Depending on who you ask, there doesn’t seem to be much of a set time.
Yeah of course. I didn’t mean to have a go at you, it just seems so odd given the reality of music they play.
I’ve just had a look at the metro log. Some hours they don’t even play a single song from before the mid 00’s. The occasional late 90s song littered throughout the day doesn’t strike me as PMFM, which again ended in the early 00’s.
Technically 92.9 could have revived PMFM because their call sign up until December last year was 6PPM.
Mix sounds like two different radio stations at the moment. Playing one format when they’re local and another format when they’re networked. Personally I prefer the Hit Network format and at least the Hit brand still has presence in Perth to cater for ex 92.9 listeners. Can’t let Nova get away with dominating that format.
Networking is good when you have a brand, logo, identity, talent and a music mix that can smash it out of the park. The whole sound of the station is a match for the demo. It often takes a lead station as the lighthouse that shows the way. Think of the 2SM/3XY/2NX group in the late 70s and early 80s. Think of Triple M for a few minutes in the early 90s. Think of 2Day and Fox in the late 90s and Nova in the early 2000s.
Networking limits success when you have a weak brand, cheap logo, mismatched music, reused talent and no powerhouse station. Think of Hit in the early 2020s.
I was driving back from Byron Bay a few weeks ago. It was a Friday morning and I was passing through Coffs Harbour and there was no internet access. I was stuck with the local hit station playing RnB rubbish or the local Triple M with Ray Hadley. It was dire and I felt sorry for the locals who have no local station - instead they were stuck with crap music on hit and 2GB on Triple M.
Roads NSW should warn people as they approach the area that they are entering a dead zone for radio and to pull over in a rest area and get their MP3 music powered up, especially on a Friday.
I couldn’t agree more. The Hit Network is terrible with a ridiculous name, (mostly) forgettable DJs/hosts & a complete lack of anything remotely interesting to the local market. I’ve said it time & time again, why would I want to listen to Carrie & Tommy in, say, Dubbo? If I really really wanted to I could stream Fox. There’s nothing relevant or interesting about it.
But as you say it can be done well. An example is BBC Radio 2, which was just being discussed in the Random Radio thread.
I just don’t know whether reviving brands that are well & truly dead & buried is the solution.
Off-Topic, you could’ve switched over to 104.1 CHYFM instead, which has a youth format, and is local too. 
or 2HC!
Yeah, I wouldn’t have either.
Bingo. ARN learnt a lesson when they ran 96FM into the ground - you can’t rely upon heritage to get you through if you torch everything that’s remotely heritage about the station. The 96 product now is miles apart from 2014/15, not just in music but content. It owns its place in the market.
What would SCA have done with PMFM? Brought back Gary Shannon et. al.? Not at all - a generic logo and no other discerning links to the past.
I did! I found CHYFM on the Sydney-side of Coffs - I was alone in the car and could sing along to the radio again!
It’s a funny world when the community station is more engaging than the local commercial FM stations. I suppose that with the spread of Hit and Triple M across this wide, brown land, more community stations are filling in the gap left by the commercials stations - that is to create radio that people want to listen to.
From the business/ad sales side, they like to be able to have a simple, general (across the country) audience profile, etc. to sell to advertisers, and that’s where the money comes from.
But of course, no/small audience = no/less ad sales.
Hopefully SCA can sort out what they’re doing; while there needs to be some consistency, it needs to be what people want to listen to.
You are 100% spot on right there!
Community Stations I’ve heard are running things like The Hype & Mix shows on Fridays & Saturday nights.
I swapped over to Hit & heard Bachelor Girl Buses & Trains (again)…flipped straight back to community 
I honestly don’t know why they haven’t attempted state based drive shows. I know a lot of it would come down to cost, but surely, for what they’re paying C&T, they could pay a handful of alternative local hosts.
I think a lot of the complaints from Perth people at the moment come from the eastern states shows being on delay. It’s so parochial here. But what’s stopping SCA from having a local drive show in QLD, broadcast out of B105 with QLD hosts, broadcast to the regionals in QLD?
And the same for WA. Broadcast a statewide drive show from Mix. This would also require them to align musically, but they’re doing that in drive anyway. SA would be easy because they have two SAFM stations.
You know, that’s actually a good idea. Still not quite the same as a truly local show of course, but would offer far more flexibility than the current Hit Network drive offerings allow.
Of course because it all comes down to money, I doubt this will happen anytime soon.
Thank you. I guess it would also allow them to stay localised when something big happens. Perth recently had bad bushfires AND the lockdown, which still affected people in regional WA (couldn’t travel to Perth, flights cancelled, etc).
As long as they don’t pretend they’re sitting in Port Hedland when they’re actually in Perth (being transparent about it being WA’s drive show, or whichever state), then I think it would be okay. And they could technically still sell national sponsorships. Run the same competitions, sponsored segments, show sponsorships, etc but just run them locally (if that makes sense). Actually, I really don’t know why they haven’t done that.
Yeah, you’re onto something here. But SCA have never been known to go for the cheap talent - they love big names. They probably also think that the cost of behind the scenes staff like producers would just tip the balance too far. They probably also think that the hassle just isn’t worth it considering that most markets face no realistic competition.
If you’re willing to believe the rumours & some of the spin of the executives running the place at the time, they nearly did go this option for 2018.
I think that’s a perfectly reasonable thing to complain about. SCA’s breakfast/drive shows have been very interactive over the last decade or so, relying mostly on caller anecdotes - all of which have to come from over East due to the time delay.
I also think this is entirely fair, people we’re never happy about the networked rubbish on Mix all the way back when they introduced KM, and the ratings have been downhill ever since then. I can’t blame them, the shows aren’t relevant to them at all, they’re all quite bland/samey, and aren’t even that popular in their home markets.
From 3pm I turn mix off
Can’t stand the shit they waffle on from the east🤷♂️
Spotify is played a lot in my car these days
Don’t blame the east for Carrie and Tommy, she’s one of yours.
I’m the opposite. Carrie & tommy is the only part I listen to on mix.
There it is…
Let’s be realistic though, how many of Perth’s current population of 2 million were actually even living there the last time PMFM was on air? Maybe 1.4 million or so? You forget how much Perth has grown over the last 20 years.
Also taking into account the births, deaths and people who’ve moved to/left Perth over the past two decades, it could potentially be half or less of the population?
Yes I would say half or less when that is taken into account.
BTW I looked it up and Perth’s population in 2000 was in fact 1.4M so I was spot on lol. Now it’s 2M