Hits & Misses - the Radio 1 specialist show takeover day

Monday 13th April saw Radio 1's second takeover day where presenters from the evening (and in some cases, dead of night) take over a daytime show for the bank holiday. As i listened to most of it, here are a few thoughts.

Zane Lowe (Breakfast 0630-1000, normally Chris Moyles)
Radio 1 are very lucky to have a presenter with the abilities of Zane Lowe. His presentational skills are very adaptable and he demonstrates his versatility by moving from the old "Evening Session" slot into a mainstream breakfast seamlessly. Admittedly, the music choices were a bit wild at times, but Lowe delivers a consistently good and entertaining show with a mix of music more akin to what Radio 1 should be, in my humble opinion. He clearly wasn't daunted by the presence of Davina McCall during the final hour of the show, which would probably phase lesser talents.

Huw Stephens (Morning, 1000-1300, normally Jo Whiley)
Probably the most similar presenter to the normal output, normal indie-phile and Welsh output specialist Stephens produced a competent show with a good mixture of indie and pop including plenty of variety. In a similar vein to my favourite radio presenters, he manages to keep the show moving without being too shouty nor anal. Hundreds of 'yoof' presenters nationwide would do well to take a leaf out of his book. I think Huw Stephens is setting himself up quite neatly in the Steve Lamacq niche of presenting indie in a enthusiastic, but non-elitist way. My only real problem with the show came towards the end with some god awful dirge from Lil Wayne.

Overall, i probably preferred last year's Morning slot takeover from Rob da Bank, but Stephens did a sound job.

Daniel P Carter (Afternoon, 1300-1600, normally Edith Bowman's Film Show)
Alright, it isn't officially Edith Bowman's Film Show, but the persistent movie topics get highly draining if you're not really in to hardcore cinema thrashing. As such, i never have high expectations of this time of the day and given how poor Carter's show was this was probably a good job. Carter normally presents the Rock (or should that be RAAAAAAWWWWWWK) show from midnight til two one night during the week and on paper a daytime show from him should have been great, but sadly it wasn't. Almost all the music was either dire stadium rock standards (what felt like an eternity of AC/DC's "To Those About To Rock" was painful) or Slipknot / Korn style shouty thrash toss. And then to cap it all, he plays bloody Bat for Lashes. Carter's laid-back-or-possibly-horizontal presentational style is fine, but whoever passed the playlist for this show needs shooting. Even Kerrang's DAB station is more accessible than this.

Tim Westwood (Drivetime, 1600-1900, normally Scott Mills)
Westwood is potentially the biggest untapped talent in Radio 1. On the occasion they move him into mainstream hours, his output is hilariously over the top. Perhaps it would get tedious if it happened too often, but in the small doses we get at the moment, Westwood is brilliant. Two or three times, Westwood has co-hosted a show of some description with Scott Mills which should be a disaster on paper, but the two are surprisingly compatible as radio talents. The playlist for the show started off a bit obscure, but included just enough commercial music to keep me tuned in for the most part; Daniel P Carter take note.

Overall, a worthwhile day of broadcasting. I'd be very surprised if the BBC can hold on to Zane Lowe, but given the current climate for commercial broadcasters, his safest bet may well be to stay put. If Andy Parfitt (Controller of R1) could see the light enough to sort out the afternoon show (which has been poor since about 12 months before Colin Murray left) with somebody of the calibre of Zane Lowe or Huw Stephens, they'd be on to a winner. But i suspect that the next round of changes will see Greg James promoted into M-F Daytimes rather than one of the specialist show faithful.

The big question remains: Who will be the next to go?

Moyles remains a hit and is more likely to leave of his own accord rather than get pushed (interestingly, his show ticks almost none of the boxes of what should work on Radio 1, yet gets consistently superb audience figures).

Jo Whiley will eventually end up on 6 Music or presenting music programmes for Channel 4, and may possibly go on bad terms if a reformatting of her show is demanded.

Edith Bowman remains a moderately good presenter in need of a decent raison d'etre for her show - the constant movie thing is a shambles and Bowman overdoes the Luvvying with various actor types to a worrying level. R1 also needs to look at their output during the afternoon school run which is a main time for them to be securing their most desirable demographic of listeners. Yet every afternoon at 1545 we get the terminally shit "My Life in Music", which is even worse than Mark & Lard's Cheesily Cheerful Chart Challenge and at least that was broadcast off-peak. The feature does nothing but alienate the younger audience when some aged standard gets trotted out.

Scott Mills is obviously top choice for the breakfast job when Moyles moves on, but his recent forays into TV have been mostly well received and he is far more of a natural in the visual medium than his breakfast counterpart.

If i were a betting man, my money would be on Bowman being the next to go, but you never can tell in this business...

April's Assorted Anger

Another collection of musical musings. I apologise that i'm not in a good mood at the moment;

Lady Gaga - Poker Face
I'm mystified as to why this record is popular. It seems to be a badly produced half song with an irritating earworm. "Pa pa pa Pokerface. Pa pa pa pahkerface" she sings. Apparently men can't tell whats going on in her mind. Well duh.

TI - Dead and Gone
This is far less irritating that his last record, but i suspect we'll be suffering from it for ages yet as he's now 84% more famous as he's fulfilled one of the rapper cliches, namely being arrested for trying to buy machine guns. Come on, what the hell do you need a machine gun for? To prove your predictions about what'll happen when you're Dead and Gone?

Kings of Leon - Revelry
America's favourite nasal whiners notch up a third album from their "Only by the Night" album. Why on earth this tedious album filler track is picking up mainstream radio play is anyone's guess, the only possible plus side to arise from it is Chris Moyles' parody that is currently doing the rounds.

Akon - Beautiful
Another tedious identikit record from Akon. The only partial interest found around this one is that he's discovered how to make his records sound like slowed down versions of late 90s dance music, which would be fine if it was an instrumental. Instead we're punished with Akon's mithering.

Beyonce - Halo
In which Ms Knowles demonstrates that if somebody forgets to write a song, she'll just sing a few random words and it'll still be a massive hit. With a silent S.

Ciara - Love Sex Magic
America's #1 overpromoted dancer who can't sing has obviously fallen out with her record label and they won't pay for her to have decent songs any more. Love Sex Magic seems to rely on vocal post-production, backing singers and guest vocalists, yet Ciara still sounds awful. And its not even as interesting as the irritating Goodies.

Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal
I don't get Fleet Foxes at all. I hear etheral, layered vocal folk music for people with beards and nothing even remotely innovative. Their albums should be released by a Glastonbury based record label who produce organic CDs on hemp discs.

Ironik - Tiny Dancer
The man who soundtracked a thousand chav funerals with his chipmunk vocals in Stay With Me returns with a useless Elton John sample being used to prop up a below average wander around the desert of uninspired rap. Why is he called Ironik? What is remotely Ironik about his music? The fact that he doesn't have a clue what irony is?

And i'm not even going to start of the latest bloody awful and pointless Girls Aloud record. I could almost stomach them when they were making half decent pop, but they just seem to warble along to any old toss now and count the money coming in.

Home isn't where Heart is.

Local Radio has recently undergone another shambolic rebranding with over twenty established, recognised commercial local radio stations being rebranded as "Heart" across the UK. Apparently they're the "better music mix". It must be 1985 again.

Their output is very dull and constant promotions for Lionel Richie and their networked Toby Anstis show (which seem to be the main idents being played on what used to be Orchard in Somerset) don't help.

One of the most notable losses is that of Bristol's GWR, easily the most popular and established ILR in the city. Outside of Bristol, the other parts of the GWR empire have been somewhat less successful, but within the city the (sometimes irritating) pro-Bristolian programming and idents were obviously a winner.

I just can't see people getting excited about a national brand taking over their local stations, particularly as similar rebrandings of grouped radio stations have resulted in abysmal listening figures. If the Heart brand was recognised as a quality broadcaster in locations where they were already active then there might seem to be logic behind this exercise, but i haven't yet heard any positive comments from casual radio listeners about their "new, improved" local commercial broadcaster