Adam Ant

Stuart Leslie Goddard, better known as Adam Ant (born 3 November 1954), is an English singer, musician, and actor. He gained popularity as the lead singer of new wave group Adam and the Ants and later as a solo artist, scoring 10 UK top ten hits from 1980 to 1983, including three UK No. 1 singles. He has also worked as an actor, appearing in many films and television episodes.

Born in Marylebone, London, Ant began his musical career playing bass in the band Bazooka Joe. From 1977 to 1982 he performed with Adam and the Ants, and their debut album '' Dirk Wears White Sox'' (1979) reached number one on the UK Independent Albums Chart. Prior to recording his second album as Adam and the Ants, he asked producer Malcolm McLaren to manage his band, who instead took his backing band to form Bow Wow Wow. Ant regrouped with new members, including Marco Pirroni, to release his second album ''Kings of the Wild Frontier'' (1980). It reached number one in the UK Album Chart, spawned three hit singles, became the UK number-one selling album in 1981 (and the 48th best-seller in 1980), and won Best British Album at the 1982 Brit Awards. He released his third and final album with the group, ''Prince Charming'' (1981), which spawned two UK number-one singles "Stand and Deliver" and "Prince Charming".

In 1982, he disbanded his group for a solo career retaining only Marco Pirroni as a bandmember and co-songwriter for later solo albums. His first solo album was '' Friend or Foe'' (1982), from which the debut single " Goody Two Shoes" reached number one in the UK and Australia in 1982, and became his first top-20 hit in the United States. The album reached number five on the UK Albums Chart and number 16 on the US Billboard Album Chart, becoming his most successful solo album. His next two solo albums '' Strip'' (1983) and ''Vive Le Rock'' (1985) were less commercially successful in the UK and the US, and were a noted stylistic departure from his earlier rock albums, being more grounded in pop and dance. Ant also began to focus on an acting career, performing on stage and in film and television roles throughout the 1980s and 1990s. He released his fourth solo album '' Manners & Physique'' (1990) which was produced by André Cymone and featured a Minneapolis sound. Despite the US Top-20 success of the single " Room at the Top" from that album, Ant was dropped from MCA Records, and the fully recorded ''Persuasion'' (1991) was shelved and never officially released. He signed with Capitol Records to release '' Wonderful'' (1995), which featured more acoustic songs than his previous albums. The single "Wonderful" became Ant's third US Top-40 hit single.

Since 2010, Ant has continued his music career, performing live regularly in his hometown of London and beyond, recording and releasing a new album ''Adam Ant Is the Blueblack Hussar in Marrying the Gunner's Daughter'' (2013, UK number 25), and completing eight full-length UK national tours, five US national tours, and two Australian tours. A further album, ''Bravest of the Brave'', was recorded in 2014 and is still awaiting release.

Early life

Stuart Goddard was born in Marylebone, London, the only child of Leslie Alfred Goddard and Betty Kathleen Smith. His father had served in the Royal Air Force and worked as a chauffeur, and his mother was an embroiderer for Norman Hartnell. His home was two rooms in the De Walden buildings, St John's Wood. He recalls: "There was no luxury, but there was always food on the table." He is of partial Romani descent; his maternal grandfather, Walter Albany Smith, was Romanichal. This heritage became a basis for a theme in his later work: a concern for oppressed minorities.

His parents divorced when Goddard was seven years old and his mother supported him by working as a domestic cleaner, being briefly employed by Paul McCartney. Goddard's first school was Robinsfield Infants School, where he created a considerable stir by throwing a brick through the head-teacher's office window on two consecutive days. In the aftermath of this incident, Goddard was placed under the supervision of teacher Joanna Saloman, who encouraged him to develop his abilities in art and whom he later credited as the first person to show him he could be creative.

Goddard then attended Barrow Hill Junior School where he boxed and was a member of the cricket team. He passed the eleven plus exam to gain a place at St Marylebone Grammar School, an all-boys school, where he enjoyed history, played rugby, and became a school prefect. After passing six O levels and three A levels, in English, History and Art, Goddard attended Hornsey College of Art to study graphic design, and was a student of Peter Webb for a time. He dropped out of Hornsey, short of completing his BA, to focus on a career in music.

Early musical career

The first band Goddard joined was Bazooka Joe, in which he played bass guitar. He has said that the idea of Adam Ant came to him after watching the Sex Pistols play their first gig in 1975: "After seeing the Pistols, I wanted to do something different, be someone else, but couldn't work out what and who".^{: 92, 94}

He renamed himself Adam Ant, choosing the name because "I really knew I wanted to be Adam, because Adam was the first man. Ant I chose because, if there's a nuclear explosion, the ants will survive". He formed his own band, the B-Sides, with Lester Square and Andy Warren.^{: 94} In 1977, together with drummer Paul Flanagan, they went on to form Adam and the Ants (initially named just "The Ants"), with the inaugural band meeting held in the audience at a Siouxsie and the Banshees performance at the Roxy Club in London's Covent Garden.

Musical career

1977–1982: Adam and the Ants

Adam and the Ants started as part of the burgeoning punk rock movement. Ant later acted in Derek Jarman's seminal "punk" film ''Jubilee'' in 1977, as Adam and the Ants were beginning to gig around London with manager Jordan from the SEX Boutique on Kings Road. His debut as a recording artist was the song " Deutscher Girls", which featured on the film's soundtrack, along with "Plastic Surgery" which was performed in the film itself. "Deutscher Girls"/"Plastic Surgery" was re-released as a single in 1982. The band toured extensively around the UK but proved to be unpopular with much of the British music press who disliked their fetishistic lyrics and imagery. Late 1979 saw the release of their début album '' Dirk Wears White Sox'' (1979, Do It Records), with Matthew Ashman