In the beginning...

The Theme Time Radio Show was the idea of the founder of XM Satellite Radio, Lee Abrams. Abrams has detailed his personal odyssey to recruit Bob Dylan in a rollercoaster blog. His adventure, he writes, began in 1998. After seemingly endless knockbacks by unreceptive managers the project finally got off the ground in 2006.

On air at last

Each episode was conceived as the perfect “daydream” soundtrack, a mix of mainly retro songs, jingles, jokes and musings. The first episode, Weather, aired on May 3, 2006.

The husky lady

The show opened with the sound of rain falling and a sultry, femme fatale husked (revealed months later to be actress Ellen Barkin), “It's night time in the Big City/Rain is falling, fog rolls in from the waterfront/a nightshift nurse smokes the last cigarette in a pack.”

And our first song is...

Muddy Waters's Blow Wind Blow.

A touch of Steele

The spoken-word introductions were inspired by the “Nightbird”, the pioneering DJ Alison Steele. A mind-bending mix of prog rock and poetry, the show opened with her reading the lines: “The flutter of wings, the shadow across the moon, the sounds of the night, as the Nightbird spreads her wings and soars, above the earth, into another level of comprehension, where we exist only to feel. Come, fly with me, Alison Steele, the Nightbird.”

Who produces this stuff?

Theme Time's producer is the comedy writer Eddie Gorodetsky, whose more obscure claim to fame is as a compiler of legendary made-for-friends Christmas tapes. In 1990 he released what he called an “aluminum biscuit” (CD). It is one of the finest seasonal compilations yet made.

Theme Time goes multimedia

Gorodetsky recently commisioned the cult comic artist Jamie Hernandez to create an imagined promotional poster for the show. Populated by all of the nightowl characters described in the opening vignettes, the poster has in turn inspired a short film by a blogger called Simon Nielsen. You can watch it at http://blip.tv/file/450465

Bob plays the joker...

Dylan has proved a droll host, asides so far include:

“In what other profession can you tell a woman to take off her clothes and send the bill to her husband?” (from Doctors).

“If girls love diamonds so much, why do they get so mad when you take them to the ballpark?” (from Baseball).

...and the cocktail waiter

In an episode on drinking, Dylan gave his own Mint Julep recipe. Here it is:

4 mint sprigs

2 ½ ounces of bourbon

1 teaspoon powdered sugar

1 teaspoon water

Put the mint leaves, sugar, and water in a Collins glass. Fill with ice. Top with bourbon and more ice. Garnish with a mint sprig. “Two or three of those and anything sounds good”.

Now we are 70

Now on its 70th episode, the show has featured more than 850 tracks. The earliest song so far has been Hallelujah, I'm a Bum recorded by Harry “Haywire Mac” McClintock in 1926. The most recent is Bob's own a capella rendition of Take Me Out to the Ball Game.

Theme Time Radio is broadcast on Radio 2 and BBC 6 Music. The Theme Time Radio Hour compilation is out this week on Ace Records

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