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Gideon Coe's Theme Time Radio Hours

As you may have noticed, the Spring brings with it a whole slew of bank holidays. By that I mean about three or four with some regional variations. That's a slew in anyone's book. Even though these are normal working days for me, they don't feel quite the same and for that reason we generally run themed specials on my 6 Music show.

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Of course the whole area of a themed music show is now largely the domain of the really-quite-talented Bob Dylan. His show is the best music show on radio anywhere at the moment so we endeavour to think of themes that he has yet to chance upon. Perhaps more accurately, we come up with ideas with a mere fraction of the wit and imagination that fire his shows.

So far we have themed shows to particular record labels ( and ), we've presented three hours of music from Scottish artists and done the same for Ireland and Wales, taking care with the latter to pay due respects to a show which constantly champions Welsh music, namely Adam Walton on Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Wales.

To complete the tour of the British Isles we had an English night. It proved to be more of a challenge than the others as Englishness is arguably less defined and somewhat muddied. But a combination of The Specials, Roy Harper and Billy Bragg got the ball rolling. As with all our themes, ideas for who we think we should play are added to and punctuated by listener suggestions.

For the second Bank Holiday in May (you know the one, I forget what it's called, it's this weekend) we decided to focus on three years and dedicate an hour of concerts, sessions and records to each. The years are 1979, 1980 and 1981. These are pivotal years for me and each has an embarrassment of riches from which to choose.

As in all shows the idea is to get as much as a balance of styles and genres as possible, mixing those that were hits with those that got nowhere near Top of the Pops. So for 1979, do we go for M's Pop Musik, the Fall's Industrial Estate, Motorhead's Bomber or something from Boney M's Oceans of Fantasy? At the time of writing, it could be all of the above.

If you have suggestions of your own please leave a comment here or visit the message board for my programme.

Gideon Coe's show is on 6 Music Monday - Thursday from 9pm