No wit, no brains and no classical – Desert Island Discs is struggling

On Radio 4, the technicians were having trouble with the Desert Island Discs interview with Lord Rix and played Barber’s Adagio for Strings for ten minutes instead. “Has someone died?” I texted a friend at the station. “They keep playing the Platoon music.” “I think someone’s died!” he shouted across the room. Everyone immediately went on to Google. Just then the station managed to patch into the interview, and we found Kirsty Young being more than usually bouncy.
It soon became clear why: 84-year-old Lord Rix himself was not exactly sur le ball. He recalled how in the 1950s he’d played on a blues record that George Martin had produced. Kirsty laughed. “And I wonder what happened to him!” she said. “Well, actually, you know, he became the famous producer for the Beatles,” said Rix. Thanks for that, Brian.
Mind you, it hadn’t been much more edifying the previous week, with David Walliams giving a much-trumpeted “frankest interview yet”, which consisted of him holding hands with himself and admitting that sometimes he goes into his dressing room and feels quite flat – but then lots of comedians get, you know, low, don’t they?
Wow. What else are we going to learn on this show? That none of the other Beatles liked John’s wife, Yoko Ono? Possibly you might be gay? suggested Kirsty, going out on a limb. Walliams chewed on this for a minute and came back, typically reflective. Yessss – but then how come I really want to go to bed with my dear friend Natalie Imbruglia, or failing her, my dear friend Kate Beckinsale? It’s a proper conundrum. Meanwhile – here are the Pet Shop Boys.
And I’m thinking, “When did people on Desert Island Discs get so rude? What makes them feel they can abandon civility altogether and not even try to choose a single piece of classical music!” In the old days nobody would dream of not including at least a little stretch of Rachmaninov – even if they’d never actually heard it all the way through before – just to be polite.
Don’t the producers have appropriate discs to give to such people, like they give ties and jackets to the underdressed at the club? This past week, Richard Madeley chose John Mayer’s “Why Georgia”. I mean, that song’s only been around for five years! How can it, therefore, make him go into the bucolic haze required of a desert island disc? Did anyone actually vet Madeley’s selection? Who the mother howdy is in charge around here?
And, more to the point, where are all the guests with brains? How about Gerhard Richter? The other morning I heard him on Radio 2 actually making a good joke in Augsburg. Get him on! Or how about someone properly intellectual? How about Sean Bean? Just one look at the guy and you can see he’s bang into Hindemith. He loves shaking things up, Sean, loves playing against type. In the opening episode of the Red Riding trilogy on Channel 4 he actually played the Pennines-based hard nut.
I sat there for two hours thinking, is the killer a) Sean Bean, b) Roman Polanski, c) the guy who stole Sean’s diet pills, and d) Can I date all of them, even if the show is shit?
Next week, Kirsty takes on Baaba Maal. The only way is up.

Pick of the week

Ursula Le Guin at 80
17 March, 11.30am, Radio 4
The groundbreaking sci-fi writer looks back on her career.
Night Waves – Landmarks
19 March, 9.15pm, Radio 3
On Truffaut’s Jules et Jim.
Bob Dylan’s Theme Time Radio Hour Mother’s Day special
19 March, 11pm, 6 Music
Bob dedicates this one to mums.

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