Bill Aitken

:"If you look in the book and see the phrase 'Do it yourself' you'll see beside it 'Bill Aitken'. He's the guy who produces and writes and sings and plays all the instruments, and he's a star and we're just delighted to play his music again on the Saturday Show, as is John Peel during the week, between Mondays and Fridays between 11 and 12 pm." (Alan Freeman, BBC Radio 1 disk jockey, on air, c.February 1976)
A BBC studio manager who used a 16-track commercial studio to record songs in his spare time. Despite his not having a recording contract, Peel, John Walters and Tony Wilson liked his session so much that it was broadcast in any case. Featured on the following shows:
*08 December 1975 (first broadcast of sole Peel session)
*02 February 1976 (repeat of above)
*28 December 1976 / 03 January 1977 (split repeat)
At least three of the songs (Chimney Pots, Open Up Your Eyes and Ghosts Of Yesterday) were also featured over a period of the same few weeks in late 1975/early 1976 (some more than once - Chimney Pots was broadcast for the second and final time on 21 February 1976) on the Saturday Rock Show, produced by Tony Wilson and hosted by Alan "Fluff" Freeman, from which the quotation at the head of this article is taken.
== Links ==
*BBC Ariel: Putting rock on the radio
*Bill Aitken: Inside The John Peel Sessions
*Linked In
Category:1975
Category:Artists