The second contentious issue is on a very different scale. It comes from fans of the BBC’s Glastonbury coverage, and it’s about a single person: the presenter Jo Whiley. Now I’ve met Whiley, and she’s a lovely person to talk to. But from the way most viewers talk about her presenting style you’d think she was a cross between Hazel Blears and Clostridium difficile, with an “edgy” fringe.
To be fair, she didn’t do herself any favours last year when, in discussing Led Zeppelin, she shruggingly referred to them as “before my time” — scarcely a comment to inspire confidence in a Radio 1 DJ. But it’s her on-screen style that seems to inspire the main rage — a decades-long, squirming awkwardness that makes her look as if she’s about to corkscrew right off her chair and start drilling into the ground. This awkwardness extends into her conversational rhythm, which is angular — possibly free-jazz — in origin. A Radcliffe and Laverne link is a free-flowing conversation between two people relaxed enough to crack some gags. A Whiley link, on the other hand, is a bit like someone’s just run into the room, madly banging a set of clackers off the walls. And she always looks on the verge of panic when she interviews bands — as if one of them might suddenly mention Led Zeppelin, and she will have to reply, “Sorry — you see, they were before my time.”
Still, you don’t watch Glastonbury for the presenters. That would be like going to the festival itself to buy a hat.
