Saturday 17 November 2018

The Comedy of Errors: John Peel Show - BBC Radio 1 (Saturday 2 May 1992)

Last week, through the medium of Bang Bang Machine, I ruminated that their session track, A Charmed Life reflects the sense that youth can be a halcyon time.  The challenge is to recognise it as such when it happens.  Well for me, Saturday 2 May 1992 was a wonderful day because my beloved Ipswich Town had clinched the Second Division championship and would be returning to English football’s top flight after an absence of six years and the promise of riches in the new FA Premier League  which would be starting the following season.  It wasn’t until August, when it became obvious just how much Sky TV were throwing money, attention and razzamatazz at this to try and mark it out as an event rather than simply The Football Season that I realised just how changed things were, not only from this 1991-92 season, but from the division that Ipswich had last competed in back in 1986.  On this day, it was merely the cherry on the icing of the cake that had been set with Ipswich winning promotion on the previous weekend at Oxford United.  Among the large crowd of 26,803 who saw Town lift the Second Division trophy after a 3-1 win over Brighton and Hove Albion and hopefully joining in the pitch invasion at the end were The PigDanda and Tom. According to Peel, one of Alexandra’s friends had managed to give a Town player (not identified alas) a kiss during the pitch invasion.  I would have done too had I been there, but instead I was at home catching the final scores and thinking that, at last, when it came to talking about football among the Manchester United and Liverpool fans who had been my peers at school over the previous six years, I could talk to them excitedly about matches my team were going to have with their teams instead of trying to hype matches against Shrewsbury Town or Port Vale, like any of them would give a shit. However, a look at the table as it stands after our most recent match means I could be hyping up similar fixtures next season if results don’t pick up soon.

Peel was still buzzing from Polly Jean Harvey’s impromptu guest appearance in his previous show  Through her he had received a request for a Duane Eddy track from Gallon Drunk.  He was unable to oblige them but put forward what he regarded as a suitable soundalike in Vampire by The Belairs, though after hearing it he repudiated it as an Eddyesque substitute.
PJ Harvey (the band) were about to have their first Peel Session put out alongside those of their labelmates on the Too Pure Records label, Sterolab and Th’ Faith Healers on a 10” limited edition Strange Fruit release.  Peel was tempted to keep them all for himself because he liked the cover art so much, but he was giving 3 of them away in a competition.  Winners would be determined by whoever sent him “something interesting in an envelope - not vulgar and it must be flat”.  I really hope I get to find out what won.

I’ve been listening to Peel shows from the end of May 1992 in which he laments, not entirely in jest, that bands and artists never invite him to socialise with them.  Quite often on the weekend shows, he would relate that he had organised meetings with friends and acquaintances in London for lunch or drinks only for them to pull out and leaving him to kick his heels either in the city or at the Radio 1 offices.  Anyone looking to invite him may have felt  moved to complain that their parties always clashed with Peel’s own visits to exhibitions.  After his March trip to see Normski’s photography exhibition, Peel was looking forward to visiting Edward Barton’s exhibition at Afflecks in Manchester.  It was called Hole Keeper and featured among its exhibits a live Beat the Goalie activity.

The selections from this show were taken from a 79 minute file.  There were two tracks I would have been interested to share if I could have got hold of them:

Midway Still - Making Time - this would have owed its place to a very personal reason, namely that its central riff sounded very close to that used six years later by Therapy? on Church of Noise.  If I ever get my own music radio show I intend to call it The Church of Noise and use the chorus of that as my intro music.  There’s still time and if I find any of you have beaten me to it, I will find you and I will kill you (except for Webbie who has bailed me out that many times, they can use whatever
music they want).

Sin City Disciples - Go Work - an absolutely tremendous rock song by one of Kansas City’s finest, though if I was being critical I’d call it slightly guilty of some of the things Peel accused British bands of the time of being guilty of - namely being in hock to sounds that had come before.  But
when it’s as good as this tune was, who cares?

Falling from favour were:
TPOK Jazz Band - Zena Mama na Lolita - I had a question mark against it and found when I listened to it again, I got 3 and a half minutes before realising I hadn’t thought about the track once.

Full tracklisting

“Good evening my lords and ladies...”



Video courtesy of colzo666


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