Some archived coverage from BBC Radio 5 Live on the royal baby

PRESENTER                                                                                                     

You join us on Radio 5 tonight in the midst of what can only be described as a royal birth. This is a moment of unrivaled national significance and on the ground for us with the rapturous crowds is our royal correspondent Sam Cumberton. Sam can you hear me?

SAM

I can hear you Deborah. ‘Crowd’ is certainly the word I would use for this, there are indeed several people here Deborah grouped in various pools...forming what can really only be described as ‘crowds’ or en masse, collectively of course they are a single crowd, it very much depends how you look at it Deborah...

P

Ok Sam, can you tell us a little more regarding the baby itself?

S

Well yes, of course the crowd are here to see and to witness the royal birthing of his royal highness the Royal Prince. The crowd must be pushing nearly 50 or 60 people, most of who are not just passing through, some of course are stuck or lost and some have been hired from events agencies by the royal family to save the embarrassment of absolutely nobody turning up.

I must be honest Deborah , when we first arrived the crowds were mainly made up of journalists and broadcasters and so it was a confusing huddle of questions, interviewee’s were noticeably absent and journalists simply asked other journalists questions which were answered with more confused questions. It was a conversational dead end but now of course the crowds have gathered and these crowds, as we discussed earlier on quite rapturous and jubilatious in their spirits.

Earlier on I was speaking to a family from Kent who were quite overwhelmed by the events here. They, of course, knew it would happen, had read about it in the newspapers, had 9 months to prepare for it and had been making baby shoes from their own hair and prams from cereal boxes for many weeks leading up to it, but actually being here to witness the royal mirth of the crowds post the actual birth and actually coming to terms with the birth having really and genuinely occurred was really too much for them. The reality of the situation really hit home, in fact the father of this family from Kent suffered from a minor stroke during our conversation and the youngest daughter, Daisy aged just 12, was repeatedly vomiting into her own hands staining her shorts and drenching her brother with rancid sick who was already passed out from jubilation on the floor. Paramedics have been on hand but they really don’t have the training to deal with these overdoses of national pride and joy.

P

It is then quite an atmosphere down there Sam. Can you give us any idea of what the moment was like when the birth actually occurred?

S

Well of course Deborah. The moment itself was momentous to say the least. I was in among the onlookers here at the Palace gates, we had been waiting with our faces pressed up on the iron bars since sun rise, expecting the duchess to present herself in the palace courtyards out here in front of the palace. This was following speculation that the royal birth would occur in a public royal birthing tent for the public and press to see as the event unfolded. Plans had been made for the royal baby to be given a very basic iPhone, maybe the iPhone 4, so he could tweet throughout the proceedings and maybe even Skype the anxious crowds and the press which was eagerly awaited as one of the first press conferences with unborn royalty. These ideas were scrapped in favour of a more conventional birth and I think their royalnesses were sensible in that decision.

A conventional behind-closed-doors-birth took place instead, the duchess here showing her roots as very much a ‘woman of the people’ and a commoner; born into absolute destitution into a bin outside the co-op she has really shown that the modern royal family today represent the average working person.

In answer to your original question Deborah, the moment itself was of course jubilatious with the crowds cheering and whooping in ecstatic jubilance. An old man beside me whispered in my ear and told me that he was now ready to die, and wondered off  into the park behind us here and, I think, put himself face down in a bin as things could really not get any better than this; quite poignant really.

P

It is also an international event of course, sending political tremors throughout the globe. Do you get any real sense of that down there Sam?

S

Well absolutely; the United Kingdom’s dominant presence around the globe as the chief exporter of hats and Sellotape is quite evident down here. Apart from the many tourists who just happened to be here I also saw, just after the announcement actually, a group of Brazilian tourists in a state of frenzied happiness after hearing the news and they ran around and around cheering gaily and then proceeded to rip their faces off in a state of absolute glee. Really fantastic to see the international community coming together for this a very international event, the nation’s presence still very very very strongly felt around the world.

After the birth itself, the official announcement was actually made by the royal yeoman of the guardsman’s royal yeomanry of their royalness; the official representative of the queen’s  council’s yeomanry. He was wheeled out ceremoniously on one of the upright boards, held in with white straps, since he is, by tradition, only used during events of great national interest such as a royal birth, or a royal wedding or a royal swimming gala. He was wheeled out here, carefully unstrapped, and allowed to ring his bell and shout incoherently for a few hours much to the joy of the crowds who still have quite an appetite for curious characters like these who, I think, hark back to simpler times. After ringing his bell for about two and a half hours he finally announced the royal birth and that of course was the moment when the royal birth was announced.

P

Thanks very much Sam, we will come back to you later in the show.

Portrait of a marketing exec., part 2

Jenny caught a warped glimpse of herself in the chrome of the cabinet handle in the staff kitchen door and her heart sank again – she looked rough. She cursed the unpredictable nature of common reflective materials after a ‘big’ night. She stared pathetically at her mug and poured the water from the kettle particularly slowly almost so as to revel in her state of misery. It had, to say the least, been a big night, no surprise of course when it featured a large dose of ‘El Vino Classico’ hastily acquired from the local corner shop. Initially, she had planned to meet some old school friends for a chummy reunion at a Hungry Horse just outside Reading, but realised at the last moment she actually didn’t like them and so decided to stay in. Instead she cracked open one of her £3.50 emergency stock of ‘Classico’s’ and settled down to besiege Normandy on an early Call of Duty. Two and a half bottles later Jenny decided she had killed enough Nazi’s and went to bed just as the birds were starting to chirp. It wasn’t a badly spent evening Jenny thought, just maybe not advisable the night before her big sales pitch to Collin and head management.

‘J babe, you are looking dark and broody today, what’s with the new look?’ asked Stevie as he glided into the kitchen fresh faced, Kumquat smoothie in hand.

‘Ah no it’s not really a ‘look”, Jenny sighed, ‘I’m just feeling a bit tired. Had a big night last night...’

‘Big night...right, right, right...yep, say no more Jen, I know the story, I know the story. Uncle Stevie knows the bloody story you...you...you animal you! Ha!’ said Stevie as he leaned back on the kitchen surface, allowing his gold paisley shirt to hang lose around his chest so he could proudly sport his meagre tangling of hair. He nudged his sunglasses down onto his nose and starred at Jenny with a grin, ‘does he have a name then?’ Jenny paused for a moment and contemplated stringing him along with a tale of forbidden f lust and romance involving Vernon Kay, but decided that it would be akin to kicking a sleeping baby considering Stevie’s low intellect and so she told him the truth. ‘Nazi’s eh? A damn nasty outfit if you ask me. I don’t know what the hell they were thinking. Bunch of bloody prongs!’ exclaimed Stevie.

‘Yea, exactly. So I spent the evening doing that and now I’m shattered, basically’, said Jenny.

‘Don’t fret pet’, Stevie said as he tilted his head to one side, ‘c’est la vie, right?’ he said, meaning to help with wearing a painfully smarmy grin nevertheless.

‘I bloody hope not’, Jenny said.

‘Jen, don’t worry about it babe. We all have our guilty pleasures right?’, said Stevie with his eyes widening at Jenny, ‘yours is cheap wine from the corner shop and mine...well if I’m honest...mine is probably original Motown 7 inches’, he said emphatically ‘yea can’t get enough of that shit.’

‘I’m not an alcoholic Stevie I was just...bored I suppose I have no ambitions or something’, said Jenny, but Stevie wasn’t listening.

‘I mean historically I was always a Jazz man: bee-bop, early big band you know, that kind of thing? But I have come to see myself more as more of a soul man lately. Don’t know why really but just can’t get enough’,  laughed Stevie as Jenny starred into her cold tea lamenting that fact that she couldn’t even hold the attention of Stevie for longer than 5 minutes. Collin burst through the door swinging his laptop bag by his side and ending a phone call.

‘Trust me, just trust me that skimpy sells in the kitchen utensil industry...it just fucking does! Tell her to strip off or get lost, this B&Q contract is gold dust!’ he ended his call angrily, partly annoyed at the fact that there was no truly aggressive way to end a phone call on a touch screen. He missed the days of the folding mobile phone. ‘Hi guys, what’s up?’ he asked absent mindedly as he rifled through the cupboards for coffee.

‘Erm, not much I...’, Jenny tried to reply but was cut short by Collin’s early morning buzz.

‘Jesus fuck Jenny you look like crap! What the hell happened to you!? Am I right Stevie? Am I right!?’ he chortled nodding over his shoulder towards a grinning Stevie as he marched back out of the kitchen.

*

The open plan office was crafted by psycho-architectural ‘experts’ from San Francisco back when the company first moved in 6 years ago. They had told Julian Jewson, the creative director of the ‘Sales and Marketing’ division and part of the top management, that if their chairs and desks and sofas were not organised correctly the life force of the company would fall straight out of the window, and maybe onto the heads of unsuspecting passersby. “Qi”, they had said, “is directly related to profit and profit creates new energy. This is the cosmic business cycle which must be embraced if you are to succeed in what is a murky plane of financial uncertainty.” Some charts might have been fitting but it was possible they thought quantifying the meaning of life on an axis with corporate profit might have stretched their credibility beyond breaking point. Julian certainly embraced them and their huge consultancy fees. He was currently sprawled on a beanbag taking off his socks, engaged in some ‘blue sky thinking’ with two rigid and stuffy looking men from accounting who felt uncomfortable on a bean bag and were certainly above sprawling. ‘Mr Jewson...’, said the taller one.

‘Call me Julian’, Julian interrupted.

‘Ok, Julian...’, the accountant said.

‘Actually maybe call me Jules, we need to break down some barriers here, straddle some communicative canyons yea? We have to communicate together’, there was silence. ‘Actually no, call me Julian.’ More silence, ‘go on’, Julian finally said.

‘Julian, we understand that here in ‘Sales and Marketing’ creativity and the stretching or parameters is encouraged, but in ‘Accounting’...’ the taller of the two accountant said, ‘in ‘Accounting’ Julian we stick to the rules.’ He allowed a brief smirk of satisfaction to cross his face. ‘We stick to the rules here because without rules we have uncertainty and with uncertainty comes chaos and chaos is bad for business. So I must reiterate: we cannot afford to fund your spa trips any more, the budgets simply do not allow it.’ He and his assistant starred coldly at Julian as he sunk further into his bean bag allowing folds of fat to gather around his neck.

‘But an army needs...’, Julian feebly tried to say.

‘...needs a General. Yes, we know, you have said already. But a General doesn’t need 7 spa holidays a year’, replied the same accountant curtly. Julian huffed in acceptance, acknowledging the sad fact that he couldn't keep offsetting his extravagant living costs onto the company. Sensing agreement the three men tried to rise from their beanbags but Julian struggled and flailed around awkwardly trying to disguise his struggle as an elaborate core stretch. ‘Thank-you Mr Jewson’, said the same accountant as the pair walked off in sync. Julian eventually rose from the beanbag and stretched his arms so as to release the negative energy seemingly created by the accountants. He climbed onto a nearby table, occupied by a new intern, flexed his still bare feet on the young boy’s paper work and addressed the ‘Sales and Marketing’ team.

‘Brothers. Sisters. A moment of your time please,’ he shouted to the entire office of 18 staff. ‘We function...this office and these people function...not as individuals driving independent micro-circuits...but as a real unified spiritual entity’, he paused for dramatic effect, ‘a spiritual entity. We are one body with ‘Sales’ as our ultimate horizon. Our goal. Our Mecca if you will, and Marketing...marketing is our raison d’etre...our life blood...our daily nourishment. So you must feed, feed off the struggling helpless antelope that is the common consumer, frenzy off their psychological reflexes and unrealistic goals. You must sink your creative canines into their thighs and tear the flesh of profit from the bone...’ Julian paused again, ‘feed, go and feed!’ Clive, a relatively new recruit to the ‘Sales and Marketing team’, dropped his Biro. Susan coughed. The intern gazed up at his flamboyant boss with awe and confusion. Julian thought it was best to close his outburst with an actual point, ‘Ok, remember: team meeting at 10.15. Senior staff only please – strategic re-formulation imminent’. He clambered down from the table and put his socks back on.  

Nostradamus Barley?

Nathan Barley, a sitcom by Chris Morris and Charlie Brooker, when viewed more than six years after it first aired in early 2005, has a prophetic air about it. The lead character, Nathan Barley, originated on Charlie Brooker’s TVGoHome website: a satirical TV listings and reviews page. Barley is first mentioned in the 14^th May 1999 “issue” as the focus of a fly-on-the-wall documentary series entitled Cunt. Barley is described as ‘a twenty-something wannabe director’ in the program’s fictitious blurb, and ‘a worthless, moneyed little shit who deserves to die’ by Brooker.

It’s fair to say that Nathan’s persona changed little in the transition from the web to the small screen. The televisual Barley epitomises not just what leading character Dan Ashcroft describes as ‘self-regarding consumer slaves, oblivious to the paradox of their own uniform individuality’, or more simply ‘idiots’ but also, unintentionally, his own ‘credos’. Barley runs a website, trashbat.co.ck: ‘registered in the Cook Islands, yeah?’ named for said ‘credos’: ‘trash, as in what’s all around us and - bat’.

Nathan Barley is indeed bat-like: flitting from place to place, unable to form a clear view of his world, but dimly aware of its constituent parts as echoes within his hollow skull. His “political views” reflect the low level of his external awareness, consisting largely of an ill-defined anger with George W. Bush and a tasteless fetishisation of 9/11 imagery: ‘Trashbat is - two people leaping from the twin towers - but they’re fucking on the way down’.                                                                                          

The detachment from the non-trivial aspects of reality shared by Nathan and his fellow idiots is one of the most zeitgeist-skewering aspects of the show. Despite the massive quantities of sophisticated communication technology that the “idiots” own, they exist in their own little universe and display minimal awareness and concern for real-world problems. A recurring theme of Nathan Barley is the inappropriate reactions that the “idiots” have to Dan’s sister Claire’s documentary about drug addicts, the homeless, and other socially marginal groups. When Claire first shows Nathan footage of an ex-heroin addict singing a song to schoolchildren about his ordeal, Nathan starts laughing mindlessly. Claire later receives a similar reaction from a half-witted TV commissioner, Ivan Plapp: ‘it’s not funny, but it does - make us laugh…there’s a positive message for people, but if we want, we can drop back a layer and laugh, if we’re in the chuckle demographic’

What do the ‘idiots’ care about? Much the same things as their real-world counterparts, or at least the section of the idiot world that takes the most savage satirical beating in the show: pretentious urban types with plenty of money and an impaired sense of morality. 

An excellent example of how close to the bone Nathan Barley gets when attacking this target is found in trying to spot the article title from the show’s inane lifestyle magazine SugarApe amongst a selection of titles from genuine publications. Scope the following: A) Serial killer sock art B) German ice rapists C) Do you want to have sex with my fake leg? D) Ethiopia’s iconic mentally ill dress so impressive [Answer at the bottom of the page]. Certainly attention-grabbing titles, but the problem for Barley et al is the superficial mindset that won’t allow them to look past sensationalism and image and see what lies beneath.

You could even go as far as to say that Nathan Barley was a very appropriate show for the New Labour era. Tony Blair even makes a brief, but memorable appearance in the show as the main villain of a video game called Labour Party Conference: lurching from the darkness, cock in hand, grinning demonically at the player’s character. New Labour, like the “idiots” of the show, seemed to value style over substance. Admittedly, it is quite the stretch to go down the “Nathan Blair” route in analysing the show. If nothing else though, Labour Party Conference is just one example of the relentless attention to comedic detail that characterises the programme.

However, does Nathan Barley still seem as prescient in less frivolous times? These days, with cash less abundant, the consumerism of the “idiots” can seem almost dated. But decades of cheap-money-fuelled frolicking in a sea of stuff have left their mark on western society. Political disorientation, self-obsession and sheer idiocy all remain hallmarks of our time. Even one of today’s more intelligent and sane political movements is not immune to the curse of modern idiocy. Pause to consider this quote from an “Occupy Wall Street” protester: “I like the use of public space as a performative realm and I like the combination of bodies in space”, printed in Private Eye’s “Pseuds Corner” as a reason for their involvement. So, the hijacking of democracy by heartless corporate interests and their subsequent rape of the world isn’t enough to get you out on the street, but conceptual performance art is? 

To paraphrase Dan Ashcroft, the idiots are still winning.

 

Answers to earlier question:

B) is from SugarApe, A) is from Fun magazine, C) and D) are from Vice magazine