HUGH MacDONALD INTERVIEW
VIPOND BANGS THE DRUM FOR PRO14
THIS is how he rocks. ‘I was doing the Commonwealth Games for BBC3 and had just finished a five-and-a-half hour live broadcast. I grabbed a taxi to Hampden, did a sound check and appeared on the same stage as Lulu and Kylie.’
This is how he rolls. ‘I have my eyes on a Norwegian bike race. Basically, it’s a midnight sun sort of thing, a 100-mile ride through the night.’
Dougie Vipond, father, cyclist, triathlete, Deacon Blue drummer, presenter of The
Adventure Show and Landward, veteran of the Holiday programme, has a new gig. He will be the Scottish voice of Premier Sports’ Guinness Pro14 coverage. It is another step on a journey that has unusual signposts.
The Hampden date was the closing ceremony for the 2014 Commonwealth Games. The cycle in Norway is one for the future. The diary for late August, early September is typical for Vipond, exhausting just to read for the casual observer.
This week, he has been fishing off Stonehaven for mackerel, picking broadbeans in Kirriemuir, and cooking with Nick Nairn. This weekend, he heads to the Hebrides to report on Heb, described as a ‘race on the edge’ but basically masochism in shorts and on the isles. All of the above will be captured on film for
Landward and The Adventure Show. In November, he will embark on a two-month British tour with Deacon Blue that will take in such venues as the SSE Hydro and the Hammersmith Odeon.
Oh, and next Friday he will be at Scotstoun to commentate on Glasgow Warriors’ clash with Munster.
At 51, he seems to adhere to the rock and roll motif of living fast. He is, also, splendidly self-deprecating.
‘I was known as Sport Billy on Deacon Blue tours,’ he says. ‘I was always phoning ahead to hotels to see if there were places I could play basketball, volleyball, football, whatever. It’s ridiculous. There are actual letters to the band from hotels praising us for our behaviour. Shameful.’
If his career as a musician, his passion as an amateur sportsman and his ubiquity as a professional broadcaster seem to form a crazily multi-faceted mosaic, there is one theme that shines brightly and clearly. Vipond, the man of many jobs, is a worker.
This truth emerges early. It has never faded. And Sir Alex Ferguson played a key part.
‘At school, I wanted to do sport and music, with a view to a career,’ he says of life at Park Mains High School in Erskine.
‘I probably wanted to do sport more but I wasn’t talented enough to do anything with it in a career sense.
‘I was mostly into rugby as my dad played. Then Alex Ferguson came round to my primary school and handed out Proud to
Be a Buddy badges. I had only heard of Rangers and Celtic and didn’t realise there was a team nearby to where I lived in Inchinnan. So, I became a St Mirren fan. I still am.’
The future knight of the realm was subsequently sacked by Saints. The future Pro14 commentator embarked on a career that was never to see him out of work.
He left school to go to the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama as an orchestral percussionist, playing with the National Youth Orchestra of Scotland.
His next move has echoed on the years. In 1985, the young student was approached by a certain Ricky Ross.
Vipond reveals: ‘He was looking for a drummer. He asked me: “Have you got an electric drum kit?” I said: “No, I don’t like them”. I was hired.’
Nine albums, thousands of miles on the road, a Brit award, and the odd interruption later, Deacon Blue are still making music. Again, the theme of work is emphasised.
‘The band was regimented, disciplined,’ says Vipond. ‘For us, the important thing was the music.
‘We wanted to affect even just one person. If someone fell in love at a show, kissed a girl, went out and bought a record… we wanted it to be memorable.
‘We wanted people to be changed in some way by our efforts. That’s why we’re there.
‘That is why we are still doing it. If you are just going through the motions, don’t do it. Our jobs were to be musicians. So, we worked at it. We still do. Rehearse and rehearse.
‘We were as good as we could be on every single show. It is still hugely important to still do that now.’
And what about the rock-and-roll excess? Vipond admits: ‘I did discover lager. I drank — but only after the show. We had that work ethic.’
It is not hard to spot the obsession in this. It is even more obvious when it comes to work and play onscreen and in his career off-stage.
He moved into television as the band were splitting up in 1994. His audition for his first television job — on the NB arts programme on STV — was a masterclass in Vipond vigour. The audition was approached with precision.
He filmed an episode on a friend’s
camcorder in the style of NB. He wrote reviews on a series of items, he constructed a piece to camera and he supplied the subsequent script to the producer, director and cameraman at the audition.
He was hired. It was the first evidence of a Vipond TV trait. He had mastered the art of seeming to be the engaging amateur, while maintaining a professionalism that is unwavering.
His Pro14 commentaries will not be lacking in preparation.
‘It is exciting, it will be fun,’ he says. ‘But it is work.’ The professional musician does not busk it.
His interest in rugby is piqued by the exploits of one of his three sons.
‘They are called Finn, Angus and Hamish,’ adds Vipond. ‘One of my mates says my family sounds like a cast list from Para Handy.’
Finn, 20, played basketball for Dunfermline Reign and is now at university. Hamish, at 15, is described as ‘the creative one’, while Angus, 16, is in the Scotland Under-18 rugby squad and has been identified as a rising talent.
The father, meanwhile, finds his sport as part of his day job. ‘The Adventure Show changed my life,’ he admits. ‘I didn’t have a bike when I started 14 years ago. Now I have nine.
‘I like to show the public how hard events are. I have just finished the Elie triathlon. I finished last.’
Yes, but he also finished a 600 metres swim, 29km on a bike, and a run. ‘It was five or six miles. A bit more for me because I got lost,’ explains Vipond.
His hardest challenge was the Braveheart Triathlon of 2016.
‘That was a bit mad,’ he admits. ‘I was approaching a significant birthday and decided to go for it.’
The prospective 50-year-old completed a 1.2mile swim, 56 miles on the bike and a marathon. ‘The run was up and down Ben Nevis. So that was quite a challenge,’ he says. Quite.
So why does he do it? ‘It’s healthy,’ he insists. ‘Normal people do these sorts of things every day in Scotland and I am just one of them. I like exercise as a stress buster, too.
‘There is nothing better than getting on my bike and doing 40 miles. I stop halfway for a scone, though.’
The Premier Sports job came suddenly but surely he was not surprised, he has been covering rugby for BBC Scotland?
‘No, I was genuinely taken aback,’ he says. ‘But I am thrilled by it. They have a great team, apart from me, obviously. It is a massive undertaking, a real challenge.’
He does not seem deterred by it. He never is. So what might be next in his life?
‘I’ve not been much of a planner,’ he says. ‘I’m more of a stumbler. I suppose my biggest attribute is that I’m up for things.’
He is the drummer who will give anything a bash. He makes more than a decent tune out of all of it.
“I’m of a not planner. much I’m a stumbler. My biggest attribute is that I’m up for trying things...”