Two weeks of Breakfast begin
Scott and Chris began two weeks covering the Radio 1 Breakfast Show while Grimmy was away at Coachella. The automated introductions repeatedly called Scott “Danny Howard”, adding a useful identity crisis to the first early start.
Real or No Real moved to shortly after 07:00 and listener Amy joined during a revision break. Phillip Schofield was not a secret UFO hunter, while another unlikely claim about an enormous living organism proved true. Amy and Scott finished level on 30 points before she returned to her work, establishing that ordinary listeners rather than afternoon presenters would play throughout the Breakfast run.
Somebody must wake Scott in Newcastle
The pair had to catch the 13:00 train from King’s Cross to speak at the Student Radio Conference in Newcastle. Scott could sleep anywhere, but warned that he snored, kicked the seat and sometimes lashed out. Chris planned to occupy himself with a bulky portable DVD player that resembled both a toasted-sandwich maker and Martin Clunes.
Scott appealed for somebody in coach B to wake him at Newcastle before he continued accidentally to Scotland. Listeners volunteered to telephone, but he needed a person physically aboard the train. The schedule left them only 11 minutes to reach the conference after arrival, making their confidence about presenting a carefully prepared talk seem increasingly optimistic.
The best things people say in their sleep
A listener’s embarrassment about screaming in front of new housemates revived Scott’s fascination with apps that record noises during the night. Most captured rustling, but the selected examples included somebody singing DJ Fresh immediately before breaking wind, another person apologising before doing the same, and a mysterious instruction to “Go to the window, Gary”.
One sleeping woman wanted to be a potato, while another appeared to plan a marriage involving several people. Scott and Chris promised to record themselves that night and asked listeners to send their own clips. “Go to the window, Gary” quickly became the phrase neither could stop replaying.
Scott enters the glass lifts
The new Sack of Shame placed a Bluetooth speaker inside a rucksack on Scott’s back. Chris remained at a distance, typed anything he wanted into his phone and sent it through the bag in a synthetic voice. Because the lifts at Broadcasting House were glass, he could see exactly who entered with Scott and personalise the humiliation.
Scott had to travel repeatedly between the ground floor and Radio 1 while the speaker announced naughty thoughts, claimed to fancy strangers, asked whether somebody had farted and complained of an onion smell. Managers, news staff, tourists and employees trying hard not to laugh were all potential passengers. Scott could neither predict the messages nor explain them without making the situation worse.
A concealed camera caught him burying his head in his hands as one particularly unimpressed woman refused to engage. Listeners found the silences between announcements almost too uncomfortable to watch. Chris immediately imagined using the equipment in a lecture, library or on the Newcastle train, while Scott faced the alarming possibility that it could interrupt their boss’s conference speech later that day.
Breakfast continues
The first programme also looked ahead to Tuesday’s guests: Hayley Pearce from The Call Centre and newly crowned Voice winner Jermaine Jackman. Scott was still trying to understand will.i.am’s disappearing act during the final, while Chris had turned the sack into a portable threat that could follow them far beyond the studio.
The early start had therefore produced more than a relocated afternoon show. Listener contestants, sleep recordings and a feature capable of humiliating Scott anywhere had all been established before the first morning was over.
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