The shock jock who ain't so shocking

By Sandra Dick

ENGLEBERT is on the phone. He just wants to tell everyone he's listening in and that, yes, that is his real name and that he's living in Glasgow.

Rufus has already called. He had dressed up in his finest diamante, darling, and waited and waited for his lift to the party, which never came. He's a man with a seriously petted lip.

Then there is the woman who wants to talk about mental illness. Click, brrrrr.

It can only be one thing. That weird sub-culture of society that makes up late-night radio.

Nick Abbot is manning the phones. He's widely portrayed as one of the nation's top 'shock jocks', but the only shock so far seems to be the one he gave himself when he tried to remember Real Radio Scotland's new telephone number.

"Call me," he urges the Scottish nation. He starts to announce the phone number, appears to suffer memory loss, then flounders a bit as he tries again to get it right. You can almost hear pieces of paper being frantically shuffled in the background.

To be fair, it is Nick's first night in the hot seat for Real Radio Scotland's late-night phone-in, and he's really not doing that badly at all.

He's smartly talked his way out of the mental illness call, tried to explain - over and over again - to callers to switch off their radio because of the time delay, and neatly sidestepped getting embroiled in a "which team do you support, then mate" type argument.

No doubt his legion of faithful fans would forgive him one or two teething problems. Forget Chris Evans, Sarah Cox and Wee Fat Bob. Nick, the former George Heriot's pupil from Dalkeith who used to dodge games to listen to punk rock records, seems to have more dedicated fans - and certainly more tribute websites - than any other British DJ.

He is, according to one site, www.nickabbot.com, possibly the most gifted broadcaster ever to grace the British airwaves. Nick is much more modest. "Well, that's the internet," he shrugs. "People say all kinds of things on the internet. Doesn't mean they're true."

Mr Modesty he certainly is. And, it emerges, for a man who makes his career out of chatting to people on the phone, is not one for spending a second longer than necessary chewing the fat in his own freetime.

Finally cornered, he is far from what you'd expect from a man who makes his living on talk-based radio.

There are no 'Smashy and Nicey' soundbites, he's more John Peel than Steve Wright, and he's certainly more grounded than some of his listeners seem to be. Which, perhaps, wouldn't be too hard.

Nick is one of Real Radio Scotland's big stars. Launched on Tuesday, the new station, which broadcasts from a Glasgow industrial estate, has been born from the ashes of Edinburgh's loss-making Scot FM, taking over its licence in a £25.5 million deal.

With managing director John Myers, 42, at the helm, it is being touted in a £2m advertising and marketing campaign as a tartan-trimmed, spiced-up Radio 2, with its sights set on stealing listeners from Radio Scotland and Radio Clyde.

If you've never heard of Nick Abbot, then some of Real Radio Scotland's other names may be a touch more familiar: ex-Scot FM broadcaster Robin Galloway is there, as is a certain Jay Crawford, 30 years in the business and now the new station's programme controller.

Already, it seems, the latest round of radio wars has got off to a stirring start. According to one diary columnist, Myers' declaration that they would "tear the liver" out of BBC Radio Scotland and Radio 2 prompted Maggie Cunningham, head of Radio Scotland, to respond with a congratulations card for the launch party. It read: "Don't damage your liver during the celebrations." It was accompanied by a transistor radio - a prize from the Janice Forsyth show.

All jolly good stuff, but Nick prefers to leave the radio wars to the bosses. The psychology graduate from Brunel University, Uxbridge in west London, has his work cut out just trying to keep up with the Engleberts, Rufuses and assorted other late-night radio show listeners.

And what about those listeners? Night-shift supermarket shelf-stackers, skiving while the bosses aren't looking, call in just to say they are listening. A nervous-sounding woman phones up. She's fed up with all these callers saying he's doing fine on the launch show and she just wanted to say, "Nick, you're doing fine."

And so it goes on, drawing you into listening just as your eyes are drawn to a road accident. "I like the odd calls," Nick says defensively. "If it wasn't for them, it would be one of those boring phone-in shows you get on the BBC, where everyone wants to talk about Northern Ireland. Come on, if we were all perfectly normal it would all be too boring. What's normal anyway? I'm not.....who is?"

Warming to his subject, he continues. "People just want to have a natter.

"So many people live on top of each other these days, but no-one talks to each other over the garden fence any more, or even knows their next door neighbour. Life is too fast, too closed in for that to be a part of our lives, but people still want to talk. Radio phone-ins are just one outlet for that - another is the internet. People just want to have some kind of contact."

If they are looking for a friend in Nick, they may be sadly disappointed. Off air, he admits, he doesn't give his family of callers a second thought. "I've got worries of my own," he shrugs. "You have got to be removed from it all. Like people in the medical profession, they have to switch off.

"I'm not remotely as worthy as people in the medical profession," he quickly adds, "what I do is very silly. But it's all I ever wanted to do."

He can't say for sure when the burning desire to be a radio presenter first emerged.

Half-Welsh, half-Scottish, Nick was brought up on the outskirts of Dalkeith. Most of his father's family still live in Edinburgh - although Nick's radio accent is more middle England, prompting anxious callers to demand he reveal his football allegiances.

He remembers shutting himself in his bedroom as a teenager, tuning into Radio Caroline and Luxembourg, and to punk being born, kicking and screaming, on the John Peel Show. And he just knew he wanted to be a part of it.

His parents, however, were not particularly impressed. After all, they may have considered thousands of pounds worth of fees paid to George Heriot's would have produced, at the very least, a doctor or lawyer. "They are okay about it now," laughs Nick. "But for a long time they were worried. Just like any parents, they wanted me to get a real job."

That psychology degree probably comes in handy for his particular line of work, but Nick insists he didn't chose it with that in mind. "I just knew I didn't want to work," he admits. "Back then it was easy to be a student, everything was paid by the Government. Psychology just seemed like something to do."

But breaking into the world of radio was his ambition. From spinning discs at a Virgin record megastore, he eventually made it on to Talk Radio. Latterly he worked with Chris Evans at Virgin Radio - Nick was the DJ who announced his boss's marriage to Billie Piper, although, he adds, they were work colleagues as opposed to drinking buddies.

Then there was an unfortunate legal run-in with an American journalist who took exception to some of Nick's outspoken comments about her during one Virgin programme. Eventually she accepted a £40,000 payment. Not surprisingly, he prefers not to discuss that particular part of his career.

Perhaps it's that little episode which earned him his 'shock jock' title. But it's one that doesn't sit very easily. "I'm not a shock jock," he insists. "What I do is more like people having a chat in a pub. People use the term 'shock jock', but if you apply the same criteria to the media, then The Sun is a 'shock newspaper'. And I don't go out of my way to shock."

No, he can leave that to his army of faithful listeners.

Nick Abbot's show is on Real Radio Scotland, week nights from 10pm to 1am.

RADIO GAGA: Nick's show is weird and Wacky but the face behind the voice reveals a rather modest bloke.

Further reading:-
NickAbbot.com
Scotsman.com