That they may face the disc jockey’s afterlife

GOLD NIGHT CAP

RTÉ Gold, nightly, 10pm

THE MARTY MORRISSEY SHOW

RTÉ1, bank holidays, 9am

OLIVER CALLAN

RTÉ1, weekdays, 9am

One evening last week, I went to see the film That They May Face the Rising Sun .LaterI was listening to RTÉ Gold. Both of these experiences raised my awareness of some of the deeper aspects of the human condition.

Now you’re probably expecting some sort of a punchline here, because you see no link between the fineness of the McGahern adaptation, and the spinning of the discs on RTÉ Gold, much of it done by elderly RTÉ DJs for whom this is a kind of radio afterlife. Indeed the only obvious connection is that Rising Sun and RTÉ Gold would tend to be most meaningful to people who were alive during the Middle Ages – or, if you like, the 1970s.

But there’s more to it than that. The film stays with you because it gives you this profound sense of a civilisation that is now gone with the wind. But it does it in such an absorbing style you hardly even notice things like the total absence of futuristic phenomena such as telephones or televisions.

Then you come home and you happen to tune into Gold Night Cap on RTÉ Gold, and you hear the following tracks: Jarrow Song by Alan Price; Wonderous Stories by Yes; Private Eyes by Hall and Oates; Can’t Get Used to Losing

You by The Beat; Maggie’s Farm by Bob Dylan; How Come by Ronnie Lane and Slim Chance; Abraham, Martin and John by Marvin Gaye... and on and on…

And just as the McGahern piece raises your appreciation of the complexity of the human spirit, so you are visited by a feeling of awe at the sheer abundance of great music that has been coming at us through the wireless for the last 50 years or so.

Each track on the Gold Night Cap immediately transports the listener to a particular time in their life. Because much of it is broadcast at dead of night, it has this extra evocative power. Indeed the BBC4 TV channel is now largely devoted to showing old episodes of Top of the Pops, not just because it was an excellent show, but because it sets off a myriad of individual responses in each viewer. It is the most brilliant memory machine ever invented.

But having said that, “Lovely Leitrim” in the film was also immensely powerful.

We may have fewer classic songs or books being written today, but we have more bank holidays – maybe too many, if truth be told. The Marty Morrissey Show fills in for the usual RTÉ1 fare on these days, and increasingly what once seemed like an occasional spot, now feels more like a full-time job – in the RTÉ sense. But the pay-off comes with the regular look back at the sporting weekend.

Last Monday he had Gavin Cooney, Vincent Hogan, and Angelina Nugent in the studio, normalising this practice. It’s an item which is right in Marty’s wheelhouse, though of course it should be in everyone’s wheelhouse.

I’m pleased to say Oliver Callan also does the bit of sport in his round-ups of the weekend, though I’m even more pleased at some of his other editorial choices. Around the St Patrick’s Day bank holiday, he mentioned that every time the then taoiseach Leo Varadkar goes to the US it seems he does something embarrassing – a line that could never possibly be said by his predecessor Ryan Tubridy without adding: “Sure, we all do something embarrassing sometimes.”

Callan is in the fortunate position that he has a career outside RTÉ, which should free him from some of the restrictions felt by those who are more institutionalised. It’s like being “independently wealthy”, and sure enough, he’s making use of it.

In last Tuesday’s round-up he mentioned a Pat Spillane “rant” about the decline of The Sunday Game. Now, “rant” in these situations is usually a bad word, used by the enemies of freedom to undermine those who may well be putting forward a coherent argument. “You’re better than that, Ollie,” I said to myself.

And indeed he was better than that. Soon he was broadly agreeing with Spillane, pointing out that he can’t remember the last time there was a buzz about something a pundit had said. “Maybe everyone is frightened of being interesting on television these days,” he suggested.

It was a line spoken in an understated way which brought to mind the work of... McGahern?