This documentary about the man who (may have) invented dance music played some of the best songs of the last century
Electric Dreams
Britain in a Box
Could there have been a more perfect moment for an epic documentary on Giorgio Moroder? The man who, according to the show's very starry (and very generous) presenter Niles Rodgers, invented dance music? On the night that Daft Punk's fourth studio album finally launched, with fitting audacity at the top of the Shard, Radio 2 put out *Electric Dreams: The Giorgio Moroder Story*, the most enjoyable music documentary I've heard this year. Snippets of recent Daft Punk collaborator Moroder, 73, talking about his life were tacked over some of the best music made in the last century: I Feel Love, Together In Electric Dreams, Now I Need You. In between came New Order's Bernard Sumner, Debbie Harry, Sparks and more, colouring in the detail of what Moroder's music has meant.
"Ian [Curtis] would play his stuff," explained Sumner. "He would have a turntable and bring Moroder, disco and Kraftwerk to rehearsals." A classic Donna Summer clip played over Love to Love You Baby, as she confirmed how embarrassed she was to be singing it. "I didn't want to do it, it was too erotic, I was just goofing in the studio" was about the sum of it. As for Moroder himself, perhaps my favourite revelation concerned the artist who first inspired him: crooning pretty boy Paul Anka, whose 1957 hit Diana was the "one that made me think I should play an instrument and compose". This is the kind of radio made for blethering on to your friends about, for forcing iPlayer links on their ears. Part two airs next Monday.
The story of a West Indian barber shop in Peckham which went on to inspire the Channel 4 sitcom Desmonds has been fairly well documented. But missing from that pub quiz knowledge is context. This was the first sitcom to feature an entirely black cast, with black writers and an audience never before represented in the same way before on British television. Paul Jackson's *Britain in a Box* (Radio 4) was a great bit of social and TV history, talking to commissioners and actors who helped make the show such a runaway hit in the late 80s. Reported by guardian.co.uk 13 hours ago.
Electric Dreams
Britain in a Box
Could there have been a more perfect moment for an epic documentary on Giorgio Moroder? The man who, according to the show's very starry (and very generous) presenter Niles Rodgers, invented dance music? On the night that Daft Punk's fourth studio album finally launched, with fitting audacity at the top of the Shard, Radio 2 put out *Electric Dreams: The Giorgio Moroder Story*, the most enjoyable music documentary I've heard this year. Snippets of recent Daft Punk collaborator Moroder, 73, talking about his life were tacked over some of the best music made in the last century: I Feel Love, Together In Electric Dreams, Now I Need You. In between came New Order's Bernard Sumner, Debbie Harry, Sparks and more, colouring in the detail of what Moroder's music has meant.
"Ian [Curtis] would play his stuff," explained Sumner. "He would have a turntable and bring Moroder, disco and Kraftwerk to rehearsals." A classic Donna Summer clip played over Love to Love You Baby, as she confirmed how embarrassed she was to be singing it. "I didn't want to do it, it was too erotic, I was just goofing in the studio" was about the sum of it. As for Moroder himself, perhaps my favourite revelation concerned the artist who first inspired him: crooning pretty boy Paul Anka, whose 1957 hit Diana was the "one that made me think I should play an instrument and compose". This is the kind of radio made for blethering on to your friends about, for forcing iPlayer links on their ears. Part two airs next Monday.
The story of a West Indian barber shop in Peckham which went on to inspire the Channel 4 sitcom Desmonds has been fairly well documented. But missing from that pub quiz knowledge is context. This was the first sitcom to feature an entirely black cast, with black writers and an audience never before represented in the same way before on British television. Paul Jackson's *Britain in a Box* (Radio 4) was a great bit of social and TV history, talking to commissioners and actors who helped make the show such a runaway hit in the late 80s. Reported by guardian.co.uk 13 hours ago.
