Pop Shield

It’s 3.45am and I crawl out of bed as quietly as I can and slip outside onto the landing.  Today I’m going to approach things a bit differently – rather than get a car from home I’m going to get into my misted-up Fiesta and drive fifteen minutes through the starry night to the nearest station to park up there instead.  I didn’t sleep too well being slightly anxious about the new arrangement, but it all goes fine and by 5.40am I am safely at work.

Today is Sunday. I’m working with Hilary and a presenter called Deepak Kapoor who I have not worked with before.  I’ve been copied into an email to him and am impressed that his email address is Howdeepakisyourlove@xxxxxxx.com.

The first thing that I do is try to get ahead with rigging for the three live music acts coming in later that morning to perform live on Jerry Wobegon’s show.  This involves lumping around the very heavy Nations Favourite house keyboard and a multitude of mic stands, amps and DI boxes.  I feel a little bit weak, time for tea.

As I sit drinking tea and chatting with Hilary, I set about getting the studio ready for Deepak who has yet to arrive.  I think nothing of it, as I’m used to certain presenters flying in with minutes to go. “Will the set-up be the same as Jane has it?” I ask. “Ah, yes I think so” says Hilary.  So, I configure the desk so that Deepak has control over the mic faders and I have control over all the other sources.

At 6.40am, about twenty minutes before we are due to go on air, we are still awaiting our presenter. Hilary says, “I’m worried about Deepak, time is getting short and it’s very unlike him to not let me know if he is going to be late.”  This rings alarm bells in my mind.  Between the two of us we get thinking on our feet.  We are currently in a one-hour tape which finishes at 7am, followed by a three-minute news bulletin, then us. Hilary tries to get hold of the last presenter who has already left the building and is on voicemail.  He only lives four miles away and is probably tucked up in bed.  I dig out my list of long records suitable in an emergency which I compiled for if an OB falls off air on Little Sister Radio.  I start scouring the pre-complied playlist tracks for extra-long records and dragging them into the schedule, asking Hilary to say which ones she prefers.

Hilary meanwhile wakes up Mike the duty editor.  He is somewhat croaky having launched an 80’s show the night before, after which the team decided to relive their younger years by going to a nightclub.  His ability to recover from this kind of event is not what it was in the 80’s, however Mike is helpful and reassuring in what to do, as is Hilary’s colleague, who suggests the name of a reverend with broadcasting skills who lives locally.

Meanwhile I try to call the newsreader in The Mothership, but he is not picking up nor answering my shout outs down the talkback.  I phone the Broadcast Manager and let him know that I am taking the network and going on air without a show but that we are currently working on getting one of three presenters to come in.

And with the out-words of the newsreader I play a jingle followed by the unedited eight-and-a-half-minute full length version of American Pie segued into Abide With Me, a jingle, Innocent Man, a trail, Let the Sunshine In then crossfade to a scripted track so that it finishes on the dot of 0730 into a generic news strapline I’ve found on the system.  It is our hope that we can get through to half past seven news, then resume out of the news from page 5 of the script with whichever presenter arrives.

During this time Hilary has made contact with the reverend and amazingly he is in a position to come in.  He has never done the show before, but Hilary says she’ll tell him everything he needs to know when he gets here.  He is en route when Hilary gets a text from Deepak that reads “I’M COMING!!!”  Of course, everyone arrives at once, all with their shirts skew whiff: our first live guest; closely followed by the reverend; and finally poor Deepak who is really upset.  He was staying in a hotel for the night, had an early night and then slept through his phone alarm.

At 0728 I go into the studio where Deepak has sat down. I introduce myself and say “Ok, so just to check you are happy to go live at 0731 and that you will fade up the mic and I’ll do everything else.”  “No!  I can’t do that!“, he gasps.  I look at him quizzically.  “I’ve never done the mics before!”  “Oh, ok, that’s no problem, leave it with me” I reply. I place a green light on his desk and hotfoot it through to the control room, where I start twiddling mic and group fader inputs and gain and compression settings as fast as my racing heart will let me.  News jingle, fade up the one-minute news bulletin, fumble for abandoned script, cue up jingle and first record and off we go.  Jingle, segue record, dip during the intro for Deepak’s voiceover, fade up Deepak’s un-EQ’d mic expecting the worse.  But miraculously, the ideas do come out of his head, his voice does come out of his mouth, his mic does come up on the desk through the mic group, and it all goes out on the radio.  During ‘Happy Together’ I run through, and check Deepak is ok. He doesn’t look very ok.  “Do you need a hug?“ I ask.  He looks forlorn.  “Yes, I need a hug and a strong coffee please.” “Oh, poor you” say I.

And so there I am, live on air on the wrong side of the glass at silly o’clock in the morning hugging a big religious man in a turban who I’ve never met before.  And it feels like the most normal thing in the world.  It just goes to show that no matter how professional anyone tries to be, we are all human.

An aside: In the light of this event, I wonder if Deepak will change his email address to Howdeepakisyoursleep@xxxxxxx.com.