My Desert Island Disc

the assignment, the reflection and the playlist

The Assignment (written by Katherine Lamb)

Ahoy there castaways, 

As part of Kelsey's birthday cabin weekend we're going to play Desert Island Discs (specific date to be determined by the bday gal). Here are the rules! 

We're all part of a shipwreck (boooo) and get castaway to separate solo islands. You get to pick eight pieces of music, one luxury item and one book to take with you. Nothing more. Everyone gets given the Bible and the Complete Works of Shakespeare by default to take with them (coz we Brits). Inspiration here and here.

The luxury item has to be inanimate, and cannot be practical - i.e. Kelsey cannot take Fala, and Andrew cannot take his penknife. Some examples are - Tom Hanks picking a Hermes 3000 manual typewriter & paper, theatre director Marianne Elliott requesting a bath with three taps: hot and cold water and wine, Ed Sheeran asking for a lifetime’s supply of ketchup, and Miranda Hart taking Wimbledon Centre Court, racquet, balls and a ball machine. 

Send me your list of eight tracks, your luxury item and your book. If you would like specific recordings, re-releases, extended editions or anything else please specify. Send an 'intro' for each of your tracks - why you picked it, what it means to you. The majority of guests tend to pick eight chronological tracks to signpost a soundtrack of their life, but each to their own!

The Actual Show

Late one evening in 1941, freelance British broadcaster Roy Plomley was at his home and already in his pyjamas, when an idea came to him. He sat down and wrote immediately to the BBC. The pitch was successful and a broadcasting institution was born.

That first Desert Island Discs was recorded in the BBC’s bomb-damaged Maida Vale studio on 27th January 1942 and aired in the Forces Programme at 8pm two days later. It was introduced to the listening public as "a programme in which a well-known person is asked the question, if you were to be cast away alone on a desert island, which eight gramophone records would you choose to have with you, assuming of course, that you had a gramophone and an inexhaustible supply of needles."

The Reflection (written by me)

This assignment stresses me out. I hate the finitude of it all. Eight songs? For the rest of……my life? I approached the task without a narrative lens, no chronology or storytelling or weaving of my identity and memories with music. If I washed up on a desert island, literally, these are the songs that would bring me comfort, joy — songs I’d scream sing, or fall asleep to when I’m shivering and scared.

But after listening to the desert island discs for our friends, I became inspired to face the finitude and curate the B-side of my stranded soundtrack. Tracks 9-16 on my desert island disc are a different kind of comfort. I don’t listen to these songs all that much now, but each represents a different period or person. Maybe it is in those memories and those relationships, the reminiscence of who I used to be, that would bring the most comfort on my desert island.

The Playlist - My Desert Island Disc

Thank you to my friends who have already shared their 8tracks with me. I’m still thinking about your stories and your songs.