John Peel’s Festive 50 was an end-of-year chart compiled based on the votes of the Radio 1 DJ’s listeners. It was first broadcast in 1976 and thereafter was broadcast almost every year. It was always an interesting snapshot of the year in music, though it leaned more heavily on white boys with guitars than did Peel’s own taste.
I’ve noticed a few people making Spotify playlists of old Festive 50 lists. So far I’ve found 1978, 1982 and 1988. I thought I’d sift through Spotify myself and see what the online music service could do for Peel’s 1990s lists. A couple of the 90s lists were unusual – Peel didn’t broadcast the 1991 list until 1993 and he broadcast only the top 31 tracks from the 1997 list, even though all 50 were chosen.
Anyway, Spotify did ok. The most tracks I found were from 1990 – 38 of the 50 – and I found the fewest, 23 tracks, for the 1997 and 1999 lists. The playlists are below. You’ll need to install Spotify on your computer to listen to them and some tracks may be unavailable in your part of the world.
1990 (38 tracks)
1991 (29 tracks)
1992 (28 tracks)
1993 (34 tracks)
1994 (32 tracks)
1995 (35 tracks)
1996 (24 tracks)
1997 (23 tracks)
1998 (24 tracks)
1999 (23 tracks)
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- Spotify playlist: The Auteurs fantasy setlist
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Comments About Spotify playlists: John Peel’s Festive 50, the 90s
// 9 comments so far.
Kieron // March 09th 2009
Hi Sean, some great playlists there. We have just launched a Spotify community site at ShareMyPlaylists.com, it would be fantastic if you could upload your playlists there too.
Thanks,
Kieron – Founder, ShareMyPlaylists.com
Tim Footman // March 09th 2009
But it’s not the same unless you intersperse samples of the great man’s drone.
Shane Richmond // March 09th 2009
Perhaps Spotify could upload some John Peel samples for us? They should also look into playing the odd record at the wrong speed.
Tom // March 09th 2009
I’ve started compiling Spotify festive 50 playlists for the 1970’s and have started on the 1980’s. You can find them here:
http://indiefy.wordpress.com/tag/festive-50/
Tom Ewing // March 12th 2009
Hi Shane – awesome playlists, I’ve been wallowing in nostalgia here.
One thing though – the 1994 version of Common People by Pulp is the Peel Session version (the studio one hadn’t been released yet) which you can find and add here: spotify:track:0v5ShgiWEEJHrd11fMq636
Shane Richmond // March 12th 2009
You’re right, Tom, thanks for pointing that out. I’ve fixed the playlist now.
stu // April 12th 2009
Great links thanks! Have checked out some of the older lists before me time and found some gems, I really miss John Peel a total legend.
Leonie69 // May 11th 2009
Hi there – maybe someone can help?? I’m a big Peel fan and was keen to listen to the playlists. I installed Spotify – and it seems to be working fine, but for some reason when I click the year links to the playlists it just says ‘playlist not found’. Can’t figure out what has gone wrong??! Does anyone here have any idea? Obviously it’s working for everyone else, judging from the comments… do I need the paid-for version, or is there something else going on?
x Leonie
Paul // November 08th 2009
Superb! Was just about to try and do the same thing myself. Thanks for all your hard work.
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