This?
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Thanks, that was the example of jingle production I was looking for.
BBC Radio 5 Live presenter Danny Baker has been sacked after a tweet on the newborn son of Meghan and Harry.
British radio executive John Myers has died, aged 60. He was involved in the launch of the Century Radio, Real Radio, Smooth Radio and Rock Radio brands in the UK.
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What is going on with the US style obit artwork? Very un-UK. Cheapens the solemnity.
Charming.
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Based in Australia, how can you access BBC radio stations?
Feel free to send a private message if you prefer.
The players on their website arenāt geoblocked as far as I know
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I have a UK app store account and downloaded there new BBC Sounds app which works outside the UK.
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Thereās a bit of geoblocking (eg; when 5Live carries commentary of certain sports) but theyāre fairly assessable
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You can also use Tune-in - I occasionally stream BBC 2 in the car using that.
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Am spending some time in the UK, so expect some sporadic posts from me through most of July.
Spent 4 nights in London but didnāt get a chance to pick up a radio; the BBCās national stations and a few of the large commercial brands are, however, carried on Freeview. I actually donāt mind this experience, given most televisions are able to avoid screen burn-in when an audio channel is left on for extended periods of time.
Yesterday was the drive from London to Bath, deviating south for a time. Had Absolute Radio on FM for quite a distance along the M4 before switching to the D1 National DAB multiplex. For my first introduction to original flavour DAB, this journey gave it all - 80kbps mono, muddy audio and drop-outs along some of the rural A-roads.
What was good about the hire care Passatās stereo was switching automatically between FM and DAB when the DAB signal dropped out. I couldnāt tell you if this worked for the BBC stations - it certainly did for Absolute Radio on the edge of the 105.8FM listening area.
RDS and DAB RT is generally consistent across stations. Some of the stations on the new SDL National also carry station logos, which the Passat decodes quite well. Not convinced itās a necessary use of bandwidth, especially on original flavour DAB.
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Have you had a listen to Virgin on DAB? I donāt think itās everywhere but certainly in London. Their supplementary station Virgin Anthems is a bit of fun. Classic Rock with a British slant.
Smooth in the UK isnāt as good as here imo. Itās very sleepy. Magic Soul isnāt a bad listen on DAB only.
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Another update to wet your radio whistles (steady!) - this time from the Cotswolds, while Iām staying relatively put for the time being. Have split this into two posts to keep things tidier.
Started off from Bath listening to Kiss, which despite holding a regional licence for the West of England and South Wales has no local identifiers and takes all programming from London (more on that here). Curiously, the RDS PS is āKiss 101ā, although this may be to distinguish it from the National feed available on the Digital One DAB multiplex. Itās your general CHR fare, seemingly live on a Sunday morning and supported by strong brand extensions in Kisstory and Kiss Fresh.
So, given Bauer succeeds so well with Kiss, Absolute and Magic, we have to ask why their local brands are in such a state. Hits Radio - much like our very own Hit Network - is a super weak brand, built off the back of an attempt to reboot a stagnating local station and a now defunct breakfast show. Does this sound familiar to anyone?
Iāve been meaning to write a post about whatās happening to CHR radio, but until then Iāll instead try and understand what Bauer are doing. I think theyāre trying to distinguish two different approaches to CHR: Kiss is the rhythmic station, a national brand with a young breakfast show; think a more polished version of The Edge. Hits, or whatever Hits is called where youāre listening, is a middle of the road CHR station, built around local markets with familiar names aimed at the 25-39 demographic; think contemporary era Nova.
ARN have shown that you can build two CHR brands in a market that attract different audiences. Many North American markets also have a number of CHR stations next to Urban or Rhythmic formats. Bauerās plan is not as obtuse as it sounds, but their execution is way off the mark.
Also had a quick listen to JACKfm and JACK2 Hits from Oxford. Not much to remark upon, except to say that Clive Dickens is sorely missed in the radio space. Nice to see theyāve kept the late Paul Darrow as their voiceover artist.
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On the subject of BBC Radio 2 in the Random Radio thread:
Gave this a go earlier but it looks like Iām too far west to pick up Caroline on AM or on DAB. Will definitely give it a shot before I leave, if not around Glasgow where itās also carried on DAB. Likewise for Radio 2 - aiming to give it a good listen in the next few days.
Had Virgin on for most of the afternoon. It was one of UTV/Wireless Groupās brands which launched with the Sound Digital mux in 2016, and is technically national if you count national to mean 75-80% of the country.
It has definitely shifted into a middle of the road AC format, flanked between Absolute and, to a lesser degree, Globalās Radio X. I remember from streaming the station a few months after its launch that it definitely had more of an AOR lean, possibly in homage to the original Virgin 1215 format.
The Chris Evans Breakfast Show (with Sky, you darenāt forget it!) was promoted in probably every second talk break* during Christian Williamsā shift, although less so during spot breaks. For the uninitiated, Evansā show - defected from Radio 2 earlier this year - runs advert free, sponsored by Sky. Sky happens to be owned by News UK, and News UK also happen to own Wireless Group. Funny that.
*The Brits on here may insist I refer to breaks as ālinksā. Much like Marmite, you can keep it.
Also as an aside, if I have to listen to another Costa Coffee ad I may well go insane.
Like Kiss, both Virgin and Absolute have had live shifts over the weekend. You could tell because they were constantly complaining about the heat, then reading out text messages from listeners who were also complaining about the heat. Today, itās more Glastonbury envy. Iāll have a go at the brand extensions later this week and get back to you.
A comparison, if you like, from both stations from 1:30-3:30pm today (Sunday, June 30) courtesy of Lava: first up, Virgin Radio UK:
|Time|Artist|Title|Year|
| ā | ā | ā | ā | ā | ā |
|13:33:16 BST|Catfish And The Bottlemen|2all|2019|
|13:37:18 BST|Red Hot Chili Peppers|Californication|1999|
|13:44:38 BST|Blondie|One Way Or Another|1978|
|13:46:37 BST|Soul Asylum|Runaway Train|1992|
|13:52:18 BST|Bastille|Joy|2019|
|13:56:07 BST|The Police|Message In A Bottle|1979|
|14:03:42 BST|Pink|Just Like A Pill|2001|
|14:07:27 BST|Fleetwood Mac|Everywhere|1987|
|14:11:16 BST|Keane|The Way I Feel|2019|
|14:15:06 BST|James|Laid|1993|
|14:16:57 BST|Avril Lavigne|Iām With You|2002|
|14:24:34 BST|The Lemonheads|Mrs. Robinson|1992|
|14:26:25 BST|Queen|Bohemian Rhapsody|1975|
|14:32:09 BST|Liam Gallagher|Shockwave|2019|
|14:37:50 BST|Coldplay|Adventure Of A Lifetime|2015|
|14:45:27 BST|Nirvana|Smells Like Teen Spirit|1991|
|14:49:22 BST|Imagine Dragons|On Top Of The World|2012|
|14:53:02 BST|Vampire Weekend|This Life|2019|
|15:00:37 BST|Blur|Song 2|1997|
|15:02:33 BST|Peter Gabriel|Sledgehammer|1986|
|15:08:18 BST|Ed Sheeran|I Donāt Care (Acoustic)|2019|
|15:11:59 BST|Muse|Starlight|2006|
|15:15:52 BST|Hozier|Take Me To Church|2013|
|15:25:17 BST|Radiohead|Creep|1992|
|15:29:07 BST|Bryan Adams|Run To You|1984|
Absolute Radio from the same time period:
|Time|Artist|Title|Year|
| ā | ā | ā | ā | ā | ā |
|13:33:16 BST|Ash|Shining Light|2001|
|13:40:50 BST|Ocean Colour Scene|The Day We Caught The Train|1996|
|13:44:38 BST|Blur|Charmless Man|1995|
|13:52:18 BST|The Rolling Stones|Sympathy For The Devil|1968|
|14:01:46 BST|Blink 182|Whatās My Age Again?|1999|
|14:03:42 BST|Arctic Monkeys|Arabella|2013|
|14:07:27 BST|Tears For Fears|Head Over Heels|1985|
|14:11:17 BST|The Vaccines|If You Wanna|2011|
|14:18:47 BST|The Stone Roses|Love Spreads|1994|
|14:24:34 BST|George Ezra|Paradise|2018|
|14:32:09 BST|The Coral|Dreaming Of You|2002|
|14:37:50 BST|Lenny Kravitz|Are You Gonna Go My Way|1993|
|14:41:37 BST|Liam Gallagher|Shockwave|2019|
|14:45:27 BST|Iggy Pop|Real Wild Child (Wild One)|1986|
|14:49:22 BST|Snow Patrol|Chasing Cars|2006|
|14:53:02 BST|The Charlatans|North Country Boy|1997|
|15:00:37 BST|Garbage|Stupid Girl|1995|
|15:04:20 BST|Foo Fighters|Times Like These|2002|
|15:08:18 BST|Bon Jovi|Wanted Dead Or Alive|1986|
|15:14:00 BST|Kings Of Leon|Fans|2007|
|15:17:46 BST|Happy Mondays|Kinky Afro|1990|
|15:25:17 BST|James|Laid|1993|
|15:27:15 BST|Muse|Time Is Running Out|2003|
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Gāday from the foggy Isle of Skye. Scotland is a truly beautiful place, and I thoroughly recommend it if you get the opportunity. Very fortunate indeed.
Iāll split this long post up into two. This may be dull reading for some, but to my credit itās always a challenge to balance brevity with detail. Hopefully you get something out of it, and if thereās something curious I should be listening out for let me know!
The remainder of my time in England (for now - Iāll be back down south in a week) was otherwise unremarkable. Sampled Dee 106.3 while in Chester, middle of the road commercial AC music with a breakfast jock that sounded like a bad Frank Sidebottom impersonation - sadly, with none of the humour. Wikipedia suggests both it and sister station Silk 106.9 have a healthy degree of live and local programming on weekdays, as well as weekend mornings and early afternoons, and comes as a pleasant change to the Capitals and Hearts of the world.
Speaking of the devil, while heading north on the M6 I had Capital Liverpool on DAB. Firstly, as much as Iām put off by the ongoing trend towards voicetracking and networking, I also subscribe to the school of thought that your output - however it is produced - should sound as good as possible. The likes of SCA, then, should be taking notes from how Global integrate local content into their quasi-national brands. It was pretty much a seamless transition from the (mandatory) local news, into a voicetrack from a London-based presented over a localised sweeper/music bed. The casual listener - most of Capitalās audience at 1pm on a weekday are hardly paying attention to the radio - would not have bat an eyelid.
Perhaps more interestingly, I caught the Passat automatically retuning from Capital Liverpool to Capital Lancashire as we crossed into the latterās broadcast area. RDS AF is impressively implemented on FM, particularly by the BBC for their four national FM networks, but itās the first time Iāve seen similar on DAB - two separate streams, two different multiplexes. Of course, whether Australia gets to this point is another question. When is the Gold Coast DAB trial supposed to happen again? 
Still a negative on Radio Caroline. The Glasgow DAB mux on 10B is only broadcast from two transmitters and I didnāt get an opportunity to tune in while passing through on the M74/M8/M898 to the south and west of the city. Granted, it remains as a trial, but youād hope Nation Broadcasting pulls its finger out in the future.
And lastly from Skye: found two curious stations on the stations list rebroadcasting Smooth Scotland under the entries āL BROOMā and āTwoLochsā. Turns out the former is the community radio station Lochbroom FM, which since 2012 has simulcast the latter, the UKās smallest commercial radio station Two Lochs Radio. A curious scenario in which, for most of the day, a community station simulcasts a local commercial station in turn simulcasting an out-of-area commercial station. Write that down in your copybooks now.
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Iāve finally given BBC Radio 2 a decent listen, so I feel like I can give some somewhat qualified thoughts here. When I say that, Iām also not entirely sure this is enlightening, and maybe this might invite some discussion.
To give you an idea of my first proper exposure to Radio 2: our presenter is Steve Wright. Heās just played an 80ās track, and now heās reading out text messages. None of the expected sound effects, so weāre safe. Oh, and now weāre playing a radio cut of Underworld - āBorn Slippy (NUXX)ā.
Awry is one way to describe it. Bewildering comes to mind. Iām all for broad playlists and left-of-centre tracks - Trainspotting is a wonderful film, and that song is on a number of my Spotify playlists - but that was a seque I wasnāt prepared for.
I can forgive the edginess of Underworld, but looking at this from a more methodical approach you can see where this new cool and hip attitude is permeating through the regular playlist. Heading out of the Lakes District the next morning, it was the bastions of middle England chit-chat - Alan Carr and Melanie Sykes - where new music ranged from CHR/AC friendly pop like JP Cooper / Astrid S - āSing It With Meā and Bananarama - āLooking For Someoneā to an AAA/rock heavy track like Morrissey - āLady Willpowerā - Liam Gallagherās āShockwaveā has had quite heavy rotation too.
(And yet, as if to counter any accusations of being too hip, the imaging is as daggy as ever. Those sung jingles make me miss the smoothfm top of hours, and I mean it.)
Radio 2 is a diverse station - the same station that plays Underworld at 3pm on a Wednesday will, by Saturday morning, be host to 1960s music with Tony Blackburn. The same station where Jeremy Vine presents a debate on whether clothes should be washed (yes, really) gives airtime to genres like reggae and country. This is its strength, and it should be lauded for it.
The risk you fall into here with the audio smorgasbord approach (which we often see with community radio) is that switch-off effect. If a listener likes one show, you have to work harder to convince them to stick around for a show with possibly a radically different format.
The BBC, I suspect, knows this - else Vineās harder early-afternoon talk show wouldnāt be followed up with by Steve Wright and his wall of sound effects. The style of talk changes between the shows, but the music doesnāt radically change, and it works fine as audio wallpaper in the background. That is, of course, until the wallpaper no longer matches the room, and your audience begins to question why theyāre even in the room when thereās a better looking Heart/Capital/Smooth/Magic/ā¦ next door.
(On a lighter note, I am incredibly amused by their traffic reports. It takes about 4 minutes in peak to get through everything - still shorter than a spot break, mind.)
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