Mention the name Gary Glitter to most over-30s in the UK and you’ll usually get a look of contempt. Once one of the darlings of the 70s glam-rock music scene, he is now synonymous with his various convictions for child porn and transformation from a slightly manic-looking pop star to a bald-headed weirdo with a grey goatee.
In fact, you’ll rarely – if ever – hear one of his songs played on the radio. Radio 2 – the most likely outlet for his tunes – regularly overlook him in the likes of Pick of The Pops or their festive/bank holiday countdowns.
So there was naturally a bit of a kerfuffle when Gwyneth Paltrow decided to perform a cover version of Do You Wanna Touch Me on the TV show Glee – a song, in case you’re interested, that in January 1973 reached No.2 in the UK singles charts.
Glitter – real name Paul Gadd – committed a pretty heinous crime, but is that a reason to expunge his music from the annals of history? I don’t think so.
Take the following music artists, for example: Jerry Lee Lewis (married his 13-year-old cousin), James Brown (convicted of armed robbery and arrested numerous times for domestic abuse) and Phil Spector (convicted of murder).
If radio bosses carried out the same punishment on their music, as has been on Glitter’s, the likes of Great Balls of Fire, I Feel Good and Be My Baby would rarely be heard ever again.
And imagine what a dilemma radio bosses would have had if Michael Jackson had been found guilty of the child abuse crimes of which he was accused back in 2005. Can you imagine radio stations without the option of playing Beat It, Billie Jean, Wanna Be Startin’ Something or Smooth Criminal?
As I said before Glitter is obviously a disturbed individual, but his music should be separated from the man. Let’s not forget that his music was loved so much during the 1970s that he achieved 3 No.1s and another 8 Top 10 hits – no flash in the pan.
And in case you think he’s been completely expunged from popular music, take a closer listen to Katy Perry’s worldwide smash hit I Kissed A Girl. Do you recognise the drum beat that kicks it off and continues throughout the song. Yup, it’s a sample taken from none other than Gary Glitter’s Rock and Roll Part 2.
Let’s hope that someone finally decides to make the sensible decision and allow people to make up their own mind and hear Gary Glitter’s music for what it is – whatever the actions of the man.
Today in the car, I suddenly realised, after 20 minutes of paying no attention, that I was listening to the aural wonder that is Heart Radio.
Now I could probably fill an entire blog with my thoughts on Heart, but my observation today was specifically about the DJ, or rather the lack of it.
Every Sunday from 12-4pm, Heart employs that well-known radio presenter Jason Donovan – yes, that’s right – Jason Donovan. Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but Donovan’s CV over the years may have included a number of TV, film and singing highlights, but at no point did he train to become a DJ.
Worse still, during the 20 minutes I was tuned in to Heart, I heard Donovan talk for just 90 seconds. Now, if that is a representative average, that adds up to a total of 18 minutes over a four-hour show, which is completely astonishing.
At a guess Jason Donovan is probably paid around £50k a year, so with maybe 4 weekends off a year, he’s pulling in £57 for every minute he actually speaks on the radio. A gig that I’d gladly take.
Aha, you’re saying, but he does a four-hour show every Sunday. There’s a bit more to it than simply speaking.
The thing is, though, DJs no longer really have to do what we once expected of them in the glory days of radio. The likes of Kenny Everett splicing his own shows together is long gone. Very few DJs choose their own records, even fewer actually know how to use the electronics. The reason Mr D got the job was because he’s a name. And he’s a name that appeals to the radio station’s core demographic – in this case, 30/40-something women who remember the 80s exceptionally well.
And, on the face of it, it would make sense if it weren’t the fact that his presence on the radio is barely enough to warrant people tuning in. People listen to Heart for the, ahem, ‘more music variety’, not who presents the show.
But it’s not just Heart who are guilty of promoting celebs who have no experience into relatively high-profile shows. Radio 2 have done it on more than one occasion. Davina McCall famously stood in for Ken Bruce back in 2007 and provoked 150 complaints.
More recently, Patrick Kielty – let’s face it, a dodgy Irish comedian – has inveigled himself onto the network, for no other reason than he’s mildly famous (having heard him, it surely isn’t for his broadcasting technique).
What’s more irritating is that every time a non-radio person gets him or herself onto the radio, it stops someone who has learned their trade and probably deserves their chance more. Is it really that important for radio stations to pull in a ‘name’ just for quick, cheap listening numbers, rather than try someone who actually has experience, but no ‘reputation’?
Interestingly, radio listening figures are at their highest for many years, so the fact that ‘celebs’ are infilitrating the airwaves doesn’t seem to have made that much difference, but it would be nice if at least some of the radio stations gave credence to substance over style.
You just might have noticed that there are a couple of Doctor Who episodes showing on BBC1 during this festive period.
What’s more, they are the last appearances as the Doctor by David Tennant – a role he has played for the past four years.
It’s generally accepted that Tennant has played a blinder as the time-travelling Gallifreyan, something no-one thought possible when he took over from Christopher Eccleston, back in 2005.
I’m a big fan and have already watched the Christmas Day episode and am looking forward to the final throw of Tennant’s (and Russell T Davies’) dice on New Year’s Day.
What I do object to, though, is the utter Doctor Who – and of David Tennant, in particular – saturation across the BBC in the last couple of weeks.
He alone is apparently making 75 appearances on the BBC over Christmas and New Year.
I’ve seen him presenting Never Mind the Buzzcocks, as a panellist on QI and a guest on Alan Carr’s Chatty Man. I’ve also heard him on radio being interviewed by Kirsty Young for Desert Island Discs, co-presenting the Jonathan Ross Saturday morning R2 slot with Catherine Tate, interviewing Dr Who collaborator Russell T Davies on R2 for a show called Who on Who and at least one other appearance I can’t remember.
Surely, this is total overkill? Most of us understand the need to plug important shows, but there’s a limit to the amount of exposure one show/man can expect.
Worst of all, it doesn’t even seem to have worked that well. Christmas Day viewing figures showed that, although 10 million people tuned in to see Tennant in action, it was only the 3rd most watched programme behind EastEnders and the Royle Family, and down on both of the previous two years’ audiences.
The Tennant exposure is not the first time that the BBC has been accused of overfilling schedules this year. When U2 released their new album back in February, the BBC came in for flak for heavily plugging the launch of No Line On The Horizon on Radio 1, 2, 4 and BBC2.
On the one hand, this shows how popular the BBC is and how many external outlets desperately want to be linked to its important shows, but it also gives weight to those naysayers who are trying to reduce the BBC’s power and influence.
Let’s just hope the New Year’s Day episode of Doctor Who does well, because otherwise poor David Tennant’s efforts will be sorely in vain.
Mention the name Gary Glitter to most over-30s in the UK and you’ll usually get a look of contempt. Once one of the darlings of the 70s glam-rock music scene, he is now synonymous with his various convictions for child porn and transformation from a slightly manic-looking pop star to a bald-headed weirdo with a grey goatee. 
