DJ Fat Tony: “I had one tooth left in my head - I wasn’t sane”
Full Disclosure with James O'Brien
Global
4.5 • 3.6K Ratings
🗓️ 12 June 2026
⏱️ 72 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This episode includes discussion of sensitive topics, including addiction, that some listeners may find distressing. Please take care while listening, and feel free to pause or step away if you need to.
DJ Fat Tony has spent a lifetime turning chaos into charisma. Long before he became one of the most recognisable figures in British nightlife, he was a kid from Battersea learning, far too young, how to protect himself, how to perform, and how to survive. His childhood wasn’t without love or colour - he speaks warmly about his glamorous, indulgent mother, his complex but protective father, and the freedom and style that shaped him - but it was also marked by abuse, secrecy and the sense that he had to grow up far too quickly.
In this episode of Full Disclosure, James O’Brien sits down with DJ Fat Tony to trace the path from those early years to the centre of London’s club culture. Tony reflects on sneaking into nightlife as a teenager, finding his people on the King’s Road, and building a reputation not through technical brilliance but through instinct, energy and an unerring ear for what moved people.
He speaks candidly about trauma, addiction, identity and the masks he wore to stay in control, as well as the extraordinary highs of a life lived at full volume - from the golden age of clubbing to the friendships, fame and excess that came with it. Tony opens up about recovery, honesty and the hard work of building a life that no longer depends on performance or escape.
It’s a funny, moving and often startling conversation about survival, reinvention and what it means to finally feel at home in yourself.
Find out more about Recover Me by DJ Fat Tony here
Additional support:
If you've been affected by anything you've heard in this episode, please take a moment to read the resources listed: We Are With You, Change Grow Live, Turning Point
Full Disclosure is a Global Production
Listen or watch every Friday on Global Player, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal -> https://nordvpn.com/fulldisclosure Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This is a Global Player original podcast. |
| 0:05.8 | This episode includes discussion of sensitive topics like addiction and sexual abuse, |
| 0:10.6 | which some listeners may find distressing. |
| 0:13.3 | Please take care while listening and feel free to pause or step away if you need to. |
| 0:19.0 | Pioneering superstar DJ. |
| 0:22.4 | Technically, how good were you? |
| 0:29.5 | Um, I was shit. If I'm the bitchiest, they're going to love me. If I'm the loudest, they're going to love me. Do you what I mean? I was fake full star. Were you? They just |
| 0:33.8 | washed their hands with me at that point. Irving Welsh says, when the gays farted, the straight stood up and listened. |
| 0:40.9 | It was always a whispering of so-and-so's not well. |
| 0:43.7 | Our peers were all dying. |
| 0:45.3 | Yeah. |
| 0:45.6 | And no one ever talked about it. |
| 0:46.9 | They all went off and died. |
| 1:02.3 | Hello, and welcome to full disclosure, a podcast project conceived entirely to let me spend more time with interesting people than I would ever get on the radio. |
| 1:09.7 | And I've introduced a few guests with the observation that we'd probably need at least 10 episodes to even get close to the full life lived. |
| 1:12.6 | This week that holds particularly true. |
| 1:21.1 | Fat Tony, welcome. Thank you. I mean, for people who don't know your work as a pioneering superstar DJ, they're probably going to want the first explanation because you're not fat. |
| 1:26.5 | No, but, you know, I was a long time ago, around like 14. |
| 1:31.3 | You know, we become fat for protection. |
| 1:34.3 | I mean, I was always a skinny child, but then some trauma-based thing happened, |
| 1:38.3 | which is abuse, and then what happened was, |
| 1:41.3 | after the four years of abuse, I become really fat because it was like building a castle around myself. |
... |
Transcript will be available on the free plan in 22 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Global, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Global and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.