Julian Cope is an English musician and writer from Deri, Caerphilly, in the United Kingdom. Born in 1957, he grows up in Tamworth, Staffordshire, and studies at the City of Liverpool College of Higher Education.

Music career

Cope first comes to notice as a member of The Crucial Three, a short-lived band that also includes Ian McCulloch and Pete Wylie. The group lasts for only a few weeks and does not play any public shows or make formal recordings, although the song “Books” is later recorded by both Cope’s and McCulloch’s later bands.

He later becomes the singer, original bassist and main songwriter of The Teardrop Explodes, a Liverpool pop band that he joins in 1978. The group disbands in late 1982 after completing three albums.

After that, Cope begins a solo career and releases a long run of records through the 1980s and 1990s. His first solo album, World Shut Your Mouth, appears in 1984 after he reworks material recorded for John Peel’s show in 1983. It is followed by Fried, then Saint Julian, which produces “World Shut Your Mouth”, his biggest solo hit and a UK Top 20 single in 1986. My Nation Underground follows, and its single “Charlotte Anne” reaches the UK Top 40. He then records Skellington in secret over a single weekend, and later issues Droolian in aid of Roky Erickson.

In the early 1990s, Peggy Suicide and JehovahKill reflect his interest in the occult, animal rights, the goddess and ecology. These albums, along with 20 Mothers, all reach the UK Top 20. 20 Mothers appears in 1995 and includes the single “Try, Try, Try”.

Other projects and labels

Cope is a founding member of Brain Donor and Queen Elizabeth, and he continues to record both under his own name and with regular collaborators under those band names. Brain Donor is described as a proto-metal power trio, while Queen Elizabeth is an ambient two-piece. He also releases music himself rather than through a major label, with later work issued mainly through his website Head Heritage. A label associated with his releases is Fuck Off & Di.

Writing and research

Alongside music, Cope writes non-fiction and autobiography. His autobiographical books Head-On and Repossessed cover his years from 1976 to 1989 and are later republished together as Head-On/Repossessed. He also writes Krautrocksampler, a study of the German krautrock movement, The Modern Antiquarian, a large survey of stone circles and other ancient monuments in the British Isles, The Megalithic European, which extends that subject across Europe, and Japrocksampler, a study of post-war Japanese rock from 1951 to 1978.

He hosts a community-based Modern Antiquarian website for contributions about ancient sites in the United Kingdom and Ireland, and he gives lectures on prehistory, including talks at the British Museum on Avebury and Odin.

Live work

Cope continues to perform live in the UK and elsewhere in Europe, including at Glastonbury Festival in 2003.

Style and genres

His work spans alternative rock, neo-psychedelia, new wave, post-punk, psychedelic pop and psychedelic rock, with tags also associated with post-punk, psychedelic, alternative, rock and indie.