Is That Machine On?

Stuart Maconie celebrates the golden age of the music press interview.

In the heyday of the printed music media between the mid-60s and early noughties, the music interview was many things - combative, intimate, confessional, unhinged, flirtatious, sometimes violent - but it was rarely dull. Still, it seems that long-gilded age of rock journalism is now over.

The days of extraordinary access, when a reporter might spend a week with a band on its tour bus or private plane, hanging out in their dressing rooms and hotel suites, are at an end. The music papers are gone. In 2018, NME - the last inky survivor - went online only.

Stuart Maconie looks back at the lost world - those revealing encounters between journalist and musician.

Featuring classic recorded archive interviews with:

Jimi Hendrix
Kurt Cobain
Bob Marley
Michael Jackson

Plus contributions from journalists Caitlin Moran, Barney Hoskyns, Allan Jones and Dawn Slough.

Producer: Jonathan Mayo

A TBI production for BBC Radio 4, first broadcast in May 2018.