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Janice Long.

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Just seen on the BBC website the sad news that Janice Look my has passed away.

I always enjoyed listening to her when I was on night shifts at the power station & she did the graveyard slot on
radio 2.

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  1. Very sad, always liked Janice. One of the good ones on Radio 1 in the 80s and I used to listen to her on Radio 2 also, always so enthusiastic

  3. Yes, a real shame. I was a big fan in the eighties and she kick started the careers of quite a few very good acts who went on to long term success. The somewhat more accessible end of night time radio 1 then, although many (me included) would stay tuned for the Peel show as well. RIP.

  4. I never heard much of her show, but pretty much every musician I follow on social media, across a wide range, is united in their praise of her support of them and her friendship.

  7. She was always full of love and enthusiasm for the music she played, and for the bands who came in to play in the studio. A great shame to see her go, especially at such an early age.

  8. Loved the Robert Palmer anecdote involving John Peel when rehearsing TOTP. After watching the video for Addicted to Love, Long said “more like a dickhead in love!”. Peel reprimanded her, saying she’d be sacked if she said that on air – so HE will. And he did!

  10. Behind the turntables at that time
    Was the funkiest lady you ever could find
    You could rock her like Chaka, and that weren’t wrong
    Coz she’d rock you back. She was Janice Long

    Melody Maker to Peel’s NME, I loved her early evening shows, my favorite radio auntie/big sister.

  14. Always had a soft spot for Janice. Listened to her on Radio 1 and occasionally on her early hours show on Radio 2. Always engaging, never cheesy, one of the best. Hard to believe she has gone.

    • She will indeed.

      Years ago, my tall chum did a live session on her R2 show in the B’ham studio where The Archers is recorded. All the sound effects (door bells, squeaky hinges, cows mooing, etc) were left set up which he pressed, like a little kid in a sweet shop, during the interview.

      Janice played door bell percussion on one of the tunes, while he struggled to suppress a fit of the giggles. He ended up staying for the whole show, the playlist went out of the window as he picked tunes and Janice played them. She just laughed.

      I have a tape of it in a box somewhere.

  20. A fitting tribute by Elvis Costello.

    It was with a shudder of sadness that I woke on St. Stephen’s Day to news of the passing of the broadcaster, Janice Long.

    Janice and I were approximately the same age and although our friendship was more episodic than constant, I was always gratefully aware that she had a genuine curiosity about the music she played, listening to every tape or, more recently, music file that was sent to her by upcoming musicians, getting out to see young bands and singers play live and frequently airing the gems and surprises of less celebrated voices, along with the more routine work of any long-term broadcaster.

    When we were both kids, the BBC’s view of the role of women in society was pretty much explained by the titles of radio shows like, “Housewives’ Choice”, the soap opera serial, “Mrs. Dale’s Diary” and even the long-running magazine programme, “Woman’s Hour”, as if an hour was all you were likely to get.

    The BBC’s early attempts to get “with it”, admitted at least one strangely sinister misfit who had clung to the edges of show business since the ‘50s. When it came to spinning records – prior to Janice – I can only think of Annie Nightingale’s voice among a chorus of mid-Atlantic, former pirate radio disk jockeys, hired to drag the BBC into the late 1960s and on into the backside of the 20th century, with a cast of blokey, clubby types, many of whom became household names just as surely as they were the spitting image of the deluded, self-promoters of popular satire in the 1990s.

    Bear in mind that when Janice and I were but children, the BBC had only just abandoned the practice of male broadcasters donning an evening-dress jacket to read the news…on the radio, while recorded music was strictly rationed, so you frequently heard hit parade tunes mangled by radio dance bands and light music ensembles. You could turn on the “wireless” in 1960 and imagine that it was still 1935.

    Curiously, it was the very rarity of shows that actually played the music you loved that made them so precious.

    Over the last 45 revolutions of our lives, the voices that have stood out and stood up for music have often been at odds with a tendency to quip or froth at the quickening pace without any apparent strength of conviction, let alone a pause for thought.

    Nevertheless – despite what might be suggested by a song I wrote a very long time ago – I keep my favourite broadcasters in my heart and memory and while Janice might have named some different personalities, I’m glad to say that there are such advocates out there to this very day, although we are now poorer by one of their number.

    **************************************

    There was a poignant comedy to the last conversation that I enjoyed with Janice Long.

    That we were thousands of miles apart; Janice in a temporary home studio in Liverpool in the early evening, while I was timing my remarks between the droning approach of sea-planes on my back porch on a West Vancouver morning.

    We struck out confidently via a trio of miracles; the internet, home recording and a video phone connection that used to seem so impossibly futuristic when it turned up in “Star Trek” or “2001″.

    While I could hear Janice’s cheery voice with the clarity of a crystal set, my replies apparently sounded to her as if they were being relayed via “Studio One” in Kingston, Jamaica and processed some particularly willful dub echo.

    There was nothing to do but press on regardless. We had “Vision” but we did not have “Sound”.

    Although our words were being recorded clearly at either end of the line, any chance of a coherent rhythm of conversation was quickly reduced to semaphore and mime; fingers pointing at ears, exaggerated enquiries of “Can you hear me?” – mouthed at the computer camera.

    Through all of this, Janice remained only mildly flustered, typing furiously on a phone, apparently, to her dear friend, Gill Taylor, who has worked with me for thirty odd years. 

“What’s he saying?”, Janice texted.

    “I’ve no idea, I’m not on the call but probably something about “Helsinki””, replied Gill.

    “So tell me about Helsinki”, said Janice without missing a beat and I went into an explanation of my expedition to make some records of clattering noise at an island studio in the freezing approaches to the Finnish capital.

    There was a pause when I finished speaking and Janice and I stared at each other for a moment on our respective screens as a jumble of my words began ping-ponging across the world wide web via various delays and echoes.

    An expression of recognition spread across Janice’s face.

    The word “Finnish” must have finally filtered through the relays.

    “So how did you finish this album?”, asked Janice, ever the cool professional.

    And so we stumbled on….

    Of course, if this had been back in the analogue days, it would have taken a stack of razor blades to edit this comic routine into a coherent conversation but apart from Janice’s acknowledgement that the technical circumstances had been a little trying, we got the job done and had some fun doing it and that is how I should best like to recall Janice, whatever time and fashion have brought, she has been a pal and a dear friend of the music and I will miss her.

    My condolences go to her many friends and most especially to her husband, Paul, Fred and Blue.

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