Frank Off The Radio: The Frank Skinner Podcast

00:00 It's Frank off the radio, Frank off the radio, Frank off the radio. It's the Frank Skinner Podcast, don't you know? 00:14 That was based on an old tradition, that opening, in Birmingham when I was growing up. There used to be blokes who... They did tunes that didn't exist. 00:27 Really? 00:28 Yeah. So it'd be folks who just were constantly... 00:34 They might have come up with, for all we know, they might have come up with some really brilliant tunes that could have been developed into something, you know, memorable. 00:43 Why didn't they sing known material? I don't know. 00:46 I don't know if it was a copyright issue. They were very, very anxious about copyrights. They were rigorous, weren't they, about the trademark? 00:54 Yeah, exactly. 00:56 They were very, very tight on it. So they were just to play careful. They used their own library music. 01:03 Did you have any family members who'd do that? 01:07 No. I had a tour manager who used to do it. 01:09 What did he do then? 01:10 That was it. He would just go... Be in the car. 01:16 Would you say, what are you singing? 01:19 I did say to him, I don't... 01:21 Why are you doing that? Is that a tune? He goes, no. And then I wrote a book about that tour. 01:29 Oh, yes. 01:29 And I wrote about it in the book and it drove me fucking insane. 01:33 And did he contact you? 01:35 He did. And I said, it's like antibiotics, this book. You need to read the whole thing before you make the judgment on it. Because I grow to steadily love him as the tour goes on. 01:45 So did he initially say I was a bit upset that you wrote this? 01:48 Yeah, he did. 01:49 So did he read the book? 01:49 I sent him the book, but I did write in it. 01:53 I sent him the book? 01:54 Yeah, I thought it was best to get it out there. 01:58 Did he ever get back in touch and say, do you know what, I've now read this? 02:02 Yes, he did. Oh, that's good. And he said it was quite nice. 02:05 Oh. 02:06 And he used to say Sonny a lot as well. So he'd say right off to Sonny Sheffield. Oh, yeah. 02:13 I used to work at... 02:16 I used to work at, it was like a council house. 02:20 I used to live in a council house. That's any good to you. 02:23 What do you call it? Like a place that looks after council houses. I can't remember what it's called. And the head office. 02:29 What is it, Frank? 02:30 Housing Association. Yeah, okay. I used to work there in West Brom. And the head office was in Speak. 02:36 And every month we'd get like a roundup and an email about what's been going on at the company. And it would always open with, greetings from sunny speak. 02:45 It's obviously a thing. 02:48 It used to make me cringe. And it was never sunny there. 02:52 He also used to call Stratford-upon-Ivon, Stratford-upon-Ivon. He never missed the trick. 03:00 Would you pick him up on those things, Frank, when he said... So let's say it's happened the first time, then you get to Town 5, and he said off to Sunny, Solihull or whatever. At that point, are you picking him up on that, be honest? 03:13 Well, I mean, on that particular tour, I don't think I had a support act. So it was just me and him in a car for hours and miles, you know, in the early hours of the morning. So you have to try and keep it a little bit... 03:30 But I think I did bring up... 03:35 It's the most Curb Your Enthusiasm plot line I've ever heard in my life. 03:40 There's so many tunes available. That's what I've got about it. That's millions of written shit. And it's fine. No one's going to pull you up on it. You could have, you know, Beethoven, but instead you've gone for... 03:55 There's a creativity to it. 03:57 There is. I do think if you did it long enough, someone would. You know, it's like the thing about monkeys. If you left them in a room with typewriters, they'd eventually type complete works of Shakespeare. Yeah. It can't be right, can it? 04:17 The monkeys would type Shakespeare. 04:19 That's the idea. 04:20 I do believe that. 04:21 Do you? 04:21 Yeah, because I watch a lot of Simeon documentaries. 04:24 Okay. 04:25 I'm quite obsessed, and I really think it's terrifying. 04:29 How many words a minute do they do, generally? 04:32 Bear in mind they can use their feet as well. 04:34 They haven't got on to typing yet. 04:37 Okay. 04:39 But some of the... Because their bombs look like robbers, don't they? They look like they could erase with their bombs. 04:45 I mean, I wouldn't say typing is something I'd associate with them. But what I do find fascinating is how sophisticated their emotions... I mean, normally anger is what I would say. They're very vengeful, the Simeon community. 04:58 Yeah, I would say like five acts of blank verse is quite a step on from swinging on a tyre. 05:07 You know what I mean? Okay, they're on a tyre. They haven't even set that up themselves. Someone's had to do that for them. As far as I know, I've never seen them erecting a tyre rope thing at the monkey house. 05:20 No, but you do see with the gorillas. Remember Coco? She loved Robin Williams. She cried when he died. Robin Williams. 05:27 Oh, OK. Have you never seen the monkey footage? She cried when Robin Williams died. 05:31 She got to know him very well. He became friends with her. I watched that once a week, that clip. I didn't know that. And the trainer says Robin is no longer here and shows him the video. 05:41 Why tell her? 05:42 Yeah. 05:43 Say he's filming. She wouldn't fucking remember. 05:47 I can see why she'd get on with Robin Williams. He was a hairy man, wasn't he? 05:52 Oh, he got on so well. I'm going to send you this clip. You're going to cry. He got on so well with this monkey. And then I think you're right, Frank. I've never thought about that. Why did the trainer tell her? 06:02 Because some people are like that. 06:05 anecdote was burning a hole in the trainer's pocket she held up the video and said robin dies robin is dead she's got a video what do you mean she held up the video with a photograph of robin on the cover of it was jumanji whatever the film he was in she did it and then she does crying emotion crying signs with her eyes like but you're right that's telling coco you this is sad and she did like a sleeping robin's dead it was very sad 06:31 I wouldn't have got a Jumanji. I don't know about you. I've got a Jumanji. Wild animals are seen as quite menacing. 06:38 Do you know, I've never seen Jumanji because I was too old when it came out and I had no children to take. And going to watch that as a 30-whatever-year-old woman is downright sad. 06:46 No, but it's on the telly. 06:47 Oh, is it? 06:48 Who'd know? Oh, yeah, that's true. We wouldn't tell anyone. 06:51 Oh, thank you, Frank. I appreciate that. 06:52 It's got a brilliant theme tune. 06:54 Has it? What is it? What's it about, Jumanji? 06:56 Animals? It goes, duh, duh. Duh, duh, duh, duh. 07:02 My old tour manager. 07:06 Can you imagine if you saw a Steven Spielberg film and suddenly you heard a John Williams music start going... And now we're off to Sonny Jumanji. 07:22 Like the Star Wars. 07:24 I'll tell you what it is. The Robin Williams film is good, but the new ones, the Karen Gillan, Jack Black of Jumanjis, are fucking brilliant. Is she the one from Doctor Who? Yeah. They're really funny. Okay. Properly funny. 07:42 Okay, maybe I'll watch those. 07:43 I'd recommend those, Steph. 07:44 Anyway, my point is, having seen Coco, and I'm not exaggerating with that, Frank. People often exaggerate, oh, once a week. I genuinely do. I find it very soothing and calming watching Coco. I watch it very regularly. I would say the level of sophistication there is extraordinary. I don't know about Shakespeare. I don't know about Shakespeare plays. Possibly a Geoffrey Archer novel. 08:05 No. 08:07 Okay? 08:07 No. 08:09 Anyway, yeah, I mean, I find that very odd. How did she even know Robin Williams? 08:15 Because Robin Williams had come to visit Coco many times. Why? They'd formed a friendship because he was a celebrity. Everyone was obsessed by Coco, except for you, it seems. 08:25 I've never heard of. 08:26 You don't know Coco, the gorilla? 08:27 I remember Washoe the chimpanzee. Washoe? 08:30 Washoe? Washoe? 08:33 Washoe? Washoe was a chimpanzee who was taught sign language. Washoe? 08:38 When was this? Washoe? 08:40 I interviewed... Washoe! I don't know if you'd call them their owners. I interviewed her assistants. 08:47 The assistants? 08:48 At my chat show, yeah. The gorilla had an assistant. She was a chimpanzee. 08:53 Okay. 08:54 Washoe. 08:55 I don't know about Washoe. Washoe was... I remember Washoe's... You're talking about Robin Williams. Washoe's baby died and she was sitting really glom at the corner of the cage and when he said, what's wrong, Washoe? She did a, you know, when you swing your arms like footballers do, let's just had a new baby, a cradley. She did that and then did that mark of a tear running down her eye. That was properly. 09:18 Oh, don't. Well, that's what Coco did. 09:20 I know, but with gorillas, it's not the same, is it? 09:25 Why do you say that? 09:26 They're more brutal, I think. 09:28 No, not Coco. I'm going to make you watch some of this, Coco. Honestly, some of the people she interacted with. I mean, she did like celebrities. I won't lie. She was a little bit, you know, shallow in that respect. 09:39 I wonder what she picked up from Robin Williams. 09:42 Every time she made a mistake, she went, whoa, dopey me! 09:50 Anyway, what else? 09:52 Oh, dear. What's Ruth been up to? Yeah, Ruth. Well, I went back to the black country to do... It's a bit of a retro experience because I went to get some keys cut. 10:02 Oh, I thought it's because she went to the black concert. Oh, yeah, exactly. Talking about outdated views. Oh, I love getting keys. 10:07 Oh, yeah. 10:08 Did you get a sports trophy while you were in there? 10:11 Oh, yeah. No, because my mum insisted that I take them to B&Q and you put them in a little machine. Have you done it where you pop it in the machine? 10:17 Oh, you did it yourself? 10:18 Yeah. Have you ever done it? 10:19 Oh, I need a man with an apron to do that for me. Yeah. I love an apron man. 10:24 Yeah, well, I ended up, so I put these two keys in and it said, buy two keys, you get the third one free. I put the third one into the backdoor key and it said, oh, we can't cut this. And I was like, oh, okay. So I took the keys away and took it to a man with an apron. 10:38 Was it a Bannam? 10:39 A banham? 10:40 They won't cut a banham. 10:42 Oh, I think it might have been a banham. 10:43 I think a banham is high security and you can't just cut them willy-nilly. 10:47 It wasn't just a job. It definitely wasn't high security, this key. And I took it to the man with the apron and I said, can you cut this key for me? And he looked at me and was like, oh, no, no, no. No, I can't cut this one. And I was like, oh, why? And he went, it's just a very old key. 11:01 Really? 11:02 Yeah, it's just very old. So he couldn't cut it. 11:05 He couldn't cut it as an individual. 11:07 No, it's just very old. So that means you can't get in. What about Dracula's castle? That's old. 11:13 What's one of those massive keys like that, like the popass on his chest? 11:18 I'd say it's one of them where it's like a long, like a backdoor key, like a long one. So yeah, you couldn't do that. But anyway, that's not the point. Is it almost like what I call a nursery rhyme key? Yes, very much so. Do you know what I mean? A big comedy key. 11:32 Yeah, but that's terrible to know that you could be using a key at home which is no longer reproducible. 11:38 Yeah. Hang on to it for dear life, I say. Might be worth something. 11:42 Oh, my wife always says that'll be worth thousands. About anything. 11:46 Yeah. 11:46 Anything old. It never is. Four magazines in a drawer, that'll be worth a fortune. 11:50 Do you know, I've dug out all the stamps. My parents' friends always bought us stamps. I don't know if you heard that, where they used to buy a sort of the first edition of Beatrix Potter or things like that. And you think, oh, wow, these will be worth a fortune, they tell you. They're worth nothing. 12:04 I remember David Baddiel's mom bought him a sheet of Marilyn Monroe stamps when he was about 45. I never worked that out. 12:15 I saw some, it was like limited edition Coronation Street ones. Oh, yeah. Ken and Deidre and Vera. 12:20 No, we always got bought Wind in the Willows, Beatrix Potter. You get the point. 12:25 Boz has got the Iron Maiden first day covers. 12:29 Oh, well, that's cool. 12:29 Oh, yeah, that's good. 12:31 So what happened? So can you get into this property now? 12:33 Well, I got the front door keys cut, but just got to keep the back door key now. There's just one. 12:39 That's it? I couldn't live like that. 12:41 Unless I go to another key cutting place and see. But I went there. But more importantly, I'm bearing gifts because I went to Teddy Gray's, which is the sweet shop. And I've got, I have in my hand. 12:55 Have you got herbal lozenges? 12:56 I've got herbal lozenges. Hooray. Well, I've got, hold on one second. 13:02 In an Oliver bonus bag. 13:04 So everyone thinks I'm middle class. 13:05 I used to work with his brother, Brucie. 13:08 Oh, crying. So I've got Herbal Lozenges Extra Strong. 13:12 Oh, I didn't know there wasn't Extra Strong. You know what's great about these? They've got Doddley Castle on them. 13:17 Exactly. Oh, that's so adorable. 13:19 Right next to the zoo. 13:20 And I've got some regular Herbal Lozenges. 13:24 I said to Andrew... God, these are deluxe Herbal Lozenges. 13:29 I said, what do you recommend? I'm going to get some lozenges. What else do you recommend? She said, have you tried herbal candy? So I've got herbal candy for you as well. 13:40 Oh, fantastic. 13:41 They're like the tackies, the sweet tackies. That's so nice. Did I get anything? For the ladies, because I think lozenges are disgusting. 13:48 Did you say, I've got another friend who's very sheltered and spent most of her life in North London. 13:54 The word lozenge just virtually disappeared in the South East. When's the last time you went into a shop and said, you got any lozenges? 14:06 She won't like a herbal lozenge. So I've got these ones. She said, I said, what can I get for the ladies? And she gave me jelly babies and strawberries and cream. Strawberries and cream is lovely. 14:15 So there we go. Jelly babies, of course, classic Doctor Who suite. Are they? All the doctors. Well, since Tom Baker have carried them. That's incredible. 14:22 Incredibly kind of you. And look, isn't this adorable, the bags they do up there? 14:26 That's lovely. 14:27 I took loads of them. What's that? 14:28 A castle? That's Dudley Castle. You remember we talked about Dudley Zoo? Yeah, well, that's right next to the castle. 14:34 I might go to Dudley. I think I'll like it. And it says, for goodness sake, Teddy Graves. And makers of the world famous herbal. 14:41 I think that was where Paul... 14:47 Paul Hollywood? McKenna? 14:49 Vince? 14:50 Young? Paul Young used to leave his wimple. 14:54 Listen to the last podcast if you want to understand. 14:57 How terrible that I forgot Paul Young so soon after I mentioned him in the last one. 15:02 That's right. But while I was in there. 15:04 He's not around. It was the word Young. 15:07 So we're deeply ironic about forgetting that, isn't it? 15:12 Oh, did you hear talking of Birmingham? Did you hear Joe Lysett talking this week about Birmingham? He said he still lives there and he prefers it. 15:20 Yeah, he's a great champion of Birmingham. 15:22 Well, did you hear one of the reasons he gives? I don't know how well this is going to go down. Oh, I did see this, Saraya. I think you maybe need to say it. I'm not sure I can. Do you see what I mean, Ruth? Yes, I do. 15:32 You and Frank can say this. 15:33 He's not woken by the sound of bins being collected. 15:37 No, he said... What he likes about Birmingham is when he gets off... When he's in Birmingham, everyone's very unattractive. When he goes to London and he gets off the train, Joe suddenly feels like, oh, there's a lot of hotties here in London. So he goes in London, he's like a what? Like a five or something? Four. He said he feels ugly in London. But when he comes to Birmingham, he feels like an eight. Yes. 15:59 What do you think of that? 16:01 I'm not sure about that. 16:02 I'm not sure about that. 16:03 I remember we... 16:05 I actually don't think it's true either. 16:07 We were, no, I don't. We were loads of ugly people in London. Come with me now. Come on the page. I'll take you around to the street. Let me take you by the hand. I bet you I can find 12 in the first minute. 16:19 I'll show you something that'll make you change your mind. 16:24 No, I don't agree with that. We were filming for Fantasy Football, which is a TV show I did before the old king died. 16:35 And I remember the producer, we flew from Milan to Munich. And the producer said, this is brilliant. When we were in Milan airport, we were the least well-dressed. And now we've become, in Munich, the height of fashion. So it can happen. I remember looking at the Everton fan site. 17:00 We were about to play Everton and the thing said, what you need to know about West Brom fans, the Everton thing. And he said, all West Brom fans look about 52, even the children. 17:21 Oh, I love a toddler who looks 52. It's my favourite. I think there's a grain of truth to that, isn't there? 17:26 But that's lovely. 17:30 Thank you for the sweets. Oh, that's okay. The old traditional bag. For some reason, the lozenges always had an Airedale, a black and white photograph of an Airedale. 17:40 Oh, the dog? 17:41 Yeah, the dog. 17:42 Yeah, it's still on the back of the, it's in the shop. 17:45 Yeah. 17:46 And it's on their website. Teddy Gray's got a website. 17:49 What? 17:49 Yes. 17:51 But while I was in there, I meant to say, they were talking to me about what I was buying the sweets for. So obviously I mentioned Frank. Oh, yeah. And this guy called Ian. Did he go wild, Ian? Oh, yeah. He goes, oh, he goes, my favourite. This is your legacy, Frank. He goes, my favourite. He goes, look, Frank's going to. He says, do you remember that? He goes, it might be before your time, actually. Do you remember when he was dancing in his pants? Yeah, they love that. He goes, oh, God, I love that. Watch that so much. Oh, it's brilliant. 18:20 Watched that so much. Yeah, watched it so much. I mean, I can understand watch it once, but watched it so much. 18:25 No, it was. 18:28 I remember saying to the producer, so what happens is we play the Venga Boys and then I dance in my white pants. 18:37 Was it your idea? 18:38 Yeah, because it literally happened. I got out of the bath, I put my pants on and the Venga Boys were on the radio and I started dancing. I looked in the mirror and burst out laughing at myself. 18:50 Is that why you did it? I didn't know that. 18:52 So I said to him, so it's me in my pants dancing to this music. He said, right, okay. And he was writing it down. Then he looked up at me for the rest of it. I said, no, that's it. 19:03 Was it on your chat show or was it on Fantasy Football? 19:05 No, it was on my chat show. 19:06 Yeah, because Dave would have done it as well. He would have had to have done it as well. It would have been both of you, but it was just you. 19:13 I watched it again, re-watched it, just to refresh my memory before today. And I went through some of the comments and people were saying how great it was. They've watched it a hundred times. And someone said, you showed it to Germaine Greer. 19:29 I did. 19:29 And she was confused. You showed that to Germaine Greer? Are you actually kidding me? 19:35 I was ready for her response because I then had a picture of me done up as Shakespeare. Oh. We're like Shakespearean knickerbockers on. Hang on. 19:46 You showed it to Jermaine Greer. I did. On the chat show, what did she say? She just said, what are you doing, Frank? 19:53 Exactly. 19:55 I don't understand that. 19:57 So in the comments it says the Shakespeare thing. You ask her if Shakespeare's ever done anything as funny as you dancing in your pants. And she says, oh yeah, definitely funnier than that. And then you showed the video with Frank dressed as Shakespeare. Oh, that's good. 20:12 Really good stuff. She said to me that, she said, I like to put three hours or so aside each day to just sit and think. 20:24 Think I sound like Hulk Hogan. 20:25 I don't do anything. I just think. 20:30 Oh, yeah, Paul Hogan. I said Hulk Hogan. I got my own, he got his own back. I tried to put him down and said, oh, make us sound like Hulk Hogan. And I actually got it wrong. I completely humiliated. 20:41 Hoist. 20:42 Hoist. 20:43 Boy around, pet on. 20:44 Well, we know you enjoy that, Frank, occasionally on a weekend. 20:48 That's not enough. 20:50 What's that? 20:51 Of being hoist. We know you've enjoyed that in the past with the S&M community. 20:56 Oh, I see. 20:58 Have you ever been to a nightclub called Hoist? There was one, wasn't there? I don't know. Yeah, I do. Some friends of mine used to go. I said, I'm not going to hoist. I didn't think it sounded very me. 21:08 It sounds all right. That sounds very uplifting. 21:12 That's the one they told me. They said, if you go to Hoist, you have to put all your clothes in a black bin liner when you get in. I said, how do you buy a drink? You know, and they said, everyone is naked. 21:23 Yes. 21:23 You walk in, there's a black bin bag and there's a man. I said, there's the man at the desk. I'm assuming it's a man. I wasn't wrong. 21:29 You're sure it's not a laundrette. 21:34 No, he said, it's very easy. You hand over the back. I said, I don't want to get my clothes over. He said, well, you could probably wear a bikini. You wouldn't have to. But everyone has to hand over the clothes because it's sort of egalitarian then. It starts to feel exposing if somebody's got clothes on. 21:49 Yeah. I don't think. Fancy that. 21:53 You don't fancy hoist? 21:54 No. 21:55 Okay. 21:56 That wasn't Pissing Billy, was it? Pissing Billy was in Berlin. No, that was something else. That was in Berlin, yeah. Yeah. Okay. You could understand him not wearing clothes and having to be in line with him. 22:09 That's fair enough. 22:11 I mean, if I was him, I think I'd have had a J-cloth and so on. Swoffy. 22:16 I do love a gay club. Hoist was a bit extreme for me, but I just do love the playlist. It's my kind of music. Best song I ever heard at a gay club. 22:25 Go on. 22:26 The DJ played the theme music to Grange Hill, which is the campest thing I've ever danced to. Do people dance to it? Yeah. 22:33 Yeah, it was great. Or did it go... 22:52 Oh, man. I went to see Metallica on the road again. Well, you know I've got a soft spot. Have you? 23:01 Yes, I have. Ever since I saw that amazing documentary, Some Kind of Monster, I became a bit obsessed by James, the lead singer, the one I like, Frank, I think. Is it James? James Hetfield. Yeah, I like James. And I saw them on Apple Vision Pro, their gig. You can see a sort of experience of it where it's kind of immersive. 23:19 Did you go and see them live then? 23:21 Well, no, I went to, first of all, we queued 40 minutes in Hackney to get into their pop-up shop. 23:30 It's become a thing now, the band pop-up shop. Yeah. 23:35 Boz went to the Blink 1821 and there's a system of a down pop-up shop. Anyway, so we went there and they had things like, they had a beach ball for 35 quid. The great thing about the metal element to this is it was black. 23:52 Oh, lovely. 23:53 I mean, a black beach ball. A black beach ball. Just really absorbing heat on the beach. 23:59 Horrible. I've been scalded by the goth ball. 24:05 35 quid for a black beach ball. 24:10 So they had Doc Martens, 160 quid. 24:13 Is that reasonable? Shoes are expensive. 24:17 Shoes rather than boots. 24:18 Yeah. 24:19 Oh, shoes. I would say for branded stuff. It's a little on the punchy side, but this is Metallica. 24:26 Someone told me a story the other day about their cobbler. Cobbler? Who are they? 24:36 The Pied Piper? 24:37 I was talking to Daniel Day-Lewis. 24:41 Are they from 1382? 24:43 No, he's got a regular cobbler. And he does Doc Martens. And apparently he got a, what do they call those letters? Something and desist or whatever. 24:53 Cease and desist. 24:54 Cease and desist. Copyright. From Doc Martens saying, we repair. 24:58 What, Martin Clunes? 25:01 He's got a bit aggressive, Martin Clunes. 25:02 Yeah, he always had it in him. 25:05 I never knew that was a pun on Doc Martens. But it is, isn't it? So why did they make the pond, Frank? 25:10 No, but there was another Doc. Wasn't there a Doc Martin dog? 25:14 There wasn't. 25:16 Oh, no. 25:16 Was that something else? 25:17 I don't know. 25:19 Bob Martin, I think that might have been. 25:20 Oh, no, but that was unfortunate because it was, yeah. 25:23 What? 25:24 Oh, I'm lost now. 25:26 I'm totally lost. 25:26 The person in it has been not without scandal. 25:30 No, I'm on about Bob Martin dog drugs. 25:33 Oh, I'm talking about the show. 25:35 I don't want you casting shade on Bob Martin's... I can't remember what they were anyway. 25:41 Anyway, let's go back to the cobbler and the merchandise. We've got a black beach ball. We've got Dot Martins. 25:47 So then we went. Kirk Hammett, who is the guitarist in Metallica, was doing a Q&A at a place called Hackney Earth. I don't know if you remember. I went there before and had to sit on a fucking wooden floor. 26:01 I did the same. 26:01 On my bony old arse. 26:03 I went with your wife and your sister-in-law. My back was in agony for three days. 26:07 Why did they make you sit on the floor? Then we found out after. It was a bit like Wimbledon. You can hire a cushion. And we didn't find out till after. 26:17 How was Kirk? Kirk was great. But it was like one of those days when it was like 34 degrees. And there was no air con in Hackney Earth. It was... It was fucking steep. It was really hot. And I don't mind, at my age, I don't mind a bit of intense heat. 26:38 And also there's a lot of black being worn as well, absorbing the heat. 26:42 There's a guy next to me and he said, oh, Frank Skinner, great to see you. And he said, how many times have you seen Metallica? That was the first question. I said, I've seen them twice. He said, I've seen them eight times. No, it'll be nine tomorrow. You going tomorrow? I said, no, no, we're not going. He didn't speak to me again. 27:01 Oh, he was one of the super fans. 27:02 I like... Is it Lars, the drummer? Oh, yeah. I'm a big fan of his. I like Lars. So... He gets a lot of... This is not a pun. 27:11 He gets a lot of stick. Lars. People sort of say, well, you know... Like people used to talk about Ringo. 27:18 I think, is it because Lars and James used to fight quite a bit? 27:21 No, I think it's about his drumming, but I can't feel anything wrong with it at all. 27:26 I think he's wonderfully creative. 27:28 I don't know. Anyway, it was really hot. And on stage they were saying, God, it's really hot in here tonight. Look at him, it had got like skinny jeans on. 27:40 A leather jacket and a scarf. He had a fucking scarf on. And, of course, he had shades on throughout. Of course. But I thought, everybody was like, oh, God. You know, there's a lot of big men in there, you know, and they were putting as much fluid in as they could. 27:57 A lot of beards as well. 27:58 Yeah. Yeah. 28:00 And then he had his guitars on stage and he talked about Peter Green. Do you know who that is? Who was in Fleetwood Mac. 28:10 Oh, yeah. 28:10 And he's got an old guitar of his, which he paid a fortune for, which he calls Greeny because it was played by. Then he finally got to meet Peter Green. And he said, this is, you know, your old guitar. And Peter Green said, no, I think mine was more red. 28:30 And he said, no, this is definitely, I know, because I bought it. And he goes, no, I don't think it's mine. 28:36 Oh, no. 28:37 Which is what Ringo did to me. I showed him some autograph. Did he? I didn't know that. And he said, no, I don't think those are real. 28:45 Did he? 28:45 I said, look, it's written on the menu of a Bahamas flight that the Beatles were on. 28:52 Of course it is real. 28:53 And he said, no, no, I don't think so. LAUGHTER 28:58 Oh, he's always nice, isn't he? Well, he probably just does that. 29:02 And he had the Boris Karloff guitar, which is a famous guitar of his, which has a big picture of Boris Karloff as the monster. Oh, OK. Not as the monster, as the mummy, I think. 29:11 Yeah, the mummy, yeah. 29:14 Married six times, I think, Boris Karloff. 29:16 Boris Karloff? Yeah. 29:19 A lot of that scarring you see on the monster face is actually from Rice. Yeah. 29:24 Oh, God. Six times. Wow. They didn't have therapy in those days, so I think they didn't understand. They just kept thinking, oh, I'll have a new start. They didn't realise. 29:37 But there was a great moment when the bloke said, the interviewer said, how many guitars have you got, Kirk? He said, well, you know, I don't play them all, but I've got... He said, how many have you got there? He said, well... 29:50 And then he said, Steve, call to some bloke. He said, how many guitars? He's slightly embarrassed. And the bloke said, it's... 29:59 He said, oh, yeah, OK. He said, well, how many is it? He said, I've got 492. 30:08 Oh, Steve's done. Wow. 492. I was going to say 10. Yeah. 30:13 And then he said, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to phone Rob, right? Rob is the bass player. He said, I'm going to phone Rob. And we all got excited. We thought we'd hear Rob. 30:23 Is he the one, Frank, who joined? He's the most recent member to join. 30:26 He's been in a long time. 30:27 He's been a long time, but in some kind of monster, he was hired around that time. Yeah. Yeah. 30:33 Someone was telling me recently that when he was hired, they said, right, we just want to tell you, you've got the job. You're the new bass player for Metallica. And he started going, oh. 30:47 Like really not hiding it at all. And they said, there's another thing. And he's going, oh, wow, wow. And they said, we haven't told you the other thing. And he's still going, oh. And they said, we're going to give you a signing on fee of a million dollars. 31:03 Oh, it's so lovely. And then he was going, oh. 31:07 Oh, man. He is really good, though. So they got him on speakerphone and he says, where are you, Rob? And he said, I'm in the taco place. 31:16 And he said, you're still in there, Rob? And he said, well, I've left there now. 31:21 I'm not there anymore. So where are you, Rob? He said, I'm here. 31:25 And he suddenly walked out with the bass on. 31:27 Did Kurt not know he was there then? Yeah, they'd set it all up. Oh, Kurt did. 31:31 He said, you know, I'd just been to attack. I just had, I forgot I had the bass around my neck. And they played. It was brilliant. And he's one of those blokes. You know, they say there's two ways to wear a guitar. You wear it high up and then you hold it as if you're cradling a beautiful woman. Yeah. 31:50 With the slim hips and all the rest. 31:52 Oh, I love it. 31:53 Or if you hold it lower down, it's like a massive penis extension. 31:56 Oh, no. I didn't know that. 31:58 I mean, I love them, but that's quite 90s. 32:01 You pay your money. But Rob is very much, it's a long strap. 32:07 So I've heard. On Rob's base. 32:10 Tell him to call me. 32:12 Apparently he used to perform with Ozzy Osbourne, which is lovely, before he joined Metallica. That was one of the themes of, which if you haven't seen, I so recommend Some Kind of Monster. I think Buzz would like it now. I feel he's ready for that film. 32:25 Yeah, I've seen it. Yeah, it's extraordinary. Recommend it. 32:28 Is there a monster in it? 32:29 No, but it was the name of the album. 32:31 I would say there is. I think there is. 32:32 I think you're right, actually. I think you're right. And it's The Therapist. 32:36 But the weird thing is that you get a sense of a band sort of in crisis. There are all sorts of problems. And then the album, everyone says, was brilliant. One of their best albums. Oh, yeah. 32:50 Yeah. But it's a great thing with the therapist who becomes a great story in it because you sort of realise he keeps, they say, well, we think we've worked through this and we're okay. No, no, I think you still, there's still so much more we can do. And then Metallica starts saying, how much are we paying? 33:07 Yeah, it was like Elvis's hairdresser they discovered was giving him spiritual counsellors. 33:15 And it made the other guys very sort of wary of him. And him and Elvis, you know, he'd give Elvis a trim. Yeah. And then he'd talk about the Eastern deities and stuff with him, which I find they just talk to me about how they've just been to Ibiza. 33:37 So it's all changed over the years. 33:41 Frank, may I share this with you from David Lewis? Yes. I don't know if he's related to Martin. You never know. Seems so. 33:49 It's a shot in the dark. 33:49 It is a bit of a shot in the dark. One step away from you. 33:54 Come on, carry on. 33:56 I am a long-time listener, originally from North Wales, Wrexham, who's lived in China since 2009 and I just want you to know how your show has become an excellent English listening tool over here. 34:11 My wife, who is Chinese... Haven't they got enough listening tools over here? 34:18 My wife, who is Chinese, and our children, I think he's speaking specifically about his family experience, love listening to your podcast every week in the car. I know this sounds like praise, and I'm not being a bit Capital Radio, like, we love the show. I just think it's very interesting. Specifically, it's an interesting language tool for the children. I wonder why they've settled on your show. 34:39 Well, I suppose listening to a language, even in a strange accent. 34:44 Well, it is a strange accent. And they listened to it constantly recently during a two-day road trip to Hong Kong. 34:52 Goodness. 34:53 Yes. 34:54 And so David Lewis says, I genuinely feel that Frank should be an official learning material for English language learning around the world. 35:05 Well, you were an English teacher, of course. But also they used an extract from my autobiography in a mock exam English paper. 35:15 I wonder which one it was. Do you know which one it was? 35:17 What, the extract? Yeah. Yeah, it was me as a child going to the top of my garden and screaming as loud as I could at night. And it says things like, how does Frank Skinner create the atmosphere of being all alone? You know, those comprehension questions. It's got all that stuff on it. I would have been quite thrilled if I'd have seen that. Oh, I'm thrilled by almost everything. 35:44 Okay. It's good to know. 35:45 Yeah. 35:46 How are we going to end it now? I feel like we should end it. I don't really know what to say, Frank. You got anything you want to say? 35:53 Well, I've got something I have to say. What is it? The next episode of Frank Skinner's Radio Days is out on Wednesday. 36:01 Emily's been to see Blythe Spirit. 36:04 Oh, yeah. Okay. 36:06 I'm telling everyone about my daydreams. That'll be interesting. 36:10 That sounds awful. 36:11 Yeah. 36:12 I hate daydreams. 36:12 I can't listen to this one. 36:14 It's the worst thing you've ever done. 36:16 Yeah. Is that like when I... My daydream's like when I'm on the... Toilet. I used to be on the toilet being interviewed by Michael Parkinson. You did. 36:25 Or you played for Barcelona. 36:26 Yeah. And managed. 36:28 Yeah, you managed and managed. 36:30 That daydream lasted so long that I retired and started managing. 36:34 Tell you what else must have lasted long. 36:36 Yeah. 36:36 Might want to leave it a while. 36:38 It was an instalment. 36:41 Yeah, it wasn't all in one go. But yeah, I got so many years that I actually quit playing. 36:48 You know that's what he used to do, fantasise. He calls it a daydream. 36:51 Oh, that's Ruth, what she knows about me. Oh, yeah, I knew that. Best not to know. 36:57 So, and the team make a bet on whether Boz will become a successful comedian by 25. Hmm. 37:06 Well, I'm sure at 25 you'll be already well established. Okay, so that's it for another episode. 37:15 I'm going to have some of these sweets, Frank. 37:17 Yeah, me too. I'm going to try the supersonic lozenge. 37:22 Oh, okay. A bit wonderful, isn't it? Don't go down the gaga route. 37:26 I seem to remember a line from an old movie where someone slips a pill into a bloke's drink and it knocks him out. 37:38 A bit problematic. 37:40 Yeah. And the guy, one of the guys who did it, he said he's gone to sleep quick and he said, I remember exactly what he said, That lozenge would have stopped Godzilla's clock. 37:57 So that's live with me. 38:00 It would be a good thing, people sending in really obscure quotes they remember from films. 38:05 I would love that. 38:06 But not the ones you get on the internet. No, no. Really odd ones. 38:09 We don't want love means never having to say you're sorry or anything. 38:13 No, or nobody puts baby in the corner. 38:15 No, we want really obscure ones. I love that, Frank. 38:18 Yeah, let's see if we get any. My guess is no. 38:22 Oh, don't be so negative. Eat your Birmingham sweets. 38:26 Okay. 38:31 It's the Frank Skinner podcast. 38:36 A new winter change is blowing. It's the Frank Skinner podcast. 38:43 I'm not totally sure how it's going. 38:47 Thanks for listening to the podcast. Make sure to like and follow so you never miss an episode. And if you want to get in touch, you can email the podcast via frankofftheradio at avalonuk.com.