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Radio News
May. 24th, 2007 08:59 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
ms-bracken.livejournal.comXFM ditching all DJs between 10am and 4pm
Most of this post is from an email I sent to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
infov0re (who sent me the above link) yesterday, so for one person in this community this is a cross-post.
This looks a catastrophically bad idea; if their target demographic want to listen to the radio without DJs they have ample better options. Also, presumably they will still have adverts - so essentially that's all the downsides of Radio 1 (same songs over and over) without the upsides (no ads, chatter) and all the downsides of last.fm (bit cold and impersonal) without the upsides (no ads, ability to skip / love).
Presumably this is based on some kind of "but this is how the kids listen to music! On their iPod Shuffles! Get with the programme, grandad!" research, but it seems to be ignoring the fact that THE UNIQUE SELLING POINT OF RADIO IS MUSIC PLUS COMMENTARY and not music alone which is pretty much everywhere.
XFM does seem to be noticeably going down the pan, and I don't know if that's just the music taste of the current breakfast DJ or if it's policy - but the music, whilst already heavily playlisted, seems to have become a lot more homogenous in sound as well. I do remember this happening before, with Radio 1 - once Chris Evans left there was a big management shake-up which moved things in the opposite direction, towards (more) WOAH PERSONALITY DJs who, curiously, followed playlists more slavishly. This was, obviously, equally horrible as a look.
So, whatever you think of XFM as a station generally, what do you think about the idea of ditching DJs entirely during the day? Am I justified in the above horrified squealing, or is this the way, if anywhere, music radio is heading? Incidentallymiggy mentioned The Nation's Favourite in a post a couple of weeks ago, and this has got me thinking that that would be a very interesting book to read given the changes in how music has been delivered and consumed since it was written.
Most of this post is from an email I sent to
infov0re (who sent me the above link) yesterday, so for one person in this community this is a cross-post.This looks a catastrophically bad idea; if their target demographic want to listen to the radio without DJs they have ample better options. Also, presumably they will still have adverts - so essentially that's all the downsides of Radio 1 (same songs over and over) without the upsides (no ads, chatter) and all the downsides of last.fm (bit cold and impersonal) without the upsides (no ads, ability to skip / love).
Presumably this is based on some kind of "but this is how the kids listen to music! On their iPod Shuffles! Get with the programme, grandad!" research, but it seems to be ignoring the fact that THE UNIQUE SELLING POINT OF RADIO IS MUSIC PLUS COMMENTARY and not music alone which is pretty much everywhere.
XFM does seem to be noticeably going down the pan, and I don't know if that's just the music taste of the current breakfast DJ or if it's policy - but the music, whilst already heavily playlisted, seems to have become a lot more homogenous in sound as well. I do remember this happening before, with Radio 1 - once Chris Evans left there was a big management shake-up which moved things in the opposite direction, towards (more) WOAH PERSONALITY DJs who, curiously, followed playlists more slavishly. This was, obviously, equally horrible as a look.
So, whatever you think of XFM as a station generally, what do you think about the idea of ditching DJs entirely during the day? Am I justified in the above horrified squealing, or is this the way, if anywhere, music radio is heading? Incidentally
miggy mentioned The Nation's Favourite in a post a couple of weeks ago, and this has got me thinking that that would be a very interesting book to read given the changes in how music has been delivered and consumed since it was written.
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