Aaron Chwatt lives!

Surprise! Here is Collings & Herrin Podcast 108, without warning. [It is in the pipe awaiting the selfless Orange Mark’s attention – check here.] We apologise that it is one hour, 13 minutes and 50 seconds long – this is because we recorded it on Richard’s new laptop and for some reason it didn’t cut us off at the usual one hour, six minutes and 35 seconds. Like a cloud of volcano dust, we cover everything – ha ha – from the new Dunkirk and John Wayne Gacy to the Leaders’ Debate, The Poseidon Adventure (topical!), Red Buttons’ real name and Kiefer Sutherland’s big night out (ie. not the one he spent with Andrew). As ever, Richard, while auto-asphyxiating with a spare lead, is very encouraging about Andrew’s tentative steps into comedy and not at all dismissive of the Precious Little podcast.

For one week only

Richard Herring was on his way to Whitby for one of the final Hitler And His Moustache shows, which meant he couldn’t do the Collins & Herring show on 6 Music, so his Chortle-Award-stealing, Iron Maiden Fan Club-belonging, Action Man scar-faced nemesis Michael Legge filled his shoes [look, there he is in the picture between Uncle Henry and Nephew Will, who’s filling in for Niece Lucy while she is skiing]. It was fun, except when I played Simple Minds’ Belfast Child at him, and he accused me of reigniting the Troubles, when I was just trying to make him homesick. And yes, there will be a Collins & Legge 6 Music podcast for one week only. No doubt it will appear here, and on iTunes, on Monday, as usual, when Management have checked it for penises. (We had a lot of texts and emails about penises.) Don’t forget, if you’re in London on Monday night, you have the fun of deciding whether to come and see me and Michael at the Hen & Chickens, or Richard Herring at the Albany. YOU DECIDE. (I say: vote Dalek.)

Doing this guy at night

In our 107th podcast [it will appear here soon, Orange Mark willing], we weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of NHS versus private healthcare in terms of service, waiting time, cost at point of delivery, bedside manner, general machinery you can be hooked up to and the likelihood or not of a happy finish and the application of unguent. In other words, Richard has had a life-changing brush with mortality, and Andrew hasn’t. There’s a bit of the election, the “paedo bikini”, York City’s youths, the rabbit whisperer/murderer and a joke about Patrick Moore that may or may not make it into Andrew’s £7 work-in-progress stand-up set. We also see who is the best author out of Richard, Andrew, Stuart Maconie, Stewart Lee and Emma Kennedy. (It is not Stewart Lee.)

New jingle required!

As Richard [pictured, in his rightful throne between Uncle Henry and Niece Lucy] won’t be able to do our 6 Music show this Saturday because he has to get to Whitby, his nemesis Michael Legge will be manfully filling his shoes. This means, for one week only, it will be Collins & Legge. You’re clever, you people, so who fancies making an emergency jingle for us that says, “Collins and Legge, dun dun” or something? We also need a “Legge Rules, for one week only” (which I haven’t told Richard about yet, so shush).

Dyin’ Air

Armed with a brand new, Marvin’s-head-style external microphone that actually seems to work and a pot of actually quite disgusting Jelly Beans, we selflessly produce an audiophile-friendly Collings & Herrin Podcast [number 106] despite having to hit the ground running and record in the brief hour-long window between Andrew coming off air at 6 Music and Richard gallivanting to the Infidel premiere. In it, we mainly discuss the fact that Andrew is better than Richard because he has been in the studio audience of a recording of Have I Got News For You, while Richard has only been on it. There is even time, after the interminable list of coffee-and-cake donors, and the necessary plugs for any other business, to cover Weekend At Bernie’s II, the fact that Richard’s Dad fancies Professor Brian Cox, the exact nature of the prelude to a heart attack, and the Mooncup. Tell us what you think of the sound quality. No, really. We invite it. You will have to listen to find out what the funny, improvised joke “Dyin’ Air” means. Put it in the show.