That’s 2 hours of my life that I’ll never get back…I know the BBC create a LOT of radio output, but the shows are either not well documented or, if they ever were, the information has now been deleted.

Loose Ends is a BBC Radio 4 (R4) show that is a mix of conversation, music and comedy and started in 1986. The host from 1986 to 2006 was Ned Sherrin (who died in 2007) and the helm was taken over by Clive Anderson (who is still hosting it now).

The results of my research into Jimmy’s appearances are:

This 2002 BBC article (mysteriously re-dated as 2014) says he’s a “regular guest and interviewer on Radio 4’s Loose Ends”. And Jimmy’s Loose ends involvement gets another mention in this BBC article (talking about the “outrage” at the 6-comedian shortlist for Edinburgh’s Perrier award all being men).

Tatchell’s Guide to BBC Radio Comedy (PDF, here) covers the years 1938 to 2023 but has no entries at all for this radio show.

Which is a long way of saying that, despite trying all kinds of tricks (and trawling the British Newspaper Archive) I can find no details of these above-mentioned episodes. I even tried searching just under “2001” and “2002” and just got offered back a lot of my own articles. Doh!

You would think, if he had been an interviewer, that there would be a mention of the dates of those shows SOMEWHERE. Even the BBC Genome has no information.

I’ll plough on…

He appeared on a Christmas 2005 show (December 17^th) and got into trouble for a joke about a Gypsy Moth (here) after 1 listener complained to OFCOM (see this post on the OFCOM complaints topic). Regardless of whether you would consider the word play in good taste (or not) this was one of those instances where the public broadcaster issued an apology for the joke going out on the radio.

Jimmy’s last appearance that I can find (which may not have been his actual last appearance) was on March 11th 2011. He was on his Laughter Therapy tour and had a gig in Reading (The Hexagon) that evening. He dropped into Loose Ends and participated in a live chat “where he discussed his work and engaged in live chat with hosts and callers”.

The link to the programme (here) now no longer works and the gallery now only starts from 2013. The image below is therefore copyright of the BBC and you have to wonder what happens to all of this history that they delete?

In summary – it would appear that, between at least 2001 and 2011, he made MANY appearances on this show. But your guess is as good as mine as to exactly when and how many.