Our thanks to Eugene Byrne for permission to reproduce this article first published in Bristol Times 7/1/2025.
BT was saddened to hear of the death just before Christmas of Darryl Bullock at the age of 60.
Darryl had – has! – a world-wide following as the author of a number of respected books on music and LGBT+ life and culture, including The World’s Worst Records (two volumes!), Florence Foster Jenkins: The Life of the World’s Worst Opera Singer (Duckworth-Overlook, 2016), David Bowie Made Me Gay: 100 Years of LGBT Music (Duckworth-Overlook, 2017), The Velvet Mafia: The Gay Men Who Ran the Swinging 60s (Omnibus Press, 2021) and a few others. His book about Gloucestershire record producer and songwriter Joe Meek, Love and Fury is due out later this year.
In Bristol he deserves a prominent place in local gay history. He grew up in Gloucester, later moving to Bath before coming to Bristol as a freelance journalist. For years in pre-internet times he covered local LGBT+ issues in local listings magazine Venue, playing an important role in creating a city that’s much more welcoming and tolerant than it used to be.
He and his then-partner were also the first couple in the region to enter a Civil Partnership, in December 2005.
“We had it in Bath, as we’d previously had a blessing there (Bath was years ahead of Bristol when it came to recognising and celebrating same-sex couples)” he told BT some years back. He later lodged some memorabilia from this historic event with M Shed.
He and his then-partner later became the first same-sex couple to have their partnership dissolved (“a difficult process as the court had never had to deal with one before”).
He had been with Niall since 2008; their Civil Partnership was upgraded to full marriage on the first day the law allowed it, in 2014. They later moved to Cumbria.
Darryl was a lovely man, easy company, and an editor’s dream to work with. His delight in many of the more absurd aspects of both popular culture and gay culture was infectious.
Our sympathies go out to his family, and to Niall. He will be greatly missed.
©Eugene Byrne