Box 39: Recent Episodes
Guppy Productions
'Box 39' is the long-running and unique magazine radio show, originally broadcast on Colne Radio in North East Essex, UK. Fresh, innovative and unexpected, and blending gorgeous music, features, chat and banter, its a show based in the heart of our local, national and international community. What will come out of Box 39 next?
Top indie book shop manager Jo Coldwell and The Director of Essex Book Festival Ros Green discuss the ethics of censorship, what being cancelled means, and whether freedom of speech is really necessary. Meanwhile Bill is having trouble with Matron, and Adrian and Janice are on full expenses, for art’s sake, of course.
With great music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Jo Coldwell and RosGreen
It’s a city of renewal and redemption. The rain and Eccles cakes are still there, but Manchester is a progressive, modern and revitalised city, proud of its past - and its future too.
It's unique - a day like no other! Special in so many ways - sport, leisure, TV, and if we're lucky, an extra hour in bed! From the Polynesian island of Kiribati, to Saturday Night Fever... its another live Box 39 with all the usual nonsense, and with great music too...
It’s the last day of David’s Fair, and his followers are in the car park. But is he the wellbeing messiah? Or just a very naughty boy? Adrian’s plotting against him, and Bill is lost in his past. It’s going to end in fireworks, that’s for sure…
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and David Nash
Mike is trying Welsh, swearing in Victorian and speaking Cold War Doublethink. Bill is winning Radio Scrabble. And there are revelations from the past in GCSE Esperanto.
Chaotic, charming and engaging live studio Box 39... with great music, of course
Live from a very cluttured Studio 1, all the next generation of devices and inventions, alongside the tech they replaced. But accidents can happen...
With great music and the new Yellow Pages ad that may haunt you forever...
with Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Bob May and Simon Grinham.
The murky waters of East Anglia have always hidden big secrets. But now Mike’s talking big numbers, Jonathan’s making big money, and Adrian’s refusing to wear his fiery bamboo underpants. And where are the budgies being hidden?With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Mike Harwood & Jonathan Pearsall
The London Underground transit system. The tube. A crossroads of history, culture, and innovation.
Joining Bill are Anthony Roberts, Pulp, Lily Allen, King Charles’ Royal Antelopes, Suggs, the naked station staff at Dagenham East, and The Jam. It's an innovative live broadcast that travels on every one of the 11 lines of the Underground, that symbolise London's great journey through time.
with Bill Lawrance
This is a journey around the World War One Battlefields of the Somme, in northern France, where the British and German armies engaged in conflicts of such enormity and horror. As idealism perished, the futile tragedy of ‘the lions led by donkeys’ emerged.
As one German officer wrote: ‘the whole history of the world cannot contain a more ghastly word than ‘Somme’’.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Iain Tallentire
Join our special celebration of that cornerstone of our communities, The Pub - described by Samuel Pepys as ‘The Heart of England’.
With appearances by Bruno Brookes, Floella Benjamin and manyglorious pubs, past and present - and with great music too, of course.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Bob May
Bill & David have the spirit of Christmas – but Adrian is missing, Anthony’s been sacked and only Keith knows the password. Can Mr Tinsels save the show? He’s 87, you know…
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & David Nash
There are bargains galore, as Bill and Ian dig deep into the educational phenomenon of online instant-qualification gratification.
As the pennies drop however, the shocking truth becomes apparent, that “Everyone has a Price”.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Ian Hornett
Live from Studio One, we share the secrets of ‘How to Win at Football’, all the things you need to know to fulfil your football based dreams.
With remarkable access to the Radio Presenter’s XI, their new stadium, and their approach to winning mindset ways, we also hear from four Box 39 celebrities with their own answer to this vital question.
And there’s a whole lot of sporting nudism. And great music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Craig Barker
So many of the Western Front’s bloodiest engagements were fought In Belgium and particularly around Ypres - it was also one of the most unsuited to modern warfare, with its flat and boggy terrain.
The shocking and important truths of these Battlefields are told through its bunkers, dressing stations, trenches, tunnels, monuments, and museums. Their tales are told in the show alongside connected personal stories and scenes from the Home Front in Colchester and Wivenhoe.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Iain Tallentire
We’re just messing about on the river, from historical Sudbury to hysterical Harwich. Simon shows us his pork-based cock-pocket, and Bob’s on watch up his long ladder There’s wild soup to eat, and Antoine’s made the nettle tea. And there’s a drunken sailor loose on deck…
Sail the stream of chat, humour and great music, live from the Box 39 Studio.
With Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen
Amidst astonishing tales of disaster, ordeal and humanity across East Anglia, Jonathan’s big secret is out, and Mike’s strictly cash only. Antoine speaks for his socks, and Venetia Tardy-Bint speaks from God...
It’s the usual live studio chaos, of course. And with great music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Yvonne Pini, Mike Harwood andJonathan Pearsall
It's all change in the studio this week as Jill, Toni and Yvonne do the heavy lifting whilst Bill & Adrian do very little indeed for their executive fees.
As modern life becomes more complex and confusing, so does juggling our roles. How can we survive?
Just ask Barbie….
With Bill Lawrance, Jill Ball, Toni Peers & Yvonne Pini.
Live, from the studios of Sunshine FunTime FM, in Nicosia, Cyprus, Box 39 investigates the magical mixture of traditional and modern life on this remarkable island. Guest presenter Sue Beer joins regulars Bill and Adrian to examine this beautiful yet complex Mediterranean tourist attraction, and uncover the secrets of the people and the places that only their Senior Presenters expense accounts can allow…
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Sue Beer
There’s peril, risk and electric shocks in the Studio, as Bob is tested to his very limits – will his supreme knowledge of Telephone Poles help him to avoid the consequences? It’s a live show, and with listeners choosing what happens next, anything can happen…
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Bob May
Comrades, it’s Revolution! Wivenhoe has declared itself as an independent state, no longer in the UK. From the roadblocks at the Co-op comes the new President Martin Newell in some serious epaulettes and a pointy hat. Announcing 5 edicts for the citizens, playing great music, and declaring a new national anthem, it’s a critical moment in Wivenhoe’s history.
And Box 39, Official Broadcaster of the Revolution, proudly brings you every moment of the uprising, as it happens …
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Martin Newell & Danae Brook
The beautiful Essex town of Billericay is in danger from an ancient historical curse, and time is running out.
Box 39 is on a mission to save the town - with the help of listeners, the Colne Radio Sports Car, some great music and a reasonable lunch expenses budget.
A unique and remarkable radio adventure, that could just save Billericay…
With Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen
While Bill’s away, Adrian steps up and takes charge. Always unappreciated, overlooked and in Bill’s shadow - until now.
Can Adrian sit in the Senior Presenter’s Chair? Or is it rigged against him?
With all the Great Colne Radio Senior Presenters, and Great music too
With Adrian Coen
Our Box 39 investigation into our furry feline friends reveals how important Cats are to us all. Scrutinising cat fishing, Tom and Jerry, wildcats and the physics of licking ones own fur, this is a joyous exploration of the purring, meowing world of Cats. And with great music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Isobel Lawrance
Live from Studio One, we examine some notable failures, setbacks and letdowns. With our most exciting competition ever, a Big Sue oboe solo that defies description, the shocking truth about ‘Luton Late Afternoon Fun Time’, and lashings of snake oil.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and David Nash
Bill is on the road and out of the Studio, driving the Colne Radio company sports car around the country, as he investigates the secrets of our street and highwys, our lanes and motorways - and with great music, of course.
with Bill Lawrance
These are the Awards that really matter.Better than 'Stanway FM'. Stronger than 'Clacton South Sounds'. And more adequate than 'Your Accountancy Radio'We may be controversial. We may be exciting, glamorous and dazzling. We may be why radio was invented...
with Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Craig Barker.
Historian Jonathan Pearsall is live in the studio as we uncover secrets from East Anglia’s 20th century wartime past. But Mike Harwood’s gone missing, Adrian sounds familiar and Bill’s got Sue Pollard on his mind. Even Jonathan has secrets to be revealed…
With great music too
with Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Jonathan Pearsall
Some are called Genius from the start. But though he is in the GCSE Poetry Anthology, Mallory remains unrecognised. This is his remarkable story that has remained ball-achingly untold for the last 75 years…
this is ERNEST MALLORY, WIVENHOE’S LOST GENIUS
with Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Venetia Tardy-Bint and Kath Kershaw.
This is Tristan da Cunha, the world’s most remote inhabited island.
Unique. Beautiful. Shocking. And strangely very British.
The island at the end of the world.
With Bill Lawrance
There are 56 of them and can stick out half a mile – like barnacle clad phallic erections saturated in salt water. They are of course the pleasure piers that we find all around our coasts. Are they as relevant in our post millennial digital world of Apps today as they have been in their Victorian and Edwardian heydays of glamour and excitement when their priapic presence drew crowds of excited holiday makers to the seaside in search of excitement like a soft and stout banana draws a swarm of happy fruit flies?
With Adrian confused, and Mike’s expenses under scrutiny, can Bill hold the show together?
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Mike Harwood
Aged 28 and over a period of 21 months Ade was in Indonesia and did not set foot in Britain, a country he had never spent any more than 4 weeks away from up until that point.
Examining this fledgling expatriate through the prism of the western rock and pop music that he listened to during those 21 months - none of which, for Ade, evokes any associations with Britain at all – reveals an original soundtrack of exceptional music and extraordinary recollections.
With Adrian Coen
with Bob May throwing a sickie, and show plans redundant, Bill and Ade turn to the theme of OBSOLETE.
Relying on out-of-date tech, wearing unfashionable flares and bouncing round the studio on unlicensed space hoppers, can they survive the wrath and fury of the Wivenhoe Arcane Wordage & Quite Literal Vocabularists Society….?
With Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen
The bad news is that the world is going to end. But the good news is probably not anytime soon.
North East Essex’s most infamous scrutinisers of the cultural nosebleeds of modern life examine potential sources of Armageddon, helped by Nostradamus, the prophet hen of Leeds, a death clock online predictor, and some sexy robots that can surf. And with great music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Simon Grinham & Bob May
We look back on the highs and lows, the controversies and the debates, of an imitable tournament played at a unique time and place.
With a new house band live in the studio, and the rare and exclusive appearance of Statto, it’s a very happy World Cup for us all. Plus great music of course.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Craig Barker, Iain Tallentire & Mike Harwood
Live from Mission Control at The Space Centre, expert David Nash joins Bill as he prepares to become the first Radio Presenter in Space. It’s a tense last few minutes before lift-off to the International Space Station. Bill’s got his space suit, a badge, and his ticket. What could possibly go wrong…?
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & David Nash
Our live studio show explores the sounds, sights and even the smells of the Lake District, perhaps our best loved national park. It seduced Wordsworth and Beatrix Potter, and it attracts sightseers, walkers and adventurers. The plentiful lakes and striking fells rise above hill farms and villages, and time moves slowly, as places remain as remembered, from season to season and from year to year.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Bob May
Live from Studio One, Box 39 takes a deep dive into the world of writing to discover exactly how writers work and think, and to reveal what really is involved in their business - with best selling authors Ian Hornett & Angela Cairns. And great music too.
With Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen
Think that size doesn’t really matter? Then think again, as Craig Barker joins Bill & Adrian for a Box 39 investigation of everything that is Big and Small in life – The momentous and the significant. The greatest and the most profound. The noblest, the coolest, the most eminent.
In short, the grooviest things. And with gorgeous music too!
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Craig Barker
Live from Studio One, join Bill and north Essex icon Jo Coldwell for a show entirely about BABIES.
With great conversation, and expert analysis from the world leader in baby wellness, and expert in all Baby matters, Gayle Berry.
And with Del Boy, the 1950s, Dirty Den and the most gorgeous music too.
With Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen
What you are about to hear is not an experiment – nor is it science fiction. It is very real indeed. Using highly sophisticated, sensitive and quite secret technology, our doctors and scientists are able to plug into the subconscious mind of Mr Arthur Crabtree, to monitor secret thoughts and music that have until now remained hidden. Our journey is to the remote parts of his psyche. It will not hurt him, but it may disturb us. This is indeed a unique and dazzling radio experience.
With Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen.
Bill Lawrance is joined by expert research wranglers to discover life in 20, 50 and even 100 years from now. The end of conflict, climate change and China crisis… quantum matchmaking…3D emojis... and a space elevator to heaven. The future is here – and it’s edible and invisible.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Mike Harwood & Iain Tallentire
Another wonderful bonus to enjoy from Guppy Productions sister show 'Bill's Big Bag of Onions'.
NEIL FINN ONIONS look, smell and taste of Neil Finn, the New Zealand-born singer-songwriter and musician who is a member of Crowded House and Fleetwood Mac. A truly reliable and absorbent Big Bag of Onions.
Sit back and surrender to the splendiferous music and originatively homegrown storytelling, that is Bill's Big Bag of Onions... Original 100-word stories to enthral and delight.
with Adrian Coen & Yvonne Pini
another bonus episode from sister podcast 'Bill's Big Bag of Onions':
There are over 50 professional Elvis impersonators in the UK. This is the story of just one, from North East Essex, told through 13 short stories written by 13 different writers.
Sit back and surrender to the splendiferous music and originatively homegrown storytelling, that is Bill's Big Bag of Onions... Original 100-word stories to enthral and delight.
with Adrian Coen & Yvonne Pini
Viva Las Stanway!
A bonus episode from sister podcast 'Bill's Big Bag of Onions':
Bill's Big Onion Tip: GLOBAL ONIONS are here, there, and everywhere in between all 4 corners of our world.
Sit back and surrender to the splendiferous music and originatively homegrown storytelling, that is Bill's Big Bag of Onions... Original 100-word stories to enthral and delight.
with Adrian Coen & Yvonne Pini
Sporting expert and quiz champion Andrew Oldershaw faces unique physical and mental challenges live in the studio. If he wins, his statue will be placed on the roof of Colne Radio Towers. But should he fail, he must walk the plank - out of Studio One on the 4th floor, high above the raging torrents of the River Colne below…
with Janice Minty-Spoons, George Formby, Bog Snorkelling, Michael Gove's Baguette, and the animals from Colchester Zoo.
And Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Andrew Oldershaw
Live from Studio One, Box 39 reveals just how MONEY TALKS, with TV & Radio financial journalist, Isobel Lawrance, from MoneyMagpie.com. With tips, hacks, explanations and all the facts, this is our comprehensive examination of Money – with the best music too.
Box 39 travels to the Danish capital to investigate the claims that Denmark has the most contented inhabitants on Earth. Adventures in restaurants, bars, on bikes and on the Metro, reveal that this may well be true. Music is curated by our Danish correspondent Maria. And there’s lots of Herring.
With Bill Lawrance, Izzy Lawrance & Lord David Price
Ever since Adam & Eve transgressed the rules on eating fruit there have been constant scandals – and we love them, as they allow us to unmask hypocrites, moralise happily and feel ourselves to be superior!
Box 39 reveals some of the biggest, most exciting and most unexpected outrages - with great music too.
Live from Studio One, it's a scandalous show!
With Bill Lawrance, Bob May and Adrian Coen
A deep dive of humour, music, chat and surprises, examining the exciting, surprising and controversial world of the 2021-22 football season - when players held politicians to account - clubs, competitions and players were bought and sold for eye watering sums - and England got incredibly close to winning!
with great music too...
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen & Craig Barker
East Anglia- a region, a feeling, a state of mind.
It’s a place of beauty and big skies, of mystery and mindfulness, of diversity and delights, and of coastline, countryside and cities. It's history is important and rich, and its place in the modern world is vital and valuable. With great music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Mike Harwood & Jonathan Pearsall.
Live from Studio One, Box 39 investigates The Absurd – the ridiculous, the illogical, the bizarre – even the downright silly.
From Philosophy to Film, with a live game of ‘Find My Frogs’, and a phone call from Donna’s mum… and great music too.
You won’t get this on the BBC…
With Bill Lawrance, Mike Harwood, Iain Tallentire and Adrian Coen
A Ghost Hunt, broadcast live and as it happens, from The Old Mill House, at Rockingham St Mavis, a place with a terrible reputation for being haunted. With only 2 presenters, a producer and an Outside Broadcast Van.
Unrehearsed, and unedited. Just Music and Ghosts. What can go wrong?
With Bill Lawrance, Bob May & Adrian Coen.
A happy and musical journey that investigates the ancient river port of The Hythe, which over the centuries has been vital to the life, wealth and development of Colchester. From the original Chinese settlers, through Norman invaders to the great Fish & Chip wars that beset the Hythe in its industrial heyday, this is History with heart and soul.
With Bill Lawrance, Jonathan Pearsall & Mike Harwood
Plastic, lovely plastic! So useful, cheap, and so everywhere! It’s at the heart of our communications, our technology, our buildings and our clothes. Its convenient and enjoyable. But it’s the modern miracle that might just end up destroying our world!
Live from Studio 1, Box 39 investigates…with great music too, of course
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Simon Grinham
live from the Box 39 Festival, on St Barbra’s Island, off the coast of north east Essex.
Joining Bill Lawrance in the Outside Broadcast Yurt pitched between the Main Stage and the Wellness Tent is Festival connoisseur David Nash.
House band Ausgang Exit are set up on the Global Digital Retail Acoustic stage, the campsite is full, and the famous St Barbra’s goat herd have eaten all the wild mushrooms. It’s the full Festival experience, without having to use the toilets…
With Bill Lawrance & David Nash
A new concept in entertainment - it's mime on your radio! Live from Studio One, Bill , Mike and Iain bring you a series of favourite word games, from Scrabble to Countdown, with a ferocious game of Just a Minute in between..
You'll never get this on Radio 4...
Coming soon, the Box 39 team investigate the intense rivalry at ITV that north-east Essex working class viewers were kept in the dark about, as were north-east Essex middle class viewers, who only watched the BBC.
With Bungle, Zippy and others
Live from the Box 39 Dugout, Bill, Bob & Craig are pitch side, and with their Box 39 tracksuits on, as they put our national game through its paces and examine if football is still a sport or a multi billion pound business. Nothing is offside, so expect surprises and great music before the final whistle.
With Bill Lawrance, Bob May & Craig Barker
Live from Studio One, the Box 39 team are joined by historian Jonathan Pearsall, as they investigate Victorian Colchester. And it's time to unearth secrets and stories, from sewage pipes to drag artists - and with great music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Mike Harwood & Jonathan Pearsall
A Box 39 special investigation that scrutinises the legendary musical phenomenon that is Ausgang Exit.
For over 3 decades, Henry – who like Adele needs only one name – has forged a path throughout the music, entertainment and business worlds that has defied expectations and stretched probabilities. Speaking to friends and foes alike from the world of celebrity, can the truth be reached?
With Frank Bruno, Frankie Howard, Boris Johnson, Julie Goodyear, Billy Connolly, Tony Blair, Julie Walters, David Frost, Bob Geldof, Dickie Bird, Elton John, Neil Kinnock, John Cleese, Ken Dodd, Stephen Hawkins, Ray Winstone, Ricky Gervais, Ronnie Corbett, John Peel and Bill Lawrance.
Adele does have a last name by the way, its Adkins. Not Atkins, but Adkins. A lot of people make that mistake.
Live from Studio 1, we open our Time Capsule, first buried in 1975, and with pouches added every 5 years until 2000. With an emergency accountant present, we reveal secrets from the past, carefully prepared for the future, and now placed in the present.
Can the capsule’s contents be monetised? What was Su Pollard doing at breakfast time? And what really caused the feud between Bobby Davro & Ausgang Exit?
With Bill Lawrance, Bob May & Iain Tallentire
Live from Studio One, Box 39 takes you on a culinary journey, examining the language of food, how McDonalds may not be healthy, lockdown deliveries, eating in the dark, and the best restaurants in North East Essex. And Delia and Fanny too. With great grub related music, of course.
With Bill Lawrance, Jo Coldwell and Tamsin Burnett-Hall.
Probing the minds of our listeners, to find the big answers. Seeking the truths, that only Box 39 can provide. Asking the biggest, boldest and most badass of all the binary questions. Box 39 will tell you what you want, what you really, really want....
Live and dangerous, unique and funny. And with great music.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Mike Harwood, Iain Tallentire...and introducing Jonathan Pearsall.
Live from Studio 1 , Bill and Adrian attempt to solve 6 of the toughest mysteries that have defied explanation and investigation.
Harnessing the power of Box 39's wall of worldwide expertise, Bill & Adrian swerve through analysis, intuition and imagination, accompanied by an impressive cast of listeners, in their race to find the truth before the end of the show - with great music too, of course.
Engaging, funny and completely mad!
with Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen
Box 39 is brimming with gadgets and gizmos - whether older, redundant, influential, or redundant, these inventions reflect their times, and speak about our expectations and our changing views of our communities and society. Adrian supplies the music via a 1981 Sony Walkman, and live house band Ausgang Exit are are connected to a Sinclair ZX Spectrum computer from 1979.
From cleaning glass eyes to the measurement of lemons - it's tomorrow's world...today!
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Bob May and Simon Grinham.
Memories - Powerful, emotional, and sometimes unreliable - no one knows how memory works, but it's one of the central aspects of our lives. Bill Iain and Mike remember, recollect and reminisce - with the original house band Ausgang Exit, special guest Donna From Norwich, and an appearance from Alan Partridge too.
With Bill Lawrance, Mike Harwood, Iain Tallentire and Adrian Coen
To mark the start of Season 5 of Box 39, Ade chats to Rob Jelly at BBC Essex about his adventures in Japan, Australia and Java, Indonesia, after he left Essex in the early 1990s...
With Adrian Coen & Rob Jelly.
It's Bill's last radio show - after 5966 shows with the radio station he's moving on, to become the online voice of a digital merchandising website. To celebrate Bill's 45 year love affair with radio, he's hoping that several old radio and showbiz chums will drop by during his last show, to say farewell.
It should be quite a party. But this is live radio - and love affairs have a habit of ending in tears...
With Bill Lawrance & Yvonne Pini
Live from Studio One, our feast of all things ‘summer’, as Box 39 fills your plate, and satisfies your appetite. Our recipe includes: live cooking on the radio, some wandering poets, clever scientific stuff, and some creamy spatulas. And served with a big side dish of great music, of course! And don’t worry about doing the washing up, we’ll do it in the morning…
With Bill Lawrance, Andrew Oldershaw, Iain Tallentire and Adrian Coen
Bill speaks to Rob Jelly at BBC Essex about the 100th edition of Box 39, 'Bill's Last Show' - coming soon.
SIX - that mysterious, beautiful and rather gorgeous number, beloved by many, hated by a few, and which has been at the heart of the rise and fall of Kings, and dominated the Surgeon’s invoice to the Bionic Man. It’s the hour when we hear our news, it’s when we say ‘over’, and it’s the perfect handful of strings on our guitars, though is 50% too many on a violin
Live studio joy, in a very SIX-Y way...
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Bob May, Mike Harwood and The Ausgang Six...
Join Bill and May, as they travel around East Anglia in the Colne Radio staff sports car, investigating disused World War 2 airfields, examining their important history, their key locations and finding out what they have become today. And with great music too!
With Bill Lawrance and Bob May
Box 39 is live in the studio for a special show, with TV Maths wizard Johnny Ball, and The Man with Animal Magic, Johnny Morris. However, wrong Ball and wrong Johnny - and its soon becomes a celebration of local hero John Ball, priest and advocate of the power of the people over despicable authority, whose brave words and actions 640 years ago encouraged the Peasants Revolt, and who has inspired revolutionaries across the world ever since.
With reflections on the great traditions of English Morris Dancing, and with Ausgang Solo playing live in the studio, its not long before Bill and Natalie step up for a unique moment in Radio History, as with bells, sticks and garlands, they begin a Morris Dance, live in Studio One...
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Natalie Eldred
It might be coming home..
72 hours from England's appearance in the final of Euro 2020 (played in July 2021), Box 39 investigates the glories of the beautiful game, from England's own performance, the tournament itself, as well as reflecting on Women's football in the Tokyo Olympics and the World Cup in Qatar, in just 16 months time.
It's a great show, packed full of analysis, emotion, chat, passion and the best music.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Craig Barker & Bryn Griffiths.
Box 39 is live, sailing on the Ocean wave, from Studio One at Colne Radio Towers this week.
Our oceans cover 71 percent of the Earth's surface and contain 97 percent of the Earth's water, their currents govern the world's weather and we all depend on these teeming waters for comfort and survival. With two experts in the studio to help, Bill Lawrance and Jo Coldwell set sail to investigate. Eleanor Church is a documentary filmmaker & photographer, and Leanne Hepburn is the Director of Education, Senior Lecturer in Marine Science & Conservation at the University of Essex.
And there's great music too, of course.
With Bill Lawrance, Jo Coldwell, Eleanor Church and Leanne Hepburn
Live from Studio One, the Box 39 brigade consider the impact of our dreams on human culture - whether in music, poetry, art, language, our dreams have affected the course of History itself, and remain reflections of our condition as well as being drivers of our destinies.
With dream catchers in hand, Bill and Mike investigate what inspires us to dream...and meet Steven Spielberg, Morgan Freeman and Martin Luther King along their journey. And with outrageously great music too, including live House Band Ausgang Solo.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Mike Harwood
New owner 'Lord David Price Digital Media' has taken everyone on a team bonding event, leaving just Bill and Adrian in the studio. With only a new Russian based search engine, some fruit, and texts from listeners, will Bill and Ade get through the show?
The unique 'Wall of Radio Sound' from Box 39 must prevail!
with Bill Lawrance & Adrian Coen.
Using the Colne Radio sportscar and credit card, Bill and Natalie journey to the city of Brighton, known as 'The Happiest place in England' and just a few hours from NE Essex. They visit a range of places in this seaside city that celebrates individuality - and soon find a strong sense of community reflected in the history, architecture, shopping, literature and people.
With great music, vegetarian shoes and a flock of seagulls.
With Bill Lawrance, Natalie Eldred and Adrian Coen
Live from the rooftop botanical gardens at Colne Radio Towers, this is an exploration of that special friend within our homes, the humble House Plant. We might love them or loathe them, but we can't ignore them!
With deft watering, clever leaf polishing, expert compost fiddling - and with the best music too - this is award-winning green fingered radio!
with Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen, Natalie Eldred and Gurpreet Kaur
Live from Studio One at Colne Radio Towers, an exploration of those influences that helped form the Baby Boomers and Generation X, way before the new world order of Generations Y and Z, the Millennials and Centennials…
With cultural references and great music from those times, this is unashamed nostalgia, pulled out of Box 39, with flourishes and flares...
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Iain Tallentire
Settle back with your popcorn, orange drink and hot dog, for our main feature - as Bob May chooses 6 of the best films you will ever see, to whet your appetite for the reopening of cinemas. Films that will inspire, shock, thrill and make you tingle...that reflect why a night at the movies remains such a wonderful and heady experience of sensory pleasure! And there's some great movie music too!
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Bob May.
Live in the Studio, and with the possibilities of travel once more as the global pandemic begins to subside, Box 39 examines our Dream Destinations. But where should you go, and what would make your travelling easier and better value for money? With a recommendation for every continent, and one for domestic holidays in the UK as well, Bill and Steve carry you around the entire world, playing great music at every venue - and House Band Ausgang Solo squirt gorgeous and original sounds in your ears as you go...
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Steve Ball
Live in the Studio, with just 100 days before the postponed Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games is scheduled to begin. But are the Olympic Games broken, with a lack of interest from the public, corruption rife and overwhelming debt for decades for the host city? Or does the legacy of the Games make it all worthwhile? With performance enhancing drugs on their mind, Bill and Iain play great music for the occasion and House Band Ausgang Solo keep the whole show on track.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Iain Tallentire
Live from Studio One, Box 39 investigates the First Day of April. With an examination of the practical jokes and hoaxes that happen on this day, Bob May and Bill Lawrance are joined by the Box 39 house band, 'Ausgang Solo', for a unique celebration of the special place that the 91st day of the year has in our community.
With Bill Lawrance, Adrian Coen and Bob May
Mike Harwood brings a selection of presents of poetry to celebrate our return to live radio after another lockdown. With poems for campaigning, poems that mark personal moments, poems that transport and inspire, and poems just to make you feel good.
With poems read by Adrian Coen, Yvonne Pini, and Mike Harwood himself.
Box 39 investigates how the 100 word short stories are written and then created into the finished 'Onions' for the award winning show 'Bill's Big Bag of Onions'. With views from contributors in the Writers' Room, its a fascinating view of how these unique and original stories are boiled into award winning onions. And with gorgeous music too!
with Bill Lawrance and Adrian Coen.
Box 39 is out of the Box this week - on a mid winters journey along the Essex Coast, from south to north. With a mixture of great music and the rambling imaginings, thoughts and contemplations from Bill's brain that accompany the waves that he walks besides....
with Bill Lawrance and Adrian Coen.
Curated music, chat, poems, features and inspiration from around the world, to commemorate International Women's Day. A very special show.
With Gurpreet Sidhu, Pamela Ennis and Yvonne Pini.
Box 39 is opened once more, for a programme about Grief. Examining our responses, offering contrasting cultural perspectives from East and West, suggesting paths to positive management. Unique and moving, and beautifully written and produced by guest presenter Gurpreet.
With Bill Lawrance, Gurpreet Sidhu and Adrian Coen.
Box 39 goes on a long journey to south-east Asia, to explore Indonesia, the world's 4th most populous country, made up of thousands of islands, a land of jungles, beaches, thriving cities and agricultural rice fields. Bill and Iain travel around the largest island, the volcanic Java, to meet communities, and discover how people live, work and enjoy themselves. With gorgeous music too.
With Bill Lawrance, Iain Tallentire and Adrian Coen