First broadcast on FAB RADIO INTERNATIONAL at 19:00 on July 23rd 2023

A couple of years ago, back in our forty-eighth edition of VISION ON SOUND in September 2021, I welcomed ANDREW-MARK THOMPSON onto the show for the first time, and we spent a happy hour discussing his artistic life, creating his witty television-themed illustrations and graphic images, and about how his love of archive television inspired many of them.

His creation of spoof adverts featuring characters from shows like SAPPHIRE AND STEEL being used to promote products that never actually existed had given ANDY exactly the kind of internet presence that draws attention to people, and, little did I know at the time, but even as we recorded that show he was on the very brink of being commissioned to produce a collection of his artwork in book form.

Two years later, and here, in the summer of 2023, that rather beautiful book is in the process of being released at last into the world, courtesy of DAVID J HOWE and his TELOS PUBLISHING Company.

The book is called THIS IS A FAKE – after the words infamously scribbled onto the back of several MONA LISAs in felt-tipped pen by TOM BAKER’s DOCTOR WHO in the story CITY OF DEATH penned by DOUGLAS ADAMS in 1979 - and is a lovingly crafted volume of delightful and witty works of art which somehow manages to weave an alternative history of the DOCTOR WHO series that we sort-of know and love, and many of the television shows existing alongside it, as seen through the kind of promotional material that could only exist in some other, far stranger, parallel dimension.

So the book takes us on a visual journey right back to DR WHO’s post-war radio serial roots, which would inspire so much incredible familiarly unrecognizable merchandise, and even a celebratory Garden Fete held in deepest, darkest Sussex, that led to a specifically 1960s form of traffic chaos.

Sadly, as this book is indeed a celebratory pastiche, none of the products pictured within has ever been produced or placed on sale, which is, in several cases, rather unfortunate, as there are many that many Archive TV fans would have snapped up in a heartsbeat.

Obviously, with a brand-new glossy and shiny fresh great big book to promote, ANDREW-MARK THOMPSON has been busily doing the rounds promoting his Magisterpiece, so I was rather delighted that he – or at least someone who looks and sounds very much like him - has taken the time out of his now frantically busy schedule to join me once again to spend a rather delightful hour talking about how the book came into being, his processes, ideas, and inspirations, some of which I hope that you might actually not have heard before, and I hope you enjoy spending time in his company as much as I did.

PLEASE NOTE - For Copyright reasons, musical content sometimes has to be removed for the podcast edition. All the spoken word content remains (mostly) as it was in the broadcast version. Hopefully this won't spoil your enjoyment of the show.