Good to hear that although his input will be minimal. Nigel has been covering a bit recently on BBC Sussex and Surrey where i think he would really feel at home with a full time gig as he is excellent at doing speech radio.

With Jazz FM (which is now surviving as one of the few independant stations left and hopefully staying on air!) seems to be busy
http://www.jazzfm.com/onair/presente...igel-williams/

Smooth may become Capital Gold, They do like the Capital brand

The Public File will need to change for Automation and Nigel has joined. More well known names joining the station.

Smooth Radio uses radio automation technology during the following hours:

Saturday 20.00-24.00

Sunday: 00.00 - 06.00, 09.00-12.00

Still don't agree with this as there is some good easy listening new music which fitted in well on Smooth as it does on R2. It also helps new easy listening artists who might be out of place on xfm, Heart or other stations.
Does look like Global are getting ready so Smooth and Gold will merge as an oldies station

Seems to have been all change around the news today. No weather in the lead up to the news any more and the travel news has moved to before the adverts. The lead-up to the news is now also voiced by the following presenter rather than the finishing one.

Makes sense.

Peak time Sunday is an odd time not to be live although R2 do of course.

Your very much miss informed then, Steve Wright's sunday love songs is voice tracked from 9 - 11.

Didn't Pat Sharp say that Richard Park sacked him from Capital in the 90s by literally showing him the red card in front of everyone at a restaurant?

If there's any animosity between them, is there any chance Pat Sharp will end up either leaving Smooth or get moved to another slot?

Voicetracked? I think he records the show live on Thursday or Friday before. He had to announce all letters etc needed to be in before Thursday, as the station had a slap on the wrist recently for miss informing listeners thinking it was Live.

If a Smooth Radio presenter suddenly took leave of their senses and wanted to play The Witch by The Rattles, could they just choose it from Smooth's library of tracks, or if not there, find the song on iTunes, pay 99p, download it and then play it? Or are they just stuck with the songs Smooth make available to them and nothing else?

They probably could do it, but I dare say it'd probably be their last show.

They'd be rightly fired for playing something that probably tests somewhere between 'Shaddup ya face' and the other dogs cited recently in this thread

Never got an answer to this reasonable question....

Thats the equivalent in whatever job you do of turning up to work and not doing your job. In the case of an office environment just browsing the web all day looking at crap.

As a result exactly the same would happen, you would be warned or fired. The exact same would happen in radio, first time you would probably get a large bolocking, second time would be your final time.

So what exactly is the new smooth target audience. I'm in my 30s and loved the old smooth. And although the presenters are good the playlists are awfull now and dreadfully boring just like Magic used to be but this is even worse.

Something like that ... I was more shocked to hear an anecdote so wasn't really listening to the details. I do recall it was something about Langan's Restaurant. The one Michael Caine had/has a stake in.

45+....

Sorry I wasn't clear that's what I was trying to say that R2 also wasn't live.
Taking another point that Smooth is aimed at 45+ why on earth do Global consider that at this age people want to hear the same songs over and over?
Looking back the repetition seems to be the main gripe with listeners. I think people could learn to live with less talk but the repetition is putting people off.

Not really seeing as Park considers his best ever line up in radio the capital era with Pat on mornings. The reason he got fired from capital is just a refresh, Park may thinks he suits Smooth to a tee.

I have a funny feeling that before long Margarita Taylor may do some cover or a show on smooth.

The way global program there radio stations is pretty clever, most normal people only listen to the radio for a small amount of time each day. So instead of having large playlists where when you tune in a obscure or less known song could be playing and as a result you tune away global rotate songs a lot more that way when you tune in you hear strong, well known songs every time you tune in.

So clever that it makes me switch off. Why on earth would an intelligent adult of 45+ want to hear the same songs everytime they switch on? There's so much excellent music that Smooth could play which I am sure would not make people switch off. Smooth is broadcasting to mature adults not teenyboppers.
I will never accept that a small repetitive playlist is acceptable for a station like Smooth.

Intelligence has nothing to do with it. One of the most intelligent person I've ever known had a very restrictive taste in music yet could do complicated maths within seconds.

People connect with music in very different ways. Take time to observe others rather than force feeding them what you want and you'll be surprised. Life will be a lot happier too

I have yet to find a non radio enthusiast that likes repetitive playlists. How many people have just 300 songs on there ipod?