Ian Robins Dury was an English singer, songwriter and actor who rose to fame in the late 1970s, during the punk and new wave era of rock music. He was the lead singer and lyricist of Ian Dury and the Blockheads and previously Kilburn and the High Roads.

New wave is a music genre that encompasses pop-oriented styles from the 1970s through the 1980s. It is considered a lighter and more melodic "broadening of punk culture". It was originally used as a catch-all for the various styles of music that emerged after punk rock. Later, critical consensus favored "new wave" as an umbrella term involving many contemporary popular music styles, including synth-pop, alternative dance and post-punk. The main new wave movement coincided with late 1970s punk and continued into the early 1980s.