Andrew Collins, one of the UK's best loved music journalists (and an oft spotted talking head on those '100 best' nostalgia shows), is a man of many talents. Rocketing from his early foray into music journalism on the NME to later edit the rock bible that is Q, he is also a very brilliant diarist, having penned two best-selling volumes of engaging memoirs - his utopian childhood charted in Where Did It All Go Right? and his big-haired 'difficult 80s' exposed in Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now - and there's another on the way. But we're here to talk about his spanking new shows on top digital station BBC 6 Music and Gigwise is champing at the bit to get on with it, so if yer don't mind?
Gigwise: Since moving to the weekend with your two new shows on 6, this means no more Andrew Collins in the week (Steve Lamacq has stepped in to the Mon-Fri shows)... do you miss your weekday slots?
Andrew: I don't miss coming into work every day! It was, of course, a treat to have my own show Monday to Friday every week for three years, but it does take it out of you mentally! So far, I'm enjoying the freedom the new arrangement offers. It's nice to sit at home and listen to 6 Music in the daytime! I miss Roundtable the most, I'll be honest. I'm hoping they'll have me on a guest at some point when Steve's bedded in.
G: The Saturday show is the 6 Music Chart, but what will be the difference between the weekday Andrew Collins shows and the Sunday show?
A: The Sunday show is very relaxed. Coming off the back of the Music Week, we feel comfortable doing the non-music week, that is, looking back with the listeners over the previous seven days and finding out what books, TV programmes and films they've been consuming - and albums and downloads too. Our plan is to get a pop star or musician in every week
and find out what they do In Their Own Time, ie. when they're not working. In the first show, it was fascinating to find out what Miles Hunt does in his leisure time - he painted a really evocative picture of his average Sunday at home in his county house in Shropshire.
G: Who can we expect on the show with you?
A: Richard Herring, the comedian and writer, will be with me every week to plough through the Sunday papers. I shall look forward to him turning up, as he's a very warm individual with no airs and graces and, unlike many stand-ups, doesn't feel the need to dominate or crowbar in material from his latest set. It's just like having a chat with someone who happens to be very funny. This section really sums up the vibe of the
show. Even though great music dominates, we won't be afraid to look outside of it and take in a bit of the outside world.
G: Who would you most like to have on the show with you?
A: Well, in future weeks we have Glenn Gregory, Jim Bob and Clare Grogan pencilled. This is exactly the kind of musical guest I favour - those who have, in the nicest possible way, been round the block and have something to say. Let's face it, they're closer in age to most of the listeners. People we can identify with.
G: Reading about your splendid musical tastes as you grew up (in Where Did It All Go Right?), all that punk and post-punk, has your taste evolved beyond recognition or does it still have a place in your heart?
A: I will always love the bands I grew up with, The Cure, the Bunnymen, Durutti Column, Joy Division etc. But three years at 6 Music has really opened my up to new music again. And the 6 Music Chart will keep me ahead of the pack! I've heard of Prefuse 73 now. I'm really enjoying the new Gorillaz album at the moment. But if I'm on the train with my iPod, I'm a sucker for a compilation of 12-inch mixes from the 80s including stuff like Lloyd Cole and Tears For Fears and even Curiosity Killed The Cat! I'll also fall back on The Fall, time and again. Old and new, that's me.
G: It must be cool having your own rock show, but how much say do you have in what you play? (that wasn't intended to rhyme, by the way...)
A: The programmes are assembled from a vast database and we play them out from a computer, but for each show, the
basic playlist and vintage material is always interspersed with tracks added in by the presenter and producer. That's how you add in your personality. If I fancy playing something off The Scars' album from1981, Author! Author!, I'll just bring it in and play it.
G: Is there anything that you secretly hanker to play on your show that wouldn't fit into the 6 Music mould? Any 'guilty pleasures', as Sean Rowley might call them?
A: There is no record on earth that I wouldn't be allowed to
play. We played some Throbbing Gristle once. It was requested by a listener almost as a dare. We dared. That's the joy of 6 Music - if you don't like a record, stay tuned, and you might like the next one. On some radio stations, you know exactly what you're going to get next. We're not like that. I'd play more jazz if I didn't think it would drive all my listeners away. That's self-censorship. It's weird how people will accept the blues but hate jazz.
G: Your path has crossed with Stuart Maconie's since your days on the NME on subsequent programmes and publications, and currently both of you can be seen in the Radio Times and heard on 6 Music...
A: We haven't actually worked together for a long time. It was on the Radio 2 adaptation of our Edinburgh show with David Quantick, Lloyd Cole Knew My Father, about three years ago. But we are still friends, and it's rather nice coming before his Freak Zone on a Sunday. It's one of my favourite listens on the network. It's amazing how many people still fondly remember the stuff we did together on Radio 1 and ITV.
G: Do you get much time to go to gigs? If so, what has been your top gig recently, or indeed ever?
A: I'm 40 years old. I live in Surrey. Gigs are not practical really. Plus, I went to so many gigs during my NME/Select/Q years I think I've seen enough. I pick and choose very carefully these days. Gig venues are too smoky! I saw Pop Will Eat Itself earlier in the year and relived the early 90s with abandon. Brilliant. Over the last couple of years I've enjoyed Radiohead, Supergrass, Franz Ferdinand. Best gig ever? Possibly Radiohead at Wembley for Hail To The Thief. Blew me away. I loved seeing Bauhaus, local heroes, at a leisure centre in Northampton in 1982.
G: Do you have any records you couldn't live without?
A: Entertainment by Gang Of Four. My Cocteau Twins collection. I'd be sad to lose my Disneyland storybook albums from when I was a child. They have sentimental value. Mind you, I could always get them again on eBay. I'm less sentimental about consumer goods than I used to be.
G: Have you really kept every record you have ever bought?
A: Yes. Way too many. Thousands of them. I got a record player for my 40th birthday (having been without for many years) and I really must set it up.
G: You seem like a man who has a million plates spinning; apart from your new shows on 6music, what else do you have lined up?
A: I'm writing volume three of my memoirs right now. I'm also trying to get the BBC to commission another sitcom by myself and Simon Day, and there are a couple of film script ideas in the fire too. With more time on my hands, the possibilities are endless.
Andrew can be heard on the 6 Music airwaves on Saturday at 4pm for the 6 Music chart show, and on Sunday from 2pm.
