Signing off

Radio legend Johnnie hosts final show of iconic career

- MATT ROPER

When legendary DJ Johnnie Walker tunes out of his Radio 2 show for the last time on Sunday, it won't be the first time he's hung up his mic.

The 79-year-old broadcaster once quit his Radio 1 show after being told he had no choice but to play tracks from the Bay City Rollers - a pet hate of his.

He was sacked from the BBC's London radio station GLR after celebrating Margaret Thatcher being forced from Downing Street. And he was once forced off a station in America after his guests, the Sex Pistols, said its name KSAN sounded like a lavatory cleaner.

But the reason for his final exit from the airways will be the hardest of all to bear, and one which the universally admired DJ admits he will not be able to bounce back from.

Suffering with worsening pulmonary fibrosis, an inflammation of the lungs, which Johnnie describes as terminal and getting progressively worse, tomorrow will be his last time presenting Radio 2's Sounds of the 70s - and the end of a 58-year career.

Johnnie bowed out of his other Radio 2 gig The Rock Show last night. having announced it during his Sunday show on October 6, before playing the Rolling Stones' 1978 single Miss You adding that the track "seems quite suitable at the moment".

He said: "The struggles I've had with doing the show and trying to sort of keep up a professional standard suitable for Radio 2 has been getting more and more difficult. So I've had to make the decision that I need to bring my career to an end."