31 August 2002/Transcript

This is a transcription of the 31 August 2002 episode, from Xfm Series 2

In the Beginning

Ricky: Back to form there - Oasis and Little By Little. This is Xfm 104.9, I'm Ricky Gervais, who are you?

Steve: Er, my name's Steve Merchant, good to see you.

Ricky: Thanks. Er, with us, er, the producer in the studio is Karl Pilkington. And he'll be doing the m-buttons...

Steve: Yeah? You made a good effort there...

Ricky laughs

Steve: But er, once again...

Ricky: Got bored.

Steve: Words are your enemy Rick, and they defeated you once again.

Ricky laughs

Steve: Just ran out of steam with the sentences.

Ricky: Ohh, every week I think right, I'm really gonna make an effort now.

Steve: Yeah.

Ricky: I'm gonna, I've, I've chosen some records...

Steve: Yeah.

Ricky: That's it.

Steve: That's it. That's as far as it goes isn't it?

Ricky: Yeah.

Steve: Maybe you should write out what you're gonna say at the top of the show?

Ricky laughs

Steve: Write that out. Get a nice big crayon.

Ricky: No, I like to keep a little bit of...

Ricky clicks his fingers

Ricky: You know.

Steve: Little bit of sumin'. Little bit of spark. Little bit of liveliness to it, sure.

Ricky: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Steve: Sure, sure, sure, sure.

Ricky: Yeah.

Steve: How are you? Good, good to see you

Ricky: Yeah, great. It's great to be er...

Steve: It's great to be out

Ricky laughs

Steve: Out of the house again.

Ricky: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Just, erm, I was going to say because we've been doing this for a long time now with a little break, erm, but XFM are bringing new listeners all the time. I've heard four or five a week.

Steve: Really?

Ricky: Yeah.

Steve: Wow, man alive.

Ricky: New listeners tune in to XFM 104.9.

Steve: Radio 1 beware!

Ricky laughs

Ricky: Yeah, yeah. And, uh, we might take it for granted that people that know who we are, know who you are, know who Karl is.

Steve: Sure.

Ricky: Um.

Steve: Old listeners, certainly.

Ricky: Now, if, if, if you, you know, if you're a regular then you know exactly who we are. But, erm, for those of you who don't, uh, I'll say I'm, I'm Ricky Gervais.

Steve: Ricky Gervais, BAFTA-award winning actor and, uh--

Ricky: Yeah, yeah.

Steve: And writer.

Ricky: Steve Merchant, erm, all those.

Steve: Friend of yours.

Ricky: Yeah, yeah. And, this is the important thing, Karl Pilkington.

Steve: Absolutely.

Ricky: Our, erm, produ-- I say producer. He was the bloke who was lumbered with the job. When I said, "Listen--" See I used to run the desk in the old days when I was working for XFM, I used to press the buttons and run the desk and everything. And then I said, "Listen, I've been on the telly, I do not press my own buttons." And Karl said, "Well, I don't really work weekends." And they went, "Well, you do if you want to keep your job."

Steve: Absolutely.

Ricky: And we were lumbered with him. And then we discovered that he's not just a, a little, like a little dork. A little Manc-y, sort of, idiot.

Steve: Sure. Sure.

Ricky: He's got, he's got a nice shirt. He's got, you know what I mean? He's got something else.

Steve: Absolutely. He brings another dimension, yeah.

Ricky: Yeah. And, uh, he, he started having a little chat and we discovered--

Steve: We both love him.

Ricky: That he had quite a lot to say.

Steve: Mm. Well I, I think you're absolutely right and I think, um- I was wondering maybe we should maybe play another tune. But after that, I just think we should refamiliarize our radio audience with Karl.

Ricky: Yeah.

Steve: And any new listeners, just get- let, somehow, kind of let them get to know the real Karl again.

Ricky: Well if you are new, you'll, you'll find that we like some old songs, some new songs, some chitter-chat. Uh, we get serious sometimes.

Steve: Oh yeah.

Ricky: There's some tears and some laughter.

Steve: Yeah.

Ricky: We kicked off with Oasis's new one, "Little by Little". We're going to go back in time now to Iggy Pop and his Stooges with "I'm Bored."

Song: Iggy Pop - I'm Bored

Q & A

Ricky: Iggy Pop, "I'm Bored" on XFM 104.9. I'm Ricky Gervais.

Steve: Steve Merchant here.

Ricky: Yeah. Little Karl Pilkington. Well, to reintroduce or introduce people to the first time to Karl, um, I think we should have a--

Steve: Yeah, maybe sort of a, kind of, a quick Q&A Karl, and we don't need, sort of, lengthy answers from you. We don't need lots of detail. Uh, you know, it can be a, just a couple of sentences--

Ricky: Just to get a flavor of who you are.

Steve: To answer these questions. Yeah, so firstly, name obviously Karl Pilkington. Age, Karl?

Karl: I'll be, uh, I'll be thirty next month.

Steve: Really?

Karl: This month. No next, wha- where are we?

Ricky and Steve burst into laughter

Steve: I don't think we need to ask any more questions.

Ricky: I, I don't- I think we've done it.

Steve: That's it.

Ricky: I think we've done it there.

Steve: Welcome to the world of Karl Pilkington.

Ricky chuckles

Ricky: I think- Oh, I thought it would take three or four questions--

Steve: I thought it was going to at least--

Ricky: To really explain what Karl is about.

Steve: Yeah, that was, that was the first question.

Ricky and Steve laugh

Ricky: Oh, oh God!

Steve: Absolutely incredible. But um, but we can't really leave it there cause, um--

Ricky: No.

Steve: Because we haven't got enough else to do to fill up the two hours.

Ricky: No.

Steve: So, um, so let's pursue this line of inquiry.

Ricky: Yeah.

Steve: So, um, age? What was the age, Karl? In a couple of--

Ricky: When were you, when were you born?

Karl: I'll be, uh-- '72.

Ricky: Right, what month, what day?

Karl: I'm on the cusp.

Ricky and Steve snigger

Steve: You're on the cusp of a day?

Karl: Um, twenty-third of September.

Steve: Ok.

Karl: '72.

Steve: So anyway-- ok, alright. Good.

Ricky: And there you were talking there about, um, obviously your star sign, were you, on the cusp?

Karl: Yep.

Ricky: You believe in that, do you?

Karl: No.

Ricky: You don't believe in star signs?

Karl: No, not really.

Ricky: But you do believe in ghosts, I understand.

Karl: No, because the star signs--

Ricky: The paranormal.

Karl: Yeah, but the star sign thing, you've got how many, how many different star signs are they?

Ricky: Twelve, innit?

Karl: Right, and then you've got, like, loads of people.

Ricky: Yeah. You do the math.

Karl: So they're saying that, you know, there's only twelve different sorts of people in the world.

Ricky: Exactly. That's exactly right. It's, it's made-up. It's made-up nonsense. It's non-science.

Steve: It's pseudo-science.

Ricky: It's, yes. It's, it's, it's, it's hairy-man and, um, dyed-hair-woman science.

Steve: Yes.

Ricky: Innit?

Steve: Alright?

Karl: Yeah.

Steve: Anyway, back to you, Karl. Where were you born?

Karl: In, uh, in Manchester.

Steve: Okay. What GCSE results did you get?

Ricky sniggers

Karl: I got, uh, was it an E? Got an E in history.

Ricky: You got an E in history. And how did you find out that?

Karl: You found out.

Ricky: Cause you thought you, you didn't, you couldn't remember what you got. You didn't turn up and you thought you'd done about three, one of which wasn't history, and actually--

Karl: I knew, I knew I did art.

Ricky: Yeah, you didn't. I'm telling you didn't cause we checked. You did one. You turned up for history, you did history, you got an E in history.

Karl: No, I definitely did art. I made a little clay man.

Steve laughs

Ricky: Yeah, you've got to register for O-levels. You don't just do it and then phone 'em up and say, "How was that?" And they go--

Steve: "I'm sending you a clay man."

Ricky laughs

Steve: "Send me a grade."

Ricky: Yeah, yeah. There's all things, there's forms to fill out and things like that, Karl.

Steve: Anyway...

Ricky: Yeah, go on.

Ricky sniggers

Steve: Who was your closet childhood friend?

Karl: Closest. At what age?

Steve: Well, when you were young, when you were--

Ricky: Oh, I remember this. It's a fella. Um, someone Makin, innit?

Karl: There's, there's, well he wasn't really a close mate. Darren Buckley was me--

Steve: Darren Buckley?

Ricky: Yeah.

Steve: Tell us briefly about Darren. I'd forgotten about Darren.

Karl: He's the one who, um, all the, all the girls liked him.

Steve: Did they?

Karl: He had, uh, he had permed hair. Used to--

Ricky quietly laughs

Karl: Have his hair like a footballer.

Steve: Sure.

Karl: Um--

Steve: Were you jealous of him?

Karl: His dad was a copper.

Steve: Did you hang around with Darren, like, in the hope of getting of, maybe, his, kind of, castoffs?

Karl: Nah. I, I- You see, it's weird with me. I wasn't that bothered about having loads of mates an' that. I sort of--

Steve: Sure.

Karl: I had lots of mates, but I could do without 'em.

Ricky: You had a magpie, didn't you?

Karl: I was happy, I was happy playing with me magpie.

Ricky: Yeah, and what happened to him?

Karl: It, uh, flew away.

Ricky: Yeah.

Karl: But I wasn't bothered because it was giving me grief towards the end, wasn't it. It was--

Ricky laughs

Karl: It was popping me, me Grifter tyres an' that.

Ricky continues to laugh

Steve: Yeah, sure.

Karl: Flying down, pecking me head.

Steve: Sure. Now you went to school with a number or different interesting people. Some of whom are freaks.

Ricky: Two of which, I understand, had big heads and webbed toes.

Steve: Is that right?

Ricky: Yet they were not related to each other and they weren't friends with each other. Why weren't they friends with each other?

Karl: Because that'd be obvious.

Ricky laughs

Steve: Did they, did they wear shoes or did they walk around in their, in their webbed, uh, feet?

Ricky: Were they good at swimming? Were they good at swimming?

Karl: Uh, I don't know. I don't they ever, ever went swimming.

Ricky: Did they ever talk, did they, did they ever look over at each other and think--

Steve: "Yeah, we should hang out more."

Ricky laughs

Karl: I told you something in the week, as well, there was another lad at school- had a pigeon chest.

Steve: He had a what?

Ricky: Can we come back to this?

Steve: He had a pigeon chest?

Ricky: I think we should play a record, Karl. Cause we, I think we've hooked them now. I think, I think--

Steve: Yeah. There's no one switching off now, Rick.

Ricky: No, play a record.

Song: Blur - Coffee & TV