Chris wanted the smart speaker to run his entire life
Chris had decided the next stage of adulthood was connecting as much of his house as possible to a smart speaker.
Lights, television, kettle and anything else with a compatible plug were candidates.
Scott already lived in a heavily connected home thanks to his boyfriend.
The problem was that Scott did not know the exact phrases required to control any of it.
A command as simple as turning off the television could fail because he had forgotten whether it was called “TV”, “downstairs TV” or something else entirely.
His boyfriend would also occasionally change the wake word, leaving Scott shouting commands at an assistant that no longer recognised its own name.
Little Mix were genuinely nervous about the Live Lounge
Little Mix joined after performing for Live Lounge Month.
Despite years of huge tours and television performances, they admitted the Live Lounge still made them nervous.
For the group it carried a particular pressure because the performance was so exposed.
There was nowhere to hide.
They had grown up listening to the compilations themselves and regarded appearing in the Live Lounge as a genuinely important test of whether an artist could deliver live.
Listeners immediately praised the harmonies.
Scott then made the group do something several performers hated:
listen back.
Reviewing themselves was almost worse than performing
The group picked apart little moments in the playback that most listeners would never have noticed.
Scott kept reminding them that everybody outside the group had thought they sounded brilliant.
Their discomfort made the segment work.
The Live Lounge had been completed successfully, but having to sit and hear every detail again caused a fresh wave of nerves.
Cry Dancing was a real phenomenon
The previous day Scott had discovered videos of people apparently crying while dancing at concerts.
Listener Sophie confirmed this was absolutely real.
For her, One Direction concerts were the perfect environment.
She described the moment in *You & I* when the emotion built, the group reached a particular high note and she could no longer keep it together.
The tears were happy.
The dancing continued.
That combination became Cry Dancing.
Scott played the relevant part of *You & I* for her live and Sophie immediately began reliving the reaction.
An acoustic version made things even more emotional.
The boys were not actually making eye contact
Sophie explained that at a concert you still dance hard because you are convinced the band can see you in the crowd.
Scott rather cruelly pointed out that One Direction were almost certainly looking in the general direction of thousands of people rather than specifically at her.
Sophie did not need that reality check.
Tuesday’s trumpet returned
Listeners again celebrated small victories.
One caller had finally registered with a doctor by himself at 25.
The show treated the completed paperwork and two forms of identification like a major life milestone.
That was exactly the point of Blow Your Own Trumpet.
Nobody else needed to care.
Radio 1 would.
Don’t Look It Up went metal
The quiz included heavy-metal versions of familiar pop songs.
The arrangement could make even an obvious hit surprisingly hard to identify.
Scott and Chris continued to insist the quiz had outlived lockdown and deserved to remain part of normal radio life.
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