Trevor Lock

I don’t know, but some of you are probably aware of the large-haired S&M Willy Wonka comedian that is Russell Brand. You almost certainly have heard of him if you are British, and I hear that recently he may have broken America. In any case, you may or may not have heard of him, but that’s not really important, as he has basically nothing to do with the article.

Bar the beginning. I was first introduced to Mr. R. Brand (as a historian would introduces one to Alexander the Great, i.e. not in person) by a friend of mine, via that Russell Brand BBC 6music podcast. Now, these podcasts starred, along with Russell himself, his long time collaborator Matt Morgan and comedian Trevor Lock. These were, believe it or not, extremely funny. Of course they were, otherwise I wouldn’t have started downloading the weekly podcast myself. The dynamics of the podcast were actually similar to the immortal Ricky Gervais podcast, basically 2 men in a room bouncing jokes off a third. Well, similar, as this time Trevor Lock, their Karl Pilkington, was actually quite intelligent, and bounced jokes back (and Matt Morgan isn’t anywhere near Stephan Merchant at being funny, but I won’t dwell on that). The break up of these shows went something like this;
50%Humorous anecdotes, 30% Deriding of Trevor by Russ/Matt, 10% Russell on how great he is, 10%SURPRISE!

Then, the show moved to BBC Radio 2, and celebrations were had, as I no longer needed a digital radio/internet to listen. But in early 2007, disaster struck. Trevor Lock announced he was leaving the show to focus on his own projects. And leave he did. Needless to say, this completely ruined the dynamics. Matt and Russell on their own…, Well, the new shows were like this;
90% Russell on how great he is, 10% Matt weakly tries to reel Russell back

Sure, it was still somewhat funny, but it was missing Trevor Lock. Both me and my friend knew, even before his departure, that it was him that made the show. It wasn’t the same without him. I still download the podcast, but without Trevor (and also as they seem to have exhausted their stock of humorous anecdotes) the show is missing something. It has been a downward slope since ‘Cocky-Locky’ left the show, and some of the more recent shows…

But what happened to Trevor Lock? He disappeared off the face of the Earth, and was never heard from again. His own projects never materialised, and it seemed the world had lost that much humour….

Until, last week, I got a message from a Trevor Lock fanclub I’m a member of (which I signed up for PURELY for this message) that the Lock was returning to radio! Much jubilation occured, until I actually checked where and when he was on.

10pm-12am on PowerFM, a local radio station in Southampton.

Shit.

Well, thanks to the wonder of the internet, I’m listening to his show right now (albeit a disrupted version due to my BLOODY internet). He appears to even have acquired his own Matt Morgan (Ollie someone or other, who sounds disturbingly like Paul Miller (who’s radio show I would be listening to now (BBC Radio Solent/SCR/Oxford/Kent), were I not listening to this (and I’ll catch the last hour of anyway))).

My opinion of it?

Needs a Russell Brand.

In other news, it only seems right to mention Russell Howard, who you may have heard of from his appearances off Mock the Week (the young blond one). He has his own 6music podcast, his own Trevor Lock (John Richardson), and a name to match. It’s probably the thing I’ve found that is most similar to the ‘glory days’ of the Russell Brand podcast.

My complaint?

Needs a Matt Morgan.