Jopijedd's Radio Memoirs

This is possibly part one of a dynamic mini series (like American TV used to make in the late 80s), possibly not. Depends how carried away i get with it, i suppose. The premise is that i'm going to go for a wander through my memories of radio.

I've got vague memories of BBC Radio Bristol all the way back to my early childhood. The likes of Roger Bennett and John Turner over breakfast and during the morning were probably the first radio shows that i expressed a preference in. Through the eighties, the playlist on Radio Bristol was probably a bit edgier than it is now, featuring more chart music than the station currently carries. Admittedly, the top 40 was probably a lot safer in general than it is now, but even so the station felt more on the pulse in those days. You also had a wide variety of specialist music programmes, one in particular which sits in my mind was the Sunday afternoon offering with Tristan B offering various black and dance music. The closest you have to anything like that now are the BBC Introducing programmes which go out in the dead of the night, which are all part of the bigger BBC Introducing strand which runs nationwide.

Other memorable early listening experiences included The Top 40 on Radio 1 with Bruno Brookes (which was simulcast on Bristol's FM frequency at the time as R1 was MW only at the time), Radio 2's Pick of the Pops (with Alan Freeman) and other local radio programming such as Steve Yabsley's legendary Saturday morning show, but more of that later.

On a family holiday to Cornwall, i was treated to my first radio cassette recorder which lived conveniently on a shelf at the end of my bed for many, many years. From that time, i would generally wake up and listen to the radio in bed, particularly Radio 1 as they had now started broadcasting in the glorious FM stereo. The first breakfast show presenter i remember on Radio 1 was Mike Smith, who was coming towards the end of his tenure as i started listening. It becomes very easy in times like these (where the workings of a radio station are far more displayed and talked about) to forget that back in those days that we didn't get months of warning when schedules were due to change, so it came as something to a surprise to me when Simon Mayo popped up and the format of the show changed. But not all surprises are nasty ones and i soon settled down to Mayo's warm presenting style with newscaster Rod McKenzie and weather reporter Sybill Ruscoe (who was later replaced by Diane Oxenberry) acting as sidekicks in a similar manner to the way that Dominic Byrne and Tina Daheley are foils to Chris Moyles on the current breakfast show.

Of course being a scholar at the time, the main times i heard the radio were during the breakfast show and later on through the afternoon with Steve Wright, whom i found entertaining as an 11 year old, but now enjoy considerably less. I think this might be down to the fact that he's still effectively doing very similar material to the same format over twenty years later. What i used to find particularly frustrating was the reliance upon the Bank Holiday Monday stalwart "Best of the Guests" programming in which tedious celebrities were dragged out for Wright to fawn over. In truth, they'd have been miles better off just getting one of the station's junior DJs in to play some damned music. In terms of the time it must have taken to edit the interview material together, it'd probably have been cheaper as well.

During the early 90s commercial radio began to play a more important role in the West. GWR had been steadily gaining momentum over the past few years to a point where it was well established, particularly in the urban areas. New upstart Galaxy had also come along, offering a younger and fresher range of programming and music than otherwise offered by local stations. Radio 1 on FM in the Mendips was (and still is to this day) very patchy, mainly on account of not having a local transmitter and relying upon the transmission from Wenvoe in South Wales.

The other great revolution of the early 90s was the revelation of the Radio 1 comedy slot, which i only came to know during the later part of its run. The Chris Morris Music Show (of which i taped every episode off air, having borrowed tapes of On The Hour from a friend at school and decided that i was a fan of Morris) was a staple of my Wednesday evenings during 1994.

If i'm honest, my specific memories of the more mainstream radio from this 91-96 period start to get a bit woollier for a few years. I didn't have a great following for any show in particular and i don't think anything on the daytime spectrum really piqued my imagination. I didn't think much of the Radio 1 daytime presenters of the likes of Simon Bates, Emma Freud, Lisa I'Anson and Nicky Campbell and anybody broadcasting at the time on ILR was pretty much interchangeable with the next presenter. I had taken far more to making my own mixtapes (a habit which continues to this day) and sourcing my own playlists mostly from the bottom of the bargain bins of our numerous local record shops.

This seems a sensible juncture to leave it for now. Partially as a preview (and partially as an aide memoire for myself), part two will concern MTV Europe and the massive influence it had over my future listening habits; Viva Northern Europe; Computers and Radio 4; What i missed from 1996-9 and Listening to GWR on the 18. Even later on, we'll get on to Taping the Dark Lord; Conversion to Radio 2; Conversion back to Radio 1; the birth of my obsession with radio and my current listening habits.