Choon Choosday: The Undertones – Teenage Kicks

Ten years ago this week, on 25th October 2004, a true great, a genuine legend, a uniquely loveable and popular man, John Robert Ravenscroft aka John Peel passed away. It is impossible to overstate the influence Peely had over the entire musical industry in the 37 years he broadcast on British Radio. His show was THE show. He didn’t just bring the best records and the best bands to the nation’s awareness – he singlehandedly championed whole genres. Thousands of DJs and musicians since the late 60s namecheck Peel as the number one influence on their career.

His knowledge and love of music was enormous and his favourite tune was, as everyone knows, Teenage Kicks. When asked why, he didn’t give an arty answer about chords or teen angst or poetry or the zeitgeist of alternative late 70s music. He just said “because there is nothing you can add to it or take away from it to make it better”. And when asked what his favourite kind of music was, he would say “music I haven’t heard yet”. He lived for the new, for that buzz of discovering truly great music.

Peel often played the wrong record, the wrong side of the right record, the right record through the wrong fader, or the right record at the wrong speed, and all of this revealed his “one of us” character – he was a normal bloke who just happened to be a wonderful broadcaster. And sometimes, just sometimes, he would do the one thing that no DJ should ever do – he played the same tune twice.

Here is a clip of him doing just that. Peely, you were unique, a great, and you are still sorely missed.