Yesterday, one of our secretaries at Radio Trent/GEM AM in the 80s and 90s indignantly posted this on Facebook:
Although it was years since Debbie worked in radio she has a better idea of radio programming than those over-paid 'suits' at BBC Radio. Apart from Jeremy Vine and few others, I find it unlistenable both in terms of the music choice, and the 'dj's' they use, but as Deb's pointed out, it was the WORST ever..
The line-up included: Nicki Chapman (from some house-buying TV show) Zoe Ball (was a kind of dj in Radio One now does glossy TV shows) Kate Humble (who?) in for Steve Wright (and merely a 'TV presenter') and to add cost to injury they put on two people, so actor (and TV star) Charles Dance joined her! And with Sarah (I lost 1 million listeners on Radio 1) Cox on breakfast and Vanessa Feltz on Jeremy Vine's show it was clearly nothing to do with giving us the best person to cover the shows, merely more of the BBC's increasingly tiring gender-balance nonsense.
Someone needs to tell the BBC 'suits' that gender-balance will ONLY work if you put women on who can communicate, have good voices, and KNOW about the music they play!
BBC 'suits' seem to think that just because someone is on TV, or has sold a few records 15-35 years ago it makes them worthy to broadcast on a National radio station. but most importantly all this is why BBC Radio 2 costs the licence payer
FIFTY MILLION POUNDS a year !
Add-up the costs of those TV people who cannot 'self-op', so need more producers and engineers (+ the BBC are paying their agent's fees as well) and I'd guess that over a year that costs about 85% more than employing ONE 'relief presenter' to cover ALL holidays as I used to do on my stations in the 80s and 90s.
Weekdays between 5am and 7pm there are 6 shows, so if each presenter takes 6 weeks holiday a year (or time off to do more TV/ launch their books..) that is 36 weeks show cover needed a year, in other words it can be one ONE job, and be (say) Alex Lester, a 'proper' broadcaster relegated to the graveyard shift on Radio 2 at present as these TV folks 'play' at being dj's....
Take a deep breath.. there is more....
As if this on-air debacle was not enough we found out this week that Tony Blackburn is being replaced on 'Pick of the Pops' by Paul Gambacinni. So they are getting rid of their BEST KNOWN on-air personality, and to add insult to injury, putting an American on the run-down of 2 old BRITISH charts (did the 'suits' not realise?)
Did Gambo go crawling in to get this show? No! Quite the opposite - he was 'told' he had to do it*, and bless him, for in return doing a very long podcast with Trevor Dann in which he lifted the lid on all kinds of unsavoury BBC management attitudes. For radio trade 'news' aimed at the business, it also very quickly made the national press+.
It's a long podcast but I recommend you listen to it* all; if you don't have time, here are some choice 'cuts':
(This week's Crucifying Countdown!)
No.5 "Sometimes I walk in to do a program me at Radio 2 and I see someone sitting-in for someone, and I feel as if someone has walked-in off the street, as I don't recognise this person"
No. 4 "The chasm between talent and management has never been as wide or as deep as it has under the current management. Another of the great chasms is high culture versus populism, you have Tony 'Royal Opera House' Hall versus Tony 'Top 40' Blackburn."
No 3 "We at Radio 2 know that the current management of the BBC dismiss us."
No.2 "Poor Tony Blackburn is universally regarded at radio level as a scape-goat - it was a brilliant (BBC) manoeuvre as all the press attention of Dame Janet's report was on Tony"
And... Britun's Numbur Wuuunnn!"
"The BBC is not a team effort anymore"
Oh, bubbling under..... is 'news' just in - on the same day the BBC announced that Fearne Cotton is to sit in on Graham Norton's show over the summer and to add more cost to the show she has an 80s pop start doing it with her.
Does it count as gender-balance if a man is on the show as well :-) ?
Cotton is EIGHTEEN years younger than Norton, only 35, and will be unfamiliar to mature listeners as she was on Radio 1 until LAST YEAR - playing music Radio 2 listeners would definitely not have enjoyed.
If she did Radio 1 because she loved the music, she must have dramatically changed her music tastes in 12 months....
Cotton is remembered by adults for her appearance in the BBC tv coverage of the Diamond Jubilee Pageant++
How on earth do the BBC 'suits' think she will be 'right' to fit-in on a major weekend show for a MATURE audience on a national station? And it's not just 'radio people' who are noting this, some listeners are VERY musically aware as witnessed by many comments on the Gambacinni podcast such a from:
Dave Crane: "sadly the 80s stuff that Sara Cox plays are the "obvious" hits and nothing much else - if only it was done in a more informed and in depth way like the Sounds of the 60s show was done, then it could be brilliant - well at least for the music! I feel that Radio 2 should not forget 50s, 60s and 70s music either. What does sicken me about the current output of Radio 2, are the constant bombardment with ADVERTS (promos for other shows) - which totally disrupt the flow of every programme - and are also too long and repetitive. The music output is also very repetitive - always playing the obvious oldies, and overplaying modern stuff on the PLAY list. Then there's so many rubbish TV presenters playing at radio - and hardly any DJs who know and love the music the play. I know what I want to hear on Radio 2 - and they're just not doing it!"
When listeners get THAT aware, and animated in their feelings you know a radio station is NOT getting it right for them.
Lastly..... ask yourself WHY Radio 2 have not taken on Simon Bates to do 'Pick of the Pops'?
- He works on a BBC local station so could voice it from that studio rather than travelling to London
- He has a GREAT voice and is still well-known from his Radio 1/ Classic FM days
- He was HUGE on Radio 1 and played songs from the later charts when they were new!
Surely it can't be that someone at the BBC still holds a grudge from his Radio 1 days?
So...... with all respect to Paul Gambaccini, who is a great factual broadcaster, I ask the BBC 'suits' WHY is Simon Bates, a 'proper' dj not taking over "Pick of the Pops"?
If all else fails, maybe it will be Cox or Cotton on it, sooner than you might imagine?
The 'suits' who control Radio 2, seem to be steering it younger and younger; if it continues there will be NO national station for mature listeners!
They push gender-balance to extremes, waste MILLIONS of pounds on non-radio staff, are completely out of touch with listeners, and leading gilded-lives in London fuelled by the licence-fee funded BBC gravy train....
* http://radiotoday.co.uk/2016/06/gambaccini-blasts-bbc-bosses-before-new-radio-2-show/
+ BBC is 'worst employer of all time', says Radio 2's Paul Gambaccini http://gu.com/p/4k5g7/stw
++ http://www.theguardian.com/media/2012/jun/08/fearne-cotton-bbc-jubilee
