|
Screaming Lord Sutch (November 10, 1940 - June 16, 1999) was a British politician, musician and maverick.
He was born David Edward Sutch on November 10, 1940. In the 1960s, inspired by one of his favourite rock'n'roll stars, Screamin' Jay Hawkins, he changed his name by deed poll to Screaming Lord Sutch, 3rd Earl of Harrow, despite the fact that he had no connection with the peerage. Following a successful career as an early-'60s pop music attraction, it became customary for the UK press and citizens to refer to him as Screaming Lord Sutch, or simply Lord Sutch.
He founded the Official Monster Raving Loony Party in 1983 and fought the Bermondsey byelection. In his career he contested over 40 elections, rarely threatening the major party candidates, but often getting a respectable number of votes. He was an easily recognisable figure at election counts due to his flamboyant clothes. It was shortly after he polled several hundred votes in Margaret Thatcher's Finchley constituency in 1983 that the deposit paid by candidates was raised from £150 to £500. This did little to deter the legendarily deposit-losing Lord Sutch, who increased the number of rock concerts he performed per year to pay for his mock political campaigns.
Lord Sutch's album "Lord Sutch and His Heavy Friends" was named in a 1998 BBC poll as the worst album of all time, a status it also held in Colin Larkin's book "The Top 1000 Albums of All Time."
Screaming Lord Sutch suffered from bipolar disorder and committed suicide on June 16, 1999, following the death of his mother the previous year.
Discography
- Lord Sutch and His Heavy Friends (1970)
- Hands of Jack the Ripper (1972)
- Alive & Well (1982)
- Murder in the Graveyard (2003)
External links
|
