Thirty years of 'Doot Doola Doot Doo … Doot Doo'

Nardwuar the Human Serviette lives up to his name. Not that he's walking around wiping up spills or dabbing at the corners of anyone's mouth, but as his made-up punk-rock name suggests, he is not your typical music journalist (or typical anything, in fact).

Dressed to the nines for an interview in clashing shades of plaid and other patterns – including his signature tartan tam, atop a mess of frizzy hair – Nardwuar has a wide smile and a casual, quirky courage. He overenunciates as he recites bits of oddball trivia stored away in his encyclopedic brain. And he exhibits an almost child-like enthusiasm for CiTR, where he has hosted a radio show since 1987.

"Did you get the logo in there?" he asks the Globe and Mail photographer, wanting to make sure the University of British Columbia radio station gets its due. He also expresses concern about the camera's proximity to his face. How are "the Nard-teeth" looking, he asks. "Is my hat okay?"

This self-consciousness is a bit surprising coming from a guy who displays zero fear when it comes to scoring interviews with celebrities and politicians or asking audacious, often bizarre, questions.

This week, CiTR listeners can hear 20 hours of those interviews, marking the milestone anniversary.

"At first I tried to play records, but it didn't work; it was too much work to listen ahead of time," he says. "So the next week, after playing records, I turned on the mic, I spoke and then 30 years later, here I am."

Nardwuar, 49, has a large, if still somewhat underground, following in music circles, and he has achieved a certain level of fame in Vancouver ("British Columbia, Canada" as he always says). He has posed for countless selfies; kids dress up like him for Halloween. He is also a musician, fronting The Evaporators.

When he was hospitalized with a stroke in late 2015, it made the news and a flock of well-wishers took to Twitter. Ditto when he had PFO closure surgery a few weeks later.

It wasn't the first time he had made headlines. "Nardwuar nails the PM at APEC / Guerrilla interviewer makes pepper spray point" topped one 1997 article after a Nardwuar question elicited Jean Chretien's infamous "for me, pepper, I put it on my plate" response. And a Nardwuar-generated headline from 1993: "Keep on Rockin', Gorbachev urged."

There is nothing quite like a Nardwuar interview – each of which begins "Who are you?" He often arrives bearing gifts such as obscure old recordings. He brought a vintage Pierre Trudeau paper-doll dress-up book to a Justin Trudeau media conference; he once tried to give Gerald Ford a lucky chestnut. He surprises his subjects by digging up little-known details about their lives. He displays no shame and tremendous chutzpah, asking questions others would not think – or dare – to ask.

"When was the first time you did coke?" he once asked Corey Feldman. "When is the last time Noel or Liam punched you," he inquired of Paul Gallagher, brother to the Oasis bandmates. "What do mics smell like?," he asked Ed Sheeran. And to Mikhail Gorbachev: of all the political figures the former Soviet leader had encountered, "who has the largest pants?"

Responses range from "This is already my favourite interview I've ever done" (Aziz Ansari) to "You're a funny cat" (James Brown) to things we can't print in the newspaper. He's been tossed out of Lollapalooza (on his birthday); he's had pizza shoved into his camera lens. Quiet Riot was once so angry about an interview, he says, that they destroyed the tape. Another metal band, Skid Row, chucked his previous trademark hat – a pom-pom tuque, which had been a gift from his godmother. (He replaced it with the pom-pom tam – a gift from his mother.)

Then again, Pharrell Williams was so impressed, he hired Nardwuar to create content for his YouTube channel.

He inevitably invites politicians to join him in the potentially awkward "Hip Flip." Working in tandem, they try to swing a bell-ringing doo-dad 360 degrees; it's attached to a bar that attaches to each participant's waist. Former prime minister Paul Martin was the first to give it a shot.

He titles his interviews Nardwuar "vs." his subject, not because the encounters are adversarial, but because back when he was dubbing tapes and handwriting labels, "vs." was shorter to write than "interviews."

When he wanted to interview Seth Rogen, Nardwuar didn't contact a publicist; he sent a Twitter message to Rogen, who follows him – and agreed. "Was the Penthouse in Vancouver the first strip club that you went to?" Nardwuar asked the comedian. It was.

"People ask me, 'What is success for an interview?'" Nardwuar tells The Globe. "Success for me for an interview was after my interview was published to YouTube, was the Penthouse putting up a sign that says 'Seth Rogen drinks for free' on the actual marquee."

Born John Ruskin in 1968, Nardwuar attended Hillside High School in West Vancouver. His mother, Olga Ruskin, was a journalist with an interest in local history; she had a cable-access TV show called Our Pioneers and Neighbours.

"She taught me that everybody has a story," says Nardwuar, who titled his first record Oh God, My Mom's on Channel 10! (It was a compilation LP with tracks from several bands, including The Evaporators, as well as Nardwuar interview clips.)

In a 1988 high school film clip, he is asked whether he has any idea what he's going to do after university. "Well, my parents have an idea. My dad would like me to be an engineer … but I don't think I'll be an engineer."

The clip is on his phone, along with all kinds of archival photos and video: Nardwuar trying to interview Ringo Starr; backstage with Drew Barrymore and Courtney Love at Lollapalooza; being interviewed in 1993 by Ralph Benmergui on Benmergui's CBC TV show. There's also material from his former gig as a MuchMusic interviewer.

How does he have the nerve to ask those in-your-face questions, I want to know.

"I'm always shaking. I'm scared. And that's what keeps me going. If you don't feel scaredness, what's the point of doing it? It's good to feel scared. I'm scared talking to you."

He also says it comes with the territory.

"The minute you realize that you are going to get destroyed is kind of liberating," he says. "If you don't want to get destroyed, don't become members of the media."

When the tables are turned, and he is the one being interviewed, he is exceedingly chatty. During our afternoon together, he barely stops talking. His voice is high-pitched, almost whiny. Like an annoying little brother who won't leave you alone, but is laugh-out-loud entertaining.

Every now and then he'll pause and offer a signature pose, his fingers pointed toward you or the camera as he lights up with a big smile, on cue.

What I can't figure out is – is this all an act? How much is this a persona? And is he ever not on? I ask what he's like at home or when he's out for dinner with friends.

"I love information, I love stories," he answers. "I would love to hear your stories, Marsha. I do love cheese."

Dream interviewees are Barack Obama (he tried) and Donald Trump; he regrets not coming to Trump's 2013 Vancouver press conference. So he was delighted that short-lived White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci was following him on Twitter. "I thought the Mooch was gonna be my hook-up."

Another regret: his inability to secure an interview with Stephen Harper. He was offered one in 2004 – with the caveat that Harper would not do the Hip Flip. Nardwuar said no and never got another shot.

"I made a mistake. I should have said, 'Okay, sure, I will talk to him' – and then pulled out the Hip Flip. But I was stupid," he says.

"So I make mistakes all the time. And what's why I'm still doing it," he continues. "The minute I learn everything is the minute I should quit."

Nardwuar's CiTR interview marathon runs from 9 p.m. PT on Sept 21 until 5 p.m. PT on Sept 22. A 30-year anniversary celebration with The Evaporators is at The Hall in Vancouver on Sept. 23. And The Evaporators perform at the Drake Underground in Toronto on Dec. 14 and 15