During my two weeks in i105-107 (I was there for a week of college work experience, but stayed longer out of choice), I was working on news – this involved writing copy, doing interviews (including Eddie Hobbes!) & editing down clips from them, doing vox-pops and putting packages together (including voicing them). They liked the packages well enough to actually air them during the main (12.45pm) iWitness news bulletin… which was nice

Here’s some of them:

“Brief History of Willie O’Dea” package for iWitness News by niallok

“Love is…” package for iWitness News by niallok

I spent the last week helping out down in i105-107 as part of my work experience for college. I didn’t really need to do it as I’ve had about 10 weeks experience working in radio stations since September (we’re only required to do 2 for the course) but I reckon the more I get – the better, and… well, I just plain like it there – t’is a great little station, so it is.

The highlights of the week for me included:

Singing and busking in the Big Busk-Off with the “iDrive with Nadia & Phil” team in the Bridge Centre, Tullamore. We were up against “Breakfast with Bernard & Keith”. I played the drums (a.k.a. the empty water cooler bottle). Highlights of our performance included Valerie, Fields of Athenry and Hit Me Baby One More Time. Yes. The crowd loved us. Got plenty of hugs and gave out “Hugs & Handshakes” vouchers while there. Bernard & Keith still won. Foul play was suspected. Great craic, all the same

I meant to post this on Sunday… Dundalk man Jim Corr’s appeared last weekend on RTÉ’s new Saturday Night Show (hosted by that appalling Cork man Brendan O’Connor). Crap name for a show? Maybe… but at least it’s not “The Brendan O’Connor Show”…

And yes… Jim’s still bonkers… and he’s still going on about the New World Order stuff that he ranted about on the Last Word almost two years ago ahead of the first Lisbon Treaty. He’s still in way out of his depth and still abusing his fame and celebrity to spread this stuff and (repeatedly) promote his activist shite peddling web site.

I mean SURE… he’s entitled to his opinion and he’s certainly entitled to express it if he wants to… (although I believe RTÉ gave him way too much airtime here and any other presenter would have pulled him up on a few points far better than O’Connor could) – but if you’re to believe him, you’d have to believe the following:

I put my own voice on my new GPS… which is a bit weird. Strange having myself tell myself where to get off.. as such.. And I didn’t even do any impersonation or grand dramatic expression or anything… just used my own normal voice. Yawntastic, in fairness…

The voice I REALLY want on it though is Peter Dickson – aka Voiceover Man (he of X Factor, Britain’s Got Talent, etc. etc. fame) – his particular dramatic “ooomph!” would certainly make car journeys that bit more exciting and appealing! Here he is… just generally being awesome…

Well you may know by now that they did it in the UK… In a testament to the power of the Internet, a facebook campaign has succeeded in usurping the X Factor from the Christmas No. 1 slot and installing the most unlikely replacement in the shape of definite song of the moment “Killing in the Name” by Rap metal supremos Rage Against The Machine at the top of the UK “Singles” Chart. Scott Mills announced it just before 7pm on BBC Radio 1’s Chart Show.

The (digital only) sales of the song outstripped second place Joe McElderry’s “The Climb” (which was also available on CD for the last few days) by over 50,000 making it the first download-only Christmas No. 1 and the biggest electronic sale of a song ever in the UK. (David has the figures here).

This isn’t being seen as just a victory for Rage Against the Machine or their song – or even for rock music itself. Moreover, it’s a clear message being sent to Simon Cowell and the whole manufactured TV “talent” competition establishment that has dominated the charts and removed the unpredictability and fun of the pop music charts and the institution that is the Christmas No. 1.

That message seems to have been along the lines of “no thanks, we’d rather have real bands playing real music that they wrote and performed themselves” – and the choice of song to represent that message was a well made one. In other words… “Fuck you, Cowell.. we won’t do what you tell us!”

Here’s the guys in their recent BBC Radio 5 appearance (before the chart was announced) – where they talk about the battle for the No. 1 spot, Simon Cowell & The X Factor, – and play the song itself (featuring various inclusions of the famous “Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me!” line at the end).

UPDATE: The band are now promising that they WILL come to the UK to play a free gig there to celebrate this No. 1 – and they are giving a huge chunk of the proceeds from the downloads of the song directly to the charity “Shelter”.

Meanwhile, the race is still on for the Christmas Number One spot here in Ireland – the chart here being announced on Thursdays – so that’ll be Christmas Eve, this year.

You can do your bit by downloading it on iTunes (as I have done) or eircom music store. The X Factor single’s chances are possibly stronger over here than they were in the UK, unfortunately, as it will have been available on CD for longer than it was there – but you never know!