Jonathan Dodd’s latest column. Guest opinion articles do not necessarily reflect the views of the publication. Ed
I’m rather fond of Desert Island Discs. At its worst, it subtly punctures the bubble that some famous people surround themselves with – the one in which they imagine they can charm and bluff their way into anything. I mean those who may be famous, or rich, or very good at something, but have no clue about music, and just pick things they plainly aren’t interested in, but think might show them in a good light.
I would like to share something with these people. It’s obvious, and it’s embarrassing. Like that moment when our last-departed dearly-unloved leader tried to say he was a football fan, and mixed up Aston Villa with West Ham. I’m a long way from being a football fan myself, but even I know that’s going to make him a laughing stock among the football-appreciating classes.
I just wanted so much for him to be my friend
I put up with those episodes gladly though, for the ones where someone shows themselves to be more interesting – and interested in more things – than I would have guessed. Who would have thought that Michael Bublé would have been such a fan of Eminem? Or that Emma Bridgewater would choose a Be Good Tanyas song as her most favourite track of all? And as for Guy Garvey, of Elbow, I just wanted so much for him to be my friend.
This, of course, got me thinking. But first I’d better try to condense the idea of Desert Island Discs into a single sentence, just in case there are people out there who have never heard of it. If you’re one of those, the last three paragraphs won’t mean much, and I apologise for that. Desert Island Discs is a Radio 4 series, which has been going for decades, in which a famous person is asked to choose eight pieces of music to take with them to an imaginary Desert Island.
It’s surprisingly intimate
Over a 45-minute programme they are asked to talk about their choices and their lives in between the music, and at the end they have to select the one piece of music they would keep if they could only save one. They also choose a favourite book to accompany Shakespeare and the Bible, and they choose an item to take with them, for whatever reason.
That was a lot more than one sentence. There’s probably nothing in the Universe that I could explain in just one sentence. The pleasure for the listener is to gain insights into the inner life of someone they might have heard of but won’t ever meet, and it’s surprisingly intimate. The choices of music are never boring, except in the case where the person has no musical life, or has no concept of themselves as they are, or who needs to project their own public persona at all times. That is also educational, if a bit uncomfortable.
All the way back to the first episode in 1942
I love the occasions when they speak with so much joy and enthusiasm. I’ve been introduced to many of my favourite music over the years this way, and my musical enthusiasms are always amplified when someone I admire likes them too. If you don’t listen already, you can find Desert Island Discs on the Internet, and there’s a BBC Website that’s got every single programme to download, all the way back to the first episode, introduced by Roy Plomley in 1942.
I don’t know if the format has been adopted in other countries. I rather think it wouldn’t work, because it seems to 
encompass something uniquely British. I may be wrong though. It feels like home, and it’s definitely part of the furniture of my life. I sometimes wonder whether they broadcast all the programmes they record, or if they quietly drop some because the subject didn’t come across well. I wonder how many people turn them down too. Like the list they publish every year of those who refused honours, twenty years before, or after they have died.
Just never come up in my conversational circles
The other thing I wonder is how integral the music is to the programme. Can you be interesting and live an interesting life without gaining some musical furniture along the way? I always imagine music is like those barnacles and weeds that attach themselves to the bottom of ships. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have an inner life without music, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t a lot of them. Perhaps the subject has just never come up in my conversational circles.
If there are people like this, are they being discriminated against because the musical format disbars them from Desert Island Discs? I suppose you could have programmes with favourite books, or pieces of art, or sporting moments, but none of these feel so right in the unique ambiance of the radio format. They have tried other formats, but none of them have proved as popular or long-lasting.
Trying to answer the inevitable question
Every time I listen to Desert Island Discs I find myself trying to answer the inevitable question. What would I select? The trouble is that I’d choose different tracks every time. Not because I’m fickle, but because I have far more than eight favourite tracks, and there are other considerations.
I may love pieces of music that I know so well that I wouldn’t need to take them. I may know that there’s something I haven’t been able to appreciate properly, because it would need time, and repetition. And a lot of the time my choices would be influenced by my mood, either at the time of choice, or the mood I’d imagine myself in, all on my own on a Desert Island. My book and item of choice would vary too, but, oddly, not as much.
It’s all about you via the choices you make
The whole concept is magical and entirely unrealistic, and it tests the subject’s ability to imagine rather than allowing them to be pragmatic. Like all lists, it’s all about you via the choices you make, rather than about anything outside you. I think that’s at the heart of its continuing success. I would guess that nobody who’s unpleasant in life would be able to accept the invitation, and it would have to be sheer torture for anyone suffering from acute lack of self-confidence.
Surprisingly, and this is part of the Englishness, hardly anybody attempts to puff themselves up or exaggerate their success. That’s refreshing. And they often reveal their difficulties and tragedies, and regularly tears are shed. I particularly like it when castaways, as they’re known, aren’t British, and are subtly seduced into very English behaviour patterns. When I think about Great Britain, what I’m really thinking about is Desert Island Discs.
Honoured by an invitation to the Desert Island Discs studio
I do remember two famous conductors, appearing in different years. One played nothing but his own versions of particular works. The other didn’t choose anything from the considerable list of works he had conducted throughout his long career. The presenter at the time the time noticed this and asked why.
“I have all of these works in my head. In there, I can listen to them playing exactly how I would like to conduct them. Like any artist, I’ve never managed to achieve perfection, so I’d rather listen to other people doing that.”
I guess you can imagine which one of them was more interesting and enjoyable.
I was surprised to realise that they sometimes ask someone back after a few years. Perhaps they run out of suitable subjects, or someone pulls out, or they just like to compare each version. I can almost imagine a life that’s interesting and successful enough to be honoured by an invitation to the Desert Island Discs studio, but then I fail to imagine a life that continues to be so interesting that it merits a second visit.
Today’s eight-disc list
I suppose I can’t go on for over 1,500 words about Desert Island Discs off the top of my head before I put it on the block, so here’s today’s eight-disc list. I shan’t ask what this might reveal about me, just in case.
- The Heart of Saturday Night – Tom Waits
- Romeo and Juliet – Prokofiev
- Both Sides Now – the Judy Collins version
- Halcyon Days – Bruce Hornsby
- Thunder on the Mountain – Bob Dylan
- Hello Mabel – the Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band
- Tapiola – Sibelius
- The Long Way Home – The Hot Club of Cowtown
The music I should have chosen instead
I could talk you all through these choices, but I’m not going to here, and they’ll all change in a moment anyway. I’m already haunted by the idea that I’ve made terrible choices, and that it’s too late to change my mind about all the music I should have chosen instead. I have a sad feeling that I wouldn’t be allowed to take a fully-loaded mp3 player.
I would need a waterproof box to keep them in, of course, and there would need to be a working record player on the desert island. There’s no information about how much food would be available. I might need to listen to the music very quickly, before starving or being eaten myself by unknown dangerous animals.
Some fundamental truth that can’t be explained or defined
I would currently want to take His Dark Materials, the trilogy by Phillip Pullman, but it’s wrestling with the Complete Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, as is a toolkit against a guitar with an unlimited supply of strings. It’s a tag match. Ouch!
Which one would I rescue if I had to let the other seven go? Weirdly, I think it’s Number One. Why? I have no idea. It’s by Tom Waits (he’d be an excellent castaway), and it speaks to me about some fundamental truth that can’t be explained or defined. At least not by me. And I love it.
I could spend my days on my Desert Island trying to work that out.
If you have been, thank you for reading this.
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