It was billed as the first ever "proper" Sofa Session from Radio 2's new Session Rooms, and Antony Szmierek made sure it was memorable for all the right reasons. Mid-way through Flight Simulator, he lost the words live on air and had to stop the band and start again, laughing it off with Jo before the track. "The best thing about live radio is when things go wrong," Jo told him, and he readily admitted the nerves got the better of him, recalling a similar moment during his first ever session for the show.
Before any of that, Szmierek had the studio in stitches describing how he'd spent the afternoon unknowingly sitting on a sofa soaked in cat wee while watching Bake Off, only realising as he left the house dressed for the session. He also delighted listeners with a spoken-word cover of Charli XCX's Wink Wink, performed with backing singer Imogen Williams, insisting "if you're gonna look at the poets of our time, Charlie is absolutely one of those people."
Talk turned personal too: Szmierek revealed he and his brother and bandmate Martin no longer live together, having gone their separate ways amicably, and shared a story about meeting his hero John Cooper Clarke, who name-checked a line that ended up in Szmierek's song The Heron – "he's after some royalties… he will not get them," he joked. Jo opened the show with a warm tribute to broadcaster Dame Esther Rantzen following news of her death, before the Shiny Happy Playlist's usual run of feelgood dedications and listener shout-outs.
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