Richard Branson: I'm giving Danny Baker my record collection
Virgin Records mogul makes rash promise during Radio Times interview
Vinyl junkie Danny Baker is about to receive a new hit of potentially lethal strength: Virgin Records co-founder Richard Branson has promised to gift the broadcaster his personal record collection.
Radio 5 Live presenter Baker ended his Radio Times interview with Branson – the first the Sony Award-winning radio host has conducted for print in almost three decades – by brazenly asking the tycoon to hand over all his old vinyl records.
To Baker's amazement, Branson agreed – in words that appear in Radio Times magazine today and therefore almost certainly form some kind of watertight legal agreement.
Asked by Baker whether he still has his "horde of personal vinyl", Branson said: “Yes, I have, actually. All of them – boxed up somewhere. Haven’t seen them for years but I still have all my old albums, yes.”
"Give them to me," said Baker. "Give me your collection."
“You still collect, do you?" Branson replied. "And play it? OK. Fine. You can have them."
Make some room on the shelves, Mrs Baker: there are an awful lot of Faust, Mike Oldfield and Tangerine Dream LPs coming home with Danny...
Read the full interview with Richard Branson, by Danny Baker, in today's new issue of Radio Times magazine. Coinciding with The Story of Now, an ITV documentary celebrating 30 years of the EMI/Virgin chart compilation series Now That's What I Call Music!, the interview also covers how creating the Now franchise helped Richard Branson find love, and why he once went to Finland to scream at a band called Wigwam.
