John Peel's not dead: Long live John Peel!
Another originally intended for elsewhere article, this time for Spark, the Reading student rag. Musings about ageing without needing to mothballed for the sake of humanity's embarassment. body: |- So there's hope for us all then... getting older doesn't have to be a descent into semi-senile mutterings ("When I was a lad...", "Back in my day...") or chintzy furniture and porcelain mantelpiece dogs and owls. It's official, John Peel is sixty, and if Peely is sixty and still Peely then hey: there is hope for us all.
If the contemporary attitude towards life can be summed by "I hope I die before I get old." Then perhaps Mr Peel can be an example of how to age and remain - ahem - cool. Not only is Peel the only DJ to still be broadcasting on Radio 1 since it started back in the Sixties, but he has also side stepped into narrating documentaries and presenting a Radio 4 programme. Not only that, but the Radio 4 programme in question, "Home Truths," is not bad, in fact it's very good; the only bad thing about it is the fact that it's on at 9 in the morning on Saturdays. Peel manages to sustain two audiences: those of his Radio 1 show, which is still as bleeding-edge as they come, and the mostly older audience of "Home Truths." And you can't help but think that there's not much cross-over between the audiences... So, here's the first Peel Paradox: He has two vastly different shows, but in both it's undoubtedly the same Peel (unlike, say, Jim Davidson who presents the lame, inoffensive, family oriented "Generation Game" and does lame, offensive, misogynist stand-up. Two distinct personas.) The second Peel Paradox is that after thirty-odd years he's still playing the most out-there stuff on the planet. This is good news, folks.
John Peel is good news because he proves that getting old can be a graceful thing, a thing that adds to you rather than reducing you. I'm kind of looking forward to getting older, not because I want to go wrinkly and lose all my hair, but because the broadening of your experiences, the range of things you've done, all contribute to making you someone who is, not someone who isn't. John Peel is, so is Nelson Mandela. Mrs Thatcher, I would speculate, is not.
Maybe you don't understand what I'm trying to say, so here's a simplified version: If you still say that the best years of your life were University when you're sixty then I suspect that you've lived a dull life. Really dull, in fact. What's the point of thinking like that, thinking that life is going to be really crap once you leave here? I take the point that University should be as much about living as studying, and I'm having a damned good time of it here, thanks very much, but still: three or four years of living in mostly crap houses, eating cheap food (usually out of a packet) and getting pissed every night which, if we're honest, would be very dull if we could actually remember it. These will not be the best years. My three years here have been good years, but I reckon the best is still to come. Peel is proof of that. "I hope I die before I get old" was The Who's Sixties' manifesto. Their singer, Roger Daltrey, is now well into middle age and owns a trout farm. He is, apparently, very happy. While I'm not sure about the whole trout farm thing, I think you can see my point. Daltrey was. Peel still is.
- 5.5.2000, 12.0
- File under: John Peel, ageing