This unflinching memoir by the son of Ian Dury recalls his chaotic life with the ‘pot-soaked Fagin’ and his bodyguard
The first time Baxter Dury performed on stage was at his famous father’s wake. While various stars worked their way through the Ian Dury songbook, Baxter, who had recently launched his musical career at the age of 29, was the obvious choice to reprise My Old Man, Ian’s tribute to his own father, Bill Dury. A working-class east Londoner, bus driver and chauffeur, Bill hadn’t figured large in the life of his son, who was raised by his mother and her family, members of what Baxter calls “the bohemian intelligentsia”.
It’s tempting to suggest that one absent father led to another. Certainly, Ian had an elastic sense of parental responsibility, leaving his marriage to Betty Rathmell soon after the birth of Baxter and his older sister Jemima, then showing up erratically while contributing “a pittance” to their upkeep. His ambition to become a lead singer was all that counted, pursued first with Kilburn and the High Roads, and later with the Blockheads, once 1977’s New Boots and Panties!! had secured his breakthrough at age 35 (six-year-old Baxter is there on the album’s classic cover). With a severe physical disability, inflicted by polio when he was seven, Ian was an unlikely rock star and had become an even more unlikely national treasure by the time of his death in 2000.