b. 26 September 1945, Washington, Co. Durham, England. Ferry began his musical career in local group the Banshees, following which he enrolled at Newcastle-upon-Tyne University where he formed R&B group the Gas Board, whose ranks included Graham Simpson and John Porter. After studying Fine Art under Richard Hamilton, Ferry briefly worked as a pottery teacher before forming Roxy Music. During their rise to fame, he plotted a parallel solo career, beginning in 1973 with These Foolish Things, an album of favourite cover versions. At the time, the notion of recording an album of rock standards was both innovative and nostalgic. Ferry recorded half an album of faithful imitations, leaving the other half to more adventurous arrangements. Some of the highlights included a revival of Ketty Lester's obscure "River Of Salt", a jaunty reading of Elvis Presley's "Baby I Don't Care" and a remarkable hit version of Bob Dylan's "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall". The album received mixed reviews but effectively paved the way for similar works including David Bowie's Pin Ups and John Lennon's Rock 'N' Roll.
Ferry continued the cover game with Another Time Another Place, which was generally less impressive than its predecessor. Two stylish pre-rock numbers that worked well were "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" and "Funny How Time Slips Away". A gutsy revival of Dobie Gray's "The In Crowd" brought another UK Top 20 hit. By 1976, Ferry had switched to R&B covers on Let's Stick Together which, in addition to the hit Wilbert Harrison title track, featured a rousing re-run of the Everly Brothers' "The Price Of Love".
It was not until 1977 that Ferry finally wrote an album's worth of songs for a solo work. In Your Mind spawned a couple of minor hits with "This Is Tomorrow" and "Tokyo Joe". That same spring, Ferry appeared on the soundtrack of All This And World War II singing the Beatles' "She's Leaving Home". The following year, he retired to Montreux to complete the highly accomplished The Bride Stripped Bare. Introspective and revelatory, the album documented his sense of rejection following separation from his jet-setting girlfriend, model Jerry Hall. The splendid "Sign Of The Times" presented a Dadaist vision of life as total bleakness: "We live, we die . . . we know not why". The track "Can't Let Go", written at a time when he considered giving up music, maintained the dark mood.
It was another seven years before Ferry recorded solo again. In the meantime, he married society heiress Lucy Helmore, abandoning his lounge lizard image in the process. The 1985 comeback Boys And Girls was stylistically similar to his work with Roxy Music and included the hits "Slave To Love" and "Don't Stop The Dance". After a further two-year break, Ferry collaborated with guitarist Johnny Marr on "The Right Stuff" (adapted from the Smiths' instrumental, "Money Changes Everything"). The attendant album Bête Noire was a notable hit indicating that Ferry's muse was still very much alive. The 1993 covers set Taxi was followed by Mamouna, an album of originals which suffered from a lack of sparkle. It seemed Ferry had become so good at what he does that he had ceased to put any energy or emotion into the songs. The production and singing were excellent, but someone needed to remind him that emotion is necessary, too.
Another five-year break from recording ensued before Ferry returned in 1999 with As Time Goes By, on which he tackled the 30s and 40s standard songbook. The following year he narrowly cheated death during an abortive hijack attempt on a flight from London to Kenya. Ferry reunited with Roxy Music in 2001 for a world tour, fitted in between sessions for his new studio album, Frantic. The mixture of covers and originals harked back to his mid-70s albums and was well-received. During this period Ferry also launched an acting career with low-key appearances in The Porter (2004) and Breakfast On Pluto (2005). He made the news at the sart of 2007 when he was dropped as the face of the Autograph range by clothing store Marks & Spencer following some ambigious comments about the Nazis in a German newspaper. The singer's collection of Bob Dylan covers was released at the same time.
