This Is Your Life: John Peel

John PEEL (1939-2004)

THIS IS YOUR LIFE - John Peel, disc jockey, radio presenter and journalist, was surprised by Michael Aspel while recording the BBC programme Top of the Pops at the BBC Elstree Centre in Borehamwood.

After attending boarding school and a stint in the military, John emigrated to the United States in 1960 to Dallas, Texas, where he first worked at the Cotton Exchange and then later sold insurance. In 1961 he landed his first job as a disc jockey, at station WRR, and after several years working at various radio stations across the USA, he returned to the UK in 1967 to host a late-night programme on the pirate station, Radio London.

When the BBC established Radio 1 in September 1967 in response to the challenge of pirate radio, John was one of the new network's original recruits. He became the advocate for new and often challenging music. In the process he became enamoured of everything from art rock to punk, post-punk and beyond, introducing his audience to previously 'unknown' artists such as David Bowie, Joy Division, the Smiths and Billy Bragg.

"I'm at a loss for words! I was looking forward to going home Michael – I have to be honest with you!"

programme details...

Edition No: 941
Subject No: 917
Broadcast date: Wed 24 Jan 1996
Broadcast time: 7.00-7.30pm
Recorded: Wed 13 Dec 1995
Repeated: Thu 25 Jan 1996 2.35pm
Venue: Teddington Studios
Series: 36
Edition: 21
Code name: Kop

on the guest list...

Sheila - wife
David Jensen
Alexandra - daughter
William - son
Florence - daughter
Thomas - son
Alan - brother
Malcolm Davis
Tony Blackburn
Ed Stewart
Alan Freeman
Andy Kershaw
John Gorman
John Walters
David Gedge
Paul Whitehouse
Ken Dowe
David Bowie
Kenny Dalglish
Billy Connolly
Richard Branson
Mark E Smith

production team...

Researcher: Sue Green
Writer: Roy Bottomley
Director: Brian Klein
Associate Producer: John Graham
Executive Producer: Peter Estall
Producer: Malcolm Morris

names above in bold indicate subjects of This Is Your Life

related pages...

Radio Times

tuning in the broadcasters

Tony Blackburn

Alan Freeman

Screenshots of John Peel This Is Your Life

John Peel recalls his experience of This Is Your Life - prior to broadcast of the programme - in an interview with Danny Baker on his BBC Radio 1 show, broadcast in December 1995

John Peel recalls his experience of This Is Your Life in a piece for the BBC Radio 4 programme, Mediumwave, broadcast in 1996

Radio Times article: John Peel This Is Your Life

Radio Times 27 January 1996

John Peel's Family Album

'My first reaction to the Red Book was, why me, Lord? My second, expressed on camera, was that I would, all things considered, rather go home'

Someone signing themselves, "Discusted of Suffolk", who is generous enough to brand me a "jornilist", has sent me a photocopy of a portion of Kate Battersby's Notebook taken from The Daily Telegraph of Wednesday 20 December. "Discusted" wished to draw my attention to an essentially good-natured piece in which Kate gave me a mild barracking for not rounding on Michael Aspel when, on a recent Top of the Pops, he cornered me for This Is Your Life (shown last Wednesday on BBC1). Kate felt that I should have freed myself from what she saw as my predicament, 'with a stylish put-down and a quick exit'. She went on to suggest that my failure to do so resulted from my fear of telling Aspel to be about his business might jeopardise my career at the BBC.

Well, many and conflicting thoughts tumbled about in my pretty head as I was Aspelised, but office politics played no part in the selection of the ill-assorted words that eventually spilled forth. Kate implied that I am some master of the waspish retort, but this is far from the truth. Faced with rudeness or hostility I go an unnatural pink, something like Sanderson's Rose Quartz or Blossomtime, splutter a lot and think of a fiendishly clever response about a week later.

My first reaction to the Red Book was, why me, Lord? My second, expressed on camera, was that I would, all things considered, rather go home. My third was that This Is Your Life planners could not have reached this stage without the co-operation of Sheila and the rest of the family. Finally, I was overcome by vulgar curiosity. Who could they have dredged up from my past? Would my long-lost pal Bob, from Dallas, Texas, be there? Or the woman known only as the Hitch-Hiker who lived for six months in our roof space?

Discusted, who, I have just spotted, signs himself (or herself) "Yours unfaithfully," presses on to express wholehearted agreement with Kate Battersby. Discusted (and, for that matter, Kate) might have felt differently had they been invited to Teddington for the filming and the subsequent party. I have to say that I had one of the very best times of my life. I mean, come on; a room filled with friends from different periods of your life and from the different places you have lived, all of them eating and drinking at Thames Television's expense until four in the morning. How could it not be wonderful?

Alexandra said, when asked for her reaction to This Is Your Life, that she would have preferred it if a greater number of sexy young pop stars, especially Menswear, had been present. Thomas expressed complete satisfaction with the mini-bar in the exotic hotel we were all garrisoned in overnight and with the heated seats of the cabriolet that took him and his cousin John all the way back to Suffolk in the morning. Florence confessed that she found the whole experience rather embarrassing. Pressed further, she conceded that the evening had been "pretty good". From Flossie this is extravagant praise. William felt the same and allowed that "the wine and food was nice after student meals". He also expressed intense satisfaction that he had sat, talking and drinking, with members of Dreadzone, top post-teen roustabouts inna one drop style (don't worry, it doesn't mean a thing) and they had invited him to one of their gigs.

Since the filming of "our" This Is Your Life, hardly a day has passed without Sheila revealing some other detail of the remarkable research that went into the making of the programme. There were, of course, people I would have loved to have seen who were not there in Teddington that night. Some of my fellow conscripts from the days when, as 23558538 Gunner Ravenscroft J, I painted radar sets so that you might lie easy in your beds at night, for example. Sheila told me that advertisements had been placed in relevant local papers to try and smoke out some of these. Researchers travelled the southern states of the USA attempting to locate Russ "The Weird Beard" Knight and Paul Miller, disc jockeys with whom I had worked, when I was about, oh, I don't know, that high, but without success. Afterwards, I wrote to the production team to say that, as far as I was concerned, they could come and live with us if they wished.

Really, as Danny Baker pointed out to me later, how could you fail to enjoy the only time in your life when your friends and family would be obliged to applaud when you walked in the room?

John Peel recalls this edition of This Is Your Life in BBC Radio 1's Peel Night, broadcast on 31 August 1999

I hadn't done Top Of The Pops for nine years and the technology has overtaken me. And I found it a most gruelling experience, because I kept looking in the wrong places and doing the wrong things and making people go back and do everything again and again and again.

But right at the end I was thinking to myself, "If I get this link right, within ten minutes I'll be in the car, I can listen to the second half of the match on the radio, and I can buy a bag of chips in Baldock, and be home by 10, you know."

I could feel someone pushing really hard at my right shoulder, and I thought, "When this is over, I'm going to turn around and give them a piece of my mind." And I turned around, and of course it is Michael Aspel with the red book.

I was very wise, because I didn't do that thing where you kind of go, "Michael, me? Little old me?" Because I thought to myself I'd be the butt of the nation's jokes for the rest of my life if he said, "Sorry, John, not this time. This is..." You know, then: "Narvel Felts, ace cameraman, this is your life!" I thought, "No, I'd never recover from that." So I hesitated a bit, but once I realised it was me...

You know, you think when you are sitting in the pub and talking to your chums and stuff, you say, "Of course, if they ever did it to me, I'd tell them where to go." Everybody always says that. But when it happens, a lot of things happen.

First of all, you think, "It wouldn't have got this far if Sheila, my wife, hadn't OK'ed it." And then, kind of curiosity takes over, because you want to know who they've got.

John Peel's family recall this edition of This Is Your Life in their book, Margrave of the Marshes...

At the end of 1995, John had been chosen to appear on This Is Your Life. The plan was to ambush him while he was presenting Top of the Pops. The problem was that he hadn't hosted Top of the Pops for around eight years, and was slightly puzzled, if pleased, to be asked after so long. The technology had changed since 1987, though, and John had some trouble adapting. 'Can you try to remember to look at the camera?' a weary voice would ask as acolytes were despatched to retrieve Boyzone or Bjork from their dressing rooms with the glad tidings that they would be required to do their numbers once more because John had got it wrong again.

As if this was not unsettling enough, John had written a frankly hostile review of Bjork's performance at that year's Reading Festival and found it most alarming to be standing a few feet from her. When she smiled unexpectedly at him, he assumed this was a prelude to sudden violence. 'POP GODDESS MAULS VETERAN DJ: POLICE NOT TO ACT, SAYS SPOKESMAN' – type headlines sprang into his thoughts.

Eventually John delivered his final link. Having said his goodbyes surrounded by fifteen-year-olds, he turned to remonstrate with someone who had been shoving particularly aggressively at his right elbow, only to find Michael Aspel standing there with a large red book in his hand. John was quick-witted enough not to express joy and gratitude immediately. He could imagine Michael saying, 'No, it's not for you, I'm afraid, John. Bjork, This Is Your Life.' When he realised Michael had come for him, he said, 'I was actually quite looking forward to going home.'

To the astonishment of everyone who knew John, he didn't cry. Well, not much. But he loved every minute of it. As Danny Baker pointed out to him later, how could you fail to enjoy the only time in your life when your friends and family are obliged to applaud when you walk in the room?

Series 36 subjects