Hi, I'm Alexi Sell and welcome to my first ever podcast.

Ooh.

Normally when I've done radio, I come from a very traditional kind of world and everything is highly structured.

There's hundreds of technicians attending to my every want.

Here, it's me and a computer and at least for the first event, my dear friend Talal.

So this is all very new to me.

I'm going to see how the podcast develops, you know, what works, what doesn't.

And, you know, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a bit like, um,

parachute jump or a zip wire, uh, experience for me. It's a, it's a whole new world of, of, of terror.

So let's, first of of all talk about how we got to this point. A friend of

mine, about the same age as me, but a man who's very curious about the world, very interested

in the city and possibilities. He the first lockdown he heard about these

illegal block parties and being a say a man of in his 60s but nevertheless interested in new

experiences he thought well he'd be interested in taking part in this.

So he had searched around the dark web or wherever,

until finally he found an invitation,

a notification of an illegal block party. And on the front page was this little box,

and it said, you know, one of those tick boxes,

it said, are you over 18? So he ticked yes. And immediately the website said, you know, one of those tick boxes, it said, are you over 18?

So he ticked yes.

And immediately the website said, well, fuck off then.

I actually was in two-thirds of the way through a tour, a live tour,

...