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For my nightly show
on the BBC's digital
6 Music network I like
to submit new releases
to a kind of blindfold
Pepsi Test. In my view
artists who turn out
great new work deserve
to be heard. Those that
don't, don't. The disk we're listening
to definitely qualifies. "Whoever this
lot are," I enthuse,
"let's get 'em
in for an interview".
Alas 'this lot' turn
out to be Radiohead:
venerated by many
as the single most
significant band on
the planet, with a
legendary loathing
for talking to anyone
about anything. Get
back in the queue,
Robinson.
Music exclusives
lie in the gift of
number-hungry pluggers
aiming to manipulate
chart placings for
their artists. Even
though 6 Music's reach
is now doubling every
few months, with the
best will in the world
digital radio remains
for now a minority
medium.
The upside is a freedom
to try things out,
get things wrong and,
occasionally, get
them right. Just 12
months out of the
starting gate, 6 Music
is already up for
two Sonys. Not in
the same league as
Colchester Car Wash
Of the Year, but watch
out Eddie - we're
hot on your heels.
For myself I'm gradually
getting the hang of
live radio. The key
is always knowing
what comes next. An
inner Alan Partridge
lurks ready to burst
into spluttering banalities
the second one tears
up the running order.
Preparation is everything.
It's a far cry from
thrashing a bass guitar
in the rough and ready
days of punk rock,
which is how I got
started.
Back then an intense
blond stranger walked
up and told me I'd
have to change my
name. His was Tom
Robertson and he was
going to be famous.
In the event "2-4-6-8
Motorway" made
it just ahead of "The
Golden Age Of Wireless" and it was as Thomas
Dolby that he unleashed
a series of peerless
albums throughout
the 80s.
Always one of the
sharper tools in the
box, Dolby spotted
the internet's potential
some ten years ahead
of everyone else.
He moved to California,
invented a groundbreaking
music technology called
Beatnik and made his
fortune. Wandering
fondly through his
back catalogue on
air the other night
I wondered aloud what
Dolby/Robertson was
currently up to. A
listener suggested
sending him an email
via beatnik.com just
on the offchance.
It not only got through,
but TD turns out to
be in London this
week and prepared
to drop into Broadcasting
House (the place,
not the programme)
to chat about life,
the universe and everything
next Monday. Isn't
the internet marvellous.
News just in from
a baffled plugger
at Parlophone. Radiohead's
stubbornly reclusive
Thom Yorke has requested
an interview in June
with "that musician
guy who does the evening
show on 6 Music".
Double result !
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