Am I Wrong
4. Please
5. More




John Ashton


John Ashton was the main composer of four songs (again, as far as I know) and they are all from Mirror Moves.


1. Heartbeat
2. My Time
3. Only A Game
4. Highwire Days




Rich Good


Rich Good was the main composer of four songs from Made Of Rain.


1. The Boy That Invented Rock & Roll
2. This'll Never Be Like Love
3. Come All Ye Faithful
4. No-One




Paul Garisto


Paul Garisto was the main composer of three songs. Two from Made Of Rain, and one that was recorded during the Made Of Rain sessions but didn't make it on the album; although a year later it got released as a digital download. I wish Paul had written more songs because he's a very talented writer.


1. Ash Wednesday
2. Turn Your Back On Me
3. Evergreen



There are three other songs that I don't know who wrote the music for. The first is "Anodyne," a song that was featured on the live DVD Live From House Of Blues (2001); the second is "Cigarette," also from Live From House Of Blues, which was turned into a song called "Angelic" from John Ashton's band Satellite Paradiso years later. Because of this I feel John might have written the music for "Cigarette," though I could be wrong. And the third is "Little Miss World," a song that was debuted at one of The Psychedelic Furs' concerts back in 2012. I wonder if that song will appear on the upcoming album, and I'm curious to know if the music was written by either Tim Butler, Rich Good, or Paul Garisto, or if it's a band collaboration.

Speaking of the upcoming new album, I'm looking forward to find out what the songs will be and who composed them, and since Zachary Alford is in the band, I wonder if he will do some compositions. It will be very interesting and I can't wait.

Thursday, May 12, 2022

Tim Butler's Lineup Ranking

I thought this was interesting but here's how Tim Butler ranked The Psychedelic Furs lineups from an interview with the Chicago Tribune back in 2014.


1. The current version*: "The best that has ever toured."

Left to right: Paul Garisto, Rich Good, Mars Williams, Richard Butler, Tim Butler, Amanda Kramer. Photo by Reed Davis.


2. The first version: "Usually we were not sober, to be honest."

Left to right: Duncan Kilburn, Vince Ely, Richard Butler, John Ashton, Roger Morris, Tim Butler. Photo by Tom Sheehan.


3. The version that toured in support of the band's smash Midnight To Midnight album: "Very polished."

Left to right: Mars Williams, John Ashton, Paul Garisto, Tim Butler, Richard Butler. Photo by Henry Diltz.

Marty Williamson: Backup guitarist for the Midnight tour.

Roger O'Donnell: Keyboardist for the Midnight tour.


4. The rest of the '80s versions: "Very keyboard-y, a very big sort of stadium sound." (This one is pretty much a tie)


*Nowadays the lineup is still mostly the same but this time Zachary Alford is on the drums. He's very good and I would love to see him play with the band live someday.

Left to right: Tim Butler, Mars Williams, Zachary Alford, Richard Butler, Rich Good, Amanda Kramer. Photo by Matthew Reeves.


Sunday, April 4, 2021

Zon Guitars Photo

Here is an interesting picture that I found on the Facebook fan group page For Fans Of The Psychedelic Furs. This is a photo from Zon Guitars and it has John Ashton and Tim Butler posing with a Legacy bass guitar. It looks like this was taken during the early 80s (1981 or '82?) and the guy on the right is probably from the company.

Credits to Zon Guitars


Thursday, July 30, 2020

More Interviews

Just thought I would stop by again to show a couple more interviews I found. The first one is by Kansas City based website The Pitch and they interviewed Tim Butler. https://www.thepitchkc.com/the-psychedelic-furs-tim-butler-on-made-of-rain-the-bands-first-lp-in-nearly-30-years/

And the second one is an interview with Richard Butler by Spin Magazine. https://www.spin.com/2020/07/richard-butler-on-the-psychedelic-furs-first-album-in-29-years/

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

100 Club Punk Festival

Here's the advertisement for the famous 100 Club Punk Festival which took place over in London, England on September 20, 1976. It featured bands such as the Sex Pistols, The Clash, Siouxsie & The Banshees, and a couple others. The most important thing about this is that Richard and Tim Butler (who were 20 and 17 at the time) attended the festival and it inspired them to start a band. And that band eventually became The Psychedelic Furs...



Saturday, July 25, 2020

Cryptic Rock Interview

Since Made Of Rain's coming out next week I have been finding a lot of interviews and here's another new Tim Butler interview that was featured on the website Cryptic Rock. https://crypticrock.com/interview-tim-butler-of-the-psychedelic-furs/


Yesterday while doing chores I was listening to the four new Made Of Rain songs and I couldn't believe that the new album will be here very soon. Has it really been almost six months since we heard the announcement? It doesn't even feel like it has been this long but I'm so happy and excited that Made Of Rain will finally be released. Made Of Rain is the only good thing to happen this year and the long wait has been totally worth it!

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Music Week Interview

Photo: Matthew Reeves

Two days ago Tim Butler was interviewed by Music Week and he talked about Made Of Rain, the frustration of not touring due to the pandemic, The Psychedelic Furs' hiatus in the 1990s, influences, "Pretty In Pink", and a few other topics. I love what Tim said about his brother Richard Butler in response to this:



Music Week: You wouldn't actually know you'd been out of the studio so long – [Made Of Rain's] a pretty classic sounding Furs album...

Tim Butler: "Yeah, with Richard's voice you can't really not be The Psychedelic Furs! It's one of the most distinctive voices in alternative rock over the last 40 years."



Thursday, June 18, 2020

Zon Guitars Ad

Here's an old advertisement from what looks like to be a guitar company and it featured Tim Butler with his bass guitar. This ad is very cool and I wonder what year it was from. Maybe Mirror Moves era?


Tuesday, June 2, 2020

Another Tim Butler Interview



Just now on the For Fans of The Psychedelic Furs Facebook page someone posted a link and it was an interview that Tim Butler did. The interview was published on the website All Access back in March and Tim answered 10 questions from the website, such as how The Psychedelic Furs formed, touring, and Made Of Rain. It mentioned the Royal Albert Hall concert which was supposed to take place in May but sadly it got postponed until April of next year, due to the Coronavirus.

Here is the link to the interview. https://www.allaccess.com/triple-a/10-questions/archive/31319/10-questions-with-tim-butler-of-the-psychedelic

Tuesday, March 3, 2020

New Interview with Tim Butler



Today on one of my blog posts I got a comment from Gail and she said that Tim Butler was recently interviewed on a podcast hosted by Kyle Meredith. She told me the interview was available on YouTube and so I checked it out. I never really heard Tim Butler's speaking voice before and it was cool hearing him. The whole podcast was great and they talked about the making of the new album Made Of Rain, The Psychedelic Furs' first album (which celebrates its 40th anniversary this weekend), musical influences, and other topics. Here is the link to the video of that interview.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=YTqPdZMOoPM

Saturday, December 7, 2019

Happy Birthday Tim Butler


I would like to wish a happy birthday to Tim Butler, born today in 1958. He, along with brother Richard, formed The Psychedelic Furs in 1977 and to this day they are the original members left remaining. Back when the band first started Tim originally wanted to play the drums but since he couldn't afford them, he decided to play bass instead. He was also a member of Love Spit Love and played bass on their first album.

During the years before I got into The Psychedelic Furs I didn't really pay attention to the sound of the bass guitar whenever I would listen to music. I liked the electric guitars better because they come with a variety of sounds while the bass just has a deep thump. Nothing else. But that all changed after I started listening to The Furs. There's something about the way Tim Butler plays and he's actually my favorite bassist of all time. He has his own unique style and the two songs that show how great Tim is are The Furs' "Mother-Son" and Love Spit Love's "Superman." I mentioned a couple or few times how the bass in "Superman" is just fantastic, and it is my favorite part in the song.

I really like the way how Tim Butler interacts with people at concerts. At points he would go up to the audience and sing the songs right to them, and if you sing back he nods his head at you in approval. I was one of those lucky people and it happened to me many times. Out of all the moments when Tim sang to me the one that stands out the most was at my fourth Psychedelic Furs show back in August. It was during "India," the encore, and Tim came up to me and we both sang the line "See the ceiling raining spit the beach is backwards, isn't it?" to each other. After that happened Tim gave me an approving nod, and it was so awesome.

Happy Birthday Tim, hope you have a great day!

In Portland, OR 8/1/19. Photo by me.

Thursday, October 3, 2019

New Album Update #5

Hearing information about The Psychedelic Furs' new album is like finding buried treasure, and here is yet another British article about the new album! Tim Butler was interviewed again and he described what the music on the new album will be like. I remember a year ago in an interview Tim said that the new music will still be The Furs but more modern. On this article Tim talked about the music and he said this which got me excited:

"I'd put [the new music] somewhere between Forever Now and Talk Talk Talk. It's more, I'd say, rock 'n' roll than we'd become with World Outside or Book Of Days."

https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/whats-on/entertainment/psychedelic-furs-we-re-re-energised-and-reinvigorated-1-10031428

Wednesday, October 2, 2019

New Album Update #4

I found another article from the UK that was published five days ago and it has a great interview with Tim Butler. He talked about the new album and he said it will be released hopefully in the Spring of 2020! Other topics include England, America, Midnight To Midnight, bands influenced by The Furs, PFurs songs in recent media, fans, and The Furs getting back together.

https://www.portsmouth.co.uk/whats-on/arts-and-entertainment/the-psychedelic-furs-talk-about-their-first-new-album-in-28-years-ahead-of-playing-at-the-pyramids-southsea-big-interview-1-9087366

Monday, February 11, 2019

My Psychedelic Furs Vinyl #6



Mirror Moves (1984) (Vinyl 180 VIN180LP079) (2015 Record Store Day reissue) (Purple vinyl) (*Signed by The Furs*)

This reissue of Mirror Moves was released exclusively for Record Store Day 2015 and the color of the record is a lovely purple. When I saw The Psychedelic Furs live for the first time that year, I got this at the merchandise area. The cool thing is that this was autographed by the band members! Signed by Richard and Tim Butler, Rich Good, Paul Garisto, and Amanda Kramer.


Purple vinyl.


Side One:

1. The Ghost In You
2. Here Come Cowboys
3. Heaven
4. Heartbeat


Side Two:

1. My Time
2. Like A Stranger
3. Alice's House
4. Only A Game
5. Highwire Days

Sunday, February 10, 2019

Tim Butler's Profile



Psychedelic Furs bassist Tim Butler's profile from the Midnight To Midnight tour programme.


Name: Tim Butler

Date and place of birth: 12-7-58, Teddington, Middx

Favorite color, number and vice: Red, 22, Black & Decker

Favorite food and favorite drink: Indian, red wine

Favorite film and/or director: The Thing - John Carpenter

Favorite book and/or author: Stephen King

Most memorable occasion: My wedding

What's the worst job you've ever had: Groom

Favorite artist and/or work of art: [Andy] Warhol

Favorite clothes designer: N/A

Favorite club: Riviera Club, Chicago

Favorite single and album: "Rock And Roll" - Lou Reed. Velvet Underground And Nico

First record you ever bought: For Your Pleasure - Roxy Music

Last record you bought: Listen Like Thieves - INXS

Favorite musician: Lou Reed

Favorite songwriter: Lou Reed

Favorite guitar solo of all time: John Ashton on "Heaven"

Band you would least like to be in: The Smiths

Best and worst gig ever seen: John Cale at the Guildford Civic Hall (best)

Favorite actor and actress: Robert de Niro, Rita Hayworth