Category Archives: Music
The making of The Stars of Sergeant Pepper
What are Mae West and Diana Dors doing on the cover of Sergeant Pepper’ Lonely Hearts Club band? If you feel you’ve heard too much already about the 50th anniversary of the record, then fear not. Producer Luke Doran (who … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, History, Media, Music, Religion, Uncategorized
Tagged 60s, beatles, culture, Hollywood, media, music, Sergeant Pepper
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How to win the coming culture war in 2017
A version of this article first appeared in The Big Issue magazine in January 2017. Journalism worth paying for. Available weekly from street vendors or subscriptions here. History rarely falls into neat numerical decades. I would assert the 1980s (yuppies, … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Comics/graphic novels, Culture, Film, Media, Music, Politics, Radio, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Theatre, TV, Uncategorized
Tagged ali smith, BIG ISSUE, books, cinema, culture, culture war, Disney, dr quinn medicine woman, dreamgirls, everbody's talking about jamie, feminism, film, FTW, henry krieger, Hollywood, jane seymour, jon musker, media, moana, pauline boty, politics, rogue one, ron clements, susan faludi, tv, tyrus wong, unforgotten, Wonder Woman
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I Dressed Ziggy Stardust – revisited
I Dressed Ziggy Stardust is getting a re-broadcast on Radio 4 on Saturday afternoon. Here’s a bit about why: When I pitched I Dressed Ziggy Stardust to Radio 4 back in 2012 there was nothing more to it than a … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, History, Music, Radio, Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV, Uncategorized
Tagged 1970s, 1980s, 70s, 80s, alice bloch, BBC, David Bowie, London, Rupa Huq, Shyama Perera, Ziggy Stardust
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Ice, ash and fury: A meditation on eruptions from Mt St Helens to the Temple of St Paul’s Cathedral
Since I made The White North Has Thy Bones a year ago about our obsession with the Arctic and the North West Passage I’ve realised January has become a favourite time of the year. For this Something Understood the starting … Continue reading
The Teen Within…
This week’s Something Understood gives voice to people who I reckon are rarely heard on radio. Teenagers. The readings are all done by young actors and much of the music and poetry you’ll hear was written by them, or about … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Children, Culture, France, Germany, History, Media, Music, Radio, Religion
Tagged adolescence, alom shaha, BIG ISSUE, cat stevens, claude tardat, Hairspray, harlem renaissance, janis ian, john steinbeck, John Waters, letter to my younger self, maxim leo, peter capaldi, plum bun, red love, teenagers, the young atheists handbook
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Bye Bye Baby: The Bay City Rollers & the lost innocence of the 70s
Three ageing rockers are holding up big glasses of milk in a toast. There’s always something poignant about seeing how teen stars have aged, but the Bay City Rollers really were angelic faced teeny boppers, and I am stung by … Continue reading
Posted in Crime and Justice, Culture, Music, TV, Uncategorized
Tagged 1970s, 70s, bay city rollers, Caroline Sullivan, jimmy savile, les mckeown, pat mcglynn, tam paton
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Leaving home: The 60s and getting out
The roots of this Sunday’s Something Understood for Radio 4 are in one song – The Beatles’ She’s Leaving Home and one time: the 1960s. Over the course of the decade young people found greater opportunity through a huge growth … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Culture, Film, Music, Radio
Tagged 60s, David Bowie, London, Lord Kitchener, Lynn Redgrave, Philip Larkin, Rita Tushingham, Smashing Time, Something Understood, The L Shaped Room
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Plankton of the midsummer air
This week’s Something Understood takes its title Inebriate of the Air, from an Emily Dickinson poem about the insect heavy honeyed thickness of midsummer light and air. And insect and bird sounds (swifts) dominate this programme. Entomologist Ross Piper helps us … Continue reading
Posted in Music, Radio, Science
Tagged bjork, emily dickinson, john agard, midsummer, ross piper, Something Understood, summer solstice
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We gotta get out of this place: Small town boys & the curse of pop stardom
“I used to scrump apples in the grounds here here,” says Jim Dale, smiling that boyish smile as we sit for our interview in a grand medieval manor house. Now a country house hotel it used to be a school … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, Education, Media, Music, Radio, TV, Uncategorized
Tagged 1950s, 1970s, 1980s, Basildon, Carry On, Corby, Dave Gahan, Jim Dale, Paul Morley, Six Five Special
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Desert worlds: JG Ballard, Lawrence of Arabia, Dune & the story of Ishmael
My latest Something Understood for Radio 4 on Sunday April 19th was conceived as a sequel to The White North Has Thy Bones, about our fascination with the Arctic and the North West Passage. Together with producer Natalie Steed we … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, Film, Music, Radio, Religion, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Uncategorized
Tagged Deserts, Dune, Hagar and Ishmael, Lawrence of Arabia, Something Understood
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