Shaun Ryder says the reason he appears on TV all the time is to entice youngsters into discovering his music.
The Happy Mondays and Black Grape frontman takes part in new Channel 4 teatime series Fame in the Family this week, in which he faces four strangers who have to work out which of them are related to him.
Later this year he’ll be on E4’s Celebrity Cooking School, alongside Kerry Katona and cleaning queen Kim Woodburn, and he’ll also start filming another run of Celebrity Gogglebox next month.
But Ryder says, for him, it’s still all about the music - and he’ll celebrate his 60th in August by performing at back-to-back festivals.
“There’s a reason I’m always on telly - because every time we go and do one of these things, the youth watch it and go, ‘Who the f***’s he?’ And then by the time they finish watching the programme, they’ve downloaded all your albums and then they turn up at the concerts.”
He said that he’s recognised now by kids who only know him for reality TV.
“You get that quite a lot, of somebody who’ll say, ‘Oi, Gogglebox.’ And 12 years before that it was, ‘You’re from the jungle.’”
But as much as he enjoys appearing on Gogglebox with bandmate Bez, he says he’ll never stop gigging. “You don’t retire - unless your false hips go.
Look at Mick and Keith and Paul McCartney and all this lot that I grew up with. Talk to Tom Jones! As long as you enjoy doing it, and you can do it, then you keep going.”
Over the years his bands have had plenty of fall-outs - but they’ve always got back together.
“There’s a lot of bullshit that goes on in bands, it’s just over ridiculous trivial things and jealousy. But mostly people get back together because they realise, look, there’s financial things.
“If I can get on stage with my brother (bassist, Paul) and the Mondays and we still enjoy ourselves, out of all the differences we had, and then anyone can do it.”
He said he loves performing more than ever these days.
“With both Black Grape and the Mondays, it’s better than it ever was back in the day. We all have kids now, and we’re all sort of grown ups. The sex and drugs are gone and it’s just the rock and roll. As I got older, I’m more comfortable with me and I enjoy just playing the shows and doing the music. So I enjoy that more than ever.”
Shaun said that Bez is still getting over his “dangerous” stint in Dancing on Ice.
“He stayed in bed for about three weeks. He is 50 odd years old and using muscles that he probably hasn’t used since he was about 15.”
Is that another reality show that Shaun would consider?
“I’ve got a false hip and very soon I will have another false hip, so that’s completely out of the question,” he explained, sounding relieved.
In Tuesday’s Fame in the Family Shaun, from Salford, is happy to delve into his family tree. He knows far more about his mum Linda’s side than his dad Derek’s.
“We all knew each other in the Carrolls, and they all lived near each other. But my dad’s lot, my granddad Ryder had something like 15 brothers and sisters and I didn’t know any of them. Dad wasn’t close with his family.”
And how did he feel at the end of the show when he found out who he was related to?
He laughed: “It’s twisted my melon.”
