This post in the SCA Regional thread reminded me to write up a few thoughts about my trip up to North East Victoria last week.
I’m enjoying the metro Triple M log at the moment. It’s incredibly safe, but it’s still pretty listenable and makes a good change from flipping between the three CHR/Hot AC stations. Have caught myself listening to the Ms more than Gold in recent weeks.
Headed north on the Hume and as the Melbourne stations faded out I floated between the two Shepparton commercial FMs. Despite all my love for the metro Triple Ms, the regional stations are godawful. “Music That Makes You Feel Good”, my arse. I don’t understand why you’d run a female-skewing AC against a female-skewing CHR format when you own both stations in a two-station market. As discussed here, I’d like to see a return to the Greatest Hits format or a tweaked version of the metro log.
We rescan from 95.3 to 96.9. Mid-way through a pop song I don’t recognise, then suddenly cuts to the middle of another song. Then back to the first song again. Then a generic “Hit FM” sweeper. Then silence. Then a local “Goulburn Valley’s hit96.9” sweeper. Back to normal. Zetta or SCAsat weren’t playing ball, and being Boxing Day it seems like no-one was around to check.
We stop in Euroa. Time to check out what ACE have done to Edge FM. In fairness to the ACE team, they inherited a mess of a station to begin with. Unfortunately, they’ve not done much to improve the overall product, and suffer the same problems that the regional Ms do - a disjointed music log and a brand that doesn’t fit. The Wangaratta market particularly is a good opportunity for ACE to stand out, with considerable overspill into Albury and Shepparton. But then again, why put the effort in? It’s only radio…
At least 3NE is still a decent listen in FM. Time to get those repeaters in stereo, presuming they hang around once the main 1566AM service converts to FM.