I'll admit that I was excited for a few minutes last week when the new radio station, indie 88.1 as they like to call themselves, hit the airwaves. I had read a very puffy piece on them in the Star in the lead-up to their launch and despite my built-in cynicism was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
More fool me I suppose. Driving for work over the last couple of days I have popped in and out on the station and despite very early initial promise they have now settled in to the same old routine that pretty much all radio stations seem to follow. Why do I need to hear the same song off the "great new album" by ______ (fill in the blank) over and over and over again. In total I have probably devoted about 90-120 minutes of my time listening to this station and somehow I have heard the new Arctic Monkey's single and "Shut Up" by the Savages 3 times each. Why?? Is it too hard for the programmer to push the random play button. And exactly how do the Killers, Arcade Fire and David Bowie ("Modern Love" yikes!) qualify as independent music? I'll stick to XM35 if I want any sort of dose of decent pop/rock music.
And if anyone out there is reading this I'm curious to hear what you would expect from a station that dubs itself as an indie alternative (2 words that seem to have lost all meaning a long time ago). In other words what would have made you happy to tune in to something like 88.1 and keep you there especially in a musical world where so much is at our fingertips.
Or to put it in yet another light if you had 60 minutes of their airtime and could play any 10-15 songs of your choice what would you spin to grab everyone's attention?
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