COMFORT

My life on the chain gang isn't completely horrible these days: For the first time in years, I've started to bring headphones to work, and nobody has complained yet. I forget to bring CDs most days, and I don't like the idea of storing a lot of mp3s on my work machine. So I've turned to BBC Radio for tuneage, and it keeps me afloat at times. The only problem is that it doesn't offer round-the-clock streams. Most of the Beeb's music programming is formatted by the hour, so a lot of the best shows run out before they get going. Faves: John Peel, the electronica shows (that stuff is better in tight doses, anyway), Andy Kershaw, the reggae DJs (nobody in America does it this well), the Album Chart, the American guys that play punk, and just about anything that shoves a bunch of genres together.