It was Grime met Grimey when members of the Grimethorpe Colliery Band performed for the Zoe Ball Breakfast Show on BBC Radio 2, which also featured grime artist Stormzy. The Grimethorpe Colliery Band were invited with actor Shaun Dooley to play the Children in Need single ‘Never Grow Up’ and had an early start, getting up at 4am on the Monday after travelling down to London the previous night. By 5:30am everyone was in the studio at Wogan House having their soundcheck, followed by waiting for the coveted prime-time 9am slot.
It was only possible to fit 11 members of the band into the studio, so the players were spread around the sound desk watching the close-up the action of live radio. Shaun Dooley admitted on air to Zoe Ball that it was only the third in his life singing live, which was quite a lot of pressure when performing on a radio show with 8million weekly listeners. Adding to the pressure it was also the first time that the band and Shaun had actually performed together, as the album had been recorded in separate studios.
Shaun talked with great pride about his love of the Grimethorpe Colliery Band and his family’s strong connections to the colliery pit. The performance went excellently, and the band performed some festive encores of Hark the Herald and Silent Night. Zoe Ball watched on with delight, exclaiming afterwards “Absolutely amazing….It was just incredible, we all got very very emotional, it’s just a beautiful sound!” and asking her listeners “Why do brass bands make us cry?! I think they’re tears of joy, but it’s just so beautiful…What a moment!”. After the show Zoe made a point of staying around to individually hug all the band members and pose for photos. The album continues to make great sales heading towards the Christmas period, having now sold enough copies to go silver and raising over £600,000 for Children in Need so far.