Terry Hall



Terence Edward "Terry" Hall (b. March 19, 1959) is an English musician and the lead singer of The Specials. He is also known for his other groups, The Fun Boy Three, The Colourfield, Terry, Blair & Anouchka and Vegas.

Early Life
Terrence Edward "Terry" Hall was born on March 19th, 1959. During the age of 12, on a school trip to france hall was abducted and sexually abused by a paedophile ring. He mirrors this in the Fun Boy Three song, Well Fancy That. He left school before his fifteenth birthday, taking various short-term jobs – bricklayer, quantity surveyor, and apprentice hairdresser among them. At the age of 19, Hall joined The Coventry Automatics. In 1979, The Coventry Automatics changed their name to The Special AKA. they later removed the AKA from their name.

The Specials
The Specials. Also known as The Special AKA are a 2-Tone Ska band from Coventry, in 1977.After some early changes, the first stable lineup of the group consisted of Terry Hall and Neville Staple on vocals, Lynval Golding and Roddy Radiation on guitars, Horace Panter on bass, Jerry Dammers on keyboards, John Bradbury on drums, and Dick Cuthell and Rico Rodriguez on horns. In 1981, The Specials broke up after releasing the song, Ghost Town which encouraged Hall and his two bandmates. Neville Staple and Lynval Golding to form The Fun Boy Three.

The Fun Boy Three
The Fun Boy Three were an English new wave pop band, active from 1981 to 1983 and formed by singers Terry Hall, Neville Staple and Lynval Golding after they left The Specials.

The Fun Boy Three reduced the ska sound that they and Jerry Dammers had crafted with great success with The Specials and initially took a more minimal approach with the focus on percussion and vocals. For their second album they assembled a six-piece backing group including a cellist and a trombone player, allowing the record to feature more diverse and expansive arrangements, and also enabling them to play live instead of being a purely studio group as previously. The band enjoyed six UK Top 20 hits, including "The Lunatics (Have Taken Over the Asylum)" and "Tunnel of Love" and created two albums of which the eponymous Fun Boy Three was the most successful. The follow-up album Waiting, produced by David Byrne, was well-received critically but did not sell as well.

Blur
Before appearing as a guest on the Gorillaz song 911, Hall and Damon Albarn collabarated in a 1995 re-issue of Hall's album, Sense. Albarn and Hall both worked on the song, Chasing a Rainbow. In 1996 Albarn invited Hall to perform live with Blur, where they covered the Specials song, Nite Klub

Gorillaz
In 2001, Hall appeared as a guest on the Gorillaz & D12 collaboration single "911", a song about the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre. Hall sings the chorus along with Gorillaz frontman Damon Albarn, while D12 rap their verses, and also performed the track live at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City as part of the Gorillaz Live tour, which was later made available digitally on Spotify with the title "911 (Live in NYC)". He was also featured on the dub reworkings album Laika Come Home, providing vocals for the single "Lil' Dub Chefin'".

Hall having sung on one of Albarn's projects, Albarn later returned the favour, co-writing and singing on the song "Ten Eleven" on Terry Hall and Mushtaq's 2007 album Hour of Two Lights.

Impact on Gorillaz
The Specials (and Fun Boy Three, along with Massive Attack) were a key influence on Gorillaz music. In the Gorillaz mockumentary special Gorillaz: Charts of Darkness, Terry Hall makes a very brief cameo appearance saying “The biggest influence on Gorillaz is me”, answering the question of who was the biggest inspiration for Gorillaz. It wasn’t a mere joke, as Albarn himself has stated this, and said that the sound of Gorillaz’ debut album was a combination of the sounds of The Specials and Massive Attack. 2D was even originally named Terry, which was a nod to Hall.

With The Specials

 * Dawning of A New Era (1994, Recorded in 1978)
 * Specials (1979)
 * More Specials (1980)
 * Ghost Town (Single, 1981)
 * Encore (2019)

With The Fun Boy Three

 * Fun Boy Three (1982)
 * Waiting (1983)

With The Colourfield

 * Virgins and Phillistines (1985)
 * Deception (1987)

With Terry, Blair & Anouchka

 * Ultra Modern Nursery Rhymes (1990)

With Vegas

 * Vegas (1992)

Solo Releases

 * Home (1994) (Re-issue:1995 features a song by Damon Albarn)
 * Laugh (1997)

With Mushtaq

 * The Hour of Two Lights (2003) (features Damon Albarn on track 3)

Trivia

 * Hall suffers from manic depression. He has stated this many times through his life.
 * Hall has two sons, Theo/Leo hall and Felix hall. he is the husband of Jeanette Hall.
 * Hall is a Manchester United fan.
 * During a concert with The Specials, Hall and Jerry Dammers were arrested and charged with incitement to riot. They were both fined £1,000 each.
 * In 2003, Hall attempted to commit suicide.
 * Before joining The Specials (The Coventry Automatics at the time) Hall was a member of a local punk band called Squad.