When Annie Nightingale decided to switch to a career in radio, she found the door “very firmly locked and bolted”. DJs were supposed to be substitutes for husbands, so the nation’s airwaves were no place for a woman. Fifty years later and Nightingale is still bringing the bass bangers to Radio 1 in the small hours.
Now 75, her stories tumble out at breakneck speed in On Air With Annie Nightingale (Radio 2), as if she was holding court round a festival campfire. She darts from meeting the Beatles to watching Hendrix at the Isle Of Wight. It’s understandable – she’s got a treasure trove of moments to cram in. If anyone else told these stories they would be taken with a pinch of salt, but as she made the move from local newspaper reporter to DJ, Nightingale was, as she says, “in the thick of it”.
She was one of the first to know about John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s relationship, but kept it a secret, despite her journalistic instincts telling her it would make a great story for the Brighton Argus. Talking of great stories, she happily recounts the embarrassing moment when the Byrds came back to her flat after a gig at Hove Town Hall and she mistook their talk of LSD for a chat about pounds, shillings and pence. Nightingale is a woman who has earned the right to say “happening” and tell Jimmy Page his band weren’t going to get anywhere with a name like Led Zeppelin. “I love music,” she says, “I like talking.”
Most importantly she’s also a fan of listening, as the beautiful, crackly archive interviews with stars like Marc Bolan demonstrate. You get the feeling she enjoys hearing his laidback, sexy drawl again after all these years just as much as her listeners do.
Nightingale’s interviews are a masterclass for today’s radio presenters. The main lesson? Pipe down and let the stars speak. There’s genuine affection between Nightingale and her interviewees: the Rolling Stones are heard inviting her out afterwards and Keith Moon asked her to write his life story, 10 days before he died. Further proof that she has the best job in the world comes in next week’s instalment, taking in the 70s, acid house and beyond.
