The comedic singer John Otway, who has traded on being a rock and roll failure throughout his music career, has become a success in the film world.

As a child John wanted to be a pop star, eagerly lapping up the sounds coming from his sister’s bedroom from The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. A chance encounter with a fortune teller, at a fair, convinced the young John that fame and fortune beckoned and his musical journey began.

Now, finally at the age of 62, his dream has come true. Otway the Movie made a huge impact at Cannes Film Festival in 2012, it premiered in Leicester Square’s Odeon cinema, it was played in cinemas up and down the country including Glastonbury Rock Festival, and last year was voted the Second Best Movie of the Year by Guardian readers. It was only pipped at the post by Gravity.

This month the effervescent musician makes a welcome return to Swindon, as part of his UK tour, the aptly titled Film Stars Tour, with Wild Willy Barrett.

He is promoting the movie coming out on DVD and Bluray. The DVD: Rock and Roll’s Greatest Failure: Otway The Movie is based on the high and lows of his ongoing search for stardom. The movie itself was funded entirely by his fans.

This is not the first time his followers have banded together to bathe the singer in limelight. For John’s 50th birthday his fans made a concerted effort to get his single Bunsen Burner, written about helping his daughter with her chemistry homework, into the charts.

The single was produced by Barry Upton and recorded in Abbey Road Studios with 900 fans singing backing vocals.

Listening to the chart run down with his fans in a pub in Argyl Street in London, John had to get on a barrel with a transistor radio to make out that he was finally back in the top 10 - at number nine! The week before his 50th birthday he sang the song at the London Palladium.

It has been a rocky road for John since his first smashing appearance on the Old Grey Whistle Test where he jumped up on to an amp, missed his footing and crashed astride the box underneath, with no regard for his own safety – but the legend that is John Otway was born.

On Monday, October 20 at 8pm, John and Wild Willy will be back in action at The Vic, Victoria Road, in Swindon’s Old Town. Tickets are £10 (adv) £12 (door) from 01793 535713. - Flicky Harrison