Born Gary Webb in Hammersmith in 1958, Gary Numan auditioned unsuccessfully to become a guitarist for the then-unknown band The Jam, before discovering the Moog synthesiser and forming Tubeway Army. The band’s 1979 singles “Cars” and “Are ‘Friends’ Electric?” both reached number one on the UK charts. Three number one albums and global fame followed, with Numan selling a career total of more than 10 million records. Numan married Gemma O’Neill, a former member of his fan club in 1997, and the couple split their time between Los Angeles and Callander in Scotland and share three daughters, Raven, 22, Persia, 20 and 19-year-old Echo.
Here, he looks back on the moments that changed his perspective on work, love, family, money and health.
I made a complete cock-up of school. Back then, the autistic side of me was ferociously active and I was getting into trouble quite a lot with what I saw as badly wielded authority. I thought I was just expressing myself honestly, but the teachers thought I was cheeky. I never learnt manipulation or tact. I got expelled from that school, then caned on the first day of the next one.
Shorts
I was diagnosed with autism towards the end of my time at grammar school. I was sent to a local child psychologist, who couldn’t help me, and he referred me to St Thomas’s Child Psychiatry Unit. At that point, I thought the rest of the world was weird. I thought the only one that was normal was me. I absolutely believed it. I didn’t understand the way people reacted to the things that I said. I just thought: “F**k me, people are so weird.”
