Rusty Egan

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Rusty Egan is a British-Irish musician and DJ, born in London in 1957. He began as the drummer of the new wave band Rich Kids, which existed from March 1977 to December 1978. It also featured the former Sex Pistols bassist Glen Matlock and Midge Ure. Egan continued to work with Ure and later played with, among others, The Misfits, Skids and Shock. He was also a co-founder of Visage and played drums on a remixed version of Phil Lynott's Yellow Pearl, which the BBC used as the theme tune of Top of the Pops from 1981 to 1986.

Music and breakthrough

From 1979 to 1981 he spun records at Blitz, the New Romantic club in London, together with Steve Strange. There he played electronic music and synth-pop by Kraftwerk, Yellow Magic Orchestra, Eno, Ultravox and Landscape, among others, and so defined the musical style of that scene. He also had a record shop, The Cage, on King's Road. In 1981 he DJed at Croc's in Rayleigh and helped Depeche Mode get a regular night. In 1982 he, Strange and Kevin Millins opened the Camden Palace. Later he produced records for groups he had played for, such as Spear of Destiny, Shock and Visage.

Influence

Egan showed that a DJ can shape a scene, not only by choosing what is played, but also by deciding who gets to take part. In School of Rock he appears alongside Steve Strange as the man behind the club nights where you only got in if you looked striking.

Listening

Discography

Studio albums

• 2017Welcome to the Dance Floor

In School of Rock

The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.

• Mixtape 7: The 1980s^NL Reader