[Music] Random thought re music played on the radio

[Icy Gull]

Was thinking listening to Zoe Ball on Radio 2 this morning how here music seems quite different to what Chris Evans used to play, so my question is do the DJs have a say in the music or do they actually pick the songs?

Knowing how varied NSC professions are I was wondering if any of you have experience of radio stations and how the music is picked.

I did say it was a bit random

 

[crodonilson]

As a rule they have some input but not a huge amount.

Who on earth chooses the Radio 2 playlist?!

 

[Notters]

As a rule they have some input but not a huge amount.

Who on earth chooses the Radio 2 playlist?!

That doesn't really explain why most of the presenters seem to play a fair mix of music (not all to my taste, but that's inevitable), whereas Steve Wright plays endless R&B shite interspersed only by his irritating raspy voice. And he always talks/sings over the start and end of every song.

 

[B-right-on]

As a rule they have some input but not a huge amount.

Who on earth chooses the Radio 2 playlist?!

But that's the 'master list' isn't it and then the producers chose which off the list to to play? Cant remember where I got that from, but was off the radio.

 

[schmunk]

And he always talks/sings over the start and end of every song.

Home Taping Is Killing Music.

 

[crodonilson]

But that's the 'master list' isn't it and then the producers chose which off the list to to play? Cant remember where I got that from, but was off the radio.

Yes that'll be the core offering and then the Disc Jockeys themselves will have some input into which other songs will be played.

 

[Cian]

I work in the non-on-air side of radio, slightly different market than the UK but we used to own a bunch of UK stations which ran identically.

For normal radio stations, with "formats" - pop, classic rock, easy listening, love songs etc - the DJ usually has zero input whatsoever. Schedule made up by software then briefly checked for any clangers by a human before being integrated with the ads and send to the playout system. One programme has the bulk of the market for this, RCS Selector. You give it rules - eras, how often a song can repeat, types of music for time of day/week etc. For specialist music shows even on those type of stations though, they generally pick everything themselves.

Special cases are very, very small stations and very, very big stations - I would imagine a BBC DJ has more input than someone on a regional Heart outlet. But in this case I'd think that part of the rebrand of the show was to change the music type somewhat, to make it seem more like a clean break from Evans.

On our main station (we run two different format stations where I work) we'd play mostly established current and past top 40 tracks daytime Monday-Friday, going back to 1990; evening is newer content including non-top-40. Weekends have R&B shows, classics shows etc. Fridays have a significant tilt towards classic dance tracks. Our secondary station plays softer, borderline easy listening tracks back to 1970 and love songs at night, same format 7 days a week.

 

[Icy Gull]

I work in the non-on-air side of radio, slightly different market than the UK but we used to own a bunch of UK stations which ran identically.

For normal radio stations, with "formats" - pop, classic rock, easy listening, love songs etc - the DJ usually has zero input whatsoever. Schedule made up by software then briefly checked for any clangers by a human before being integrated with the ads and send to the playout system. One programme has the bulk of the market for this, RCS Selector. You give it rules - eras, how often a song can repeat, types of music for time of day/week etc. For specialist music shows even on those type of stations though, they generally pick everything themselves.

Special cases are very, very small stations and very, very big stations - I would imagine a BBC DJ has more input than someone on a regional Heart outlet. But in this case I'd think that part of the rebrand of the show was to change the music type somewhat, to make it seem more like a clean break from Evans.

On our main station (we run two different format stations where I work) we'd play mostly established current and past top 40 tracks daytime Monday-Friday, going back to 1990; evening is newer content including non-top-40. Weekends have R&B shows, classics shows etc. Fridays have a significant tilt towards classic dance tracks. Our secondary station plays softer, borderline easy listening tracks back to 1970 and love songs at night, same format 7 days a week.

Thanks, interesting stuff. Shattered my very old fashioned illusions of someone going through the archive, be it a DJ or back room person, and picking songs though

 

[Bodian]

Why were you listening to Zoe Ball when Lauren Laverne is on 6 Music at the same time?

 

[KZNSeagull]

I work in the non-on-air side of radio, slightly different market than the UK but we used to own a bunch of UK stations which ran identically.

For normal radio stations, with "formats" - pop, classic rock, easy listening, love songs etc - the DJ usually has zero input whatsoever. Schedule made up by software then briefly checked for any clangers by a human before being integrated with the ads and send to the playout system. One programme has the bulk of the market for this, RCS Selector. You give it rules - eras, how often a song can repeat, types of music for time of day/week etc. For specialist music shows even on those type of stations though, they generally pick everything themselves.

Special cases are very, very small stations and very, very big stations - I would imagine a BBC DJ has more input than someone on a regional Heart outlet. But in this case I'd think that part of the rebrand of the show was to change the music type somewhat, to make it seem more like a clean break from Evans.

On our main station (we run two different format stations where I work) we'd play mostly established current and past top 40 tracks daytime Monday-Friday, going back to 1990; evening is newer content including non-top-40. Weekends have R&B shows, classics shows etc. Fridays have a significant tilt towards classic dance tracks. Our secondary station plays softer, borderline easy listening tracks back to 1970 and love songs at night, same format 7 days a week.

Thanks, very interesting. I can't believe that a Heart DJ has any input at all. They only appear to have 5 cd's - Ed Sheeran, Pink, Adele, Olly Murs and the Now CD with Rehab on it.

 

[Jam The Man]

I did a stint as a hospital radio dj throughout 2002, and the joy of playing every single song of my own choice was immense!

 

[Jam The Man]

That doesn't really explain why most of the presenters seem to play a fair mix of music (not all to my taste, but that's inevitable), whereas Steve Wright plays endless R&B shite interspersed only by his irritating raspy voice. And he always talks/sings over the start and end of every song.

It’s the second most annoying thing for me on radio. Second only to excessive adverts.

 

[Cian]

Thanks, very interesting. I can't believe that a Heart DJ has any input at all. They only appear to have 5 cd's - Ed Sheeran, Pink, Adele, Olly Murs and the Now CD with Rehab on it.

They were my example of no input at all basically. The ridiculously tight rotations are "proven" to work for a certain definition of proven - I think its bollox personally. Basically the claim is the average listener, of which there are clearly lots, want to hear those songs and don't listen for prolonged periods; meaning they need to play the balls off them. People who listen for longer periods hear them over, and over, and over, and over again. Sub one hour artist exclusions have become the norm now although we refuse to go lower than 70mins - that is between two different tracks by the same artist.

One of our daytime DJs sometimes subs in for a specialist dance show and loves it as he actually gets to play the tracks he wants, and decide (roughly, +/-5 minutes probably) when the ad breaks are. Also we've no news after 7pm and less ads so he's almost uninterrupted!

 

[The Large One]

I did a stint as a hospital radio dj throughout 2002, and the joy of playing every single song of my own choice was immense!

Same on Radio Reverb. The choice is totally ours, provided it doesn't break OfCom rules (swearing, racism, homophobia etc).

So whatever you hear as an outro to The Albion Roar or what I play on Move On Up is entirely the choice of the presenters (blame us). Hear the outro to this week's Roar for an example. Heart FM / Capital Brighton FM wouldn't play it. And given the context, they wouldn't dare - that's how flaccid they are.

 

[Cian]

Oh and - the majority of 'request' shows are fake. They're also scheduled. Someone who calls in is told what song to ask for if they want their shout out on air; or they call back the texter that happens to have asked for something already coming up. Sometimes old pre-recorded requests are reused if its a quiet night.

There are exceptions, particularly shows targetting older audiences where the requests would be hugely varied in type. Also one semi-common thing would be having one "special" request in one of those shows which might actually be real and picked by the DJ.

When a track starts to play the second its asked for, under the DJ saying thanks to the caller or announcing the name - it was pre-scheduled. Listen out for that and you'll notice it immediately.

 

[BN9 BHA]

That doesn't really explain why most of the presenters seem to play a fair mix of music (not all to my taste, but that's inevitable), whereas Steve Wright plays endless R&B shite interspersed only by his irritating raspy voice. And he always talks/sings over the start and end of every song.

I was working in a house last week and the owner had radio 2 on, Steve Wright was playing music my 15 year old son likes.
Steve Wright is now worse than a Heart FM DJ, but twice or three times older.

I'm sure Jeremy Vine chooses some of his own music, he sometimes plays The Jam, The Smiths and Elvis Costello, I've heard him mention he's a fan.

 

[Don Tmatter]

I was working in a house last week and the owner had radio 2 on, Steve Wright was playing music my 15 year old son likes.
Steve Wright is now worse than a Heart FM DJ, but twice or three times older.

I'm sure Jeremy Vine chooses some of his own music, he sometimes plays The Jam, The Smiths and Elvis Costello, I've heard him mention he's a fan.

Radio 2 seem to play a lot of songs you’d hear on the Heart playlist nowadays with only the occasional oldie thrown in

 

[Official Old Man]

I'm sure that Heart record the first three hours between 6am and 9am and then just replay it all day. At least that is how it sounds.

 

[Icy Gull]

Why were you listening to Zoe Ball when Lauren Laverne is on 6 Music at the same time?

Driving up to Guildford and the radio was on Radio 2, first time I’ve listened to Zoe Ball as I don’t listen to the radio too much. Is 6 available on old fashioned car radios? Never listened to it but it seems to have a fanbase on here.

 

[Cian]

6 Music is DAB/TV/internet only