John Peel Remembered

John Peel Remembered Various Artists

Publisher: BBC Audiobooks

Price: £8.99 (Audio CD)

The Beep presents a perfect time capsule of John Peel in this audio book. “John Peel Remembered" which includes the Radio 4 Book of the Week serialisation of "Margrave of the Marshes", Peel's part-written autobiography completed by his wife, Sheila Ravenscroft, and the Radio 4 "Home Truths Special". ‘Margrave of the Marshes’ exudes Peel’s dry wit, his enthusiasm for brutal honesty and is hilariously funny in places. John reveals a fascinating life – he takes us back to when he started DJing at a local radio station in the US in the early sixties. He talks about his love of music, and his fondness of the BBC is enormously evident in stories that include how often he’d sleep under his desk at the studio. He gives a hilarious account of how he met Sheila, who would become his second wife. (His first wife gets a brief mention). Sheila later tells us her own first impressions, and the resulting first date. (I won’t give it away – but you’ll laugh!) John Peel was a man completely in love with music and life, and although he did have his eccentricities, his approach to listening to demos and the organisation of his shows reveals a bright mind. ‘Margrave of the Marshes’ is excellently read by Michael Angelis and later, Carolyn Pickles and conveys, in the same way as John Peel always did on the radio, that he was really just an ordinary, if a little eccentric, man. CD Two is the Radio 4 ‘Home Truths Special’ which went out on 22nd October 2005. Peel’s show was a notoriously honest programme that showcased his warmth and wit. It had a large and loyal audience, as it focused on real people’s lives, from nine-year-old Carers to Pet Sniffers, incorporating anecdotal stories about his own family and friends with laugh out loud vigour. BBC Radio presenter, Tom Robinson hosts the show with visiting ‘Peel Acres’ to meet John's wife Sheila and their four children, William, Flossie, Danda and Tom, resulting in funny insights into the Ravenscroft family. They are an incredibly close knit family, and very good natured. Tom reveals John’s office is just as he left it, typewriter on the floor (he hated using the laptop) and hardly an inch of space to stand in. It also features the naming of a railway engine in John's honour, something fans reveal John would find most amusing. If you’ve not heard of John Peel, ‘John Peel Remembered’ is a great introduction to a BBC icon. And if you’re already a fan, you’ll find this Audio CD a heart warming recollection.