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CMJ corpses
By Will 2 months ago, 3 Comments »
It’s not quite as side-splitting as Aggers’ moment with Brian Johnston, but Christopher Martin-Jenkins corpsing live on air is still too precious a thing to ignore. Have a listen, and here’s the run of events:
During the 52nd over New Zealand captain Dan Vettori faced England paceman Stuart Broad.
“Broad’s in, he bowls, this time Vettori lets it go outside the off stump, good length, inviting him to fish,” CMJ told listeners.
But then the trouble started. CMJ went on “But Vettori stays on the bank… and keeps his rod down, so to speak.”
At this point I am afraid to admit the laughter started amongst those of us in the box. And I can’t just blame new recruit Phil Tufnell, we were all guilty. Bill Frindall helpfully exclaimed “good luck” and after a few seconds CMJ managed to speak again.
“I don’t know if he is a fisherman, is he?” … the laughter continued but to be fair to CMJ he just went on regardless.At such a moment there is, to be honest, not much a producer can do - and I cannot lie, I know it was childish but I was laughing along as well. Anyway - you have a listen and I dare you not to laugh as well!
There was another great blooper from Radio 4’s institutional announcer, Charlotte Green, a couple of months back.
3 Comments »Listening to Australia v India
By Will 6 months ago, 14 Comments »
For those without TV or radio, here’s ABC’s stream. They claim it doesn’t work for those outside Australia, but I’m hearing it loud and clear:
http://abc.net.au/streaming/cricket/cricket.ram
14 Comments »I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue
By Will last year, mid-November, No Comments; be the first!
Don’t worry. I haven’t turned into Cricket365 with their Addiction To Capitilaising Every Word In Headlines. I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue is my favourite show, on TV or radio, and returns for its fiftieth series on Monday at 6.30pm on BBC Radio 4. It is brilliantly stupid and gets better and better. If you’ve never heard it before, try to catch it tomorrow. You’ll thank me.
This from the Guardian’s Leader tomorrow:
Mrs Trellis of north Wales will no doubt be sitting by her wireless at 6.30pm this evening when the start of I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue’s 50th series is announced by the show’s bumbling brass theme (based on a tune by Haydn). What follows is guaranteed to be brilliant. It always is. Listening is like being welcomed back into a comfortable club on a wet winter’s night, a cheerful refuge from a dour, serious world outside. There may be people who are tired of its routines, its in-jokes and innuendo - but they are the sort of humourless listeners who write in to the BBC asking for the rules of Mornington Crescent to be explained (200 do every series), who wonder why Samantha hasn’t read out the score in years and probably question the need for the licence fee to fund Humph’s expensive laser display board, too. Everyone else appreciates the show’s relaxed brilliance. Many things contribute to this, starting with Humphrey Littleton, who has chaired the show since it began in 1972, getting funnier and bolder through the years. He does deadpan gags better than anybody else in broadcasting and gets more smut past the BBC, too. Without him the show would not have made it through 10 series, let alone 50, a magnificent score matched only by the even longer-lived Just A Minute. By rights Clue should have stopped being funny years ago. But there is nothing dusty or exhausted about a programme that still asks silly people to do silly things, and gets away with it every time.
And a very late arrival at pharmacists’ ball, would you please welcome Mr and Mrs Bollock-Steroids and their charming - if well-built - daughter Anna.
No Comments »Test Match Special at 50
By Will last year, mid-May, 6 Comments »
Is it not time for more female voices on TMS? “I hoped Claire Connor might be the one, but I don’t worry too much about not having a female,” said Baxter.
“The audience have to be comfortable with the commentators and most female voices need to be pitched a bit lower. You need an alto, not a soprano. Clare Balding has a perfect voice for radio.” And what advice would he have for his successor?
“I hope he (Baxter presumes it will be a man) doesn’t lose sight of the fact the commentary is the main thing,” he said.
So says Peter Baxter, Test Match Special’s producer since time began. Interesting comments, and not something I’d ever considered. Personally, I find Balding’s voice almost indistinguishable from a man’s. Indeed, listening to her and Willie Carson speaking, it’s difficult to determine who exactly wears the trousers. So to speak.
Anyway, well done TMS. I don’t listen to it these days as we’re glued to the screen, for obvious reasons, but it remains the best of British. But for how long? With Baxter hanging up his microphone, he sounds an ominous warning note to his successor
“Five Live have people who are in charge of things called “station sound†and that rings a few alarm bells. The whole point of TMS is that it doesn’t sound like other commentaries.”
Station sound? I shudder at the thought. There’s every chance that some shallow-sighted media freaks could ruin a British institution, turning it into a brash (and by proxy, dull) service. Come on BBC: leave it alone. Change is not always for the best. There will be quite a few TMS pieces on Cricinfo tomorrow and over the week, starting with Andrew Miller’s interview with Baxter, so keep your mince pies peeled.
Who were your favourite commentators? What do you make of the current crop? Favourite TMS moment? etc. Not that I listen nearly as much as I’d like, but I think Mike Selvey is particularly brilliant and works well with Vic Marks.
6 Comments »Online radio stations covering the World Cup
By Will last year, mid-February, 52 Comments »
Adrian pleads:
This may have been addressed previously, however I have noticed that there is
no mention of world cup coverage on the BBC, have TMS lost the radio rights ?
And, if so, who has them in the UK, Talk Sport (lord’elp us!)Before the last Ashes series you were kind enough to post my suggested thread
asking if anyone knew of non UK radio stations that broadcast commentary on the
net; any chance of doing the same again. I am a huge fan of All India Radio’s
coverage, stemming from an enjoyable couple of months there last year, and
recommend it wholeheartedly.
BBC’s TMS site says their next coverage will be the World Cup but, as yet, their schedule hasn’t been published. So if you know of any online radio stations covering it, leave a comment and rock on.
52 Comments »Tufnell and Gooch at Adelaide
By Will 2 years ago, at the start of December, 3 Comments »
Good shot of Phil Tufnell and Graham Gooch commentating for the BBC in Adelaide
Interview with Billy Birmingham
By Will 2 years ago, at the start of December, 1 Comment »
Rod’s in Adelaide pretending to work and spotted Billy Birmingham on the radio which you can download at his blog. Superb. Birmingham’s new 12th Man album is out today.
1 Comment »Online radio commentary for the Ashes
By Will 2 years ago, at the start of November, 346 Comments »
Adrian emailed with a good suggestion that we draw up a list of online radio stations who will be covering the Ashes. In his words…
How about a thread detailing where we can listen to cricket on-line. I believe
that ABC in Australia broadcast on the internet occasionally.Naturally, we’ll be following the ball by ball on cricinfo, but it’s always
interesting to listen to other equivalents to TMS, I spent a couple of months
in India and All India radio’s commentary was addictive.
Over to you lot.
346 Comments »Apologies to Warwickshire residents
By Will 2 years ago, mid-September, 1 Comment »
If you were driving home at about 17.50 on Tuesday and were tuned to BBC Radio Warwickshire, then my apologies for the inane, caustic screeching coming from your speakers. It was me. Fortunately for all involved, my second foray into radio interviews was a marked improvement on the first waffling attempt - but I still wheeled out the cliches (worryingly, without realising). Thanks to Stew and Jo for sorting it out - it was good fun.
The presenter, Jo, was a bit downbeat about England’s chances in the Ashes and I surprised myself by forcefully disagreeing. It made me realise that while England have had a difficult, testing year, it’s far from doom and gloom. A lot rests on Harmison, Hoggard, Flintoff and the opening batsmen - but what’s new? They pulled it off last year, so to speak, and could pull it off again this year.
Might as well end this with one of Alec Stewart’s finest cliches: whoever plays the best cricket on the day will win. Talking of Stewart…
1 Comment »Rediscovering Test Match Special
By Will 2 years ago, mid-August, 8 Comments »
At work we obviously have to watch every ball, not simply listen to it. And down here in Devon, without Sky for some reason, I’ve just turned on the radio for the past hour which has brought memories back of listening to TMS in my youth. It really is a brilliant way of following a Test. You miss the pictures of course, but somehow feel even closer to the action.
One thing I can’t work out is who the heavy-breather is. It’s not Boycott or Agnew…anyone else hear it?
Here’s Salcombe this afternoon where I’ve been supping pints overlooking the sea
BBC secure radio rights
By Will 2 years ago, mid-February, 4 Comments »
The BBC have secured radio rights in India for four years, which is a welcome relief to those who enjoy Test Match Special. The deal allows them to broadcast England’s current tour of India, and other international teams who visit, over the next four years. Sky, meanwhile, are being shafted by Nimbus, who paid an astonishing amount of money (over $600m) for exclusive rights to broadcast cricket on TV in India.
4 Comments »CLR James; Beyond a Boundary on the BBC
By Will 2 years ago, mid-February, 1 Comment »
CLR James’ Beyond a Boundary - which sadly is gathering dust in my flat but I’ll try to get through it, at last, later this week - is the feature of a radio programme later today. I’ll forget all about it, doubtless, but if some of you manage to catch it, let me know your thoughts:
CLR James’ book extolling the virtues and importance of cricket, both within and beyond the boundary, is accepted by many as the greatest of all cricketing essays. But can its sense of moral code, forged in the West Indies of his youth in the first half of the 20th century, survive the rigours of globalisation and the culture of ‘get rich or die trying’?
CLR’s nephew Darcus Howe returns to his own Trinidadian roots to put the book to the test, at a time when both cricket and society on the island appear to be in need of re-invigouration.
Sun 19 Feb, 21:30 - 22:15 45 mins, BBC Radio 3
1 Comment »Worst attributes for a cricket radio commentator
By Will 2 years ago, at the start of February, 4 Comments »
As per the subject, what would be the worst attributes for a cricket radio commentator? I’ll just throw this one out to the public, after the hilarious response to my last off-beat topic (”Most inappropriate celebrity cricket commentators“).
I guess those with limited hearing, or limited eyesight (deaf and blind, to be blunt). And any politican would be hopeless and inappropriate.
The French.
Americans, en generale.
Yes, basically this is a “cricket is superior, now bog off and let’s laugh at your ignorance at its great glory” post.
For that matter, anyone with Tourette’s would struggle to persuade even the most liberal producer that he deserves a stint in the TMS hot seat (”Here comes McGrath, on a lovely sunny morning…he’s up to the wicket, forward comes Joyce* TOSS BAGS he’s bowled him BUGGER IT, oh, do excuse me.” So, Tourette’s sufferers would struggle I think. Mind you, so would I; I’d brick it if I had to speak to several million on the radio.
Over to you.
* Ed Joyce. [yes he'll be playing then, you see]
P.S. don’t, anyone, suggest “Being female” as an attribute. You saw what happened last time…
4 Comments »BBC Sport on Five - England’s tour of Pakistan
By Will 3 years ago, mid-November, 16 Comments »
Sport on Five on BBC Radio Five Live seems to be concentrating almost entirely on cricket all evening, which is a bonus…I doubt I’ll be able to cope listening to some of the people they will no doubt interview without tearing my hair out, but if you can, please do. Some of it, at least, will be interesting. And for those ex-pats, you can listen now online.
16 Comments »Aye up, and “Shot, boy”
By Will 3 years ago, at the end of October, 14 Comments »
Two abiding memories of this summer’s Ashes, for me, are from Geoff Boycott. “Shot, boy, shot,” to Andrew Flintoff’s straight-drive. And “Out. Out. No-ball, No-ball! Oooh, bad luck you Aussies!” when Glenn McGrath (yes - him) non-bowled Michael Vaughan.
So it’s excellent news to hear the miserable git par excellence has joined the BBC’s commentary team on Test Match Special, for England’s tour of Pakistan. Hurrah. Go for it, Boycs!
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