John Peel

John Peel, his greatness can never be overstated. From 1967 until 2004, Peel remained Britain’s (and also the world’s) most respected (and coolest) DJ, playing some of the most awesome, obscure and challenging music on national radio: BBC Radio 1. Post 1975, he became a figurehead for the “underground” scene. Featuring bands from the punk scene, post-punk, heavy metal, electronic, you name it.

Bands/musicians like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, King Crimson, David Bowie, Roxy Music, Tyrannosaurus Rex, The Fall and Pulp were some of the bands that first played for John Peel. Recording sessions even before cutting their first LP. In fact Roxy Music’s first ever live performance was a session for the John Peel show. Pulp recorded their first ever Peel Session ten years before (Jarvis Cocker was just 13 then!) their debut came out (now this is what you call vision). The Fall, probably Peel’s favourite band, recorded 24 sessions between 1977 and 2004. Some people consider Floyd’s 1970 gig for the John Peel show to be one of their finest ever. And believe me it is a cracker of a show (unfortunately still remains unreleased and is only available as a bootleg).

An example of his unconventional style is this 1973 session by Brian Eno and Robert Fripp (thoroughly unconventional musicians themselves) for the John Peel Top Gear radio show.
This is a two-track, electronic/ambient music session, each nearly 18 minutes long. And this was played live on the national radio in 1973!???! DOWNLOAD

Some info about the session :

The money on the table is that this "session" never existed and that John Peel was in on the joke. Apparently, someone thought it would be a lark to just reverse the flow of the No Pussyfooting album and have Peel introduce them as the "tracks" from the said album. Some Eno fans swear that this session was just the LP played backwards. If that's true it's still worth listening as Eno and Fripp were trying to get the three-minute pop music fan to think deeper into sound and the ambience it created. It takes an open mind to allow for such experiments on national radio. You just won't hear anything like this today. There's still NOTHING ON THE RADIO.

Check this out.