Areas with crap commercial radio choice?

I live in a large town, about 20 miles outside oxford and our selection of radio is awful.

BBC National,
BBC Radio Oxford,
Fox FM,
Classic FM,
Jack FM (barely!)

I'll listen to BBC R1 during breakfast and drivetime but elsewhere it's either specialist or Jo Whiley/Sara Cox which I personally cannot stand.

Fox FM is alright at times, breakfast can be good, drivetime doesn't really have anything to keep the listener interested - a bit of chat but mostly music I could get on my ipod. Elsewhere its the bog standard boring gcap/global networking.

Jack FM isn't my cup of tea either, mainly because it's not aimed at my age range at all.

The only local station which covers most of my 'wants' is Oxford 107.9 but it's TSA is the City of Oxford itself and nothing else.

Following the heart rebrand I'll find myself not listening to heart ox either, a station aimed at middle aged women is really off-putting for a teenage male.

Surely the whole idea of ofcom's license advertisements and formats is to consider covering all target audiences? I've found myself listening online to other local radio stations - been listening quite frequently to the recently launched Galaxy SC which is right up my street.
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Comments

  • GeorgeSGeorgeS Posts: 20,039
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    Most places outside the big urban areas have a similar level of choice it seems.
  • Richard_TRichard_T Posts: 5,159
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    Maybe when al these heart stations launch, offcom could look at whats on offer and make each heart FM station sound a bit different, so you could have a heart fm playing rock and alternative, with a neighbouring heart playing Dance, and another playing somehting else.
    they could even run a promotion asking people something like "what music is at the heart of your life - and we will be there"
  • hotmat3khotmat3k Posts: 1,496
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    Richard_T wrote: »
    Maybe when al these heart stations launch, offcom could look at whats on offer and make each heart FM station sound a bit different, so you could have a heart fm playing rock and alternative, with a neighbouring heart playing Dance, and another playing somehting else.
    they could even run a promotion asking people something like "what music is at the heart of your life - and we will be there"
    Not going to happen. The heart brand is very female orientated and full of pop records as such. Anything pass ballads or manufactured pop is ignored.

    This will give smaller ILRs to offer better choice dependant on demand for the area. Offer heaps of presenter personality (longer seques between records) and a more concentrated music choice will win over an audience.

    The choice here is a mixture of typical Global, ILR and BBC. However, I get the choice of London channels in my car which is nice.
  • realwalesrealwales Posts: 3,110
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    South East Wales is pretty poorly served. We have: BBC Radio Wales, who serve the whole of Wales, and provide dreary, uninspiring coverage of local sport.
    Red Dragon, not bad at what it does, but not as good as it used to be.
    Real Radio, which has been boring pretty much since is started.
    Gold- enough said on these forums about it.
    Nation Radio- ditto

    Local sport is poorly served compared to other areas of the country. We could do with a well-run local talk station, a BBC local station for Cardiff & Newport, and anotehr station offering something different.
  • teasconesteascones Posts: 110
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    North Wales. Radio Wales, Radio Cymru, BBC Nationals, Coast FM and Champion 103. Exciting stuff.
  • Jamesp84Jamesp84 Posts: 31,039
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    Cumbria: CFM, BBC Radio Cumbria, BBC Nationals and er.. that's it.
  • Bill ClintonBill Clinton Posts: 9,389
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    I don't rate the North West as having a good a selection of radio choices as it should, because I'm away from Manchester, there is no equivalents to Rock Radio & Galaxy for playing more specialist rock and dance, Juice FM is very similar to City and City's main playlist is very similar to Buzz/Marcher and Century. With most of the other commercial radio stations I can pick up it's the same story. There needs to be more variety in shows.
  • Andy CarltonAndy Carlton Posts: 4,016
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    Birmingham!

    One of the worst areas in the UK with very poor choice of radio.

    Having travelled up and down the UK...Birmingham has to have the worst choice of radio which is rather a shame being the UK's second city.
  • Andy CarltonAndy Carlton Posts: 4,016
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    I don't rate the North West as having a good a selection of radio choices as it should, because I'm away from Manchester, there is no equivalents to Rock Radio & Galaxy for playing more specialist rock and dance, Juice FM is very similar to City and City's main playlist is very similar to Buzz/Marcher and Century. With most of the other commercial radio stations I can pick up it's the same story. There needs to be more variety in shows.


    Are you serious?

    The N/W has an absolutely fantastic variety of radio! You should try listening to the Birmingham stations then I am confident that you will count your blessings. Birmingham has the worst radio in the entire UK! (sorry Birmingham...but just stating facts here)

    Driving to the N/W is a breath of fresh air to listen to some decent radio!

    There are quite a few radio stations that can be picked up clearly in the N/W of which I have heard and are pretty darn good compared to the drivel we have over here in Birmingham.

    Century is a great station which was once on DAB in my area, then you have Wish FM/ Dune FM/ The Bee/ Rock FM etc...the list goes on including City from Liverpool...plus a good few more!

    What a selection and a great variety of radio the N/W has compared to other parts.
  • Bill ClintonBill Clinton Posts: 9,389
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    Well I'm picking up a dance pirate on 87.9 so that's more variety. Maybe the North West has a fairly good variety especially if you add community radio into the mix, but on the commercial stations it is very much the same playlists well in Liverpool anyway with no rock or Galaxy type station.
    I'm out of range of
    97.7 XFM Manchester
    103.0 Key 103
    106.1 Rock Radio
    102.0 Galaxy Manchester

    These all play a fairly different range of music.

    Liverpool by comparison
    96.3 Coast
    96.7 Radio City
    97.1 Buzz
    97.4 Rock FM
    107.6 Juice
    105.4 Century

    Some of these ARE good stations, but in terms of the
    playlists it's all the same stuff, that's poor choice.
    Imagine if every TV channel always played the same
    programmes then you'll see my way of thinking about
    radio stations.

    Out of all the Liverpool music stations, Juice has the potential to really stand out. It could become a Galaxy/Kerrang/XFM hybrid type station and do very well itself by standing out against City.
  • Bill ClintonBill Clinton Posts: 9,389
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    Is Birmingham really that bad.
    It has BRMB for pop, Kerrang! for modern rock, Galaxy for Urban/dance.
    Granted it has a lot of safe radio stations but is it really the worst in the UK.
    Somewhere like Milton Keynes is soon going to be the worst because it's going to be surrounded by Hearts at all angles.
  • Andy CarltonAndy Carlton Posts: 4,016
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    Is Birmingham really that bad.
    It has BRMB for pop, Kerrang! for modern rock, Galaxy for Urban/dance.
    Granted it has a lot of safe radio stations but is it really the worst in the UK.
    Somewhere like Milton Keynes is soon going to be the worst because it's going to be surrounded by Hearts at all angles.

    Kerrang is probably the ONLY station in Birmingham worth listening to that is alternative from the repetitive pop rubbish you get from BRMB (who have declined in rajar figures quite badly) and Galaxy (which only because of networking has slightly improved but are still very repetitive)

    There is 'Smooth' radio which seems to compete against Heart and BRMB with very few 'smooth' tracks being played regardless of the station name...and that's about it - thats all your Birmingham stations and as we all know the 'Heart' stations are virtually all the same anyway.

    Thats your lot! (commercialised) Boring or what? :rolleyes:

    I will never understand the fascination about Birmingham as a whole and it offers a very poor radio output for what is known as the 'second city'
  • Bill ClintonBill Clinton Posts: 9,389
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    It was particularly bad choice when both BRMB & Beacon Radio
    had Late Night Love in the evening. At least now BRMB has reverted to relative independence.
    I suppose you could get Signal 1 in Birmingham which could broaden your choice slightly.
  • mj_32510mj_32510 Posts: 847
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    Here in Brighton we get

    All the BBC
    BBC Local
    Juice
    Southern
    Gold
    Classic

    I would love a dance station down here, like Juice use to be around the 2002 era, sadly it is not anymore.
  • David (2)David (2) Posts: 20,632
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    in West Wilts, we get (on FM)

    BBC R1
    BBC R2
    BBC R3
    BBC R4
    BBC Wilts
    GWR

    .....and thats your lot, unless you have a FM aerial on the roof. 6 FM stations, and only one of them is non BBC. GWR are running a thing which says they are the countys favourite commercial radio station - hardly suprising as it the only commercial station we can pick up.

    AM radio is useless too.

    DAB, radio on satellite, radio on Freeview, radio over the internet, are all a requirement in this part the UK, alhough a great number of people (I would say over 50%) dont use them.

    Dave
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 463
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    David (2) wrote: »
    in West Wilts, we get (on FM)

    BBC R1
    BBC R2
    BBC R3
    BBC R4
    BBC Wilts
    GWR

    .....and thats your lot, unless you have a FM aerial on the roof. 6 FM stations, and only one of them is non BBC. GWR are running a thing which says they are the countys favourite commercial radio station - hardly suprising as it the only commercial station we can pick up.

    AM radio is useless too.

    DAB, radio on satellite, radio on Freeview, radio over the internet, are all a requirement in this part the UK, alhough a great number of people (I would say over 50%) dont use them.

    Dave

    dont you get kiss 101 in west wilts? used to live in westbury and you got it loud and clear around there.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 463
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    bristol on fm

    we get

    kiss 101

    gwr bristol

    original 106.5

    star 107.2

    bbc r1-4

    bbc bristol

    plus passion pirate dance station in parts of bristol

    not too bad really
  • mkstevomkstevo Posts: 357
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    David (2) wrote: »
    in West Wilts, we get (on FM)

    BBC R1
    BBC R2
    BBC R3
    BBC R4
    BBC Wilts
    GWR

    .....and thats your lot, unless you have a FM aerial on the roof. 6 FM stations, and only one of them is non BBC. GWR are running a thing which says they are the countys favourite commercial radio station - hardly suprising as it the only commercial station we can pick up.

    AM radio is useless too.

    Dave

    Out on the East Coast, we don't fare much better either.

    FM:
    BBC R1...R4
    BBC Lincolnshire
    Lincs FM
    Classic FM

    If you are 'lucky' you might be able to pick up BBC Humberside, Viking FM (from Hull) and very rarely now Hereward FM (Peterborough).

    DAB is a mixed blessing, as while we get more choice:
    BBC R1..R7, Asian Network etc.
    The Arrow
    Absolute
    Birdsong
    Choice
    Classic
    Galaxy
    Heart
    LBC
    Planet Rock
    Real
    Smooth
    TalkSport
    UCB
    Yorkshire Radio

    But you will notice that there are NO local stations at all. If you only had DAB, how would you find out what the local weather was? Or what schools were closed in the snow?

    AM? Zip.
    Used to get a cracking signal from Arrow Classic Rock in Holland from across the North Sea, but no UK stations.

    R5 fades in and out worse than Luxembourg ever did.

    Liberty For London was surprisingly clear on 963/972Khz before they too closed.

    Magic 1161 from Yorkshire is almost audible, but in reality AM doesn't exist.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 2,914
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    In Ipswich:
    ON FM:
    BBC Radio 1,2,3
    SGR FM (Heart)
    Dream 100 (Just)
    Classic FM (Just)
    Town 102 (Or "Static")
    BBC Radio Suffolk
    ICR FM
    KISS 106-8
    Pirate CNN TV RADIO

    ON AM:
    Absolute Radio,
    BBC Radio 5 Live,
    BBC Essex,
    BBC Radio Norfolk,
    Gold Kent,
    Gold Suffolk,
    Gold Norfolk

    ON DAB:
    BBC DAB National
    NOW Digital Essex 12D multiplex
    Digital One
    NOW Digital Norfolk 11B multiplex
  • Andy CarltonAndy Carlton Posts: 4,016
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    It was particularly bad choice when both BRMB & Beacon Radio
    had Late Night Love in the evening. At least now BRMB has reverted to relative independence.
    I suppose you could get Signal 1 in Birmingham which could broaden your choice slightly.

    Beacon and BRMB are almost the same due to networking.

    It is almost comical that the two stations which overlap greatly have more or less the same output.

    Signal 1 is definately not my choice of radio...once a fantastic station, now you can predict what's next on the playlist. The only station I listen to which has a near decent variety is Touch which their TSA is just a couple of miles outide of where I live.
  • fmradiotuner1fmradiotuner1 Posts: 20,476
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    Essex is not that great I think.
    In North Essex all we get is dream town and heart which were essex fm + SGR and invicta which all play the same thing.

    Southend Radios the only station with no networking yet but I read this may change.

    We also have BBC Essex to and thats about it plus the London stations like Kiss.

    And I can get KMFM but this does not cover Essex but its not a bad station.
  • atkinsatkins Posts: 1,235
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    All commercial radio is crap.
  • Martin PhillpMartin Phillp Posts: 34,659
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    Here in London, the big stations all sound like versions of generic fast food chains with similar menus with the exception of Absolute 105.8 and the small FM stations.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 654
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    Local FM :

    Swansea Bay Radio - Oldies (not my age range)

    96.4 The Wave - variety of hits (hardly a CHR, but ok)

    Nation - rock, alternative, indie (which i do not like)

    Real Radio - oldies (not my age range, again)

    MW :

    Swansea Sound - Oldies, again

    Three FM stations i can get are not even for Swansea.
  • SystemSystem Posts: 2,096,970
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    Can't you get Kiss 101 in Swansea?

    http://www.arar93.dsl.pipex.com/mds975/txmaps/avon.html

    The map at the foot of this page suggests that the signal reaches Swansea & Port Talbot.
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