In Radio News…
These next three months make up the busiest and craziest quarter for radio. For most companies, September 1 marks the beginning of the broadcast calendar, a time to jam as much revenue into the fiscal as possible before the annual fall-off-a-cliff period beginning in about mid-December and extending to the end of February.
September-October-November features: the crucial back-to-work and back-to-school period; Canadian Thanksgiving; Halloween; American Thanksgiving; Black Friday; and the lead-up to Christmas. It’s a time when almost no one takes vacations and it’s expected that all hands be on deck. It also explains why we see all kinds of programming adjustments and, in some cases, format flips and full station re-brands. And you may notice lots of stations ramping up their contests and promotions in hopes of scoring big ratings.
September is also a good time to sign on new radio stations. Take the case of Roundhouse Radio in Vancouver. This is will be an interesting experiment.
On the subject of re-brands, London’s XFM is no more. The station that cut its teeth on indie and Britpop music (and financed partly by Robert Smith of The Cure) has gone dark. Come September 21, the station will return as Radio X, still playing rock but with a new lineup that includes Ricky Wilson of the Kaiser Chiefs. Details on the new programming can be found here and here.
Looking for a new radio opportunity? Southern Cross Austereo has posted for a job in a rather unique way.
This has to be one of the more unique radio formats in the world. Silver Memories is the world’s first 24/7 radio station programmed for people with dementia. With a playlist that focuses on music from the 1920s to the 1950s, it harnesses the therapeutic power of music of people with degenerating brain function. It’s already proven to help restore speech, improve memory and help calm down dementia patients prone to anxiety and agitation. (I’m a huge, huge believer in using music this way; it worked wonders for my grandfather in his final years.) Learn more here.
Streaming XFM right now (via TuneIn app). Not sure how Radio X is going to be all that different from what XFM is now. However, I’ve just learned that VIrgin Radio UK is coming to DAB in 2016. I used to stream the old Virgin Radio years ago, then they turned into Absolute Radio and geoblocked the USA.