Tim's Listening Party

This episode, Tim Burgess has a listening party for one of the biggest and best bands of all time. Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers from the Police will be chatting to Tim about the band’s fifth and final album, Synchronicity.

Grammy award winning, hall of fame inducted, number 1 both sides of the Atlantic, critically acclaimed and multi-platinum selling, Synchronicity is a record that cemented the Police as the biggest band in the world at the time.

4 decades after this incredible record was released, Tim hears all about the Police’s recording process and how they managed to navigate the infamous tensions within the band at the time. Stewart remembers how he’d record his drums in just 20 minutes, while Andy speaks about how created timeless hits like Every Breath You Take.

Synchronicity was released on 17th June 1983 on A&M.

This episode Tim is joined by Jon Bon Jovi.

One of the biggest rock stars ever fronting one of the most successful bands of all time, they have sold out stadiums, won Grammys, been inducted into music Halls of Fame. Here, Jon goes through one of the biggest albums ever, Slippery When Wet.

Jon discusses the success of singles You Give Love A Bad Name and Livin’ On A Prayer, his time working as a tea boy at the Power Station, and his love for the UK.

Slippery When Wet was released on 18th August 1986 on Mercury & Vertigo.

This episode Tim is joined by Caleb & Jared Followill, half of Kings of Leon.

A band who have headlined pretty much every musical festival worldwide, playing the biggest stages across the globe. They are multi-Grammy award winning and multi-platinum album selling. Just play Sex on Fire wherever you are in the world, and everyone will know that song. It’s safe to say they are one of the biggest bands of the last 2 decades.

Their last 6 albums have gone to number 1 in the UK, and they are back with their 9th record, Can We Please Have Fun.

Caleb & Jared chat to Tim about Nashville, how their producer provided a link to Harry Styles and how Britpop (including the Charlatans) influenced their new album.

Can We Please Have Fun was released on 10th May 2024 on LoveTap and Capitol.

Tom Chaplin and Tim Rice-Oxley from Keane join Tim to talk about their debut album, Hopes And Fears, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary.

One of the best-selling albums in UK history, it went 9xplatinum in the UK, selling over 10 million copies worldwide, and wracking up billions of streams online. The year of the album’s release, 2004, saw Keane hold the crown of being the biggest selling British artist in the country. The following year they won two BRIT Awards: Best British Album and British Breakthrough act.

Tom & Tim discuss the effect of performing a huge song like Somewhere Only We Know to a crowd, which vocalists influenced Tom’s singing, and how his parents responded to hearing Bedshaped for the first time.

Hopes And Fears was released on 10th May 2004 on Island.

Kate Pierson & Keith Strickland from the B52s are Tim's guests this episode for a Listening Party about their 1989 album, Cosmic Thing. The B52s are a band so unique, so unorthodox yet completely distinctive, it’s not often you get to say that a musical artist is totally original, and that is exemplified by this weird and wonderful album in its 35th year.

Kate & Keith talk about how they wrote their huge hit, Love Shack, how a psychic helped to make the album and how the band came together in the wake of the passing of original B52s guitarist, Ricky Wilson.

Cosmic Thing was released on 27th June 1989 on Reprise.

This episode Tim is joined by Fran Healy & Dougie Payne from Travis to talk about the Man Who on its 25th anniversary.

The Man Who is one of the most successful British albums of the last 25 years, spending 11 weeks at Number One, a further 134 weeks in the Top 100, and going 9 times platinum in the UK. It has sold 3.5 million copies worldwide. The album garnered critical recognition with 2 Ivor Novello Awards and 2 BRIT Awards for Best British Band and Best British Album, and led to them headlining Glastonbury in 2000. The Man Who remains an album that helped to define the British alternative music sound that followed.

In this Listening Party, they talk about that Glastonbury performance that made them, how a breakup informed the album, how Fran nearly forgot Driftwood, and Fran recalls a night hanging out with Michael Stipe, Courtney Love & Morrissey.

The Man Who was released on 24th May 1999 on Independiente.

This episode, Tim is joined by one of the stars of the 1980s, Martin Fry. With a career spanning over 4 decades, since the release of his band ABC’s dazzling debut in 1982, he continues to sell out concert halls up and down the country.

The Lexicon of Love is an incredible debut record, going to number 1, achieving platinum in the UK, and it remains a captivating listen to this day, 42 years on.

He speaks to Tim about Recording the Look of Love in front of David Bowie, the Sheffield scene in which ABC emerged alongside Def Leppard and the Human League, and working on the album with Trevor Horn. 

The Lexicon of Love was released on 21st June 1982 on Neutron.

For the first episode of this series of Tim’s Listening Party, Tim is joined by one of the most renowned song-writing duos in British music history, Pete Doherty & Carl Barat of the Libertines.

Notorious, raucous, shambolic and ramshackle but brilliant, poetic, smart and witty, they are the indie heroes for a generation. Defined by extreme ups and downs, their music has survived through it all and so have they. Amongst a busy field of indie bands in Great British indie renaissance of the 00s, many would go as far as calling them the most important one.

Now, they have returned with their first album in 9 years and their fourth record overall, All Quiet on the Eastern Esplanade.

Pete & Carl will be talking about that new album, recording in Jamaica, plus Carl & Tim remember a band they once formed together.

All Quiet on the Eastern Esplanade was released on 5th April 2024 on Casablanca & Republic.

Over the past year, Tim's Listening Party has seen Tim Burgess bring his world famous Twitter Listening Parties to the radio, as he's sat down to go through classic albums with the likes of New Order, Def Leppard, U2, Skunk Anansie, the Kinks, Tears For Fears, Simple Minds and many more. The show will return on April 14th with brand new episodes looking at some of the best albums ever made, with some of the biggest artists in the world.. Tune in to Absolute Radio from 10pm to hear the full show.

For this very special episode, Tim Burgess is was joined for a live Listening Party by Andy McCluskey, the lead singer and bassist of one of the most influential synth-pop acts in history, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark.

Pioneers of electronic music, OMD were one of the earliest synthesizer-led bands to emerge from the post-punk scene, influencing many artists since, and making their presence felt in the Second British Invasion in the US with the advent of MTV.

Simply put, OMD are partly responsible for the sound that defined the 80s, and the album they are discussing, Architecture & Morality, remains one of the enduring records of that era.

Architecture & Mortality was released on 6th November 1981 on Dindisc.