Smooth Radio

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Deleted member 26715

Guest
My normal radio station to have on during the working day is BBC R4, however since the lockdown it became apparent very early on they had an agenda to make a meal of the pandemic & instil a mentality of total dread in their listeners, every single program was turned over to doom & gloom. So for my own sanity I switched to Smooth Radio, pretty bland music catering to my late 50's tastes, completely unoffensive & fairly mundane. But now having listen to them for 8(?) weeks I am trying to work out their model, they only appear to have a very restrictive number of tracks, less than 500 possibly, is there a magic number they can play to not pay royalties so something like that?
 

Brandane

Legendary Member
Location
Costa Clyde
I have listened to Smooth on and off for years now, especially since BBC Radio 2 made an obvious effort to appeal to a younger audience.
Smooth was one of the few stations broadcasting on FM that was actually listenable to, but as you say, a very limited playlist meant it was not much good for extended listening. Then I discovered digital radio and it opened up a whole new world of decent stations.
 

AndyRM

XOXO
Location
North Shields
They play what tests well, and the testing (if it's anything like what went on when I worked in commercial radio) is laughable. You get a room of say 150 people, play tracks and get them to rank them A, B or C. Tracks voted A will go onto the heaviest rotation, C the lowest. The tracks will be about 70% stuff the testers have heard before, 30% "new" stuff.

The problem is that testing session details are sent out to folk who already listen to the station, so they knows what they likes. This is intentional, because losing that core of listeners means losing audience reach and therefore advertisers.

So Smooth (and all commercial radio stations) could have a far more diverse playlist, but won't because Betty really likes Lionel Richie and will listen all day to get her fix and keep advertisers sweet.
 

Drago

Legendary Member
It's not my thing. Planet Rock all the way baby!

The otherwise very intelligent Mrs D listens to Heart, where the only 3 songs they play are Don't Speak, Gangsters Paradise, and Torn. I was subjected to this aural torture on one car journey and they played Gangsters Paradise twice in the same hour.
 

Venod

Eh up
Location
Yorkshire
I sometimes listen to Smooth in the car (the ads can be annoying) when R2 is trying to get down with the kids and playing something that should be on R1 in the remote hours of the day.

My Station of choice at home is Radio Paradise, usually The Mellow Mix, but I do listen to The Main Mix as well.

Its an Internet US station, no ads no annoying DJs, if you enjoy it you can donate, you don't have to.
 
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Archie_tect

De Skieven Architek... aka Penfold + Horace
Location
Northumberland
Rarely listen to radio, and never commercial stations [I use Spotify now and again] how can you bear listening to adverts?
 
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D

Deleted member 26715

Guest
Rarely listen to radio, and never commercial stations [I use Spotify now and again] how can you bear listening to adverts?
Easily you just tuned them out, as TBH I do with most of the music & the benign banter, it only gets into my consciousness occasionally
 

Archie_tect

De Skieven Architek... aka Penfold + Horace
Location
Northumberland
When I [used to] get in the car the radio would come on if someone else had been driving and I could tell who by the choice of station... even on a long journey I prefer to leave it off, except for ISIHAC which is always worth listening to!

[Edit: just remembered when I had a year on a site some years ago, I regularly drove home at 6pm most evenings and used to listen to Simon Mayo's Drivetime- I liked him.]
 
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matiz

Guru
Location
weymouth
I tried Smooth radio a couple of years ago , bland is a understatement they seemed obsessed with Mickey Bubbles and Olly Murs tried switching to our local Wessex FM they were also obsessed with Olly and Mickey but added Kelly Clarkson once a hour I've been listening to Greatest Hits radio lately but that's starting to get a bit repetitive so it looks like joining @Drago on Planet Rock.
 

Brandane

Legendary Member
Location
Costa Clyde
I've just remembered a good reason for NOT listening to Smooth FM..
This is one of the songs on their limited playlist and they insist on playing it every time I turn the station on. ARGHHHHHH :cursing:. Never wanted to strangle anything responsible for birdsong before, but this is pushing my tolerance.
Just to share the agony.....

 
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