Thank you for all the kind comments about the last blog - apparently I made a few people cry. Maybe I should aim to do that with every one I write? You'll be lucky with this one...
Recently I was assigned someone to look after for an afternoon during their work experience. Now I can't remember a great deal about my work experience when I was 15 but I don't remember sitting there fidgeting and yawning. I'm pretty sure I wasn't checking my mobile the moment my mentor spoke to someone else (I'd have had a job - I didn't get a mobile till the following year). And I'm absolutely certain I didn't announce midway through a chat that I would be leaving at 4pm so there probably wasn't much point carrying on.
Equally, I didn't get to spend my work experience at a broadcaster. By year 10 I was fairly sure that was the direction I wanted to move in but the stock work experience opportunities offered by my school didn't stretch to anything that, well, interesting. I wrote directly to my local BBC radio station but they, understandably, said they couldn't offer anything to those as young as I was at the time, and restricted this sort of thing to college and degree students. So I ended up doing a week at my Mum's employer, the Energy Saving Trust. I'd already done casual holiday work there so knew a lot of the staff too, which made for a good week.
Five years later and I was advised by my university supervisor that if I was wanting to get into broadcasting then in addition to my student TV and radio work it would be a good idea to try and get some unpaid experience at a broadcaster in my holidays. So I wrote back to the same person at the BBC who had told me to come back when I was older, and to his credit he invited me in for a chat. After a quick conversation where we didn't talk about much, but presumably enabled him to decide I wasn't a complete nutter (phew!), I was offered a four week placement working on the station's afternoon show starting in July 2004. I didn't expect it to be as easy as that and I certainly didn't expect it to be for a whole month!
The afternoon show was, and still is, presented by a self-styled "cheeky chappy" who has broadcast in the area for 30 years, and is well-known for his quick-fire wit and earthy scouse humour. Naturally, in person he was miserable as sin and he barely spoke to me when I was there, even avoiding eye-contact as I sat opposite him in the cafe next door to the studios where I was introduced. Now I'm well aware I was just the latest in a long line of work experience kids, no doubt some of which were not much to write home about, but he could have made a bit more of an effort, especially given the way at BBC Local Radio at that point was to basically use work placements as unpaid broadcast assistants, as there wasn't the budget to employ one of those in addition to a producer (hence the lengthy four-week placement). Once the show got underway I enjoyed myself a bit more - sitting behind the glass in the control room, watching it all go out, made me more certain than ever that broadcasting was where I wanted to be.
As I sat there I remember feeling a bit chilly, but thought that it must have just been over-enthusiastic air-con. On the way home the coldness continued, turning into full-on shivering on the bus and resulting in almost being unable to talk to my (then new) girlfriend on the phone once I got home. The next morning I woke up with a chin the size of Desperate Dan, and after being sent to the doctor's by my sister I was diagnosed with mumps. She's a nurse now. I like to think I was her first patient! I was "signed off" for a week (if you can be signed off when working for free), so they must have got a funny impression of me - there for one day and then falling ill.
When I returned the following week I continued for a short while with the Chuckle Brother in the afternoons. One cringe-worthy moment was when I was invited through to the studio to announce the result of a phone-in competition. I looked down at the scrawled hand-writing of the producer in front of me and said into the microphone that the winner was so-and-so from "Widerby". As soon as I said it I knew that "Widerby" was not an actual place in the local area and there was an awkward moment as we tried to work out, live on air, what it actually said. As the next record played it became clear that what was written was W/Derby, i.e. West Derby...
Other than the chance to embarrass myself to the region I wasn't being given much to do, so I got chatting to the producer of the morning show - a young, charasmatic guy who had clearly spotted that I didn't have much to keep me busy. He diplomatically offered to my afternoons producer to take me on to help with the morning show, which I naturally jumped at, so started coming in at 9am instead. What a difference! The morning presenter was a former commercial local radio breakfast show jock who had moved to the BBC a few years previously, so was a celebrity of sorts to people of my age, and he was a breath of fresh air - a genuinely lovely guy to work with. He was enjoying the lie-ins his new slot allowed and said he would never return to breakfast hours. Of course, today he presents the breakfast show on the station.
Being still in his thirties he was easily one of the youngest people on air at the station, so his show was therefore a much more interesting one to work on. I had a good time helping out editing trails, answering the phones and sorting out competitions (I'm rather glad this was a few years before the scandals as we didn't put much science behind picking the winners, but then when the prize was a cheap recipe book did it really matter?). I even presented on air at one point when visiting a "Maize Maze" in the Wirral. They seemed to like me (apparently "the best placement we've had" - although that was probably what they said to everyone) so I starting to wonder whether I perhaps had a future at the station. I was asked back the following Easter and again in the summer of 2005 following graduation. By this point their enthusiasm had cooled slightly and I was told I'd done as much unpaid as I was allowed to do and should now start looking for positions to apply for. This was a blessing in disguise really, as I started to research positions in London to join my girlfriend who had just moved down there, and quickly found myself applying to ITV - and I'm still there now.
So that was the end of my time doing work experience. It is something that demands a fair bit of understanding on either side: that the employer does not offer placements where it is difficult to do anything constructive, and that the person on the placement realises that they are quite lucky, and are not being taken on because their mentor needs someone to keep them busy. This week I'm in Leeds training the lovely YTV guys, as the role I got back in 2005 is being relocated. Obviously there's a lot of nodding and listening involved but thankfully none of them have yet started yawning or checking their texts yet...
Tuesday, 12 July 2011
Monday, 20 June 2011
Start spreading the news...
Well - where to start?! At the end, logically.
It's been a few days now since Kate and I announced our engagement. To say it's been a whirlwind is a bit of an understatement! We've had a lot of questions about how, where and when (but thankfully not "why") and while we're going to try and see as many friends in person as we can in the near future hopefully this blog should fill in the gaps for now.
Neither of us had been to the United States before, the closest I'd got being a school trip to Canada when I was 15, so we were both quite excited about the trip. I'd been looking for a good time to propose for around a year, thinking about going for it at the Edinburgh Fringe and during our New Year in a posh hotel together, but decided neither would really be the right occasion for a proposal. I'd bought Kate tickets to see Pulp for her birthday, at the Wireless Festival on 3rd July, which is also our anniversary, so I was thinking about doing it then after the concert finished somewhere special in London, but then realised that Pulp would be last on and it'd finish pretty late (obviously) - so that option was out. That left New York - why on earth didn't I think of it before?
Our journey there was relatively uneventful. We caught the Picadilly Line to Heathrow, which was handy as a direct train but I don't think either of us have ever spent as long on one single tube train before (it's just over an hour). We flew with America Airlines who had a rubbish selection of films and TV programmes to watch and a pretty poor "veggie" option (a catch-all veggie/vegan/gluten-free option as opposed to the main option which may itself be meat-free! bizarre). Then the Airtrain and New York subway and finally checking in at our hotel. The subway has two things only going for it - air conditioning and cheap prices - in all other ways, the tube is superior. The quality of the trains, sign-posting, announcements, countdown timers - it's like taking a limo in comparison. Also, can someone exhume Harry Beck and ask him to have a go at redesigning their map?
We stayed at the Distrikt Hotel, a lovely hotel not far from Times Square that Kate had booked based on it's Trip Advisor ratings alone. The decor was not dissimilar to the Malmaison chain that we often treat ourselves to in the UK - sumptuous and indulgent, with the feel of a much more expensive hotel (although the trump card was the free iced tea in reception, a must in the hot weather!). On geekwatch as ever I was very impressed with the TV in the room - not only a great selection of channels but the vast majority in HD too. Making that work in a hotel distribution system is to be applauded, if you've ever tried to watch the grainy stretched images in most UK chains.
Our first full day was incredibly hot - 98F in old money. New York is quite well prepared for this sort of weather with air conditioning in abundance, so as long as you go indoors every so often you'll be fine. However it's pretty rare in June, and the TV networks were talking about records being broken and children being sent home from school early. Given this we naturally we chose today to go to the top of one the tallest buildings in New York, the Rockefeller Centre, but not before a trip to the outside of NBC's Today studio in the same complex. Every morning crowds gather to try and get on TV, and we think we managed it! (later in the week we watched Saturday Night Live on the same network, which was actually pretty good - there was a brilliant sketch featuring the "other two" from the Black Eyed Peas - and one of the stars was none other than Kenan from Kenan and Kel!)
The views from the Top of the Rock were, as expected, incredible, but somewhat hazy due to the high temperatures. The amount of time we could spend up there was also limited by this - we were pretty much melting up there. Kate had suggested we go up this building rather than the Empire State Building as from this vantage we'd be able to actually see the highest building in New York, rather than be positioned on top of it. Smart thinking! After lunch at a cool fast food-style Falafel chain a quick look round Bloomingdales we headed back to the hotel to recover from the heat and some mild jetlag.
That evening we went to a great restaurant called The Meatball Shop. If it was in London then it'd be full of hipsters, but despite this it sells brilliant meatballs (including veggie ones!) at a great price with a fantastic atmosphere. While we were there the promised sequel to the heat arrived - a severe thunderstorm. I've seldom seen so much water but the queue carried on out outside this place, such is the attraction. Then we went to a bar which, amusingly, was showing an Arsenal v Tottenham match from last November. Our two nearest football clubs - thousands of miles away and still can't get away from them!
I'd always planned to propose on the Friday - giving us a day before to settle in and a couple of days after to enjoy ourselves. Luckily for me the weather for the Friday was forecast to be (slightly) cooler than the highs of the day before. I had done a bit of research on places to propose in New York (it all seeming real for the first time as I typed those words into Google!) and seen a variety of fairly rubbish options. The classic cheesy option was on top of the Empire State Building, but there was no way I was doing this. I'd always known Kate wanted it to be private and I completely agreed - there was no way I wanted an audience of tourists. The only problem was, New York is a very busy city - there are precious few quiet, secluded spots where I could pop the question and know it was only between us two. One option jumped out at me.
We arrived at Central Park on the Friday morning, with me feeling quite nervous and clutching a phone full of research of where to go and what to do! However upon arriving at the Loeb Boathouse disaster struck - the boat hire booth was shut, despite apparently opening at 10am. Kate later said that I seemed unaturally concerned at this! I thought about finding somewhere secluded in the park instead, but luckily before we set off the booth opened and all was well. As I rowed out into the lake I suddenly remembered that the last time I'd tried to row was in a rubber dinghy as a teenager, so spent an undignified few minutes thrashing around with the oars trying to work out how to actually do it. So far, so romantic.
We had an hour in the boat which set a rather daunting time limit on when to pop the question, so half an hour in, when I'd reached the centre of the lake, I began my "speech", as it were. I'd prepared an album of photos on my phone of the past seven years - some of just us two, others of us in a group, some of in-jokes that only mean anything to us two. Kate later told me she could tell something was up as my hands were shaking as I got my phone out! As I got to the end of the album I said that if that's what we'd done in seven years then imagine how amazing seventy would be - and, after a few more words that I'll keep private to us, I got on one knee and popped the question. Luckily it was quite a deep boat - I had worried that this would be difficult with us both being sat down!
I wasn't so much worried about Kate saying no (although does anyone proposing ever have no doubts in their mind at all about this?!), though she did later say I was a "massive tool" for wanting to marry her. I was more concerned about making the proposal itself special. We only plan to do this once in our lives (!) and I wanted it to be perfect for us - and, amazingly, it was. The weather was gorgeous, the surroundings were spectacular, the lake was secluded and with only a handful of other boats on it largely empty. There was also a lovely symmetry about the whole thing - we'd met at university in York, so proposing in New York felt almost like coming full circle. Also, as any Wirral resident will tell you (usually without prompting), Birkenhead Park was the inspiration for Central Park, and walking around the larger cousin you can certainly see a number of features carried over. So it couldn't really have worked out much better for us!
Kate and I met in January 2004 - well I tell a lie - Kate met me in January 2004 (bear with me). I met her in the first week of university in October 2002 at the politics department meet-and-greet event. I was there with my housemate Simon, both of us trying and largely failing to mingle and meet our fellow students. Eventually we managed to get talking to a friendly blonde girl and her housemate, and stayed talking to them rather too long as we all relaxed a little having finally got a conversation going. Sadly the dept divided us up into largely seperate seminar and lecture groups so I only saw her in passing in that first year (often walking from Halifax College onto the main campus, past our houses in Edens Court), kicking myself that I hadn't managed to stay in touch with her.
Fast forward to January 2004 and the blonde girl - Kate, who became brunette shortly afterwards - joined YSTV, which I'd been a member of since the start of my first year. She was a budding journalist at this point, and used to be in the station every Thursday afternoon preparing our news programme YSTV Week. We started to hit it off and I'd look forward to those Thursday afternoons, eventually persuading her to go in front of the cameras and present. By the summer we were an item and became "official" during a trip to Dublin in July 2004. OK, perhaps it wasn't quite as straightforward as that - call that the "abridged" version! But Kate claims to not remember that first meeting in the old Derwent library, so clearly I made a great first impression. Love at first sight it wasn't - second, perhaps!
After a fantastic final year at uni spent living in each other's pockets we graduated in July 2005, and within a few months we were living together in London, somewhere neither of us really were expecting to be, with Kate on a production trainee course and me working as an assistant scheduler at ITV. The rest is history - so back to New York.
Once we'd reached dry land again, we ended up sitting on a bench, watching the squirrels and talking for about an hour, both trying to take it all in. Then we had a wander around the park before jumping on the subway back to the hotel. We'd lost our appetites after the excitement of the morning so didn't bother with much for lunch, and headed down to the Staten Island Ferry, a free commuter trip which is mainly used by tourists in order to get a good view of the Statue of Liberty.
That evening we had a gorgeous seven-course Indian tasting meal at Amma before heading back up The Rock to use the second half of our ticket, seeing New York at night, an even more incredible view than during the day. All in all an incredible day - I can honestly say it couldn't have gone better for us. If I can just turn on the cheese for a moment (and I think I've done pretty well so far in avoiding it!) it was almost like someone was looking down on us, making it so...
I'd already asked Kate's parents for their blessing the night before we flew out (note: not just her Dad and not his permission - we're both on the same page on that particular custom) which was pretty nerve-wracking, although of course they were both delighted and over the moon. It also marked the point of no return as it went from something in my head to something that was out there and I actually needed to do! But the first person we told after we got engaged was the barman in our hotel, who was absolutely lovely and made up some special cocktails to celebrate with us. The aforementioned Amma restaurant also brought out a special dessert with "congratulations" written on the plate above it. Less good was one of the hotel porters, in an exchange that went something like this:
Kate (walking out of hotel, to porter): Hello!
Porter: Hello, how are you?
Kate: I'm great thanks - I got engaged today!
Porter: You're welcome.
The only response you can really do to that without causing embarrassment to both parties is to smile and carry on walking...
The following day we were booked to go on Scott's Pizza Tour, a walking tour around some of New York's most notable pizza restaurants. A quick Google and glance at Trip Advisor will tell you everything you need to know about how superb these tours are - and Scott's enthusiasm is without limits. Upon telling him about our news at the start of the tour, he shouted to the rest of the group "OH MY GOD! GUYS, THESE GUYS GOT ENGAGED YESTERDAY!". Lot of pizza talk and most importantly lots of pizza followed. I'm easily pleased!
Sunday was our last day and after checking out we met up for lunch with the lovely Beth, who worked with Kate at BBC Worldwide and has just moved to New York to join BBC America. We decided to walk The High Line together, which is a stretch of disused elevated railway (comparable to the DLR in London) which has recently been re-opened as a public park. As Kate and I do part of our daily journey to work on North London's Parkland Walk we were interested to see it's New York counterpart (thoughts - seems to have a lot more money behind it, a lot more landscaped, shorter in length and cyclists are banned - brilliant!). After this we did a bit of shopping, with Kate scratching her J-Crew itch and me snapping up some trainers that were the same price in dollars that they are in pounds in the UK - result!
The flight home was with British Airways, and the plane was much busier than the previous flight. The facilities, food and general service was much better - despite having a huge bottle of sparkling water knocked all over me from the trolley at one point (accidentally - at least, I hope so!). The stewardess fetched me a pair of first class pyjamas to say sorry, so if you want to play "BA First roleplay" then I'm your man. Unfortunately we were sat next to a couple of oddballs who spent the entire six hours ripping up bits of plastic and paper and throwing them onto the heads of their friends in the row in front. This never stopped being funny to them. It was an overnight flight, and Kate managed to get a couple of hours sleep (as she's quite talented at doing anywhere, anytime) but I didn't get any at all really, so we eventually arrived back in Crouch End at about midday feeling pretty zonked.
We weren't due back in work until Wednesday but were quite keen to tell our famillies face-to-face before announcing it to the wider world, so in New York we'd booked a late train to Liverpool on the Monday night to see my family, then over to Halifax to see Kate's Grandma on Tuesday, followed by her brothers in Leeds and then the last train back down to London that night. So after a couple of hours sleep at home we found ourselves heading back out again to Euston station to head up north. Feeling like we did, boy was the extra £16 for the first class advance ticket worth it! We hadn't told my parents and my Gran that we were coming at such short notice after our flight (thinking they'd suss it, losing the point of the trip), so we got a taxi from Lime Street station to Upton in the Wirral (having to guide the taxi driver all the way from the Mersey tunnel exit - classic). They were pretty surprised when we turned up just before 11pm that night!
By lunchtime on Tuesday we were heading across the Pennines to Yorkshire, on the same journey I used to do when returning from home to university in York. There's some spectacular scenery that I really wish I hadn't taken for granted at the time, now I'm stuck with the tedium of the West and East Coast Main Lines on most of my rail journeys. I also love the route it takes when winding through Manchester - it really shows off what an amazing city it is. After revealing the news to Kate's Grandma it was off to Leeds for a quick meal with Kate's brothers and parents before heading back to London. We finally reached home just before midnight - shattered and running on adrenaline, but thankfully all the exertion had completely wiped out any trace of jetlag, as funnily enough we could fall asleep overnight just fine!
On Wednesday morning we told our work colleagues before finally taking a deep breath and announcing our news to the world the modern way - changing your Facebook relationship status. It was so lovely to keep checking back throughout the day and finding umpteen notifications of people congratulating, so thank you if you were part of that, it really made the day fly by when we were both surviving on very little sleep! Thanks also for the tweets, messages, emails and cards we have received - they really mean a lot. I think there was a little part of both of us that half expected the response of "what - seriously?!" when we announced it. This weekend we're off to the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter (yep, more travelling) to look for a ring. I had known for a very long time that I wasn't going to buy a ring before proposing - apart from anything else, I wouldn't have a clue, but for something so important I wanted the person who'd be wearing it to choose it. Later in July we'll be having some engagement drinks which, should you be able to make, we'd love to see you at. We're both very, very happy and more than a bit excited - and that's about as much as you can ask for. I'm a very lucky man.
It's been a few days now since Kate and I announced our engagement. To say it's been a whirlwind is a bit of an understatement! We've had a lot of questions about how, where and when (but thankfully not "why") and while we're going to try and see as many friends in person as we can in the near future hopefully this blog should fill in the gaps for now.
Neither of us had been to the United States before, the closest I'd got being a school trip to Canada when I was 15, so we were both quite excited about the trip. I'd been looking for a good time to propose for around a year, thinking about going for it at the Edinburgh Fringe and during our New Year in a posh hotel together, but decided neither would really be the right occasion for a proposal. I'd bought Kate tickets to see Pulp for her birthday, at the Wireless Festival on 3rd July, which is also our anniversary, so I was thinking about doing it then after the concert finished somewhere special in London, but then realised that Pulp would be last on and it'd finish pretty late (obviously) - so that option was out. That left New York - why on earth didn't I think of it before?
Our journey there was relatively uneventful. We caught the Picadilly Line to Heathrow, which was handy as a direct train but I don't think either of us have ever spent as long on one single tube train before (it's just over an hour). We flew with America Airlines who had a rubbish selection of films and TV programmes to watch and a pretty poor "veggie" option (a catch-all veggie/vegan/gluten-free option as opposed to the main option which may itself be meat-free! bizarre). Then the Airtrain and New York subway and finally checking in at our hotel. The subway has two things only going for it - air conditioning and cheap prices - in all other ways, the tube is superior. The quality of the trains, sign-posting, announcements, countdown timers - it's like taking a limo in comparison. Also, can someone exhume Harry Beck and ask him to have a go at redesigning their map?
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| # after the party it's the hotel lobby # |
We stayed at the Distrikt Hotel, a lovely hotel not far from Times Square that Kate had booked based on it's Trip Advisor ratings alone. The decor was not dissimilar to the Malmaison chain that we often treat ourselves to in the UK - sumptuous and indulgent, with the feel of a much more expensive hotel (although the trump card was the free iced tea in reception, a must in the hot weather!). On geekwatch as ever I was very impressed with the TV in the room - not only a great selection of channels but the vast majority in HD too. Making that work in a hotel distribution system is to be applauded, if you've ever tried to watch the grainy stretched images in most UK chains.
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| NBC's forecast - check out Thursday!! |
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| NBC's OB outside of their studios |
The views from the Top of the Rock were, as expected, incredible, but somewhat hazy due to the high temperatures. The amount of time we could spend up there was also limited by this - we were pretty much melting up there. Kate had suggested we go up this building rather than the Empire State Building as from this vantage we'd be able to actually see the highest building in New York, rather than be positioned on top of it. Smart thinking! After lunch at a cool fast food-style Falafel chain a quick look round Bloomingdales we headed back to the hotel to recover from the heat and some mild jetlag.
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| On Top of the Rock! (I'm not King Kong...) |
That evening we went to a great restaurant called The Meatball Shop. If it was in London then it'd be full of hipsters, but despite this it sells brilliant meatballs (including veggie ones!) at a great price with a fantastic atmosphere. While we were there the promised sequel to the heat arrived - a severe thunderstorm. I've seldom seen so much water but the queue carried on out outside this place, such is the attraction. Then we went to a bar which, amusingly, was showing an Arsenal v Tottenham match from last November. Our two nearest football clubs - thousands of miles away and still can't get away from them!
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| View of Central Park from on Top of the Rock - the boating lake is the smaller one on the left |
I'd always planned to propose on the Friday - giving us a day before to settle in and a couple of days after to enjoy ourselves. Luckily for me the weather for the Friday was forecast to be (slightly) cooler than the highs of the day before. I had done a bit of research on places to propose in New York (it all seeming real for the first time as I typed those words into Google!) and seen a variety of fairly rubbish options. The classic cheesy option was on top of the Empire State Building, but there was no way I was doing this. I'd always known Kate wanted it to be private and I completely agreed - there was no way I wanted an audience of tourists. The only problem was, New York is a very busy city - there are precious few quiet, secluded spots where I could pop the question and know it was only between us two. One option jumped out at me.
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| Kate walks towards the boating lake in Central Park |
We arrived at Central Park on the Friday morning, with me feeling quite nervous and clutching a phone full of research of where to go and what to do! However upon arriving at the Loeb Boathouse disaster struck - the boat hire booth was shut, despite apparently opening at 10am. Kate later said that I seemed unaturally concerned at this! I thought about finding somewhere secluded in the park instead, but luckily before we set off the booth opened and all was well. As I rowed out into the lake I suddenly remembered that the last time I'd tried to row was in a rubber dinghy as a teenager, so spent an undignified few minutes thrashing around with the oars trying to work out how to actually do it. So far, so romantic.
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| Me looking more diginified than was deserved |
We had an hour in the boat which set a rather daunting time limit on when to pop the question, so half an hour in, when I'd reached the centre of the lake, I began my "speech", as it were. I'd prepared an album of photos on my phone of the past seven years - some of just us two, others of us in a group, some of in-jokes that only mean anything to us two. Kate later told me she could tell something was up as my hands were shaking as I got my phone out! As I got to the end of the album I said that if that's what we'd done in seven years then imagine how amazing seventy would be - and, after a few more words that I'll keep private to us, I got on one knee and popped the question. Luckily it was quite a deep boat - I had worried that this would be difficult with us both being sat down!
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| We're engaged! |
I wasn't so much worried about Kate saying no (although does anyone proposing ever have no doubts in their mind at all about this?!), though she did later say I was a "massive tool" for wanting to marry her. I was more concerned about making the proposal itself special. We only plan to do this once in our lives (!) and I wanted it to be perfect for us - and, amazingly, it was. The weather was gorgeous, the surroundings were spectacular, the lake was secluded and with only a handful of other boats on it largely empty. There was also a lovely symmetry about the whole thing - we'd met at university in York, so proposing in New York felt almost like coming full circle. Also, as any Wirral resident will tell you (usually without prompting), Birkenhead Park was the inspiration for Central Park, and walking around the larger cousin you can certainly see a number of features carried over. So it couldn't really have worked out much better for us!
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| The earliest picture of us together - presenting YSTV Week in May 2004 |
Kate and I met in January 2004 - well I tell a lie - Kate met me in January 2004 (bear with me). I met her in the first week of university in October 2002 at the politics department meet-and-greet event. I was there with my housemate Simon, both of us trying and largely failing to mingle and meet our fellow students. Eventually we managed to get talking to a friendly blonde girl and her housemate, and stayed talking to them rather too long as we all relaxed a little having finally got a conversation going. Sadly the dept divided us up into largely seperate seminar and lecture groups so I only saw her in passing in that first year (often walking from Halifax College onto the main campus, past our houses in Edens Court), kicking myself that I hadn't managed to stay in touch with her.
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| At Kat's Disney Party, early 2005. Kate is Cinders and I'm a Dalmation! |
Fast forward to January 2004 and the blonde girl - Kate, who became brunette shortly afterwards - joined YSTV, which I'd been a member of since the start of my first year. She was a budding journalist at this point, and used to be in the station every Thursday afternoon preparing our news programme YSTV Week. We started to hit it off and I'd look forward to those Thursday afternoons, eventually persuading her to go in front of the cameras and present. By the summer we were an item and became "official" during a trip to Dublin in July 2004. OK, perhaps it wasn't quite as straightforward as that - call that the "abridged" version! But Kate claims to not remember that first meeting in the old Derwent library, so clearly I made a great first impression. Love at first sight it wasn't - second, perhaps!
After a fantastic final year at uni spent living in each other's pockets we graduated in July 2005, and within a few months we were living together in London, somewhere neither of us really were expecting to be, with Kate on a production trainee course and me working as an assistant scheduler at ITV. The rest is history - so back to New York.
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| Waiting for the Staten Island Ferry |
Once we'd reached dry land again, we ended up sitting on a bench, watching the squirrels and talking for about an hour, both trying to take it all in. Then we had a wander around the park before jumping on the subway back to the hotel. We'd lost our appetites after the excitement of the morning so didn't bother with much for lunch, and headed down to the Staten Island Ferry, a free commuter trip which is mainly used by tourists in order to get a good view of the Statue of Liberty.
That evening we had a gorgeous seven-course Indian tasting meal at Amma before heading back up The Rock to use the second half of our ticket, seeing New York at night, an even more incredible view than during the day. All in all an incredible day - I can honestly say it couldn't have gone better for us. If I can just turn on the cheese for a moment (and I think I've done pretty well so far in avoiding it!) it was almost like someone was looking down on us, making it so...
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| New York by night from the Top of the Rock |
I'd already asked Kate's parents for their blessing the night before we flew out (note: not just her Dad and not his permission - we're both on the same page on that particular custom) which was pretty nerve-wracking, although of course they were both delighted and over the moon. It also marked the point of no return as it went from something in my head to something that was out there and I actually needed to do! But the first person we told after we got engaged was the barman in our hotel, who was absolutely lovely and made up some special cocktails to celebrate with us. The aforementioned Amma restaurant also brought out a special dessert with "congratulations" written on the plate above it. Less good was one of the hotel porters, in an exchange that went something like this:
Kate (walking out of hotel, to porter): Hello!
Porter: Hello, how are you?
Kate: I'm great thanks - I got engaged today!
Porter: You're welcome.
The only response you can really do to that without causing embarrassment to both parties is to smile and carry on walking...
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| Scott on his Pizza Tour |
The following day we were booked to go on Scott's Pizza Tour, a walking tour around some of New York's most notable pizza restaurants. A quick Google and glance at Trip Advisor will tell you everything you need to know about how superb these tours are - and Scott's enthusiasm is without limits. Upon telling him about our news at the start of the tour, he shouted to the rest of the group "OH MY GOD! GUYS, THESE GUYS GOT ENGAGED YESTERDAY!". Lot of pizza talk and most importantly lots of pizza followed. I'm easily pleased!
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| The start of the High Line |
Sunday was our last day and after checking out we met up for lunch with the lovely Beth, who worked with Kate at BBC Worldwide and has just moved to New York to join BBC America. We decided to walk The High Line together, which is a stretch of disused elevated railway (comparable to the DLR in London) which has recently been re-opened as a public park. As Kate and I do part of our daily journey to work on North London's Parkland Walk we were interested to see it's New York counterpart (thoughts - seems to have a lot more money behind it, a lot more landscaped, shorter in length and cyclists are banned - brilliant!). After this we did a bit of shopping, with Kate scratching her J-Crew itch and me snapping up some trainers that were the same price in dollars that they are in pounds in the UK - result!
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| Kate in Times Square |
The flight home was with British Airways, and the plane was much busier than the previous flight. The facilities, food and general service was much better - despite having a huge bottle of sparkling water knocked all over me from the trolley at one point (accidentally - at least, I hope so!). The stewardess fetched me a pair of first class pyjamas to say sorry, so if you want to play "BA First roleplay" then I'm your man. Unfortunately we were sat next to a couple of oddballs who spent the entire six hours ripping up bits of plastic and paper and throwing them onto the heads of their friends in the row in front. This never stopped being funny to them. It was an overnight flight, and Kate managed to get a couple of hours sleep (as she's quite talented at doing anywhere, anytime) but I didn't get any at all really, so we eventually arrived back in Crouch End at about midday feeling pretty zonked.
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| Heading north to Liverpool on Monday evening |
We weren't due back in work until Wednesday but were quite keen to tell our famillies face-to-face before announcing it to the wider world, so in New York we'd booked a late train to Liverpool on the Monday night to see my family, then over to Halifax to see Kate's Grandma on Tuesday, followed by her brothers in Leeds and then the last train back down to London that night. So after a couple of hours sleep at home we found ourselves heading back out again to Euston station to head up north. Feeling like we did, boy was the extra £16 for the first class advance ticket worth it! We hadn't told my parents and my Gran that we were coming at such short notice after our flight (thinking they'd suss it, losing the point of the trip), so we got a taxi from Lime Street station to Upton in the Wirral (having to guide the taxi driver all the way from the Mersey tunnel exit - classic). They were pretty surprised when we turned up just before 11pm that night!
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| Celebrations! |
By lunchtime on Tuesday we were heading across the Pennines to Yorkshire, on the same journey I used to do when returning from home to university in York. There's some spectacular scenery that I really wish I hadn't taken for granted at the time, now I'm stuck with the tedium of the West and East Coast Main Lines on most of my rail journeys. I also love the route it takes when winding through Manchester - it really shows off what an amazing city it is. After revealing the news to Kate's Grandma it was off to Leeds for a quick meal with Kate's brothers and parents before heading back to London. We finally reached home just before midnight - shattered and running on adrenaline, but thankfully all the exertion had completely wiped out any trace of jetlag, as funnily enough we could fall asleep overnight just fine!
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| Celebrating with Kate's brother Lee |
On Wednesday morning we told our work colleagues before finally taking a deep breath and announcing our news to the world the modern way - changing your Facebook relationship status. It was so lovely to keep checking back throughout the day and finding umpteen notifications of people congratulating, so thank you if you were part of that, it really made the day fly by when we were both surviving on very little sleep! Thanks also for the tweets, messages, emails and cards we have received - they really mean a lot. I think there was a little part of both of us that half expected the response of "what - seriously?!" when we announced it. This weekend we're off to the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter (yep, more travelling) to look for a ring. I had known for a very long time that I wasn't going to buy a ring before proposing - apart from anything else, I wouldn't have a clue, but for something so important I wanted the person who'd be wearing it to choose it. Later in July we'll be having some engagement drinks which, should you be able to make, we'd love to see you at. We're both very, very happy and more than a bit excited - and that's about as much as you can ask for. I'm a very lucky man.
Sunday, 5 June 2011
It's not number one, it's Top of the Pops
It's been a while since I last blogged - mainly due to a lot going on at work (and boy does the opening paragraph of my last blog seem ironic now) which I'll write about once it's all sorted, and a nasty bug that followed soon after putting me out of action for a while. But there is something that I've wanted to write about for a while, so best get on with it!
BBC Four began repeating 1976 episodes of Top of the Pops on 1st April this year, and as I've always been a fan of the show it was a nice birthday present to be able to see old episodes in full. For my generation "old" TOTP was only ever seen in the sanitised world of TOTP2, where individual performances would be shown (often the same ones over, and over, and over again) but any trace of what rooted the show to that era - the presenters, titles and graphics - would be excised. Indeed it's something of a miracle that all twenty-somethings don't think that "I Got You Babe" was originally screened in 1965 with a set of slow rotating captions superimposed over the top telling you not-very-much, and a sarcastic voiceover pointing out Cher's pre-surgery appearance. So to see the episodes as originally transmitted is something of a treat.
April 1976 was chosen as the starting point mainly because this is the point that most episodes exist in the archive, with only a few shows lost. The most famous show with missing episode from the 1960s, Doctor Who, fares pretty well in comparison to TOTP: fan-written episode guides show that the earliest surviving footage isn't until show 8 in February 1964, and the first episode to exist in full, incredibly, isn't until Christmas 1967. But whoever decided the point to stop junking most episodes was to be April 1976 clearly had a sense of humour, as we've been finding out over the last two months on Thursday nights.
As a place to start with a complete repeat run it's a pretty poor place musically. Falling in the gap between glam rock and punk, the vast majority of the music in the show and therefore the charts at this point is pretty dreadful. To be fair to BBC Four, this was flagged up in advance in an excellent documentary about 1976 - and the recurring comment from anyone who has seen the 1976 TOTP repeats is that their content is basically asking for punk to to rise up and stop this turd of a programme in its tracks.
The show seems to have given up any pretence of being either for young people, or to be showcasing an exciting new musical world as must have been the case in those lost shows in the 1960s. Instead, it is pretty much a bog-standard light entertainment show, complete with gurning hosts, fancy-dress outfits and bad gags. Even the audience seem to have given up, with exuberant dancing and exciting fashion giving way to a lot of beige and the sort of awkwardly shuffling around you'd do at a disco where you knew your parents were in attendance. Compare and contrast - mostly contrast - the two clips below, the first from 1970 and the second from 1976 (with thanks to a poster on the Popscene forum who dug these gems out originally):
And we haven't even mentioned the music yet. In the two months that the repeats have been running, I can honestly say that the number of tracks I've genuinely liked I can count on the fingers of one hand. And that's not from the point of view of a muso (anyone who knows me will know I like a bit of crappy pop as much as the next person) - the music of 1976 was just so depressingly dire it's amazing they managed to fill 40 minutes every week without all ending up weeping in the corner of the studio. So far we've had Brotherhood of Man at number 1 seemingly forever with their Eurovision winner (and its slightly disturbing twist in the last line), Paul Nicholas informing us whilst wearing a bowler hat that reggae isn't what it used to be, JJ Barrie and "No Charge" (which is less a song and more Mumsnet set to music), a gollywog drawn on a drum kit, a Dave Lee Travis "comedy" record and The Wurzels, who at least acknowledge that they are taking the piss.
The one big exception I've seen is "S-S-S Single Bed" by Fox - a great track that I can't believe I haven't heard before (apparently I haven't spent enough time in Flares). Even the clip below has the spectre of Travis looming over it as he awkwardly grooves in the background at the start. Interestingly it emerged as a result of these repeats that lead singer Noosha Fox is the mother of Bad Science writer Ben Goldacre - but not, surprisingly, Alison Goldfrapp.
It's not just the music that depresses. It's hard to believe that the hosts are really the best the UK had to offer in 1976. Despite their woeful attempts at humour Jimmy Saville and Tony Blackburn aren't too bad, but Dave Lee Travis seems to have styled himself the "wacky" one - opening one show in a gorilla costume, insisting on joining in during a Ruby Flipper dance routine and larking about with one of the Wurzels' tubas at the close of one show (oh how we laughed). David Hamilton seemed flummoxed even by the act of presenting itself in one episode and instead made pervy comments in virtually every link towards any women featured. So it's surprising to see Noel Edmonds come out of this as a beacon of restraint and gentle wit, but given the competition it isn't difficult. All of which means the much derided 1991 relaunch hosts and Tim Kash probably deserve an apology from us all.
As a modern TOTP viewer some of the conventions of the show seem a little unusual although no doubt were standard at the time. The top 30 countdown is at the start of the show, rather than the end, which seems the wrong way around (although this was apparently the case for many years). There are no captions for the songs so unless you were taking notes in the opening minute or the presenter mentions it you can forgot knowing what position a song is at. From today's branded world it's odd to see the TOTP logo only appears at the start of the end credits, and there is no title sequence at all. Plus watching it week after week you are reminded of all the old "rules" that were dropped in the 90s - only songs going up the chart are featured, and even then not in consecutive weeks unless it's at number 1. Most odd of all is the pointless opening link, where the presenter either simply says "hello and welcome to Top of the Pops" or attempts a dreadful gag. David Hamilton opening one show claiming to be able to present the show standing on his head - followed by a predictable visual gag with the image being flipped. I'd like to see him made to present the show actually standing on his head, with the audience waiting patiently as he tries to do handstands and balance himself upside down as the show's duration ticks away.
All of this leads you to a conclusion: there was no golden age of Top of the Pops, or if there was, those that banged on it about eventually leading to the show's death conveniently forgot about a huge chunk of the 1970s being dirge. Apparently the show doesn't get a great deal better until the famous "party atmosphere" kicks in around 1981/2, so it's to be hoped BBC Four stick with these repeats long enough to get past this period. On the subject of BBC Four, until 1985 TOTP regularly ran up to 40 minutes depending on the schedule that night, and slots of that length are quite rare in peak schedules today. This resulted in a couple of performances per week being edited out of the first few repeats (surely an opportunity for a Stalinist re-writing or indeed improving of history), so the channel deserves credit for placing the full shows in the late night repeat slots where time is not so much of the essence.
We shouldn't overanalyse too much of course (he says, ten paragraphs later). There is a danger in implying you can read some sort of social history from a light-hearted pop programme, so the events of 1976 can no more be reflected in these repeats than you can look at Tim Kash's episodes for the country's response to the Hutton Report in 2004. But it's great to be able to watch it week in, week out, warts and all. We've seen Pan's People "exit stage left" (in the words of Edmonds) and be replaced by Ruby Flipper, leading you to imagine the incredulity of Dads nationwide as their weekly perv is now tarnished with scantily-clad men dancing as well as women. It's like a car crash - you can't not look. I've got a series link setup on my PVR, and Kate and I spend 40 minutes every week decrying the fashions and music of 35 years ago. Who knows, we might start exhibiting Stockholm syndrome if the run carries on for long enough...
April 1976 was chosen as the starting point mainly because this is the point that most episodes exist in the archive, with only a few shows lost. The most famous show with missing episode from the 1960s, Doctor Who, fares pretty well in comparison to TOTP: fan-written episode guides show that the earliest surviving footage isn't until show 8 in February 1964, and the first episode to exist in full, incredibly, isn't until Christmas 1967. But whoever decided the point to stop junking most episodes was to be April 1976 clearly had a sense of humour, as we've been finding out over the last two months on Thursday nights.
As a place to start with a complete repeat run it's a pretty poor place musically. Falling in the gap between glam rock and punk, the vast majority of the music in the show and therefore the charts at this point is pretty dreadful. To be fair to BBC Four, this was flagged up in advance in an excellent documentary about 1976 - and the recurring comment from anyone who has seen the 1976 TOTP repeats is that their content is basically asking for punk to to rise up and stop this turd of a programme in its tracks.
The show seems to have given up any pretence of being either for young people, or to be showcasing an exciting new musical world as must have been the case in those lost shows in the 1960s. Instead, it is pretty much a bog-standard light entertainment show, complete with gurning hosts, fancy-dress outfits and bad gags. Even the audience seem to have given up, with exuberant dancing and exciting fashion giving way to a lot of beige and the sort of awkwardly shuffling around you'd do at a disco where you knew your parents were in attendance. Compare and contrast - mostly contrast - the two clips below, the first from 1970 and the second from 1976 (with thanks to a poster on the Popscene forum who dug these gems out originally):
And we haven't even mentioned the music yet. In the two months that the repeats have been running, I can honestly say that the number of tracks I've genuinely liked I can count on the fingers of one hand. And that's not from the point of view of a muso (anyone who knows me will know I like a bit of crappy pop as much as the next person) - the music of 1976 was just so depressingly dire it's amazing they managed to fill 40 minutes every week without all ending up weeping in the corner of the studio. So far we've had Brotherhood of Man at number 1 seemingly forever with their Eurovision winner (and its slightly disturbing twist in the last line), Paul Nicholas informing us whilst wearing a bowler hat that reggae isn't what it used to be, JJ Barrie and "No Charge" (which is less a song and more Mumsnet set to music), a gollywog drawn on a drum kit, a Dave Lee Travis "comedy" record and The Wurzels, who at least acknowledge that they are taking the piss.
The one big exception I've seen is "S-S-S Single Bed" by Fox - a great track that I can't believe I haven't heard before (apparently I haven't spent enough time in Flares). Even the clip below has the spectre of Travis looming over it as he awkwardly grooves in the background at the start. Interestingly it emerged as a result of these repeats that lead singer Noosha Fox is the mother of Bad Science writer Ben Goldacre - but not, surprisingly, Alison Goldfrapp.
It's not just the music that depresses. It's hard to believe that the hosts are really the best the UK had to offer in 1976. Despite their woeful attempts at humour Jimmy Saville and Tony Blackburn aren't too bad, but Dave Lee Travis seems to have styled himself the "wacky" one - opening one show in a gorilla costume, insisting on joining in during a Ruby Flipper dance routine and larking about with one of the Wurzels' tubas at the close of one show (oh how we laughed). David Hamilton seemed flummoxed even by the act of presenting itself in one episode and instead made pervy comments in virtually every link towards any women featured. So it's surprising to see Noel Edmonds come out of this as a beacon of restraint and gentle wit, but given the competition it isn't difficult. All of which means the much derided 1991 relaunch hosts and Tim Kash probably deserve an apology from us all.
As a modern TOTP viewer some of the conventions of the show seem a little unusual although no doubt were standard at the time. The top 30 countdown is at the start of the show, rather than the end, which seems the wrong way around (although this was apparently the case for many years). There are no captions for the songs so unless you were taking notes in the opening minute or the presenter mentions it you can forgot knowing what position a song is at. From today's branded world it's odd to see the TOTP logo only appears at the start of the end credits, and there is no title sequence at all. Plus watching it week after week you are reminded of all the old "rules" that were dropped in the 90s - only songs going up the chart are featured, and even then not in consecutive weeks unless it's at number 1. Most odd of all is the pointless opening link, where the presenter either simply says "hello and welcome to Top of the Pops" or attempts a dreadful gag. David Hamilton opening one show claiming to be able to present the show standing on his head - followed by a predictable visual gag with the image being flipped. I'd like to see him made to present the show actually standing on his head, with the audience waiting patiently as he tries to do handstands and balance himself upside down as the show's duration ticks away.
All of this leads you to a conclusion: there was no golden age of Top of the Pops, or if there was, those that banged on it about eventually leading to the show's death conveniently forgot about a huge chunk of the 1970s being dirge. Apparently the show doesn't get a great deal better until the famous "party atmosphere" kicks in around 1981/2, so it's to be hoped BBC Four stick with these repeats long enough to get past this period. On the subject of BBC Four, until 1985 TOTP regularly ran up to 40 minutes depending on the schedule that night, and slots of that length are quite rare in peak schedules today. This resulted in a couple of performances per week being edited out of the first few repeats (surely an opportunity for a Stalinist re-writing or indeed improving of history), so the channel deserves credit for placing the full shows in the late night repeat slots where time is not so much of the essence.
We shouldn't overanalyse too much of course (he says, ten paragraphs later). There is a danger in implying you can read some sort of social history from a light-hearted pop programme, so the events of 1976 can no more be reflected in these repeats than you can look at Tim Kash's episodes for the country's response to the Hutton Report in 2004. But it's great to be able to watch it week in, week out, warts and all. We've seen Pan's People "exit stage left" (in the words of Edmonds) and be replaced by Ruby Flipper, leading you to imagine the incredulity of Dads nationwide as their weekly perv is now tarnished with scantily-clad men dancing as well as women. It's like a car crash - you can't not look. I've got a series link setup on my PVR, and Kate and I spend 40 minutes every week decrying the fashions and music of 35 years ago. Who knows, we might start exhibiting Stockholm syndrome if the run carries on for long enough...
Monday, 9 May 2011
Popping the question: which channel? Part 2!
So what comes after any wedding? The party of course!
Last Thursday night a group of us at work were lucky enough to be invited to a party on board the Dixie Queen at Tower Millennium Pier to celebrate the success of ITV's Royal Wedding coverage. It's actually pretty rare for our department to get invited to this sort of thing, missing out on both the programming events and sales parties by falling into an unglamorous gap in between, and in any case the recession has brought most of that sort of thing to a halt in the last few years. So it was nice to be remembered on this occasion, and great that the company realised that the coverage was something worth celebrating.
As well as the hospitality there was a screening of a short film looking how the coverage came to air, and a nice speech from one of the bosses, who celebrated how ITV as a whole - the regions, ITN, Daybreak and the entertainment team - had all come together to produce a great show. It was also mentioned that despite there being no commercial return it was exactly the sort of thing that ITV needed to be doing as a national broadcaster.
There were also tributes paid to the presentation team, at least three of whom - Phillip Schofield, Julie Etchingham and Mary Nightingale - were present. Most of our team were reduced to children again at being in the company of "Schofe", and after a few drinks one of us plucked up the courage to ask for a photo with him...followed by another...and another...until pretty much all of us had had a snap with him. To his credit he was a complete gent despite us all probably coming across as a bit mad. I explain that we work in presentation and are the ones that gave him extra time when Jeremy Kyle came in under - something he thanked us for! Those opening sequences where Phil and Holly (and Fern before that) stand and chat to each other for long periods owe something to the quite variable length of Mr Kyle's broadcasts. Through the broom cupboard, Going Live! and now This Morning he's been omnipresent through most of our lives, and having briefly met him you can tell how he's managed to stay a success. Put it this way, if it had been Eamonn Holmes we wouldn't have been that fussed about speaking to him...
On the way out we were all given a copy of the ITV Royal Wedding DVD, which had incredibly hit the shops on the Monday after the Friday wedding (beating the BBC's DVD, so we were told). Unfortunately it's a straight highlights package of the events, narrated by Sir Trevor McDonald, rather than of the coverage itself. You wonder if, had the turnaround not been so quick, they might have sourced the clips from the broadcast itself due to the reaction.
As expected the BBC's coverage had far more viewers than ITV's although not by as huge a margin as expected. One aspect that has been commented on internally is that ITV's audience held in the hours after the ceremony, whereas the BBC's fell away, which indicates people were indeed switching over as I suggested in my previous blog. You'd hope this would give some cause for concern inside the Beeb but, externally at least, it seems happy with how things went. Even this week's edition of Newswatch gives no indication of any dissent - the opposite, in fact. It's not long at all though before those mobile studios outside the palace are constructed once again - with the Diamond Jubilee being the next opportunity for a royal occasion. I hope ITV have already block-booked 2-5th June in Phil and Julie's diaries!
Last Thursday night a group of us at work were lucky enough to be invited to a party on board the Dixie Queen at Tower Millennium Pier to celebrate the success of ITV's Royal Wedding coverage. It's actually pretty rare for our department to get invited to this sort of thing, missing out on both the programming events and sales parties by falling into an unglamorous gap in between, and in any case the recession has brought most of that sort of thing to a halt in the last few years. So it was nice to be remembered on this occasion, and great that the company realised that the coverage was something worth celebrating.
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| Team ITV Broadcasting in front of Tower Bridge (thanks to Jess for the photo) |
As well as the hospitality there was a screening of a short film looking how the coverage came to air, and a nice speech from one of the bosses, who celebrated how ITV as a whole - the regions, ITN, Daybreak and the entertainment team - had all come together to produce a great show. It was also mentioned that despite there being no commercial return it was exactly the sort of thing that ITV needed to be doing as a national broadcaster.
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| The 2011 ITV1 presentation scheduling team |
There were also tributes paid to the presentation team, at least three of whom - Phillip Schofield, Julie Etchingham and Mary Nightingale - were present. Most of our team were reduced to children again at being in the company of "Schofe", and after a few drinks one of us plucked up the courage to ask for a photo with him...followed by another...and another...until pretty much all of us had had a snap with him. To his credit he was a complete gent despite us all probably coming across as a bit mad. I explain that we work in presentation and are the ones that gave him extra time when Jeremy Kyle came in under - something he thanked us for! Those opening sequences where Phil and Holly (and Fern before that) stand and chat to each other for long periods owe something to the quite variable length of Mr Kyle's broadcasts. Through the broom cupboard, Going Live! and now This Morning he's been omnipresent through most of our lives, and having briefly met him you can tell how he's managed to stay a success. Put it this way, if it had been Eamonn Holmes we wouldn't have been that fussed about speaking to him...
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| "Call security..." |
On the way out we were all given a copy of the ITV Royal Wedding DVD, which had incredibly hit the shops on the Monday after the Friday wedding (beating the BBC's DVD, so we were told). Unfortunately it's a straight highlights package of the events, narrated by Sir Trevor McDonald, rather than of the coverage itself. You wonder if, had the turnaround not been so quick, they might have sourced the clips from the broadcast itself due to the reaction.
As expected the BBC's coverage had far more viewers than ITV's although not by as huge a margin as expected. One aspect that has been commented on internally is that ITV's audience held in the hours after the ceremony, whereas the BBC's fell away, which indicates people were indeed switching over as I suggested in my previous blog. You'd hope this would give some cause for concern inside the Beeb but, externally at least, it seems happy with how things went. Even this week's edition of Newswatch gives no indication of any dissent - the opposite, in fact. It's not long at all though before those mobile studios outside the palace are constructed once again - with the Diamond Jubilee being the next opportunity for a royal occasion. I hope ITV have already block-booked 2-5th June in Phil and Julie's diaries!
Saturday, 7 May 2011
You're AVing a laugh
(Sorry about the title. Yes, it's awful)
I'm not going to do an analysis of why the referendum was lost - there are people who can do that far better than I could - but there are a couple of points to make in the wake of the result.
Last night (after a few pints!) I sent a rather flippant tweet about the result:
"Let's face it, the UK now has the electoral system it deserves. Nice work all. FFS..."
To be honest, the only reason I added "FFS" at to the end was just in case anyone thought I was being genuinely anti-AV, so perhaps it came across incorrectly. Anyway, the point I was trying to make was that yes, the people have voted (well, 40% of them), and shown that they're really not fussed. So good luck to them in the future - they're clearly more than happy with our political system and all it gives them.
My comment was retweeted by my friend Rowan, who links his tweets to his Facebook profile, where it was duly published. One of his anti-AV friends replied wondering if it was too much to ask that we were "gracious in defeat". I really didn't want to look like I was throwing my toys out of the pram on this one but clearly I did (and to be fair, I was). Rowan then replied with this:
"Yes, it is too much to ask. This isn't a nice little football game, this is about the fundamental fairness of our democracy. Should I have been "gracious in defeat" every time a bill to equalise the age of consent or legalise gay marriage was blocked? Should suffragettes have been "gracious in defeat" when they were repeatedly denied the vote? I know this isn't as big a sea-change issue, but I think it's perfectly OK for those of us who dislike today's result to be open about it. I will not apologise for that."
He makes an excellent point. There are some issues that, perhaps, you shouldn't just roll over and think "oh well, that's that one sorted". The subjects he mentions are all very important, with no-one in mainstream politics today seriously suggesting reversing them, and would almost certainly have not gone through had they been subject to a referendum thanks to the good old conservative-with-a-small-c British Public (TM). The problem is that losing a referendum gives your opponents rather a lot of ammunition to kick the issue into the long grass for a very long time. It's not at all clear where we go from here.
What this campaign has shown is that negative campaigning is still very powerful in British politics. Virtually everyone I spoke to who was voting "no" was trotting out the inaccurate one-liners from the anti-AV broadcasts and posters and speaking more in rhetorical questions that making an argument to keep FPTP. "It'll increase tactical voting" - how? "The second place person could win" - they won't. "It's like the least-worst person wins" - that's the whole point. "AV leads to more coalitions and weak goverment" - oh please...
Still, there is an upside. Firstly, we can expect to see more bullet-proof vests, police backup and maternity units thanks to not having to see AV implemented - they promised! - so we can all be thankful for that. Secondly, all those clever cloggs saying "no to AV, yes to PR" can now tell us exactly what happens next in that grand plan.
(apologies for the Facebook comment/like thing being a bit screwed at the moment - my experienced consultant on these things, i.e. Kate, will be giving it her full attention soon...as it was she who screwed it up in the first place. Love you darling x)
I'm not going to do an analysis of why the referendum was lost - there are people who can do that far better than I could - but there are a couple of points to make in the wake of the result.
Last night (after a few pints!) I sent a rather flippant tweet about the result:
"Let's face it, the UK now has the electoral system it deserves. Nice work all. FFS..."
To be honest, the only reason I added "FFS" at to the end was just in case anyone thought I was being genuinely anti-AV, so perhaps it came across incorrectly. Anyway, the point I was trying to make was that yes, the people have voted (well, 40% of them), and shown that they're really not fussed. So good luck to them in the future - they're clearly more than happy with our political system and all it gives them.
My comment was retweeted by my friend Rowan, who links his tweets to his Facebook profile, where it was duly published. One of his anti-AV friends replied wondering if it was too much to ask that we were "gracious in defeat". I really didn't want to look like I was throwing my toys out of the pram on this one but clearly I did (and to be fair, I was). Rowan then replied with this:
"Yes, it is too much to ask. This isn't a nice little football game, this is about the fundamental fairness of our democracy. Should I have been "gracious in defeat" every time a bill to equalise the age of consent or legalise gay marriage was blocked? Should suffragettes have been "gracious in defeat" when they were repeatedly denied the vote? I know this isn't as big a sea-change issue, but I think it's perfectly OK for those of us who dislike today's result to be open about it. I will not apologise for that."
He makes an excellent point. There are some issues that, perhaps, you shouldn't just roll over and think "oh well, that's that one sorted". The subjects he mentions are all very important, with no-one in mainstream politics today seriously suggesting reversing them, and would almost certainly have not gone through had they been subject to a referendum thanks to the good old conservative-with-a-small-c British Public (TM). The problem is that losing a referendum gives your opponents rather a lot of ammunition to kick the issue into the long grass for a very long time. It's not at all clear where we go from here.
What this campaign has shown is that negative campaigning is still very powerful in British politics. Virtually everyone I spoke to who was voting "no" was trotting out the inaccurate one-liners from the anti-AV broadcasts and posters and speaking more in rhetorical questions that making an argument to keep FPTP. "It'll increase tactical voting" - how? "The second place person could win" - they won't. "It's like the least-worst person wins" - that's the whole point. "AV leads to more coalitions and weak goverment" - oh please...
Still, there is an upside. Firstly, we can expect to see more bullet-proof vests, police backup and maternity units thanks to not having to see AV implemented - they promised! - so we can all be thankful for that. Secondly, all those clever cloggs saying "no to AV, yes to PR" can now tell us exactly what happens next in that grand plan.
(apologies for the Facebook comment/like thing being a bit screwed at the moment - my experienced consultant on these things, i.e. Kate, will be giving it her full attention soon...as it was she who screwed it up in the first place. Love you darling x)
Saturday, 30 April 2011
Popping the question: which channel?
I'll declare an interest from the start on this one. I've worked for ITV as a presentation scheduler for nearly six years, so have had a small hand in the on-air execution of many live national events - sporting and otherwise - since 2005. Despite the effort we all put in there's always been a sense that when the event is simulcast on BBC One it's all a bit futile, as everyone will be watching the other side. I can't really argue with that - as soon as you leave the womb it's pretty much drummed into your head that you turn to the BBC at time of national unity, and if you don't you're a bit strange. And whilst I've had much more interest in ITV's coverage since I've started being involved in it (often recording it to have a look back at later), I've pretty much stuck to that.
The initial announcements about the coverage didn't sound especially promising. Apart from an initial furore over David Dimbleby not hosting on the BBC (which somewhat missed the point as he's done mainly funerals and also the Golden Jubilee coverage in the last 20 years) it was more or less business as usual. Huw Edwards has been Dimbleby's heir apparent for some time now, a veteran of BBC Wales election nights and gradually taking over the coverage of previously Dimbledonian events such as the opening of Parliament. Meanwhile ITV announced that Phillip Schofield - off of This Morning (makeovers, interviews with reality TV stars, phone-ins about losing weight etc) would host with Julie Etchingham from News at Ten. It sounded very much like the old order would be preserved, with Huw doing the statesman routine whilst Phillip points at dresses and mentions Diana a lot. In the event, something strange happened.
The omens weren't good. Some bright spark at BBC Breakfast thought that putting Bill Turnbull and Sian Williams - one of the best presenting duos on television - in different locations along the wedding route, and then making them present the programme as if they were still sitting next to each other, was a good idea. This inevitably led to lots of awkward pauses, and a rather surreal newspaper review where each took turns to show their selection of papers from their part of SW1. Kelvin MacKenzie turned up later on, charmless as ever, choosing the occasion to go on a rant about the media not being responsible for Diana's death. In contrast Daybreak seemed a seamless operation, which is something of a rarity.
We had planned to watch the BBC coverage, switching over from time to time to see what was going on chez Schofield. Within the first hour, it was becoming clear that the old order didn't seem to apply today. The BBC seemed to have forgotten that today was meant to be a happy day, instead intoning on us what we could expect, when we could expect it and why we should all sit up and be interested in it. Every so often, someone aged around 150 would be wheeled on to tell us why today was so important. One of these duffers said "if you watch it on TV you'll forget it, that's why I'm here". That's us told then.
When flicking over, there was quite a contrast. Phillip Schofield and Julie Etchingham were having a ball, upbeat and humourous, talking to commentators who were asking the questions we were. Schofield was in his element here, making gags about the police "not kettling" the public on the Mall as they were brought forward and talking of a woman being smuggled into the Goring Hotel ("we assume it was a lady, the disguise could have been good"). He also started talking us through the Facebook Royal Wedding drinking game as guests were arriving at Westminster Abbey ("you're probably on the floor by now") and pointed out a man with his underwear hanging out behind Granada's Lucy Meacock in Downing Street. Later on, Julie's News at Ten co-host Mark Austin was assigned the "in the crowd" role, being given a Scout neckerchief to wear and offered vodka and Red Bull before getting completely stuck in the throngs as they moved forward, with Schofield joking they would stay with him continuously. Austin ended up trending worldwide on Twitter thanks to his amusing inserts into proceedings.
Meanwhile back with Huw, things weren't getting any better. Fearne Cotton had once again been assigned the "crowd" role, something she's been doing since Live 8 and still seems to ask questions either with straight yes or no answers or completely obvious responses that don't add anything. It's a time honoured BBC format, having a "light-hearted" insert into proceedings (think of the various embarrassing attempts over the years on election night) but if there was one occasion where they could have changed the tone of the whole thing to match the obvious joy of the crowds outside, this was it. And here lies the problem - having Cotton, Bowman, Baker et al on location is sod all use if every few minutes you go back to Huw Edwards, AKA Misery Bear, in his bubble of gloom outside the palace.
After a while, we found ourselves sticking with ITV1 more and more, and when switching back to the Beeb just in case we were missing a moment of national unity, immediately found out that we weren't. Edwards still hasn't mastered the ancient Dimbledonian art of essentially talking to yourself for hours and hours without sounding like you're losing it. Some basic errors ensured the BBC coverage remained stuffy and aloof, such as basing it in a sealed studio high above the crowds as opposed to ITV's ground level open studio. Frequently Phil would turn around and interact with the hordes outside the palace, including memorably following the balcony kiss where he gave Julie a peck of her own after much encouragement! Frequent use of split-screen by ITV was also a straightforward way which allowed you to feel you were seeing more.
Even the basics seemed to elude our national broadcaster yesterday. During the RAF fly-past they seemed more concerned about attempting to make contact with Jake Humphrey inside one of the planes (despite the link being barely watchable) than actually covering the damn thing. Then there was a swift cut to an incredibly pointless news bulletin (who on earth would be tuning in for a roundup, most of which was about the wedding?) rather than carrying on with the coverage. They let their main parliamentary broadcaster, the knowledgable Andrew Neil, slip through their fingers to appear on ITV instead. Finally William and Kate's unexpected drive down the Mall - complete with L plates and "JU5T WED" numberplate - was supplemented with chat on the Beeb about how William was driving competently and that this was probably a security risk, rather than simply reflecting the joy of the crowds as ITV did.
The unusual thing about an eight-hour broadcast, supplemented in today's world by Twitter, Facebook and internet forums, meant that there was time for many to notice this turn of events for themselves. As early as 10am people were already commenting on the dullness of the Beeb and how ITV were judging the mood far better. To my astonishment many who wouldn't normally give ITV the time of day actually started switching over. By the time of the ceremony itself the received opinion was that ITV had already won the day. So what went right?
Despite the worries about the suitability of Phillip Schofield, it's easy to forget that he's one of the best presenters of his generation, having honed his skills filling for time when bits of film snapped whilst in-vision in the BBC1 continuity announcer's booth. The wedding coverage can probably be considered his career peak so far. The snobbery about This Morning I referred to earlier is also misplaced. The programme today is far removed from the Richard and Judy years - it's a remarkably slick, fairly journalistic operation that is a credit to daytime TV, and essentially importing the format to the wedding coverage worked a treat. Coupled with the professional Julie Etchingham - also a graduate of Children's BBC interestingly - they made for a formidable team. In contrast Huw seemed lonely, almost downbeat, with only the occasional ancient posho for company.
And yet, this isn't actually that unusual a turn of events. ITV's coverage of the General Election and particularly the 2008 US elections was widely perceived to have punched above it's weight, the latter being a particularly dark night for David Dimbleby in Washington, being outshone by Alastair Stewart in Grays Inn Road. And, before the HD goal fiasco ruined everything (which let's not forget was human error in an external company), the ITV coverage of the most recent football World Cup was much lauded as having a fresh presentational style, in contrast to Lineker and Hansen doing the same dull old thing on the BBC.
The ratings for these were massively in favour of the BBC and as they trickle out the wedding ratings seem much the same (4 to 1 according to early overnights). That much shouldn't be too surprising for reasons I've already outlined. But the modern revival of ITV will be much boosted if it can continue to win PR victories like this, with the aforementioned Twitter verdict and newspaper after newspaper after newspaper queuing up to come to much the same conclusion. With rather unfortunate timing BBC One chose yesterday as the occasion to premiere their new "aren't we great" trailer, an increasingly rare sight in recent years. The tagline "when it's worth watching, watch it with us", for one day at least, didn't apply.
 |
| The crowds when we visited Buckingham Palace the night before the wedding |
The initial announcements about the coverage didn't sound especially promising. Apart from an initial furore over David Dimbleby not hosting on the BBC (which somewhat missed the point as he's done mainly funerals and also the Golden Jubilee coverage in the last 20 years) it was more or less business as usual. Huw Edwards has been Dimbleby's heir apparent for some time now, a veteran of BBC Wales election nights and gradually taking over the coverage of previously Dimbledonian events such as the opening of Parliament. Meanwhile ITV announced that Phillip Schofield - off of This Morning (makeovers, interviews with reality TV stars, phone-ins about losing weight etc) would host with Julie Etchingham from News at Ten. It sounded very much like the old order would be preserved, with Huw doing the statesman routine whilst Phillip points at dresses and mentions Diana a lot. In the event, something strange happened.
 |
| The temporary studio complex outside Buckingham Palace |
The omens weren't good. Some bright spark at BBC Breakfast thought that putting Bill Turnbull and Sian Williams - one of the best presenting duos on television - in different locations along the wedding route, and then making them present the programme as if they were still sitting next to each other, was a good idea. This inevitably led to lots of awkward pauses, and a rather surreal newspaper review where each took turns to show their selection of papers from their part of SW1. Kelvin MacKenzie turned up later on, charmless as ever, choosing the occasion to go on a rant about the media not being responsible for Diana's death. In contrast Daybreak seemed a seamless operation, which is something of a rarity.
We had planned to watch the BBC coverage, switching over from time to time to see what was going on chez Schofield. Within the first hour, it was becoming clear that the old order didn't seem to apply today. The BBC seemed to have forgotten that today was meant to be a happy day, instead intoning on us what we could expect, when we could expect it and why we should all sit up and be interested in it. Every so often, someone aged around 150 would be wheeled on to tell us why today was so important. One of these duffers said "if you watch it on TV you'll forget it, that's why I'm here". That's us told then.
When flicking over, there was quite a contrast. Phillip Schofield and Julie Etchingham were having a ball, upbeat and humourous, talking to commentators who were asking the questions we were. Schofield was in his element here, making gags about the police "not kettling" the public on the Mall as they were brought forward and talking of a woman being smuggled into the Goring Hotel ("we assume it was a lady, the disguise could have been good"). He also started talking us through the Facebook Royal Wedding drinking game as guests were arriving at Westminster Abbey ("you're probably on the floor by now") and pointed out a man with his underwear hanging out behind Granada's Lucy Meacock in Downing Street. Later on, Julie's News at Ten co-host Mark Austin was assigned the "in the crowd" role, being given a Scout neckerchief to wear and offered vodka and Red Bull before getting completely stuck in the throngs as they moved forward, with Schofield joking they would stay with him continuously. Austin ended up trending worldwide on Twitter thanks to his amusing inserts into proceedings.
Meanwhile back with Huw, things weren't getting any better. Fearne Cotton had once again been assigned the "crowd" role, something she's been doing since Live 8 and still seems to ask questions either with straight yes or no answers or completely obvious responses that don't add anything. It's a time honoured BBC format, having a "light-hearted" insert into proceedings (think of the various embarrassing attempts over the years on election night) but if there was one occasion where they could have changed the tone of the whole thing to match the obvious joy of the crowds outside, this was it. And here lies the problem - having Cotton, Bowman, Baker et al on location is sod all use if every few minutes you go back to Huw Edwards, AKA Misery Bear, in his bubble of gloom outside the palace.
After a while, we found ourselves sticking with ITV1 more and more, and when switching back to the Beeb just in case we were missing a moment of national unity, immediately found out that we weren't. Edwards still hasn't mastered the ancient Dimbledonian art of essentially talking to yourself for hours and hours without sounding like you're losing it. Some basic errors ensured the BBC coverage remained stuffy and aloof, such as basing it in a sealed studio high above the crowds as opposed to ITV's ground level open studio. Frequently Phil would turn around and interact with the hordes outside the palace, including memorably following the balcony kiss where he gave Julie a peck of her own after much encouragement! Frequent use of split-screen by ITV was also a straightforward way which allowed you to feel you were seeing more.
Even the basics seemed to elude our national broadcaster yesterday. During the RAF fly-past they seemed more concerned about attempting to make contact with Jake Humphrey inside one of the planes (despite the link being barely watchable) than actually covering the damn thing. Then there was a swift cut to an incredibly pointless news bulletin (who on earth would be tuning in for a roundup, most of which was about the wedding?) rather than carrying on with the coverage. They let their main parliamentary broadcaster, the knowledgable Andrew Neil, slip through their fingers to appear on ITV instead. Finally William and Kate's unexpected drive down the Mall - complete with L plates and "JU5T WED" numberplate - was supplemented with chat on the Beeb about how William was driving competently and that this was probably a security risk, rather than simply reflecting the joy of the crowds as ITV did.
 |
| Massive wodge of cables taped to railings outside Buckingham Palace - remind me of the YSTV days! |
The unusual thing about an eight-hour broadcast, supplemented in today's world by Twitter, Facebook and internet forums, meant that there was time for many to notice this turn of events for themselves. As early as 10am people were already commenting on the dullness of the Beeb and how ITV were judging the mood far better. To my astonishment many who wouldn't normally give ITV the time of day actually started switching over. By the time of the ceremony itself the received opinion was that ITV had already won the day. So what went right?
Despite the worries about the suitability of Phillip Schofield, it's easy to forget that he's one of the best presenters of his generation, having honed his skills filling for time when bits of film snapped whilst in-vision in the BBC1 continuity announcer's booth. The wedding coverage can probably be considered his career peak so far. The snobbery about This Morning I referred to earlier is also misplaced. The programme today is far removed from the Richard and Judy years - it's a remarkably slick, fairly journalistic operation that is a credit to daytime TV, and essentially importing the format to the wedding coverage worked a treat. Coupled with the professional Julie Etchingham - also a graduate of Children's BBC interestingly - they made for a formidable team. In contrast Huw seemed lonely, almost downbeat, with only the occasional ancient posho for company.
And yet, this isn't actually that unusual a turn of events. ITV's coverage of the General Election and particularly the 2008 US elections was widely perceived to have punched above it's weight, the latter being a particularly dark night for David Dimbleby in Washington, being outshone by Alastair Stewart in Grays Inn Road. And, before the HD goal fiasco ruined everything (which let's not forget was human error in an external company), the ITV coverage of the most recent football World Cup was much lauded as having a fresh presentational style, in contrast to Lineker and Hansen doing the same dull old thing on the BBC.
The ratings for these were massively in favour of the BBC and as they trickle out the wedding ratings seem much the same (4 to 1 according to early overnights). That much shouldn't be too surprising for reasons I've already outlined. But the modern revival of ITV will be much boosted if it can continue to win PR victories like this, with the aforementioned Twitter verdict and newspaper after newspaper after newspaper queuing up to come to much the same conclusion. With rather unfortunate timing BBC One chose yesterday as the occasion to premiere their new "aren't we great" trailer, an increasingly rare sight in recent years. The tagline "when it's worth watching, watch it with us", for one day at least, didn't apply.
Friday, 22 April 2011
Video Killed The Radio Star
Since I left York uni and York Student Television many of us have been documenting our time there (and reading about what went on before us) on the history wiki that was set up to mark the 40th anniversary four years ago. The amount of people who added details of their time at the station was quite remarkable and it really filled in many of the gaps in the history of the place, which had previously been a few key facts passed down through the generations. When you consider a generation at uni is three or four years it's no surprise that a lot of it was forgotten so quickly. It's just a shame that the thing is broken at the moment and doesn't allow you to save changes.
All of which made me wonder: why is there nothing similar for University Radio York? The website has a brief paragraph but not much else (unless it's hidden away somewhere). I'm sure there's plenty to be added about the way the station has developed over the years. The pictures in the alumni Facebook group are great, so why isn't there a place for them on the main site? Recently I dug out my old CD-Rs of my later shows on air and it's been one hell of a trip down memory lane. Some shows are astoundingly crap, others are surprisingly OK-ish. There's a load of cassettes back home up north somewhere of my earliest shows which I may have to have a few drinks before listening to again though...
I was involved in both societies (although never "behind the scenes" at URY). The "way" at York was normally to join one media society, put your all into it and hate all the others with a passion. Nowadays they all seem to get on well which is a bit disconcerting. I ended up becoming more involved with YSTV, which at that point wasn't making a great deal of programmes and had something of a change on the horizon with the graduation of lots of members, so it was easy to get stuck in. URY on the other hand had a pretty full schedule and officership making it more difficult to make your mark. But I was still keen to have a go at presenting, so given there isn't a URY History Wiki, prepare yourselves for a self-indulgent blog post...
I'd been trained in late 2002 by James Wickham who was already something of a legend at the station (I think he had something like 12 hours on air in a week at one point). As the schedules got shuffled at the start of every term I made my debut in January 2003. Because schedule space was scarce the tendency was to give new people one hour slots, but in addition to my Wednesday afternoon show (called "May Contain Nuts"- hilarious) I nabbed a Sunday 7am slot too, which could run for a whole two hours! Who would have thought there was no demand for prime-time slots like that?
In fact a few of us that year, including my housemate Michael, took on what was known as "Early Breakfast" (as the student breakfast show ran 9am to 12pm - I kid ye not) and despite the hours I rather enjoyed it. I'd roll up at the university security office at about 6.55am, sign out the key from a grumpy security guard, do the show, head home and then go back to bed again till lunchtime. It felt more like getting loads of time in the studio to practice than doing an actual radio show (because, let's face it, no-one was listening) and you didn't have to contend with the dozens of members you'd normally find staring at you through the glass during the day. I've always been a good "morning person" and something about the getting up specifically to do the show in the early hours seemed to fire me up a bit. I later did a one off early show on YSTV for much the same reasons.
Sunday Early Breakast became Weekend Early Breakfast the following term, and once it became lighter and warmer those two early walks across campus became almost enjoyable. The lack of anything approaching a social life probably helped the early starts too (although to be fair most of the uni socialising was done on weekdays - campus was like a ghost town at weekends - and I still did my fair share of shows in a hungover, dreamlike state). I even did a couple of 6am starts over the Roses weekend, when URY broadcast around the clock and was simulcast on Bailrigg FM in Lancaster, and was also asked to fill in a couple of times for otherwise engaged breakfast show presenters. To my astonishment I ended up being nominated for a newcomer award at the annual end-of-year campus media back slapathon and was moved to the breakfast show, which was more than flattering as I never really thought I was any good at it. I joined the breakfast show in October 2003 for a couple of terms, co-presenting first with Adam and then with Tom, both my housemates.
Initially I kept my Sunday early show but in January 2004 threw in the towel. Living off campus meant an earlier start and instead of walking across the idyllic campus, it was down Hull Road with a cold wind blowing in my face. Michael left his early slot for the much same reason and, having guested on each other's shows regularly since the first term of uni (including doing a Sunday review of the week's news crossed with Wheel of Fortune - it had to be heard to be believed) we decided to do a show of our own. Michael was keen for it to be slightly different so we ended up doing sketches and spoofs, most of which centred on URY itself, in a show modestly called The Nation's Favourite. We'd usually prepare ideas all morning, shouting ideas between our facing bedrooms, before walking onto campus and going on air at midday for two hours. It had a small but loyal audience who seemed to really get what we were trying to do. The two editions we put out during Freshers' Week 2004 are probably the shows I'm the most proud of in my time at URY (I may do a blog about The Nation's Favourite itself at some point as I've very happy memories of it).
After enjoying the new show so much I left the breakfast show in March that year mainly because my heart wasn't really in it anymore, and I certainly didn't think I was good enough to hog one of the biggest slots on the station. Basically, I jumped before I was pushed! That left me with just The Nation's Favourite, which itself been cut down to 90 minutes (that schedule wasn't getting any less crowded). So I jumped at the chance to do some stand-in shows throughout the term for presenters busy with exams. Through not really trying or thinking about it too much I ended up really enjoying presenting alone again, after a lengthy period of only doing so with other people - it really built up my confidence. There was also a surprising degree of listener interaction (i.e. more than none), some of which came from a girl who'd joined YSTV at the start of the year. After one show she got in touch to suggest we meet up that evening. Seven years on and Kate and I are still together!
Off the back of the fun I'd had doing these shows stuck my neck out and applied for a Saturday lunchtime show, which turned out to be the perfect slot: it left weekdays free for uni work (which by now was needing some serious TLC) and the studios were deserted. The Weekender ran for the whole of my final year, after James Brookes's long-running breakfast show. James joined URY back in 1997 and returned to the station shortly after graduating when he became a teacher, and to my knowledge is still there today. Back in my early breakfast days I would "warm up" to Brookesy and ever the gent, two years later he was happy to play along with the gag that he was now doing it for me. The contributions of a fresher called Sarah, AKA the "email female", also featured pretty much every week, so much so that she later started describing herself as my stalker!
It was at this point that my continued involvement in both campus TV and radio started to make the experience a bit less enjoyable. There had always been a bit of "banter" towards YSTV on campus from the other media societies, particularly the papers (some of it not without foundation in the days when the station seemed to show a lot of The Simpsons and little of it's own programmes, but less understandable in it's modern incarnation). I'd never really understood the point of this when we were all essentially trying to do the same thing - it seemed like two bald men fighting over a comb. I'd always shrugged it off or tried to encourage co-operation but by my final year this was becoming more and more difficult. The Nation's Favourite was ticked off a couple of times for pushing things too far when referring to internal politics, and by my final term both of us were sounding increasingly bitter and off-message, embarrassingly so in restrospect, before finally we finally shuffled off air at the end of June. Michael had (quite deservedly) got a job at BBC Radio York presenting a weekly show by this point, which naturally led to him losing interest somewhat. Gradually it stopped being so much fun.
My final show aired at midday on 2nd July 2005, not only the final show for me but also the final show on URY that academic year. My housemates Simon, Adam and Tom, and Kate also (that girl who used to email my show!), all graduating that summer too, came along too. Towards the end I said my goodbyes, and I played the same song I started with nearly three years previously (You Get What You Give by The New Radicals - oh the irony) before ending with the sound effect of a door closing and the fading "URY, URY, URY..." jingle. At 1.59pm the transmitter was turned off for the summer and that was that.
I've lost count of how many times I've been back to YSTV since I left York but I've never returned to URY. Looking at the website it all seems very different now - most of the Mini Disc and CD players have gone as has the massive CD library behind where we sat. Everything seems to be held on a playout system which of course makes perfect sense - I've no idea how many times I went to find a CD and it had either gone missing or was in the wrong place. For a while I wanted to work in radio - my nearest city Liverpool had no major TV broadcasters so my "plan" (as much as it was) was to transfer my YSTV production experience to radio instead, and from summer 2004 I did around six week's worth of work placements at BBC Radio Merseyside, spread over a year. Ultimately it wasn't to be - Kate moved down to London for work and shortly afterwards I followed her, joining ITV in the September after graduation, and I'm still there now.
But listening back to some of the old shows has brought back how much fun it all used to be, and I do miss it, although I think I perhaps more enjoyed the act of pressing the buttons than actually presenting. One of my ideas to bring YSTV and URY together that never got off the ground because of the rivalry and also the technicalities was to simulcast key URY shows on YSTV using the studio webcams, more or less how Radio 1 have done recently on BBC Red Button. Now that relations seem more cordial, and technology is frankly light years ahead of what it was, that sort of thing could be possible.
On his final URY show Tom kindly played a song for each of the people he'd presented with over the years. Of course mine was Video Killed The Radio Star. I'm not sure about the "star" bit, but the rest of it wasn't far off.
JUNE 2011 UPDATE
I've recently discovered that with interesting timing, as I was writing that blog URY were ripping out the remains of the Studio 1 that I used to broadcast from (seen here just before refurbishment) and installing a new, very minimalist setup (which can be seen on the webcam) to reflect the move away from CDs and Mini Discs that I describe above.
NOVEMBER 2011 UPDATE
Funnily enough Tom and I ended up returning to URY just six months after I wrote this blog - read about it here.
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| Side by side at Freshers' Fair |
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| Me at work in my room - Eden's Court F21 at some point in my first year |
I'd been trained in late 2002 by James Wickham who was already something of a legend at the station (I think he had something like 12 hours on air in a week at one point). As the schedules got shuffled at the start of every term I made my debut in January 2003. Because schedule space was scarce the tendency was to give new people one hour slots, but in addition to my Wednesday afternoon show (called "May Contain Nuts"- hilarious) I nabbed a Sunday 7am slot too, which could run for a whole two hours! Who would have thought there was no demand for prime-time slots like that?
 |
| On air - January 2003 |
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| It's York, it's summer, there are geese, run! |
Sunday Early Breakast became Weekend Early Breakfast the following term, and once it became lighter and warmer those two early walks across campus became almost enjoyable. The lack of anything approaching a social life probably helped the early starts too (although to be fair most of the uni socialising was done on weekdays - campus was like a ghost town at weekends - and I still did my fair share of shows in a hungover, dreamlike state). I even did a couple of 6am starts over the Roses weekend, when URY broadcast around the clock and was simulcast on Bailrigg FM in Lancaster, and was also asked to fill in a couple of times for otherwise engaged breakfast show presenters. To my astonishment I ended up being nominated for a newcomer award at the annual end-of-year campus media back slapathon and was moved to the breakfast show, which was more than flattering as I never really thought I was any good at it. I joined the breakfast show in October 2003 for a couple of terms, co-presenting first with Adam and then with Tom, both my housemates.
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| April 2004 at 17 Carlton Avenue: L-R Me, Adam, Simon, Tom, Michael |
Initially I kept my Sunday early show but in January 2004 threw in the towel. Living off campus meant an earlier start and instead of walking across the idyllic campus, it was down Hull Road with a cold wind blowing in my face. Michael left his early slot for the much same reason and, having guested on each other's shows regularly since the first term of uni (including doing a Sunday review of the week's news crossed with Wheel of Fortune - it had to be heard to be believed) we decided to do a show of our own. Michael was keen for it to be slightly different so we ended up doing sketches and spoofs, most of which centred on URY itself, in a show modestly called The Nation's Favourite. We'd usually prepare ideas all morning, shouting ideas between our facing bedrooms, before walking onto campus and going on air at midday for two hours. It had a small but loyal audience who seemed to really get what we were trying to do. The two editions we put out during Freshers' Week 2004 are probably the shows I'm the most proud of in my time at URY (I may do a blog about The Nation's Favourite itself at some point as I've very happy memories of it).
 |
| A logo that Adam made for us but I don't think was ever used! |
Off the back of the fun I'd had doing these shows stuck my neck out and applied for a Saturday lunchtime show, which turned out to be the perfect slot: it left weekdays free for uni work (which by now was needing some serious TLC) and the studios were deserted. The Weekender ran for the whole of my final year, after James Brookes's long-running breakfast show. James joined URY back in 1997 and returned to the station shortly after graduating when he became a teacher, and to my knowledge is still there today. Back in my early breakfast days I would "warm up" to Brookesy and ever the gent, two years later he was happy to play along with the gag that he was now doing it for me. The contributions of a fresher called Sarah, AKA the "email female", also featured pretty much every week, so much so that she later started describing herself as my stalker!
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| Freshers' Fair 2004: L-R James Brookes, Kate, Owen Murphy (boss of URY at this point) |
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| Doing the "Amarillo" on my last show: L-R Kate, Tom, Simon, Adam |
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| About to go off air for the final time, 2nd July 2005 |
But listening back to some of the old shows has brought back how much fun it all used to be, and I do miss it, although I think I perhaps more enjoyed the act of pressing the buttons than actually presenting. One of my ideas to bring YSTV and URY together that never got off the ground because of the rivalry and also the technicalities was to simulcast key URY shows on YSTV using the studio webcams, more or less how Radio 1 have done recently on BBC Red Button. Now that relations seem more cordial, and technology is frankly light years ahead of what it was, that sort of thing could be possible.
On his final URY show Tom kindly played a song for each of the people he'd presented with over the years. Of course mine was Video Killed The Radio Star. I'm not sure about the "star" bit, but the rest of it wasn't far off.
JUNE 2011 UPDATE
I've recently discovered that with interesting timing, as I was writing that blog URY were ripping out the remains of the Studio 1 that I used to broadcast from (seen here just before refurbishment) and installing a new, very minimalist setup (which can be seen on the webcam) to reflect the move away from CDs and Mini Discs that I describe above.
NOVEMBER 2011 UPDATE
Funnily enough Tom and I ended up returning to URY just six months after I wrote this blog - read about it here.
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