Teamrock radio has announced it will leave DAB at the end of the month and become an ‘on demand’ internet station.
Is this the future of radio – no live broadcasts on a fixed daily schedule, just listen to what you want when you want, and do so via the internet rather than over a conventional radio at home or in the car?
What are your views on the state of national and local radio, commercial and BBC.
Radio Radio
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“no live broadcasts on a fixed daily schedule, just listen to what you want when you want, and do so via the internet rather than over a conventional radio at home or in the car”
Isn’t that Spotify?
My point being if Radio is heading in this direction then it’s an already pretty crowded marketplace.
Sad.
The BBC I’ll defend to the hilt as my digital radio is tuned in to BBC4 Extra (for plays and old comedies and repeats of ‘The News Quiz’) and, even better, BBC Five Live Extra which has cricket commentaries pretty much every day from completely random places depending on where in the country it is raining.
Unlike most on this site BBC 6 Music leaves me cold. No Rock ‘n’ Roll Show – oh yeah?!
Indeed, it’s with music radio that I reserve all of my distain……if the next song on the radio is said to be by Buffulo Springfield, I’d like to not be able to put my house on it, with 100 per cent chance of being right, that that song will be ‘For What It’s Worth’.
As soon as I hear the letters D and J together I run a mile. I don’t like them.
this is a fairly comprehensive article on how R1 at least is under heavy assault from the streamers and ‘audio programming’ and gradually taking itself apart in response
http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/jun/09/radio-1-apple-attack-nick-grimshaw-zane-lowe-spotify
Might be interesting to see who’s got their DAB tuned to what. My old Pure Evoke has six preset buttons:
1. Planet Rock
2. Team Rock
3. Four Extra
4, Four
5. Five Live
6. Six Music
The only occasional retunes are to Five Live Sports Extra or Talk Sport if Test Match Special or a Liverpool match require it.
Just 6Music and Radio 4 for me. Speech is what makes the difference – the radio stations need to have good DJs and features between the records, which 6M do, IMO. We had a workman in the other week and he was listening to Absolute – the music wasn’t bad, but the ads and the chatter between the records were utterly dire.
agree with your 1,2,4,5, substitute five live sports extra and local bbc station for the other two.
My DAB is tuned to the following pre-sets:
6 Music
Radio 2
Radio 3
Radio 4
Radio 5 and 5 Extra
Classic FM
I sometimes flick over to Absolute 80s if the urge arises.
6 Music is still good, but quite a lot of repetition has begun in the daytime schedules.
Iggy’s new slot on a Friday night is great and he plays some jazz.
Interesting you mention Absolute 80s.
I can’t talk for that station but I used to, very infrequently, tune into the now defunct/internet only (?) 60s version, and soon realised that, by owning about 1000 CDs from that era, my own track-listing was vastly superior both in quality and quantity than their one……by a considerably margin!!!
Unless done well, and aside from a week-only Pirate Station anniversary on Radio Essex in 2007, I’ve never heard one done well, such retro stations are surely redundant in 2015.
Most of our DABs have a few presets programmed, well I think you may as well set 1 = radio 1 etc but the only ones that ever really get used are 6Music and 5 live. Occasionally I’ll listen to absolute 80s if I happen to be having a shower when the Freak Zone is on! The DAB in the car is almost permanently on 6 music so I don’t even bother with presets.
I still think the curated approach to finding new music works well with a DJ (such as Marc Riley). Better than, say Spotify playlists with no human voice.
And what’s wrong with The Freak Zone? Apart from Peel back in the day it’s probably cost more money than any other show! You’ll be saying next you don’t like the 15 minute free jazz tracks that Maconie plays every other week!
Really only listen to radio in the car.
Previous car was set to Radio 2, with occasional excursions to Absolute or Radio Berkshire (especially during Football season).
New car has DAB, which is now set to 6Music, with a side order of Planet Rock.
Radio 2 is repetitive, and pretty un-original in it’s music choice (Simon Mayo on Friday without Queen singing Don’t Stop Me Now – it will never happen).
Jeremy Vine at lunchtimes is worth a listen when I catch it,
Local radio (Radio Berkshire) seems designed for retired folks to have on in the background.
(Only really listen to this one when stuck in traffic)
Commercial Radio is just bad – the same 17 records played in a constant loop, interrupted by 10 minutes of adverts. And where is it written in their License that Spandau Ballets Gold must be played every 2 hours?
I used to listen to Virgin Radio – in it’s early days it seemed like it was run/programmed by the presenters. Latterly, it became more corporate and regimented. The Absolute re-invention did give it a kick, and it can be a genuinly good listen at times – most of the time when Icatch it, it just feels like a bog-standard Commercial radio station with more records
I don’t think broadcasting via transmitters and receivers has much of a future, as the internet gets more and more resilient and quick. FM is already on it’s way out anyway. DAB and Digital Video Broadcast (Freeview) seem likely to me to be much more expensive to maintain than fast fibre optic, once it’s universally installed. They’re really just stopgap technology now.
As has already been discussed endlessly, pretty much everywhere, the days of an audience listening to or watching a programme as it actually is released are over, unless it’s coverage of an unmissable live event.
If you don’t like this, tough…
Still plenty of holes in the mobile network. We’re a long way off being able to stream seamlessly on a long journey (I’ve tried). The 4G deal made with the government by at least one of the mobile operators promised coverage across 98% of the country by 2017 but on a journey from the south coast to London, approximately 70 miles, I go from 4G to 2G several times making radio the only option for vehicles unless the networks are vastly improved in the next 18 months.
Sometimes the freak g show is excellent. Most times I think its awful. I’m not a fan of either prog or free jazz so I don’t think I’m really the target audience.