Update 32
It’s been interesting these last few weeks as the Beeb marks its 100th anniversary. Being drawn to stories about the early days of radio in the UK, I’ve seen reports of hit songs devoted to “Listening In” - for that was what our forbears did - they didn’t just listen to the wireless, they “listened in”. I found a newspaper headline from 1924 bemoaning the fact that women in England were suffering from “radio faces” because of the way they scrunched them up as they tried better to hear the signal from their somewhat primitive crystal sets.
By the 1930s the wireless had become the iPad of its time. Cutting-edge designs manufactured in the new material Bakelite, were created by the likes of Wells Coates and in France, we found a Hotel Radio opened and so-named back in 1930. It’s still there today in Clermont-Ferrand with art-deco furniture and decoration, as well as wireless sets of the period in every room.
Not quite as mature as the Corporation itself, up comes Tony Blackburn to celebrate his 80th birthday on the 29th January. He and I started working together in August 1967 with the launch of Radio One and our paths have continued to cross through each of the subsequent decades. Tony is a unique broadcaster - passionate in his love of soul music in particular but also with a matchless ability to understand and to champion the very best of pop music in general. He’s never been tempted to look down his nose at the maestros who make it. Benny and Bjorn, Barry, Maurice and Robin, Bernie & Elton or Bacharach & David, the creative teams that have given us the finest possible expressions of popular music culture and which Tony has now shared with at least three generations of “listeners in”.
Big news of the week in radio land is the departure of Ken Bruce from Radio Two. I’m guessing he got fed up with the really messy music policy that the station has introduced. It’s currently neither one thing nor another and a price in listening figures will soon have to be paid. Ken is a superb broadcaster and many of his current listeners will have little difficulty in switching stations and adjusting to the intrusion of the ads on Greatest Hits Radio where he’ll be working alongside other former BBC broadcasters including Simon Mayo, Paul Gambaccini and Richard Allinson.
If you want a permanent record of the Corporation’s first 100 years then I can recommend ‘Broadcasting Britain’ by Robert Seatter and published by Dorling Kindersley. It’s one of those beautifully designed productions around which you can duck and dive, enjoying the bits that mean something to you and moving on past those that don’t.
There’ll be no change to my drug consumption this week. I’m keen to stay at 2mg of the Dexamethasone and hold on to my taste buds functioning reasonably normally. Next week it’ll be my scan appointment to be followed by analysis from the Neurologist.
In other news, Nadim Zahawi seems to have got himself into something of a muddle. First he announced that he had already paid all his back taxes, only for it to be revealed that he has only recently paid the seven figure sum to clear his outstanding debt to HMRC. Where does the truth lie?
Over in Northern Ireland the poor folks who run the DUP are still bemoaning their fate with ongoing whingeing about how badly they’re being treated - they’ve effectively withdrawn their ball from play until the UK government dances more enthusiastically to the DUP tune. What they fail to acknowledge is that the NI economy (with freedom of movement twixt the EU and NI as well as twixt the UK and NI) is performing significantly better than ours - the DUP should be careful what they wish for.
The government’s levelling up programme appears to have gone off the rails, or at least to have missed some of the junctions it was meant to take. Numerous reports detail how too many of the proposed investments benefit what could easily be seen as less deserving cases - poor Rishi, how hard it is to please even your own supporters. Perhaps the best approach is to keep your head down and try to look as though you’re doing nothing. In the Guardian, John Crace already describes our PM as “inaction man”.
We started the week by going with friends Prue & Kevin to see ‘Tar’. It is 158 minutes long, and by the last 20 minutes or so I was getting ready to call it a day. There were too many unanswered questions, but maybe that’s just my failing in wanting everything to be neat and tidy. The script makes clear that the central character is not a nice woman, is almost certainly a sexual predator, and is not going to reach her potential as a conductor. I was captivated by Cate Blanchett - she is a superb actor and that alone makes this movie worth a visit to your local silver screen. Oh okay, there was also the fact that we were served lunch while we watched: Pinot Noir, with Brie, Cranberry and bacon toasties.
To end the week we went back to Prithvi with supportive friends Jaci & Simon. The restaurant serves a multi course menu (modest portions) described as ‘The Tour’ and we took advantage of that, accompanied by a stunning bottle of Bishop’s Leap Sauvignon Blanc and a Californian Zinfandel. Functioning taste buds make such a difference.
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