LISTEN: John Peel's Enormous Music Collection Is Going Online
John Peel, the massively influential Radio 1 DJ who died in 2004, amassed a mind-boggling collection of over 25,000 records, and now they're all going online! According to The Independent, you will, by October, be able to hear this man's impeccably curated collection in its entirety, which is a great thing for music lovers worldwide.
One hundred albums per week, in alphabetical order, will be added through an online project called The Space, which is being launched by Arts Council England and the BBC.
The first group of records, featuring artists beginning with the letter A, was put online Tuesday. The list includes Mike Absalom, an artist who once called Peel "the musical Maypole around which we all danced." That's one very English compliment. Other artists added include AC/DC and ABBA.
The site will allow visitors to browse through the records and archive performances, as well as Peel's personal index cards, personal notes and home movies (including footage from his 50th birthday).
John Peel's widow Sheila Ravenscroft said, in an introductory video on the site, "We're very happy that we've finally found a way to make John's amazing collection available to his fans, as he would have wanted."
Check it out at thespace.org and let us know what you think of the site in the comments!
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