Tom Robinson (born 1950) is a UK songwriter and radio broadcaster who released 14 studio albums - with various band lineups - between 1975 and 2015 and currently hosts three shows a week on BBC Radio 6 Music.
His first band Café Society were signed to Konk Records by Ray Davies who produced a self-titled album by the group in 1975. The following year he formed his own Tom Robinson Band (TRB) who became known for their support of Rock Against Racism and LGBT rights. TRB's debut release on EMI Records in 1977 was 2-4-6-8 Motorway which hit the Top 5 and became one of the landmark singles of the UK punk era.
Other hits included Glad To Be Gay, Don't Take No For An Answer and Up Against The Wall while the band's debut album Power In The Darkness went gold in the UK & Japan. As a solo artist Tom had further success in 1983 with War Baby and Atmospherics: Listen To The Radio, and co-wrote songs with Peter Gabriel, Elton John, Dan Hartman and Manu Katché.
His most recent studio album Only The Now (2015) included guest appearances by Billy Bragg, John Grant, Martin Carthy, Nadine Shah, Sir Ian McKellan, TV Smith, Nitin Sawhney and Lisa Knapp and was a BBC 6 Music album of the day.
As a radio presenter, Tom has hosted programmes on all eight of the BBC‘s national radio stations over the last 30 years, and won two Gold Sony Academy Radio Awards. He served as a member of the Ivor Novello Awards committee for ten years, is a recipient of a BASCA Gold Badge Award, and was awarded a fellowship of LIPA in 2016, in recognition of his support for new music through BBC Introducing.
