Station to Station: Radio David Byrne is in tune with the digital age Despite the fact that I don't own one single bit of his music, know nothing about him and have never seen him perform, I have always been a little bit obsessed with David Byrne – particularly his hair. I realise this fits the profile for a typical stalker, but Mr Byrne needn't worry; stalking is time-consuming and I haven't even watched the first series of The Wire yet. Imagine my delight several years ago when, while gleaning all the latest Byrne news on his official website, I noticed an innovation – he had his own radio station. Not just that, but it also goes by the excellent name Radio David Byrne. You can listen to it on his website, or find it in the eclectic section of iTunes radio. In my tiny little brain, I imagined the former Talking Heads singer broadcasting from his garden shed, talking to his listeners about the stuff occupying his mind. Perhaps the station would feature the occasional documentary on Japanese typography, a phone-in on how hard it is to open vacuum-sealed pitta bread, and an impossibly difficult quiz show. Friends like Brian Eno and David Bowie would be taking charge of the wacky breakfast show slot (The Laughing Gnomes); David Lynch would drop in to read the weather, and here's Peter Gabriel, with the traffic. How ridiculous. David Byrne wouldn't have a shed. Somewhat disappointingly, Radio David Byrne is in actual fact a couple of hours of new music from various artists Byrne likes, on an MP3 stream that's updated every month. For anyone obsessed with Byrne, those merely curious, and even the utterly disinterested, his selections always throw up an exotic surprise or two amid more expected leftfield artists of the moment, such as Bon Iver and St Vincent. For someone as busy as Byrne (although I bet he's seen series one of The Wire), compiling two hours of new music is an admirable commitment. It would be great if more artists attempted this, so we could sample their current listening pleasures, too. Perhaps vanity radio stations are the future, and at some stage every celebrity will have their own radio station – just as they currently have their own perfumes and clothing lines. It would at least satisfy a small element of our craving to discover what celebrities are consuming (apart from themselves). TV viewers can get a nostalgia fix any time they like, but the same pleasure is seldom afforded to those with radio memories. Should vanity stations extend to everyone – and I realise they kind of already do with live365 and Spotify mixes – then it would be wonderful if it coincided with the opening up of radio archives, so we could pick and choose classic radio broadcasts in the same way as people cut and paste their favourite music. If that day was to arrive and you could play the role of station controller, with the ability to pick from any radio show, present or past, commercial or public-funded, how would you fill your day?
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