Lining their stomachs for the party
Radio 1’s office Christmas party was due that evening, so Scott, Chris and Greg James discussed the presenters most likely to provide the night’s entertainment while eating bread and drinking milk. There was always somebody whose evening became a story, and several members of staff were already nervous about appearing in the next day’s conversations.
Scott also needed to survive long enough to join Phil Taggart and Alice Levine’s Bedroom DJ party afterwards. He had missed the previous two editions despite being booked, forcing Greg to step in at short notice. Chris considered handcuffing himself to Scott to prevent a third disappearance.
Their “Songs to Lie Down To” set would place Scott, Chris and Greg together as the bedroom equivalent of Swedish House Mafia. Chris had even brought Trevor Nelson back to record deliberately intense jingles for the smooth-groove selection.
The present swap for their mothers
The steamy truth about Alan Titchmarsh’s Mr McGregor, which Scott had chosen for Ron Stark’s birthday, was still amusing the show. The gardening novel looked respectable until the title character began an affair with a television newsreader.
That inspired a riskier friendship test. Scott would buy the present Chris gave his mother, while Chris would choose the gift Scott presented to his. Neither would know what was inside, and both would have to claim responsibility when the parcels were opened.
They insisted there was a shared incentive not to be cruel, because retaliation would be inevitable. Even so, Scott began asking what Chris’s mother liked and raised the possibility of contacting her directly, making Chris suspicious before either present had been purchased.
The least cheerful Christmas magazine
Scott noticed that the festive edition of That’s Life! had placed cheerful decorations around a particularly bleak collection of real-life headlines. The front page included a husband getting together with a teenage lodger at Christmas dinner, somebody waking up with their boss after an office party, ghostly triplets and a murder beneath a Christmas tree.
The contrast fascinated him. Soap operas also became especially dark in December, suggesting that audiences wanted sadness alongside the supposed happiness of Christmas. Even television productions filmed their festive disasters months early, creating Christmas in Albert Square during September or asking game-show contestants to deliver seasonal lines long before winter.
“Feliz Navidad” becomes “Missy Elliott”
The programme’s enthusiasm for “Feliz Navidad” developed into a running joke in which the song was repeatedly called “Missy Elliott”. Scott wanted Britain to embrace it as other countries already had, while listeners who knew it from Spanish lessons could not understand how the pair had missed it for so long.
It also became the ideal record for their late-night DJ set. Its simple chorus made it suitable for a room full of people after the Christmas party, even if Chris still had only a limited idea of what he was singing.
Christmas-party Real or No Real
Greg joined a special Real or No Real based on stories from previous Radio 1 Christmas parties. Scott and Greg admitted that they once rang Early Breakfast after a party and demanded to introduce the news. Another presenter really had needed their BBC pass returned the following morning, although the identity remained secret.
Sara Cox’s dog getting its tongue stuck to a Radio 1 ice sculpture was no real. A Newsbeat reporter accidentally setting themselves alight by sitting too close to a candle, then reporting the incident to other guests, was real. The round proved there was already more than enough history for the office to worry about what the coming evening might produce.
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