Virgin 1215's DJ line-up came from Radio 1, local radio
(both BBC and ILR) and the English service of Radio Luxembourg that had closed
down the previous December. The joint programme directors were Richard Skinner and
John 'Johnny Boy' Revell.
The station promised advertisers an ambitious 3.3 million
listeners per week. Skinner accepted that his former employer "Radio 1 is
our main competitor and we will primarily be head-to-head with them. We will
make a dent in their listenership." Of course for non-FM listeners there
was also the option of the long-wave only Atlantic 252. But the big issue for
Virgin was always whether a rock audience would put up with AM's audibility
over a clear FM signal. Certainly in Beverley, where I recorded the opening
minutes, 1215 AM sounded a bit slushy.
Though the official launch was scheduled for 12.15 on 30
April 1993 the station had been beaming out live test transmissions throughout
the month. The first live voice on air for those tests was Tommy Vance, just
minutes after signing off from his last Friday
Rock Show on Radio 1.
Thanks to YouTube user 'Neatishead' for uploading this audio
of test transmissions and the launch.
Needless to say I also had my tape rolling to capture the
opening from Richards' Branson and Skinner. "The radio revolution is here!".
The newsreader is Tim Page (these days the news editor at
BBC Radio Shropshire) who reads the bulletin provided by Chiltern Radio's
Network News.
The opening weekend featured 1,215 classic hits, played in
alphabetic order of title. This is how the first hour panned out:
Born to be Wild -
INXS
Purple Haze - The
Cure (although Skinner back announces it as Hey
Joe)
A Day in the Life
- The Beatles
A Hard Rain's Gonna
Fall - Bob Dylan
A Kind of Magic -
Queen
A New Flame - Simply Red
A Sort of Homecoming
- U2
Abacab - Genesis
Abracadabra -
Steve Miller
Accidents Will Happen
- Elvis Costello
Across the Universe
- The Beatles
The first station schedules ran as follows:
Saturday
6.00 Graham Dene
10.00 Chris Evans
13.00 Emperor Rosko
16.00 Dave Fanning
20.00 Kevin Greening
23.00 Tommy Rivers
2.00 Sandy Beech
Sunday
6.00 Graham Dene
10.00 Classic Tracks with Kevin Greening
16.00 Album Chart with Russ Williams
19.00 Jonathan Coleman
22.00 Nick Abbot
2.00 Sandy Beech
Weekdays
6.00 Russ Williams
10.00 Richard Skinner
13.00 Mitch Johnson
16.00 Tommy Vance
19.00 Jonathan Coleman (Fri Emperor Rosko)
22.00 Nick Abbot (Fri Kevin Greening)
2.00 Wendy Lloyd (Fri Sandy Beech)
Here's how Martin Wroe of The Independent reviewed Virgin 1215's launch. Quoting Stuart Bailie of the NME he saw the station as being "for people who have nearly stopped listening to music, people on their way to the paddock. But just because millions of people buy Dire Straits albums doesn't mean their music is any good. But their are a lot of people out there with very sad taste, so the station could succeed."
Meanwhile, at the other end of the musical spectrum, Mike Soutar of Smash Hits said: "If it's a feel good station, which Radio 1 is not, then it will succeed. But my readers won't be listening to it. they're all at school."
Meanwhile, at the other end of the musical spectrum, Mike Soutar of Smash Hits said: "If it's a feel good station, which Radio 1 is not, then it will succeed. But my readers won't be listening to it. they're all at school."
The sole survivor from 1993, still on Absolute, is, of
course, Russ Williams. From that first weekend here's part of the Virgin Labatt's' Album Chart show. The
newsreader this time is Robert Nisbet, latter a senior news correspondent for Sky News and now Regional Director for the Rail Delivery Group.
5 comments:
One thing I remember about Virgin's launch is that the Telegraph's listings guide had an illustration of Chris Evans & David Patrick Griffin in a boxing match against each other - perhaps aware of the awkwardness of Radio 1's opposition to the Big Breakfast host being more than two decades his senior. Neither would last in that slot very long, of course ...
A largely contemporary playlist from Radio 1, considering its reputation at the time. The obvious outlier is "The Proud One" which would have been the last song on the Bates show - I think he used to end his show with an oldie from his Birthday File, and presumably he played that particular song because Merrill Osmond was 40 that day.
Must admit I preferred the Independent as it was at that time - more of a pre-Murdoch Times in exile than it became later.
Looking here - http://www.officialcharts.com/charts/albums-chart/19930502/7502/ - it would appear that Virgin were taking the official album chart but removing albums considered to be Virgin-unfriendly, whether they were too alternative (c.f. Sebadoh) or too MOR (c.f. Cliff Richard). Somewhat random - The Fall considered suitable but, seemingly, PJ Harvey not - and all very telling. The Alan Freeman show had featured a rock albums chart from 1975-78 which was similarly compiled by removing the pop/soul/MOR albums from the main chart, but that didn't exclude punk/new wave albums latterly even if some of his audience might have wanted it (and indeed he played far more new wave than some of his obituaries implied).
... but Radio 1 did start an hour-long album chart rundown on Sunday evenings after the Top 40 singles chart a couple of weeks earlier, bringing it forward from Mondays.
Going back in time I heard the first broadcasts of both Radio 1 and Virgin 1215, yes, the same frequency spanning that 26 years. In 1967 1215 Khz was 247 metres, I think it was about 1977 that Kiloherts replaced metres.
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