Gordon Astley

Gordon Astley

English Radio DJ

Moustache type: Caterpillar

Place and date of birth unknown to blogger


In the days when he had a beard, Gordon Astley played second fiddle to Keith Chegwin on the 1970s children’s pop music quiz Cheggars Plays Pop. Since then the eponymous host has sadly proven everyone who said “Cheggars can’t be boozers” wrong, while Astley has gone on to smaller and worse things. After an initial upturn in his fortunes when he was chosen as Chris Tarrant’s replacement as the host of the eighth series of the madcap Saturday morning show Tiswas (there was no ninth series), Astley became a local DJ on BBC Radio West Midlands.

Since then he has graduated to the mid-morning slot on BBC Southern Counties Radio where he “chats to the biggest names visiting Surrey, Sussex and North-East Hampshire”, including Barry Cryer and Deana (daughter of Dean) Martin. He has also pursued numerous other pursuits in attempts to reclimb the celebrity beanstalk, including magic, motivational speaking, recording a non-charting anthem for World Cup 2006, palm and tarot reading and graphology – he is the “Official Graphologist to the England Cricket Team” (or was in 2002 anyway).

Astley has listed various amusing facts about himself on his BBC website including the fact that he “hates racism and foreigners”, “would most like to be stuck in a lift with a lift engineer” and that his “moustache is real and not stuck on.” Well done Gordon.