Absolute Radio to end AM transmissions on 23/01/23

[G6Tanuki]

From a business perspective remember that as the number of stations wanting to broadcast on MW declines, those remaining will inevitably see their costs go up.

There are plenty of fixed costs associated with operating a transmitter site [Mast maintenance, insurance, business-rates to name but three] and as the number of users goes down there are fewer opportunities for these costs to be shared.

If the users have had any sense they will have negotiated some tight contracts with Arqiva which should limit cost-hikes but that will inevitably change when the next contract-renewal comes due.

Being the last-customer of an expensive transmitter site could turn out to be horribly expensive as you'll be picking up all the costs.

No doubt the likes of Absolute have some solid figures on costs vs audience reach/range for the various modes, on which they're basing their decisions. I don't really see that there's any sensible way to keep AM broadcasting viable in the near/long term... it's largely irrelevant to the vast majority of the population who have other more convenient ways to access their preferred content.

[music-centre]

I will miss the wider choice of music that Absolute gives me on my old radios at present, probably quite lucky here as there will still be Smooth radio, Caroline and Gold radio but don't know for how much longer of course.

I am not someone who would ever be listening to Sport/Talk stations, although I used to like listening to the plays on Radio 4 (LW of course!) but haven't recently.

I can remember being pleased when Radio 1 eventually got its own FM Frequency and I could listen to it on the couple of FM only valve sets I had been given and not just on Sunday nights when it joined up with R2 for the chart rundown - turned out this was the start of the rot....
Steve.

[Junk Box Nick]

The problem I have with much of current ‘via the ether’ AM/FM/DAB broadcasting is that so much of what is available today is of little interest to me (my main listening via the ether is R3, Times Radio & a bit of Boom Radio). Thus, if a couple of stations started on MW more suited my taste in content (which is quite wide except for pop and chart music and pop oldies, the latter of which I am rather bored) and presentation I would listen – as I do with Radio Caroline.

Thus I rely on the internet a lot but this means more effort on my part – listening on my computer or my one internet radio – and not so convenient as just switching on a conventional radio. I know there is tech to solve this but I find it hassle. I’ve entered a period where I want everything as simple and as ‘least tech’ as possible. (I realise the latter might sound a bit odd for someone on this forum.)

I am glad I grew up in a largely analogue age where the guts of technologies had simple access routes – as was mentioned above, the magic of making a crystal set or a simple receiver and tuning in to broadcasts is an excitement that has pretty much passed into history.

[Station X]

I asked myself the question:-

"If I didn't have vintage radios would I listen to stations on LW and MW?"

The answer is no.

[stitch1]

Originally Posted by Paul_RK

I know nothing about cars (well, I see them going by...), but there are surely still millions of AM-capable radios in normal homes up and down the country, as well as a multitude of models available for purchase new. I've probably mentioned before the 1972-ish five band Waltham portable I bought from an otherwise radio-free stall on our flea market a few months back, whose seller remarked that she had half hoped nobody would buy it as it was better than their other household sets for listening to Caroline.

Paul

Yes maybe there are but how many use them on AM or would buy one for AM use. My kids in their late 20's don't have one, they don't listen to scheduled radio station at all and my parents in their 90's use DAB radios.
I can't imagine any new AM station would attract them but I'm sure there are people outside our collectors group using AM but they are few and far between.

John

[Rich Woods]

I can’t really think that a new AM station would attract young listeners, the BBC has consistently tried and failed to attract younger listeners across all its output and as a result have peed off their older listeners & viewers. It’s definitely a nostalgia / vintage wireless “thing” and maybe we should accept it as inevitable and rebroadcast our favourite stations via pantry transmitters & be done with the main broadcasters (apart from Caroline of course).

[Radio Scotland]

At least with the absolute radio app you can skip songs you don't like which means i won't have to put up with oasis, They seem to have a bit of an obsession with them,

[turretslug]

Anyone have contacts at the Snowdon restaurant? I have a thought-experiment involving a warm metal cabinet providing background heating in a goods store at this sometimes bleak location, populated with 807s and driving a suitably situation-sympathetic aerial system. Ought to be audible over much of the central-west of the main island with "enthusiast"-grade receivers, and reach across the ditch to a good chunk of Ireland too. Local wind-farms to boot, though re-activating Trawsfynydd is an ask too far.... No harm in a bit of musing.

[Radio Wrangler]

A ski resort mountain and a transmitter as a space heater.... could cable car cables be used as an antenna. Need to make sure that the two termini are at low voltage points!

David

[Restoration73]

I note that in Ireland there are 4 low power MW unlicenced stations permitted by ComReg.

[Junk Box Nick]

AM (MW & LW) is a dead duck because it has been neglected so long it is barely in the general public’s conciousness, and where AM programming is also available on DAB most will tune to that. Things like 5 Live only live on because of cars with AM/FM only receivers – that’s the only time I listen to it on MW – and there are a lot of these older cars about. (Though IMHO 5 Live has gone down the pan – it is no longer on my DAB presets.)

Interestingly, when there is a lot of comment about older listeners clinging on to their old-style sets, I noticed a lot of take-up of DAB sets by older people around twenty years ago when DAB first started to appear on the radar of the general public. The BBC was already moving away from the older listener and there were stations on DAB like PrimeTime, which was a Saga operation.

The BBC is worried for its funding model which has pushed it ever more towards the youth/younger market. Radios One and 2 – even if the latter no longer services the older deomgraphic – have big listenership so they are useful as brand awareness raisers for a Corporation that is now otherwise a broadcasting bit player and demonstrate the advantage of output not interrupted by ads but funded by other means. However, if the BBC were to put an old style Radio 2 (a station I spent a large amount of hours listening to for getting on for four decades but abandoned some years ago) exclusively on an AM frequency I would listen because of the content. (I’d love to be in on a BBC board meeting to make that suggestion just to see the looks on faces at such a double horror!)

My knowledge of the world of teenagers is zip but from what I understand their entertainment is pretty much from online sources. However, they really are no different to many of us on here who in our youthful days ignored the mainstream and tuned into pirates at night with their heterodyne whistles, the phase distortion of Radio Luxembourg, fading of AFN, or went to some underground club to hear alternative music.

And yet, Holland seems to have a thriving LPAM scene – so who knows? Or perhaps amateurs will get some of the MW band back...

[G6Tanuki]

Originally Posted by Junk Box Nick

Interestingly, when there is a lot of comment about older listeners clinging on to their old-style sets, I noticed a lot of take-up of DAB sets by older people around twenty years ago when DAB first started to appear on the radar of the general public. The BBC was already moving away from the older listener and there were stations on DAB like PrimeTime, which was a Saga operation..

A lot of my friends in the 50-80 age-range now listen to 'the radio' on their smartspeaker; many of them don't have a device you would traditionally class as 'a radio' any more; even that old standby the bedside clock/radio has been replaced by a docking-unit with Bluetooth speakers and charger for your phone. Kitchens frequently have built-in Bluetooth speakers too, being great for hands-free phone chats as well as listening to a Spotify playlist, Smooth Radio or similar while you're waiting for your canelloni to cook.

One friend even has Bluetooth speakers in her bathroom for when she's relaxing in the bath.

So the 'radio' - whether MW/LW or FM - has been displaced. I don't honestly see there being enough of a listenership to make small independent stations viable. If the likes of absolute can't make a living at it, I doubt anyone can.

[Junk Box Nick]

I guess it depends on your circle. A lot of my friends still use the traditional systems. So it will vary.

Local commercial radio is no longer viable except in exceptional cases. Indeed some ILR stations were barely viable back in their heyday. Community with volunteer effort will be a different case but for AM the time has long gone. My local community station has filled the gap left by the ILR and now has a second FM Tx.

In a lot of cases Gold and Smooth, etc., only held onto many of their AM transmitters for strategic licensing reasons.

[60136 Alcazar]

Originally Posted by Junk Box Nick

I am glad I grew up in a largely analogue age where the guts of technologies had simple access routes – as was mentioned above, the magic of making a crystal set or a simple receiver and tuning in to broadcasts is an excitement that has pretty much passed into history.

..but from the 1970's onwards, we learnt the phrase "No user serviceable parts inside"!

[Radio Scotland]

Anybody who watches shango's videos on youtube will notice when he sweeps the MW band there is a ton of stations, There is a video where he explains that DAB Doesn't have the wide footprint of MW And with california being the traffic capital of the world and because of the terrain MW isn't going anywhere in a hurry.

It ain't real radio without selective fading

[Glowing Bits!]

Whilst I am a little saddened to hear of this news, the reality is that it rarely works in this area, the problem being that talk sport station not far away from it, it causes too much interference.
If Absolute wish to make use of the old Radio Wales site here in Wrexham, that will make it work better.
As a footnote, most of my listening these days is either DAB or streaming.

[colourking]

Originally Posted by Restoration73

I note that in Ireland there are 4 low power MW unlicenced stations permitted by ComReg.

It isn't that they are "permitted", but licenced stations do not care about unlicenced activity on MW nowadays, and the spectrum is not needed for anything else. So like with 11 metres operators, not much notice is taken of them.

Energy AM from the Dublin area which operates most weekends for the past while on 1440kHz, which is the old famous '2-O-8' metres wavelength. Also occasional activity on 1494 from Dublin.

[AdrianH]

Well just checks and all that is broadcast from Absolute now is a broadcast message saying "Absolute radio is no longer available on this frequency" plus a load of other blurb about Digital radio.

Lets see what takes it's place.

Adrian

[draenog]

Yes, my brother and I (Catkins) listened to the last 12 minutes on AM (on a 1934 GEC mains universal 3) before it closed down on Thursday (19th) at midnight. The last 10 minutes was a compilation tribute to the various stations that used 1215 kHz over the years.

They started to repeat the "no longer available on this frequency message" immediately afterwards on Friday.

[hamid_1]

Did anyone record that final tribute compilation before it shut down? BBC Radio 1 did something similar when they stopped broadcasting on MW. They played their obsolete jingles that mentioned the old AM frequencies. That was in 1994. I heard that but wasn't able to record it.

Sadly I don't expect anything will take the place of Absolute Radio on medium wave. If they couldn't make enough money out of it, who else would want to take it on?

Local MW stations have been gradually closing over the years with no replacement. The loss of a national MW station will leave quite a hole in the band. BBC are also talking about ending 5 Live on MW and Radio 4 LW in the near future. Pretty soon it looks like there will be nothing much left.

Radio Caroline did take on a former BBC MW frequency, though they are licensed as a community radio station, only allowed low power. The signal can be unofficially received much further away from its intended coverage area using specialist receivers. Sadly it's not really good enough for me to listen to.

I think the best we can hope for is that low-power local community radio stations may take over the old Absolute Radio frequencies. Ofcom seem reluctant to issue new AM broadcast licences. Some years ago they said no new ones would be issued but appeared to have a change of heart with Radio Caroline. Failing that, it may be possible to hear foreign stations or even pirates on the old Absolute Radio frequencies.