Dub dot dash

Keeping it Peel
Today is the first annual John Peel Day on BBC Radio 1. Also scheduled are gigs all round the UK - more here. Also worth a lookee - this great interview with Peel's wife Sheila, on the forthcoming publication of Peel's autobiography (tip of the hat to RB)

"...Peel had been planning to write his autobiography - which he'd whimsically entitled Margrave of the Marshes - for some years, but he always had a tendency to leave things to the last minute. Sheila and the children bought him a word-processor, but John, she says, hated being taught to do anything, and for a year it gathered dust until he finally resolved to master it himself. By the time of his death he had written around a third of the book, up to the point when he first broke into radio while living in America.

It had not occured to Sheila to complete the book until she read a newspaper item, shortly after his death, saying that the family planned to do precisely that. "It was actually the last thing on my mind . . . It was the children, not me, who said: 'Come on, if we all get together, we can do it.' " What finally decided it for them, she jokes, was William's observation that John's section ends in America with an anecdote about him giving a friend a lift to a brothel. "William said we had to finish it, because they couldn't bear anybody to think that's where John and I met."

Also, I've linked to this before, but have a read...
Novelist Andrew O'Hagan remembers the magical trip when he became friends with John Peel

"... Two years ago, I was in New Zealand with him. We were there to represent British culture, a fact which made us laugh for an entire week, and I have to say I've never fallen into camaraderie with someone so quickly in my life. The first night, I went for an Indian with John and his wife Sheila, and I wasted no time in paying dues to my former self: I told him he was a god. He took it very well, saying something profound like, "You wouldn't pass me some of that mango chutney over, would you?"

ADDED: The Peel detective... A day of concerts, a commemorative album and a specially recorded single are planned to celebrate the life of John Peel - but what were the albums closest to his heart? Jon Dennis goes in search of the ultimate Peel playlist... check The Guardian

via Coolfer...
"Two articles on Jay-Z worth sharing. One is a very good article at Forbes that takes a look at Sean Carter the label executive. It's a week old, and that almost puts it past the Bloggers Statute of Limitations, but it's a good profile. ("He gives Def Jam ... unmatched credibility with the artists that will define its future.") The other is a brief article at SoundSlam reports that Jay-Z is in discussions with a major English soccer club. He is reportedly interested in purchasing a large share in London-based Arsenal F.C."