It’s on the cricket Australia app.
It’s back on now NTS. Thanks macq radio if you read my post.
Talking Lifestyle no longer airing the A-League in Melbourne. It’s gone back to SEN since the Crocmedia takeover.
i think if MML decided to kill TLS outside of Sydney, the best thing for Brisbane would be to go to a format similar to what 2CH is… As i feel there is a gap in the Brisbane market for that type of “Golden Oldies” format.
Not to sure how a similar thing would work in the Melbourne market as I am not aware of how things work down there.
Been that TLS954 is kinda working they would be silly to kill it off there… 2UE has gone from Talk to Talk so it does not talk much to see why it worked down there…
But seriously who wants to listen to music on AM, but obviously people were
Magic had its core fan base but it was declining, and now that Magic has become TLS I imagine most of their listeners have gone to Smooth FM (or DAB) so they’re not likely to come back to AM should the music come back to 1278.
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Even though 4KQ is part of ARN’s “Pure Gold” Network, isn’t their music playlist skewed more towards the old “Classic Hits” format than the WSFM/Gold format down South?
Here in Sydney, 2CH used to rate reasonably well for an AM music station but then Smooth 95.3 happened.
Even though it’s always had great sound quality on Digital Radio, 2CH can’t really compete with a station which also has an Easy Listening-type format (albeit with some more contemporary music) except on FM without the religious messages from the NSW Council of Churches and less ads for funeral providers and nursing homes! Probably should’ve bid harder for an FM conversion during the '90s or Early 2000s, but of course it’s too late for that now.
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I disagree about Brisbane. 4KQ has that gap covered well and truly. The gap in the market is soft AC (ie smooth). 4BH usesd to play easy listening/soft AC in the mid 2000s and rated very well.
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It depends what’s available doesn’t it. If AM is the only place you can hear the music you want then you’ll listen to AM. That’s why 4KQ and Cruise do so well. FM doesn’t play adult music in Brisbane and Adelaide. Anyway many people listen to KQ and Cruise on DAB. If 4BH relaunched with their old easy listener format they’d attract listeners, many on DAB.
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Exactly right. In Melbourne it may be different that people won’t listen to AC music on AM because 91.5 FM is already providing it. But here in Brisbane where there is no Smooth (without a DAB+ radio) I suspect people that way inclined would be willing to switch the dial back to AM if the offering was worth it
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However, it wouldn’t be a good result if the listeners came from 4BC that relies a lot on the older demo groups and where I think some of 4BH’s audience has migrated - rather than to that “rock n roll” station 4KQ 
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I highly doubt a 4BH listener who used to tune in to the radio for easy listening music has all of a sudden decided they want to hear talkback all day. That just doesn’t make sense. They’ve either gone to 4KQ - as evidenced by their big jump in ratings - or they’ve gone to a community music station or DAB.
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I completely agree. And DAB can help in that regard too, to supplement the AM station.
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It’s simple for 2CH, simply provide a different universe of music than what’s on Smooth, compliment don’t compete. Wheatley, Williams and Brice should know this.
The gap is very much soft AC. No station is doing it in Brisbane. None of the community stations have had the brains to work it out either.
They’ve gone to DAB - not to community, there’s nothing available in Brisbane save for pathetic attempts at copying the commercial stations on the sub metro community stations. 96.5 as a Brisbane wide station sits in the B105/973 grouping for age demo.
It has. 4BH with David McDonald as GM and Geoff Harrison as PD on a shoestring budget, pushed the DAB+ marketing when it began. I’d say they did the most station specific marketing of DAB of any station. On air mentions and radio giveaways.
Nothing matched the big budget support that SA FM had under Paul Thompson and team to saturate the market with FM radios of course. That’s what digital needs, but the risk averse commercial radio industry doesn’t wake up to this.
Life will move on very well without TL. The music formats if programmed to fill the right gaps in Melb and Bris will do well. Music programming is not expensive. 20 hours/day with four/five announcers on air live, not a huge wage bill. And spend money on marketing to remind people these stations exist.
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You’re so right about the community stations. I can’t believe none of them have had the brains to fill the soft AC void… it’s unbelievable.
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It is - but it’s not receivable over most of Brisbane. Imagine if 96.5 or one of the other community stations played soft AC.
I think there is/was a big overlap in the over 60 age group between 4BC local talkback and the older music of 4BH. Listeners didn’t just have to stay with one station all day. I think some of those 4BH listeners are now listening just to 4BC so if 4BH was revived as a music station it could hurt 4BC.
The idea of TL was to solidify the audience for the talk station, remove an alternative for them with the gamble being that they wouldn’t move from traditional radio to find other choices.
Whether that’s worked or not is up to us to consider and provide opinion.
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A Breeze or Smooth style station is a no-brainer for Brisbane FM, but who’s going to provide it. 96.5 seems set on the modern contemporary-type music they play, 98.9 is country, 4EB is ethnic talk and 4ZZZ won’t change anytime this millennium, so it doesn’t leave a lot of options
Short of 4BH reappearing in its former glory, we need a station catering to adults in Brisbane. 2NUR seem to have done a good job in Newcastle addressing an absence in the market, we could use the same, but I don’t see anyone who’ll do it
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