T-Shirt Day: how BBC 6 Music gave us one of social media’s brightest days
The modern world of social media is a dark place at times. Platforms that were once beacons of hope for lost dogs, rare opportunities to discuss the most niche subjects. Just places for us to explain what we were having for dinner or why we thought Star Wars was overrated in 140 characters or less. They have now been replaced by cash-producing, king-making, bubble-inducing conglomerates desperate to turn your attention into data and dollars. However, every year, there is one bright moment on our timelines. It is a reminder that out in the digital world, and even in real life, there is a place of warmth, comfort, connection and, above all else, community. BBC 6Music’s T-Shirt Day is back for its annual event, and during a year in which “permacrisis” is the word of 2022, we’ve never needed it more.
This year is the 15th edition of T-Shirt Day, and I was lucky enough to speak with its originator and ultimate indie DJ, Steve Lamacq, about the event. 2022 will see the usual stories shared and photos posted but also a judged competition for the best band T-shirt ever, featuring Jo Whiley and Orlando Weeks as judges. The day will culminate in a rollicking live performance with Sports Team on Steve Lamacq’s show on BBC 6Music on Friday, November 4th. It’s a chance for us all to dust ourselves down and reach out across the airwaves to share our love of music, which is something we all need.
Let’s face it; it’s pretty bleak out there. Whether it is the remnants of the global pandemic, the ever-falling pound or the constant, and we mean constant, political upheaval, Britain has been having a tough time. While one may be able to trace back many of these issues to a few suited idiots inside number 10, for many of us, changing these national and global issues are beyond our perceived capabilities. Instead, we feel destined to doomscroll on our phones. Our eyes wince at misery, and our thumbs support those trying to change things, feeling evermore removed from real life and almost entirely confined to our digital bubbles.
However, as with every moody sky, once in a while, a ray of sunshine can break through, and for BBC 6 Music, that unique burst of UV-goodness came about during a smoke break for their legendary DJ Steve Lamacq. The story goes that during a refreshing beverage at “Lamacq’s office”, AKA The Ship public house, the DJ stepped out into the fresh London air, and an idea hit him: get listeners to send in pictures of their favourite band T-shirts along with a story about how they got them and what it means. Returning to the warmth of the bar with a new idea, Lamacq and his team began preparing the feature. Little did they know that 15 years later, it would not only still be going strong but be bigger than ever.
The team had only “three weeks” to turn that first event around, and initially, Lamacq tells me that it was a fairly low-key affair: “I think in the first year, we probably had about 60 photos, maybe? But, impressively, it was from listeners who were working in primary schools and science labs, and it struck a chord.” With both social media and BBC 6 Music in their infancy, the small influx of images of a community of music lovers from across the country resonated with the station’s fanbase. By the following year, the wheels were in motion.
There could even be a case that T-Shirt Day was one of the primary factors that the new alternative radio station from the Beeb was finding listeners: “Particularly in those early years, when BBC 6Music itself was growing. I think it helped spread the word of the network; when somebody would turn up randomly at work in an old band T-shirt, to which their colleagues would say, ‘What is this station?” However, the reality of the annual event is far simpler than that.
“It’s just, it’s there to provide a talking point,” says Lamacq, having used the vehicle of sonic expression as his own cause for conversation for most of his working life. “[T-Shirt Day] is to remind us about some of the amazing nights we’ve had as music fans. Whatever sort of music we like, we share something in common, which is the fact that we all like music.” This connection makes T-Shirt Day such a joyous event in an otherwise gloomy landscape.
Emotion has always been a large part of why we love music, and something as simple as a T-shirt can not only bring that back to the foreground of one’s mind but also encourage us to share with and hear the stories of others. The reality is almost every single band tee shared with Lammo, and the BBC 6 Music team is attached to a person and their story: “A high percentage of the shirts have been purchased at gigs and remind people of particular nights in their life. And I think that it’s also a way of bringing out what emotions music can provoke in yourself and, you know, hanging on to or reliving some of those memories, which you’d previously put away in a drawer.”
Lamacq has more than a few in his own drawers, too, having spent the best part of three decades within the radio construct and widely regarded as Britain’s only untouchable indie king, the DJ’s wardrobe is likely bursting with memorabilia. “I’ve kept T-shirts from bands, some of whom I really liked at the time. I don’t know whether their records have stood up, but I still like the T-shirt, and I still like the memory of that time when I saw them when I really liked — my collection is almost like a photo album.”
But a few stick out as his favourites, including his first: “When I was nine years old, either T-shirt for the glam rock band Mud. And they had just had a black silhouetted picture of them on the floor. I was gonna say picture, but it was more like a black silhouette drawing of mud on this red T-shirt. So, I started quite young.” However, that isn’t the tee Lamacq holds dearest of all. Like the rest of us, the DJ’s most beloved tee is connected to one of his most joyful experiences, “One that I really treasure is a very plain T-shirt; it is basically the early Pavement logo. But I bought a gig in the States when Pavement opened up in New York.”
“It was My Bloody Valentine, supported by Superchunk and Pavement,” his voice crackling with the kind of excitement all musos feel when discussing a seismic moment in their sonic journies. “And it was just such a wonderful night. I mean, being able to see My Bloody Valentine in this big sort of theatre in New York and watching Pavement for the first time. Just you know, just looking at that T-shirt puts me right back in the building, standing there on my todd, just thinking, ‘This is just incredible!’ Just the feeling of being there in the middle of this gig — I find it hard to even explain that.”
For all those indie-loving collectors out there, the DJ also picked out a band tee he thinks will remain a classic of the future, too, noting: “The round Yard Act logo is such a simple design, but at the same time, you can just stare at it for ages. It almost has the same thing that the early Factory records had.” With that, my time with the extremely busy Steve Lamacq ended, and I was left with a balmy sense of buoyancy. It wasn’t because I had just spoken to the man I have listed to, on and off, for the majority of my life, nor because I had, in that very journalistic of ways, “got everything I needed”, but because I got to speak about music with someone who loves it.
Whether through conversation, typed or spoken, or simply through witnessing photo submissions or hearing gnarled stories on the radio, BBC 6 Music’s T-Shirt Day truly offers us something unique. It provides a reminder that out in the wild and wearisome world, there are people just like you. People who want to know about the very special moment you saw David Bowie on the Glass Spider tour or how you wrestled your favourite tee from an angry sound guy at an Oasis gig. These are people who understand that, for many of us, music is so much more than what’s playing in your headphones.
So, tomorrow, when you scroll through your timelines on social media and witness another billionaire deciding to extract more cash from us, a food bank left desecrated by cuts or a barrage of racist rhetoric, look for the brightest spot on the internet. Check out BBC 6 Music’s T-Shirt Day and bask in the glorious geniality of music lovers sharing their stories and lives with one another.
BBC Radio 6 Music’s T-Shirt Day 2022 takes place on Friday 4th November, 5am-7pm
