Thursday we were all set for Hometime show on Key103, until I got notified that Gary Barlow was available for an interview... hello chicago! I got onto the agency setting up interviews and it transpired that at 5:15pm, I was on the phone with not only Gary Barlow, but also Prof Brian Cox, Chris Evans and James May!! They were travelling from Lands End to John O' Groats in a pink Rolls Royce raising awareness for Breast Cancer Care. It was a surreal experience!... I put them through to OJ and enjoyed 5 awesome minutes of radio, completely improvised and totally unpredictable.
Next we attempted the Marshmallow challenge, which made me howl with laughter. OJ had to squeeze as many marshmallows into his mouth, saying 'Fuzzy Bunny' after each to claim a world record. At 16, it was looking insanely good...then it all got a bit much and a grim sight followed!
I also prepped my Q Radio show and finalised some bits and pieces. I was completely aware it was Record Store Day on Saturday and I wanted to make a big song and dance about it. I decided to drop in to Piccadilly Records in Manchester, a heritage record store to see if, on the off chance, I could grab an interview. Low, I managed to speak to Martin, the lovely chap that is, and we talked about the romance of physical music, a resurgence in popularity for vinyl and how important RSD is.
Funnily enough, despite me going to a vintage market last weekend and adding some 20p vinyls to my collection, I don't even have a record player to play them on. Idiot me. I thought I may as well ask around and see if I could hunt one down... after all, if I was to spend money for RSD, I'll at least need to justify the further damage to my bank balance with the sound of it.
After hunting for a long time, I finally found one... a gorgeous, old Toshiba number. I got it back to the flat and eagerly set it up with my mates. It shocked me how amped everyone was for a record player purchase in 2013?! - the romance of vinyl music is still very much alive.
With my Record Store Day feature set to play out, I also had a interview pre-recorded with Peace for my Q Now show. I did SO many interviews last year for The Source radio show - I listened back to some of the podcasts today actually...3 band interviews a week and session tracks, was so much fun - but unfortunately as things go so busy with other projects, the band interviews became fewer and farther between. I picked up the reigns with interviews again when I landed my Q Radio show, and instantly rediscovered the joy of talking to musicians about our mutually favourite subject: music. I felt rusty at first, but with this chat to Peace I felt completely in my comfort zone and thoroughly enjoyed chatting about Birmingham - their hometown and feed-bed for so much great new music currently - the album, and the writing process for the album, which sounded very amusing and reminiscent of Ozzy Osbourne's recollections in his autobiography, as he describes the recording of one album in a haunted old house - bloody good book that, can you believe Black Sabbath have new music out too?!.
Peace were a pleasure to chat to and on stage they were a different class! It's great chatting to bands fresh off-stage, everyone is on such a high from the gig and it's brilliant to mull over the evening's proceedings. Especially at high-intensity gigs like that, shenanigans are rife!
With so much exciting stuff happening at work... I did manage to make time to trek to the Peak District to interview James Sharp, a textiles artist. This was for a uni project and again a really interesting thing. I had met him at this aforementioned vintage market, he was selling collages, textiles and bespoke art journals and diaries. His work is really cool, all hand-crafted and very creative. Off the back of the Great British Sewing Bee, I thought he'd be great to chat to to set up a 'What was the last thing you made?' feature for our student radio show assignment - putting a 1hr speech show together. It's a fun project, I'm presenting it, which I'm very excited about. It's not often I get a chance to do speech based shows, but rest assured I'll meander my way to talk about something new music related... I'm waiting with bated breath for the Producer to bark down the studio talk back system "FILL, NEED 2MINS"!.. so I can launch into an anecdote about some recent gig or an album I've enjoyed recently.
The Peak District was fun, and it evoked loads of fond memories of motorbiking back home in the countryside. Especially with these views, I made my way back to the flat tinged with nostalgic thoughts!
Back at Key103, we were all set for another Hometime show to finish the week. We had Record Store Day interviews and we even played out a vinyl!!
We also welcomed the presidents of both Salford and Manchester rowing teams set to come in ahead of the Two Cities Boat Race at the weekend. Having so much on the show is a rarity, but the last few days have been an absolute ball. That doesn't even take into consideration the weekend, which I'm sure I will find the time to chatter about at a later date!
