At the risk of invoking more wrath. Mark Radcliffe (along with other BBC presenters Stuart Maconie, Andy Kershaw, Verity Sharpe, Bob Harris, Johnnie Walker, and the late John Peel, and many many others) have all, in their own way championed various aspects of "our" music (whatever that is) for many, many years.

To Diss Mark as a "Pop DJ" is to show ignorance in the extreme.

And to follow the other half of the thread, of Course Billy Bragg is a folk singer, so is, Elvis Costello, Robert Wyatt, Ian Dury, Tom Waits, Kirsty McColl, and so many other current writers.
For example.
are Bill Caddick, John Tams, Pete Morton, Richard Thompson, Jez Lowe not folk singers too? (not to mention Martin Carthy himself)

Of course Channel 5 should be soundly congratulated on the current series of programmes. Of course the timing is all to cock, but, whats the problem with recording the shows, and lending them to friends to try and spread the word?

I can also thouroughly reccommend the Kathryn Tickell doc this coming Sunday. I luckily caught it on tape the first time around, and have shown it to several non-folkie friends who where amazed by it.

I would urge everyone to heap praise on Ch5 and the producers (even if not all of the programmes were to your liking)

Who knows, a few more documentary crumbs might fall from the rich mans table in the future as a consequence (Leon Rosselon gets my vote)


Regards Ralphie