Xan Phillips by Flopi Dolle
As a radio presenter Xan Phillips has two main skills: interviewing and discovering new music.
His perfect radio show would be a cross between the current issue format of Jimmy Young’s and the promoting of new talent that John Peel so successfully achieved.
The second half of this aim was accomplished at Original 106fm, a regional radio station on the UK’s south coast.
Xan’s programme “The Original Showcase” was the longest running on the station’s two year life and brought to the airwaves over 1000 songs by unsigned artists.
It also gave these musicians an introduction to recording radio sessions, the experience of being interviewed and most importantly hearing how their recordings sounded over the air.
Artists that Xan championed included Jackson Analogue who recently supported The Who, Dlugokekci who just supported The Proclaimers at SXSW, Georgia Wonder who toured with Mick Hucknal and Birdpen of whom Tom Robinson, on BBC 6 Music, has recently praised their debut album.
His love of new music was mirrored in print with a column for the Southern Daily Echo which they still publish every Friday under the banner of “Showcase UK”.
During the week, at Original 106fm, he scheduled and presented five, two hour, late night specialist shows ranging from chill-out on Monday through to a classic rock show on Friday.
Audio CV
In the course of his radio career Xan has interviewed many people and some examples of his interviewing abilities, as well as feature editing, can be heard in this Audio CV.
Currently it relives the moments when Pete Doherty picked a local band to support him at the Opera House in Boscombe, Joan Armatrading wax lyrical about her Grammy nomination, the production techniques Hollywood director Peter Bogdanovich used to make the Tom Petty documentary and former Stranglers frontman Hugh Cornwell about his solo career and the punk rock days.
It also has the epic journey in search of the Dorking Chicken.
About this website
Launched in April 2009 this site combines xan.co.uk with showcaseuk.tv, his blogs from original 106fm and Blogger, pictures from Flickr and podcasts from Odeo and Podbean. Past and present projects can be found on the Xan Productions page.
The site uses software from www.wordpress.org , the design template comes from www.woothemes.com and is hosted by Flipside Digital Xan would like to thank Dave Cartledge (Flipside) and Rob Ball (Mintsouth) for their input and support during the transition.
