Former commercial radio DJ Phil O'Brien describes hosting Matinee Idle on Radio New Zealand National during January as "every radio announcer's dream". He and Simon Morris, the show's producer and co-host, are gearing up for another month of bickering about music.
Phil, you first started working at Radio New Zealand as a fill-in announcer. How did you end up hosting Matinee Idle?
Phil: Six years ago, Radio New Zealand had nothing planned for January, so they asked if I wanted to do a show. They said, “We don’t really care what you play”, which is like manna from heaven for a radio announcer. I thought we should try something new – I’ve always said music radio doesn’t serve the public very well, music radio has always underestimated what people want to hear.
hat do people want to hear?
Phil: They want to hear songs they haven’t heard before, or songs they haven’t heard for a very long time, or only ever heard once. I started playing songs with no rhyme nor reason to the formatting – they were just songs I liked.
Why Matinee Idle?
Phil: My girlfriend came up with the name. It was matinee because it was in the afternoon, idle because it was summer and we all want to relax. It certainly wasn’t anything to do with American Idol, which I loathe.
When did Simon Morris join you as producer and co-host?
Phil: When my first producer stopped after a couple of years, RNZ said I could keep going but I’d have to get another producer. I’ve known Simon for a long time, and to be honest I would have killed to do a show with him. We’ve got similar taste in music – we know about music no one else has even heard of.
Simon: Well, that’s what we thought until we started doing the show. Then we ended up disagreeing all the time, which is actually what makes the show work.
Phil: Yeah – I’ll play a song, then Simon will play his rubbish song and I’ll have a really good one to follow it with.
What rubbish songs does Simon play?
Phil: He only plays Jeff Beck and the Beatles, and I play everyone else.
Simon: That’s not completely true – I also play some Beach Boys.
There’s a definite babyboomer bias. Do you play anything more modern?
Simon: We play a little bit of it. Once in a blue moon I’ll trip over some stuff I like – we’ve played Fleet Foxes and Black Eyed Peas.
Phil: The interesting thing is that when we try to drop in anything new, particularly anything you can hear on other radio stations, the audience comes down on us. They say, “Don’t waste your time playing things we can hear everywhere else – play stuff we’ll hate.”
You describe Matinee Idle as a couple of middle-aged blokes wrestling for control of the CD player. Is there any structure to it?
Simon: There is some structure. Phil will always do the opening number – as far as I’m concerned, that’s Phil’s job, and he sets the tone for the rest of the afternoon. The next song will be a reaction to that. And there’s always the Classic Concert at 3.00pm – that’s out of our hands.
Who chooses the Classic Concert?
Simon: The music department. We don’t have any choice – it’s quite nice to have someone else’s taste inflicted on the public.
Phil: They do tie it in with the theme of the show. We’ll have a concert this year featuring Burton Cummings, because they know Simon can’t stand him. On the other hand, the first concert will be Jeff Beck live – so they do think of us when they choose them.
How do you deal with the hundreds of emails and texts you get from listeners while you’re on air?
Phil: Kelle Howson [the show's production assistant] goes through them, and chooses the ones we should read out. Over time, our audience has just got cleverer and cleverer, and funnier and funnier. They pick up on what we’re doing and wind us up no end. As communist as it sounds, it’s people’s radio.
It’s become traditional to finish each show with a different cover version of the same song. Will you be doing that again this year?
Phil: We will – we’ll be finishing each show with Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight). Just wait ’til you hear Brian Eno doing it.
Phil O’Brien & Simon Morris
PrintEmail Tweet
Former commercial radio DJ Phil O'Brien describes hosting Matinee Idle on Radio New Zealand National during January as "every radio announcer's dream". He and Simon Morris, the show's producer and co-host, are gearing up for another month of bickering about music.
Phil, you first started working at Radio New Zealand as a fill-in announcer. How did you end up hosting Matinee Idle?
Phil: Six years ago, Radio New Zealand had nothing planned for January, so they asked if I wanted to do a show. They said, “We don’t really care what you play”, which is like manna from heaven for a radio announcer. I thought we should try something new – I’ve always said music radio doesn’t serve the public very well, music radio has always underestimated what people want to hear.
hat do people want to hear?
Phil: They want to hear songs they haven’t heard before, or songs they haven’t heard for a very long time, or only ever heard once. I started playing songs with no rhyme nor reason to the formatting – they were just songs I liked.
Why Matinee Idle?
Phil: My girlfriend came up with the name. It was matinee because it was in the afternoon, idle because it was summer and we all want to relax. It certainly wasn’t anything to do with American Idol, which I loathe.
When did Simon Morris join you as producer and co-host?
Phil: When my first producer stopped after a couple of years, RNZ said I could keep going but I’d have to get another producer. I’ve known Simon for a long time, and to be honest I would have killed to do a show with him. We’ve got similar taste in music – we know about music no one else has even heard of.
Simon: Well, that’s what we thought until we started doing the show. Then we ended up disagreeing all the time, which is actually what makes the show work.
Phil: Yeah – I’ll play a song, then Simon will play his rubbish song and I’ll have a really good one to follow it with.
What rubbish songs does Simon play?
Phil: He only plays Jeff Beck and the Beatles, and I play everyone else.
Simon: That’s not completely true – I also play some Beach Boys.
There’s a definite babyboomer bias. Do you play anything more modern?
Simon: We play a little bit of it. Once in a blue moon I’ll trip over some stuff I like – we’ve played Fleet Foxes and Black Eyed Peas.
Phil: The interesting thing is that when we try to drop in anything new, particularly anything you can hear on other radio stations, the audience comes down on us. They say, “Don’t waste your time playing things we can hear everywhere else – play stuff we’ll hate.”
You describe Matinee Idle as a couple of middle-aged blokes wrestling for control of the CD player. Is there any structure to it?
Simon: There is some structure. Phil will always do the opening number – as far as I’m concerned, that’s Phil’s job, and he sets the tone for the rest of the afternoon. The next song will be a reaction to that. And there’s always the Classic Concert at 3.00pm – that’s out of our hands.
Who chooses the Classic Concert?
Simon: The music department. We don’t have any choice – it’s quite nice to have someone else’s taste inflicted on the public.
Phil: They do tie it in with the theme of the show. We’ll have a concert this year featuring Burton Cummings, because they know Simon can’t stand him. On the other hand, the first concert will be Jeff Beck live – so they do think of us when they choose them.
How do you deal with the hundreds of emails and texts you get from listeners while you’re on air?
Phil: Kelle Howson [the show's production assistant] goes through them, and chooses the ones we should read out. Over time, our audience has just got cleverer and cleverer, and funnier and funnier. They pick up on what we’re doing and wind us up no end. As communist as it sounds, it’s people’s radio.
It’s become traditional to finish each show with a different cover version of the same song. Will you be doing that again this year?
Phil: We will – we’ll be finishing each show with Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight). Just wait ’til you hear Brian Eno doing it.