Goodevening everyone!
Well, what a week it's been! Very busy, very fun and quite diverse too!
Started off on Monday morning with the madness of the Oscars show that James King and I did. Have a listen again here. Especially good was the now imfamous "Whooooopieeee" moment (around 5:15am). Then in the evening, it was more films for me - the world premiere of 'Watchmen' in Leicester Sqaure in London. Have a look at my cracking James King-esq (I wish) review.
Tuesday I got to interview Kelly Clarkson during the day after her Live Lounge Performance and then in the evening saw one of the most incredible performances I've ever seen by the band Fleet Foxes at the Camden Roundhouse.
Wednesday was a much needed midweek lull
Thursday was another busy one as I popped off to see Russell Kane do a great stand up gig. His turn of phrase is very clever and his material is brilliantly focussed on topics such as why Brits are so happy with finding the worst in everything. We see someone do badly, and it makes us feel good. I love him. Not in that way, but you know.
Today (Friday) has been a very odd day. I was looking after the crowd at the big U2 Live Lounge gig. I had to keep them informed of what was going on and went through the safety announcements! I even did an impression of Bono, which luckily went down well. Could have gone either way! Then went and had a bit of lunch with Jo and the boss Piers and he made me do my impression of Jo to her. Thanks for that. Have a look at all the U2 guff here.
I'm now sitting in my girlfriend's kitchen writing this and am pretty tired it's to say - great week though - hope you've enjoyed all the tales on the big show. More of this on from Monday at 4am. This week will be a tough one to top though!
As always, thanks for your comments on here - it is much appreciated and I do read them all because I'm sad and I love it. I urge you to continue commenting to your heart's content but I don't want to force you! A little statistic for you here - Someone told me that approx 2% of Radio 1's audience actually bothers to text in. Incredible really - that's not a lot. So, for the silent majority that read these ramblings regularly, hello and welcome along. I know you're there - I've seen the 'hit figures' or whatever they're called.
Have a lovely weekend! Brap brap etc. I'm off out for dinner and a few frothy bevvies - to coin a phrase.
Have a listen to the interview that I did yesterday with Kelly after her Live Lounge performance. She was a lot of fun and even sang me a very impressive jingle. Have a listen again to the interview from today's show and also check out the international listeners to the show commenting on Kelly on these forums. She is VERY popular...and rightly so. Her single charts this Sunday on Radio 1's Chart Show from 4pm - could be No.1...
Last night, I got to go to the world premiere of the big new film 'Watchmen'. Now, I'll admit that I'm not the world's biggest comic book fan - well, I did quite like the Beano once upon a time - but Watchmen is a legendary comic book series. And after years of courtcases, phone calls and arguments between nerds, it's finally been made into a feature length film.
It's a very impressive film and cost more than $100 million to make. The effects are pretty decent but it is SO long. Nearly 3 hours. With poor legroom, this film is difficult to manage. Fans of the comic will absolutely love it - and I mean properly love it. There's some nudity in it too. Also, don't be misled by the term 'comic' - there's nothing in this film for kids! Very gory.
Now, I say world premiere but don't think I've gone all showbiz as the most famous person I saw there was Producer Neil because we were diverted from the red carpet into the back entrance. Have a look at the official website. They've spent just a little bit too much money on it I think...
Good film though, it's out next Friday.
Well, if you missed it this morning, I decided to rip off Gary Barlow's birthday present to Chris. And you know the old saying - if you're going to do something, do it badly.
I re-wrote the words and recorded last night very late with a stinking cold. I didn't realise how high the song was.
Have a listen
here - it's about 2hrs 20mins in.
Chris was impressed. Kind of.
What a night it was. I listened back to my show yesterday...hmmm, let's just say I think it encapsulated the spirit of the night.
Anyway, I was snooping around the backstage area and whipped out my phone at every opportunity. Here's a few shots from the night:
This was my domain for the night: I was conducting interviews with all the stars after they performed or won an award. If they didn't win, they got the hump and didn't come through.
On the way to the Brits - a bit scared as we pulled up to the arena:
Sara Cox's dressing room:
Girls Aloud's dancers before they went on:
Wheeey! Lads! Here we are at an after party we sneaked into. I look more orange than Scott:
A huge Brit:
The arena after the event:
It was an amazing night and I was so fortunate to be there. I managed to interview all the big names and even managed to rile Girls Aloud by asking a provocative question about the splitting up rumours. They overreacted a bit. Blew my chances, there.
Have a look at all the official guff from the night here.
Thank you to our BBC Sport colleagues and in particular Arlo White who had a little chat with me about the current test in Antigua between England and the West Indies.
Check out the BBC's incredible cricket coverage
here.
He has an amazing job, and an amazing view - have a look at this. He's even left the microphone in shot. Class.
Hello all, Scott is feeling a little under the weather today so I've been woken up from my nap to come and do his show as well as my big early show this morning.
Hope you had a lovely weekend - mine was action packed and very fun. On Friday night I met a mate from America and we went for a nice bit of dinner, Saturday was mainly focusssed around Valentine's Day, however, I did make time to watch my televisual debut on BBC Switch's 'Sound' programme on BBC2. Have a look at it here - if you want...
Then Sunday lunchtime as a free valentine's gift (what can I say, I'm an old romantic) we went Dancing on Ice being filmed. We were guests of Zoe Salmon after we hit it off during my week of money challenges. I met her family, chatted to her dad about radio for a while, met Andi Peters and had a really good night. Here's a few photos:
Sneaking around behind the scenes:
The studio. This ladies' face has been removed to protect her identity. I'm quite the artist
If you weren't listening this morning, the big announcement was that I have plans afoot to do my show from an off-shore oil rig. It's another one of these hair-brained ideas that hopefully the bosses will go for. The last one I had was to do my show from a service station. This would be a whole new challenge.
Watch this space!
Find out here what went on at the Service Station show
Find out more about oil rigs here.
Went to see this lot last night do and little gig and I think they are excellent. They seem an uncomplicated band that have great songs - which is all you need really. Their debut album 'Fine Fascination' is out on 2nd March and I can tell you that it's a goodun as I've been allowed a sneaky listen.
I was a bit tired and wasn't in the mood for a heavy night as you can tell by my accessories. Yes, I admit it, I took an umbrella. It is a girl's brolly too...
That's all for now...have a lovely day.
Warning, this might sound a bit pretentious...I'll try my best to make it not...
For me, I've listened to many albums that I can say in my opinion don't have a bad track on them.
There are only a very small number however that I have to listen to in their entirety because they are like one long track. I don't want to use the phrase 'musical journey' because it is a horrible phrase and it's not quite right either. It's almost like a story. And by this I mean it's not much good just reading one chapter. It's better when you give the whole thing time.
Anyway, the latest album to do this to me is 'Fleet Foxes' by Fleet Foxes. It is just incredible. A perfect package, so different sounding and beautiful. I strongly recommend this to you, it won't be everyone's cup of tea and won't ever climb high in the singles charts but it's remarkable and one of the best albums I've ever heard.
Anyway, I'll leave you with that and I'll pop off and disappear up my own bottom for the afternoon. Yar, yar darling, those glasses are so sick they're almost ill, yar, yar, Charlie wore them, he's sooo random, yar etc.
Bad news readers. I have rising damp in my flat. As I type, there are workmen ripping up the cheap flooring in my flat because over the weeks, there has been damp crawling up the walls.
This is my bedroom wall:
Awful! So, they've realised that the water is leaking from somewhere and going under the floor which is why my flat has been smelling like a mouldy sponge for a few weeks. About half an hour ago, this was found underneath the floor:
The areas of black you can see are wet bits. And by wet, I mean soaking. This isn't the best news really. The only good thing is that it makes for interesting blog posts - but that isn't much consolation. The workmen are now sitting around scratching their heads not quite sure what to do next. I don't know what to do either. I'm sitting here in my room with the most disgusting wet dog smell wafting round the flat.
The floor has now been dug up. Oh dear:
Anyway, best not to dwell on these things. I think it's a good idea to get the hell out of here for the weekend so that's what I'll do - off to see my girlfriend which will be nice as I haven't seen her in about a month.
I don't have much luck with flats really. New listeners/readers won't be aware of
this little episode from my previous place. It pales in comparison with the new problem.
Going back into Radio 1 this afternoon to interview
Tim Vine - a very funny bloke - which I'm looking forward to a lot.
Got a message from
Zoe Salmon (see, it wasn't an awkward meeting!) seeing if I could go along to watch Dancing On Ice this Sunday. Unfortunately I can't this week but will do next week - hopefully she's still in!
Have a good weekend, wrap up warm and if anyone has a spare room, please get in touch.
Well, in case you didn't know, this is the thing that EVERYONE is talking about. It's an odd revalation really and one that I didn't really fully understand - until this week.
Basically, it's a micro-blogging site which enables to write mini updates no longer than 140 characters. It is ridiculously simple, which I think is why it will become immensely popular.
Loads of celebs are on it which adds to the intrigue. Stephen Fry being the most popular who was stuck in a lift last night and gave real time picture updates on his progress:
Other good ones include Phillip Schofield, Jonathan Ross and Richard Bacon, who does an excellent show on BBC Radio 5Live by the way.
Anyway, have a look at it, if you haven't already, and join in these two groups if you get a moment:
I'm on it (along with a load of other DJs) and so is Producer Neil. He has relucantly joined but I know he loves it really. The idea is for it to work alongside the blog as kind of "blog Xtra" if you will...It won't have stuff on it that changes the world nor stuff that will particularly feature on the show, but it's real behind the scenes stuff. Get on board.
If you're a regular member of the Early Breakfast show, it's a must have!
My Twitter page
Producer Neil's one
But I couldn't resist a little mess around with Producer Neil after the show. Targets for my snow balls were Black Taxis, and a well known high street clothes retailer. Amazing. I've only ever seen this much snow when I went to Iceland - not the shop, either. Anyway, wrap up warm, have a great day and enjoy the snow - if you can!
