ThankBookFor: Black Country Radio

ThankBookFor dominated the airwaves today.

We're still waiting on official listener-ship figures to come in, but early estimates (completely fictitious

with absolutely no basis in reality whatsoever) are comparing the hour between 4pm and 5pm on Black Country Radio (102.5FM, on DAB, and online) with the viewing figures of the moon landing. Whether this estimate proves indicative of the amount of actual listeners or not, one thing is certain: a great step was taken today.

Story is, on Thursday of this week, Tom and Gemma made their way to an old Church in Stourbridge. This wasn't a random journey, it was prearranged. It's a beautiful church, if somewhat awkwardly situated, just off the Stourbridge ring road. As far as I'm

aware, it doesn't currently have a regular congregation, it's only really being used for concerts and recitals. Oh, and as the home of BCR. Black Country Radio.

A few months ago I interviewed Dr Brian Dakin (Clark Kent to Superman's Billy Spakemon) as part of our Black Country Festival series of podcasts. There were four people interviewed in total (last week's release Robert Hazel, BBC radio sports journalist Steve Hermon, and Dudley Libraries Manager Jen Beardsmore) but alas the BCF series didn't pan out how we'd hoped and we had to postpone our plans.

At the end of the recording Brian told me about his show on Black Country Radio and asked if we'd like to come on. Obviously, I knew what a boost to the listener-ship figures having us on would be for him, so I graciously got him to sign several documents meaning he couldn't legally change his mind.

In all seriousness, Brian was a pleasure to interview earlier in the year, and he was a great radio host too. His producer Dave, Liverpudlian by birth, though definitely at home next to Brian, was equally great. There's something almost awe inspiring about down to earth people enjoying whatever it is they're doing. You get caught up in the sense of fun.

So anyway, short blog post today, but there's a link here to the listen again feature for the show. It'll only be live for a week, so if you're reading this after 16th October, 2016, then I'm afraid you're already too late. But give it a go. It's not 'One Small Step For Man' epic, but it's a bit good, like.

http://www.blackcountryradio.co.uk/radioplayer/od/2116/