One evening in the sixties I was driving back from New Orleans, crossing what they call the Piney Woods of East Texas, which cover an area the size of Belgium, as all big woods invariably do. I was driving along this long road in the middle of the night, and the moon was at the far end, so it was like driving along a silver ribbon if you want to be poetic about it, and the hills were rising and falling, and there was a small town before me, and on the radio came a record by Elmore James called ‘Stranger Blues’. The first line was: “I’m a stranger here / I just drove in your town”. I just thought it was a perfect conjucture of time, place and music. You always hope in the course of doing a programme that somebody somewhere may experience a moment like that.
John Peel, quoted in The Nation’s Favourite by Simon Garfield
I’ve had, to quote Peel, a few “moments like that” over the years as a radio listener.
Often they’ve been summer-related: getting the music selection right when the sun’s out seems a bit like hitting a shed door with a banjo. You can’t go far wrong.
I always thought Zane Lowe’s “sunsetters” feature was a stroke of simple genius: one mellow, evocative track played at the exact moment the sun went down each night. Why hadn’t anyone else thought of that?
Yesterday evening, though, a brilliant and unexpected wintry moment from Radio 1.
Driving home through dark, icy, deserted urban streets, I hear this via Nick Grimshaw. Couldn’t have been more perfect.
I wish I’d produced this track myself, so much it’s almost painful. Burial did, which explains a lot.
Do what I did and download it immediately.
