Crunch & Roll

People often ask how we choose our guests. The answer is quite simple. People who've had varied and interesting careers and have a good story to tell. And it always helps if we know them.

So getting this episode's guest on was a no-brainer.

Lee Thompson has been a presenter, producer, author, head of music, TV guy... and is now part of the most listened to feature on UK radio.

He tells a bloody good story, and he has plenty of them...

As Oscar Wild almost once said, "To lose one job may be regarded as a misfortune, to lose several looks like carelessness."

John Fox's guest on this episode admits to getting sacked a lot. He also admits he struggles with "where the line is". There could be a correlation...

Allan Lake is a brilliant, one-of-a-kind radio presenter. Lesser presenters would have sunk without trace after the feature that lost him his first job, but All...

We've heard lots of reasons why people get into radio on this podcast. Often it stems from a childhood obsession, starting with good old Bedroom FM, then maybe doing mobile discos, hospital radio and what have you... It's almost a calling.

For the guest of this episode though, that really wasn't the case. She just wanted to dress up as her local radio station's mascot!

After realising her ambition, she then went on to become one of...

This is the second part of John Fox's chat with Manchester radio stalwart Adam Cole.

Catch up on part one if you've not heard it yet...

... because this episode he swaps Moss Side for Miami.

Hear about how this hot jock ended up reading the news; presenting a breakfast show with his boss; and probably the most uncompassionate and brutal sacking we've ever heard about ("In for a penny, I've got nothing to lose").

It's a rollercoaste...

shaft

/ʃɑːft/

verb

past tense: shafted; past participle: shafted

vulgar slang, informal

treat (someone) harshly or unfairly.

There are moments in some people’s career where they’re riding on the crest of a wave and an exciting new challenge comes along and tempts them away with promises that are too good to say no to.

Then… see above.

Adam Cole is a stalwart of the Manchester radio scene and has been for a very long time. In fact...

Some of our guests dip their toe in the exotic world of overseas radio but end up gravitating back to the UK. We get the impression that Ian Camfield though, would rather lose a limb than return home.

He's and XFM legend - there from the start and through the glory days which we hard about in part one of this two-parter. In this second part though, we cross the pond to the good ol' US of A where we hear the crazy circumstances of h...

Some of our guests dip their toe in the exotic world of overseas radio but end up gravitating back to the UK. We get the impression that Ian Camfield though would rather lose a limb than return home.

He's and XFM legend - there from the start and through the glory days - but plies his trade in the US nowadays... but more of that in part two.

In part one we concentrate on the Camfield origin story, including which Radio One behemoth...

Hey man! It's Griffo!

For those of you not familiar with Griffo's work, he's a legend of the airwaves in North Wales and Yorkshire. He's tighter than a gnat's chuff and has a voice that Morgan Freeman would kill for.

As one former boss told him in a snoop, "You make my station sound BIG"!

Foxy's know Griffo for almost a quarter of a century having worked with him at V*king FM, so he has some stories to hit him with off the bat. And...

We all have those moments in our lives where we look back and think, why did I do that.

In radio terms, Paul Hayes 'why did I do that' moment was HUGE. Let's just say it involved a Richard Park, Ashley Tabor and a pizza.

Paul's done a decade on the mighty Magic in London, but his career has taken in big stations in the UK, Canada and UAE, so the guides us through stories from his time at Southern FM, Galaxy, Heart and more.

Includi...

What? Another legend from the station formerly known as Wave 105? Ambassador, you're spoiling us.

Mark Collins is another stalwart of the South Coast radio scene and still plies his trade on the mighty 105.2FM (or DAB 11B / 11C in new money), under it's new name, Great Hits Radio. You might have heard of it...

But Mark had a career longer than most before he'd ever been to the South Coast taking in Chiltern, Red Dragon, Radio City,...

Us radio folk wear the term anorak as a badge of honour. But no matter how big a radio geek you think you are, you're really not, because John Foster is the Anorak in Chief.

As Foxy chats to him, he produces pieces of paraphernalia, liberated from former workplaces, each with a story attached. He also has an incredible memory for details such as radio station addresses, straplines and trim levels of branded cars he's owned!

He take...

We've featured some presenters who are synonymous with the stations where they plied their trade for an impressive amount of time - Fresh at Beacon and Elliott Webb at BRMB for example - and there's no denying that James Heming is Mr Invicta.

He spent the majority of his career at a station in Kent, somewhere he admits he couldn't have pointed to on a map before moving there! And for an incredible 19 of years of his time there, he ...

For the two of you who don't know, Clive was one of the big guns in UK radio management. The King of Capital. The Duke of Jack. The Archbishop of Absolute. But then he went to Australia, and took a lifetime of radio knowledge and enough stories to fill your average-sized encyclopaedia with him.

So very early (too early) one Sunday, when British Summer Time and Australian Eastern Standard Time conveniently aligned, we embarked on a ...

On the advice of our legal team, which as regular listeners will know is a made up guy called Gary, we were advised to give this guest the chance to rebuke a serious accusation made against him by several previous guests on this podcast. So for the avoidance of doubt, SIMON LOGAN HAS NEVER THROWN A WHITEBOARD RUBBER AT ANYONE.

Now that unpleasantness is out of the way...

Simon was the guy on the Viking FM breakfast show when a fres...

Foxy's guest this episode is a former Whatnotter. You know, from the Saturday Whatnot on Essex Radio... No?

If that's not ringing any bells, maybe you know him from his mere 26 years at Key 103 / Hits Radio. YES! That Mike Toolan!

Of course he's one of the biggest names in the business and who's been on Radio Aire, BRMB and Capital, as well as an actual GENERATION on 103FM in Manchester, so won't need too much of an introduction.

W...

Стив Пауэр любит поезда.

Just a little message for anyone who can understand Russian there. That doesn't include the guest on this episode, Steve Power, who ended up accidentally studying the language. There may have been drink involved.

Steve must have been one of the longest serving breakfast show jocks ever. 17 BLOOMIN' YEARS! And not your lightweight 6am start nonsense. He was waking up the South of England from 5.30am!

Most re...

Before we started recording, Ben Jones told us he has a namesake in the radio industry and wanted to check we had the right guy. Er, yeah. We're sure.

Ben was ever-present on the original Virgin Radio / Absolute Radio for a decade for goodness sake. He now plies his trade on the new Virgin Radio (amongst other pies he has his fingers in...), but it hasn't all been plain sailing to get there. After leaving Absolute there were some p...

Has there ever been a more iconic evening show than Dave Kelly’s epoch-defining broadcast on Galaxy?

If you were to write the recipe for the perfect evening show, you’d use all the ingredients that made Dave’s show so perfect. Daft features – Tick. Dicking about – Tick. Pushing the boundaries of what you get away with – Tick. Bangers – Tick.

But what made this young fella from Northampton become the Don of Dusk?

Luckily you’ve foun...