Rob Jan

On-air name:

Air? Typical Earth-centric conceit! I rarely use the stuff myself. It promotes rust, unsightly tentacle dandruff and hazardous spontaneous combustion. In any case, Earthlings lack the necessary vocal dexterity to pronounce my real name, so for the moment 'Rob Jan' will serve. After all, I found it in the brain of the human meatbag I bodysnatched when I landed here. (Mmmm. Brainnnnssss!!)

Show:

Zero-G: The Science Fiction, Fantasy and Historical Radio Show.

First Connection With Triple R:

My people have been monitoring your planet's primitive broadcasts for aeons, but specifically I used to listen to Triple R in the 1970s when my interest in FM radio was being stimulated by broadcasts on ABC FM of epic science fiction radio adaptations of the Isaac Asimov's FoundationTrilogy, Douglas Adams classic Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy and so on. Triple R was just along the dial and a natural default setting for me.

First Regular Show:

1994, with then co-presenter/creator Paula Ruzek.

Favourite Triple R Story:

It would have to be the time I costumed up as an undead DJ to appear in a colleague's Zombie short film musical romance which was partly shot in the East Brunswick studios; I had a lot of fun shambling off the Number 96 tram while kicking a crate of vinyl up Nicholson street. We never did explain how I got up the front stairs though, Zombies being rubbish (like your classic Dalek before they got uppity) at negotiating steps. Did I say 'costumed'? Of course, what I meant was that I just took off my Human disguise....scccchlurp, pop! (Ahhh, blessed relief!)

Favourite Other Triple R Programme:

I have too many but do have rather a special fondness for Einstein-A-Go-Go, science being your world's best hope of earning membership in the Galactic Commonwealth. (Well, that and chocolate, which is inexplicably absent from the rest of the cosmos, except for the Red Planet and its iconic Mars Bars). Gary Young's Chicken MaryShow is another fave, as I get to unwind listening to it after doing Zero-G and 'cos I've had so much wicked fun playing chicken-flavoured tracks in the lead up to his intro.

What Does Triple R mean to you:

There's just no getting past the fact that they took me in....when the townsfolk came for me waving pitchforks and flaming torches and the guberment agents wanted nothing more than to dissect my illegal alien arse and spaceship for their forbidden novelty secrets. Why, it almost makes me sorry that for the past decade I've been covertly using the station's main antenna to transmit my "Earth: Come 'N Get It!" signal to the stars. So, here's the deal: One day (no doubt, one Monday) when your disgustingly blue skies are full of the terrifying space armada tasked to rescue me, just flash your Triple R subscriber card and I guarantee my minion legions will spare you the traditional... probing. Unless, of course, you've been looking forwards to that. In which case, remember, only one per subscriber!

The studio door has accidentally jammed shut with you stuck inside. If there was only one CD in there with you what would you want it to be and why:

Any surviving Zero-G listener knows that my collection of CDs and vinyl is entirely infested with such mind-buggering frightfulness that playing any single disc warps a mere door off its unfortunate hinges quicker than you can say "Sonic Screwdriver!" (There's nothing ‘accidental' about a studio door that's been Rob Janned. My usual apologies to the long suffering carpenters). Still, if I must select one of the lesser evils, then William "Captain Denny Crane" Shatner's uniquely memorable album, "The Transformed Man", is always amusingly guaranteed to have the punters breaking their fingernails and teeth on the soundproofed glass of the studio windows.

Surely your work here is done?

Very well then. While I've monstered, pardon me, mastered most of the finer points of Human civilization there is one thing that still baffles me. George W. Bush. I mean, WHY? What's that you say, he's one of OURS?! Oh, that's all right then, carry on.