Harry Styles brought sleeping bags back to Radio 1
Scott had not seen genuine sleeping bags outside Radio 1 for a long time.
Harry Styles changed that.
Fans were waiting outside Broadcasting House because Harry was coming in for the Live Lounge.
Scott was struck by his ability to wear clothes almost nobody else could attempt without looking ridiculous.
High-waisted brown trousers.
Pearls.
A checked jacket.
The automatic transcript repeatedly calls Harry Diana Vickers, but the source title, Live Lounge context and entire discussion make the intended guest completely clear.
Scott imagined himself or Chris arriving in the same outfit.
It would not have the same effect.
Harry could apparently make almost anything look deliberate.
“Billy Armish” had only just been discovered
The conversation also returned to Scott’s best friend, somebody pop culture routinely seemed to pass by.
The friend messaged Scott saying he had found a brilliant new song by an artist called:
“Billy Armish.”
He meant Billie Eilish.
The song title was also slightly mangled.
Scott explained that Billie was already one of the biggest artists in the world.
His friend Googled her and effectively replied:
“Oh, good for her.”
This was the same person who had “discovered” Example years after everybody else.
Scott invited listeners to nominate the people in their lives who encountered global pop culture several years late.
Harry reviewed his own Live Lounge
Harry joined after his performance and heard parts of the session back.
As with other Live Lounge Month guests, Scott was interested in what the artist noticed that an ordinary listener did not.
Harry was much more relaxed than somebody surrounded by sleeping-bag fans outside might have been expected to be.
The show also focused on the strange fashion confidence which made his entrance feel like an event before he had said anything.
Chris needed Secret Santa help
Chris had a more practical request.
Radio 1 was doing Secret Santa with a £10 limit.
Chris had drawn colleague Helena.
The problem was that he barely knew what Helena liked.
The only personal detail he could immediately offer was that she was seeing somebody who apparently looked like a Disney Prince.
That was not enough for a thoughtful gift.
So Chris asked Harry Styles to help.
Harry’s solution was scratchcards
Rather than buying perfume, food or some novelty office gift, Harry suggested scratchcards.
Spend the £10 limit on lottery scratchcards and give Helena the chance of turning the Secret Santa present into something much bigger.
Chris liked it.
There was also discussion of Harry recording a little video as part of the present.
The absurdity was obvious.
A £10 workplace gift problem had somehow reached Harry Styles.
Scott wondered whether Helena would believe Chris had genuinely asked one of the world’s biggest pop stars for Secret Santa advice.
Rebel Wilson met Superfan Steve
Then Rebel Wilson arrived.
The programme introduced another supposedly enormous fan called Steve.
As always, Chris was really hidden nearby with the answers.
Rebel knew she was facing somebody who claimed to follow her career closely.
Steve’s job was to answer questions about Rebel quickly enough to become unsettling without sounding so perfect that the trick collapsed.
The conversation drew on Rebel’s film career and personal trivia while Scott watched for the moment she might begin questioning how one ordinary fan knew so much.
Superfan Steve survived the final pre-Christmas test
By this point the prank was risky for every major guest.
Cheryl’s clip had gone viral.
Rylan had previously fallen for Steve despite knowing the premise existed.
Gemma Collins had tried to let him win because she thought he was nervous.
Rebel still entered the game and allowed the familiar tension to build.
The reveal again turned the unnerving fan into Chris Stark in another room.
Scott was delighted the character had survived all the way to the final week of the year.
The final Bamboleo Wednesday
Wednesday also carried the last Bamboleo Wednesday of 2019.
Scott and Chris even debated whether it might technically be the final Bamboleo Wednesday of the decade.
Listeners supplied another collection of archive clips for the instrumental gap.
The feature had spent the year turning tiny pieces of old radio into a weekly ritual.
Its final 2019 outing landed in one of the busiest shows of December.
Harry Styles.
Rebel Wilson.
Steve.
Billy Armish.
And one last Bamboleo before Christmas.
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