Charles and Graham welcome special guest, musician, Chantel McGregor. Bradford born, Chantel is a rock musician and female guitar prodigy, who enrolled at the Leeds College of Music and became the first student in the college’s history, to achieve a 100% pass mark at BTEC, with 18 distinctions. Chantel followed this with a First Class Honours degree in Popular Music and a coveted prize, the college’s musician of the year award. Her critically acclaimed 2011 debut album, Like No Other was foll...

Graham looks back on Return to the River's Edge; the cult 1986 teen film directed by Tim Hunter that foretold Twin Peaks and the Grunge movement.Charles reports on a new documentary about Michael Powell & Emetic Pressburger. Made in England : The Films of Powell and Pressburger - the under appreciated luminaries of British cinema - is directed by David Hinton and narrated by American director Martin Scorsese.Charles reviews Paloma Faith’s recent gig at York Barbican in an attempt to...

Graham reports on his meeting with David Remfry, Britain's coolest artist, aged 81. Graham met him at his new exhibition, We Think the World of You - People and Dogs Drawn at The Mercer Gallery, Harrogate's only public gallery, once again proving itself indispensable with a high quality exhibition of national interest.Charles is fresh from seeing the Monet exhibition at York Art Gallery, a new exhibition and as part of the National Gallery bicentenary. York Art Gallery’s Monet in York celebra...

Graham has a confession to make - he's worrying about Taylor Swift. Is it time to take one of the world's newest billionaires seriously?Charles is drawn to Graham's more positive view of the Sam Taylor-Johnson Amy Winehouse biopic.Keep in touch with Two Big Egos in a Small Car:X@2big_egosFacebook@twobigegos

Graham pays tribute to guitarist Graeme Naysmith, co-founder of the Leeds band, The Pale Saints and remembers when they played one of his own Charm nights in Harrogate.Time moves on - Looking back at two of the western world's greatest political philosophers of the last half century - Noam Chomsky and Jean Baudrillard and whether two of their bestselling books stand up now.Is Civil War the best film yet from Alex Garland or is it too political?Keep in touch with Two Big Egos in a Small ...

Graham recounts interviewing Steve Howe of Yes about their forthcoming UK tour and York Barbican gig. Benjamin Francis Leftwich live in Leeds? Yes please! Charles is captivated by a fascinating gig at Leeds' Brudenell Social Club. Graham enters the crazy world of data retrieval as he reveals how he nearly lost his entire draft manuscript for a book on Magna Carta's Chris Simpson. Graham has been writing it for four years now so to lose it would be brutal. Just back from a trip to Scotland...

Graham reports on his recent stay in John Ruskin's house at  Brantwood in the Lake District- but is the Victorian art critic and social reformer really as relevant to the 21st century as his supporters claim? Graham also talks about his recent pilgrimage to a secret rock n roll shrine in a York pub related to the Rolling Stones. Charles talks about the real enjoyment to be found in Alexander Payne's Oscar winning film, The Holdovers. For Graham, there is personal sadness at the death of...

Charles and Graham get heady with the quality of the new album from the Jesus and Mary Chain and celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Glasgow band. Glasgow Eyes is their best album in over twenty years. Monet in York. Monet’s ‘The Water-Lily Pond’ will be the central feature of a major new exhibition at York Art Gallery to mark the 200th anniversary of the National Gallery on 10 May 2024. Painted by one of the founders of the Impressionist movement Claude Monet (1840-1926), ‘The Water-Lily...

Graham and Charles take the opportunity to interview music journalist Dave Simpson as a followup to the previous episode looking at the grassroots music venue crisis sweeping the country. it so happens that Dave had just the other week written about this very subject in an in-depth article for The Guardian. Dave Simpson is one of the UK's leading music journalists and writes on music, popular culture and regional issues for the Guardian, from a north of England base, and regularly appears on...

Graham focuses on the extreme difficulties being faced by venues and music artists as yet more venues announce closure. If the decimation of the live music circuit continues what will this mean for the future? Charles is thrilled by Emma Rice's version of Blue Beard for her company Wise Children, this remarkable piece of theatre is currently to be seen on tour which Charles caught at York's Theatre Royal. Graham introduces the just released second album by Leeds band, Yard Act and then...

Graham calls for an emergency debate on arts funding and reports on working with Harrogate Community Radio at a music event last week at All Saints Church in Kirkby Overblow. The perplexing talent of William Doyle as evidenced on his new album Springs Eternal. Plus when is swearing funny in films?

Does new film,  American Fiction merits a ton of Academy Awards? Graham Chalmers discusses his thoughts. Charles leads discussion around the value of musical biopics as against documentaries in the wake of the release of new film, Bob Marley: One Love. Graham reports on a new light installation coming to Harrogate and then explores the deceptive charm of Irish singer Roisin Murphy and her links to Marlene Dietrich and Jean Luc Godard.

Charles reflects on the enduring success of the play, The Woman in Black and why it is the perfect introduction to theatre for audiences more used to television and film. Graham reflects on class and the arts as Lashana Lynch, one of the stars of the new Bob Marley biopic One Love, makes the point that people from a working class background have been marginalised in her profession. 

Graham reports on how the unfairly maligned The Last Dinner Party's just released debut album revives 1970s Queen and ABBA with 21st Century attitudes. Charles and Graham discuss why Jonathan Glazer's remarkable new film about Auschwitz  - The Zone of Interest  - is only part of a new wave of provocative directors working in the new cinema of satirical super realism. Charles asks Graham for a definition.

Graham has been to see emerging Leeds band, English Teacher and reflects on a superb night at The Crescent.  Charles by contrast went to see ABC with the South Bank Symphonia at York Barbican performing hits including the glorious Lexicon of Love. Graham also discusses how Bill Ryder Jones's new album Iechyd Da hits new heights - or perhaps depths - of beautiful melancholia. Charles and Graham discuss why Rory Stewart's Politics on the Edge is one of the best ever political memoirs - and best...

Graham discusses two jarring moments in an otherwise brilliant new book about Pauline Boty, the most overlooked British Pop Artist of the 1960s. Charles and Graham reflect on the new film by Greek director, Yorgos Lanthimos, Poor Things, which features an astonishing performance by Emma Stone and is a film dividing audiences over its feminist credentials. Charles draws attention to the recent decision by York Art Gallery to re-introduce a charge to enter its permanent collections gallery....

Graham wants to correct some wrong perceptions about indie bands Bar Italia and The Last Dinner Party. Former guest (Episode 153) Rick Witter's band Shed Seven gets its first Number One album and Charles challenges the view that they are not as important as other bands of the same era. Graham confesses that in last week's episode he got a few things wrong about Sofia Coppola's new film Priscilla.  Graham stares back into the abyss of the past to reclaim the miracle of Mr Mick, Stackridge's...

Graham and Charles take a look at what Sofia Coppolla's new film Priscilla says about Mr & Mrs Elvis and contrast it to Baz Lurmann's own take on the couple in his film, Elvis. Harrogate gets a mention in a brilliant new book on Pauline Boty, the most overlooked figure in the British Pop Art movement of the 1960s. As the charts of the year reveal yet another bland list of pop artists, Graham proposes that BBC 6 launches its own chart.

Graham's Christmas presents are, possibly, the best arts-related presents anyone got this year anywhere on the planet and very well worth talking through. Graham wonders if Michael Mann's new movie Ferrari is finally the first great film made about cars. Charles considers what has been popular on TV this Christmas 

Charles and Graham continue looking back at their cultural highlights from 2023, this time focusing on their films of the year.

Charles fights through the floods to join Graham for a review of the cultural year. The duo discuss the films, plays, books and albums that most impressed them in 2023.

Longer wording: Charles and Graham are moved to discuss just why why Harrogate Theatre’s pantomime is the best in the world. Graham discusses Julianne Moore and Natalie Portman's chemistry and why May December is Todd Haynes's slipperiest film. A sombre conclusion as the great songwriting talent of The Pogues' Shane MacGowan is considered after his flame was snuffed out at 65.

Charles reports back on his return to Berlin after 34 years and how he felt about the changes since his visit there with Graham in November 1989 immediately after the wall "came down". Charles and Graham reflect on meeting Barnsley bard Ian McMillan in Bradford at the St George's Hall premiere of his very Yorkshire version of Rossini's opera, The Barber Of Seville. Graham examines the lingering impact of Robert M Pirsig's bestselling 1974 counter-culture philosophical novel Zen And The Art...

Graham introduces a new fashion slot, where he reviews the surprising return of a plethora of fashion styles enjoying a comeback. Charles takes a look at two current references to  the Yorkshire phrase`’Now Then” with a look at Rick Broadbent's new book on Yorkshire, Now Then: A Biography of Yorkshire and Richard Hawley's new album Now Then and follows up with the news on the remarkable new single Now and Then by The Beatles. Finally, Graham recounts what happened when he spent a night in...

Graham is wondering just what is the role of BBC 6Music in light of the latest official radio listening figures after a scheduling revamp? Plus, why if MOJO magazine is 30 years old does it feel more like 80? Graham contests that The Rolling Stones had an underrated role in inventing punk rock. Charles spots dinosaurs hoving into view.