Mikey entered Where Do You Think They Were?
Mikey was 26 and had never asked how he had been conceived.
Radio 1 fixed that.
His mum Eileen joined the programme and immediately revealed the date.
Valentine’s Day.
She and Mikey’s dad had been together for around six months and had decided that he would move in with her.
Eileen spent much of the day cooking.
The result was an ambitious three-course Indian meal.
There was a prawn starter, a chicken curry-style main course and an Indian dessert.
Scott wisely avoided relying too heavily on the precise dish names.
What mattered was that Eileen had spent the entire day preparing a romantic dinner.
Queen played in front of the fire
Eileen changed into something special before the meal, although she kept a dressing gown over it while they ate.
After dinner the couple moved into the lounge.
There was an open fire.
Music was playing.
The artist Eileen remembered was Queen.
Scott immediately began turning Queen songs into a reconstruction of how the evening might have developed, with the music gradually becoming much more energetic.
Mikey could do nothing except listen.
Asked whether eating a whole curry might have made romance difficult, Eileen reassured Scott that the portions had been small enough to leave room.
That was all the information the programme needed.
Mikey had officially become the one with the curry.
The birthday montage contained curry jokes too
The reward included messages from Radio 1 and music names, many of whom had already been briefed on the story.
Jordan North described the curry as adding “a little extra spice”.
Mikey said the birthday message had been good enough that he would still recommend the feature to other listeners.
He was less certain he would ever hear Queen, or eat an Indian meal, in quite the same way again.
First dates could be completely standardised
The programme then asked whether people had a fixed routine for every first date.
Scott knew somebody who used the same venue repeatedly because it removed variables.
He knew the toilets, cloakroom, staff and prices.
If the evening was going well, there was another suitable bar directly opposite.
The difficulty was that staff had started recognising him arriving with different women.
Listeners admitted doing the same thing.
Amy used a secret underground bar where the password was:
“I’m here to get lucky.”
The line had the useful side effect of making romantic intent fairly obvious.
Andrew from Kent repeatedly used mini golf followed by a restaurant where he had a 30% discount.
One Mid Wales listener had taken so many dates to his local Indian restaurant that he negotiated a two-for-one deal for every three dates he brought in.
Scott thought there was nothing wrong with having a reliable routine.
Pretending each date was experiencing a uniquely chosen romantic location was where things became questionable.
Never Happened put pop lyrics on trial
The show also revived Never Happened, where song lyrics were treated as sworn factual statements.
Jess Glynne sang that she did not wear make-up on Thursday.
Scott had photographic evidence of her wearing make-up on a Thursday.
Never happened.
Ella Eyre sang about barely making rent and needing to save up.
Scott pointed to the successful career and luxury social-media posts.
Never happened, according to Radio 1.
Meghan Trainor sang about taking a cheque to the bank.
Scott simply could not imagine a major pop star queueing to deposit a physical cheque.
George Ezra was accused of describing a journey to Australia in a way transport geography could not support.
Maya Jama and Troye Sivan’s “1999” nostalgia also came under attack because both would have been children during the era they were describing.
The feature was deliberately pedantic.
That was why almost every song eventually became vulnerable.
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