More radio reminiscing, this time looking at a few of the stations that have graced the South West airwaves for almost 30 years.
Commercial radio arrived in Devon in 1975 with Plymouth Sound, although our journey starts in 1980, when Devonair was given the license to broadcast to Exeter and Torbay, as well as the surrounding areas.
Presenters lined up to broadcast on the new station included, Travis Baxter (not a typo), Bob Kingsley who had moved from Pennine Radio in Bradford and Paul Owens who's now at Time 106.6 in Slough.
A selection of them can be heard in these pre-launch trailers from
the Devonair Unofficial Tribute site.
Station manager Jeff Winston had commissioned a jingle package by newly established jingle producers Alfasound Tapetrix (as they were known then) and the result has to be one of my favourite packages from the Manchester based jingle company.
I know it's really cosy and typical of old fashioned local radio, but it really matched the ruralness of Devon and the cuts are brilliantly orchestrated.
1980 Jingle Demo - Alfasound Tapetrix
Two years later Jeff returned to have some additional cuts produced including a superb jazz-funk theme as heard at the beginning of the demo and a cut towards the end which reminds me a tiny bit of "Peg" by Steely Dan.
Not sure about the synthy news intro however.
1982 Jingle Demo - Alfasound
By 1985 the jingles had been on the air for just over four years and new programme director David Cousins decided it was time for a change.
David already had a music background as one of the vocalists in The Strawbs who were best known for the song "Part Of The Union".
Along with commercial producer Mike Jones, they worked hard to produce what has to be an equally superb package which for it's time was contemporary and captured the enthusisam of living in the Devon area with the tagline
"The Heart And Soul Of Devon".
More detail into the making can be heard in this interview, broadcast just before the jingles aired.
Just listening to them makes me want to live there although the radio nowadays wouldn't be as good.
Having been to Devon on holiday however, it's still a stunning place and represents what I adore about British beaches and their towns.
Anyway here they are:
1985 Jingles - David Cousins and Mike Jones
The last couple of cuts towards the end are the news intro and outro which I've always found rather sinister, despite being well orchestrated.
You would get that idea if you listen to this example of how they were used on air around 1989 into an IRN bulletin.
I don't know who the presenter is but I remember Andrea Symmonds well from when I heard her on Capital Radio in the days when they took IRN bulletins, and she later went onto become an LWT announcer.
By the early 1990s the station had been brought by Capital Radio and GWR who both had shares in the station. GWR ended up taking full control in 1992 and relaunched it in November of that year as "The New Devonair - Devon's Better Music Station" which saw an end to jingles on the station.
However in the Barnstaple area and in North Devon a new station had launched under the name of Lantern FM.
They decided that in order to return Devon's radio heritage to the airwaves, the commisioned Alfasound to produce a resing of various cuts from the original Devonair jingle package, along with a few cuts from other packages such as Alfasound's Yorkshire Radio Network jingles.
Lantern FM 1992 Jingles - Alfasound/JAM tracks with Alfasound vocals
Still known by listeners, I seem to remember former employee and fellow student Tim Pryor having the main theme towards the end, as his ringtone.
However the bosses at Devonair, despite having not broadcast the jingles for 7 years were pissed off that Lantern had now commisioned their own versions and threatened legal action against the station.
However Steve England from Alfasound kindly pointed out that they weren't allowed to sue unless they were airing the package so that probably showed how much GWR knew about jingles as such.
To add a further blow, Devonair lost it's license in 1993 to Gemini Radio who promised split programming on AM and FM.
Devonair still feeling bitter, attempted to draw listeners away
from the new station by playing obscure album tracks with limited
content in their dying days.
The station made it's final broadcast on the 31st of December 1994 with a special programme which included plenty of the old jingles and presenters.
The final record played was "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore" by the Walker Brothers which was very fitting as the first song played on the station by Bob Kingsley in 1980 was "Here Comes The Sun" by the Beatles.
Gemini FM and AM launched the day after with a fresher sound broadcasting current and classic chart hits on FM, whilst Gemini AM played oldies and easy listening.
One of their presenters happened to be Tim Schofield, brother of Phillip who had grown up in the South West area.
By 1996 both stations were airing sung packages by TM Century with Gemini FM broadcasting resings of "We Play The Hits" orginally done for KIIS FM Los Angeles, whereas Gemini AM had a resing of "Classic Oldies" originally done for WMXJ Miami and also used on 210 FM, Picadilly Gold, and Magic 828 in Leeds.
I have the Gemini AM package which for me contains one of the worst use of male voice liners I have heard on a radio jingle package.
Gemini AM 1996 Jingles - TM Century
Notice how the cut at 1.55 contains a liner which happens to be a key lyric in my favourite record.
By 1999 Gemini FM was now using a package by Thompson Creative resung from a package for B96 in Chicago. Gemini AM however had now transformed into Westward Radio with a custom package by Dave Langer, but this wasn't to last as the stations as well as Lantern, Plymouth Sound and Somerset's Orchard FM had now been brought by GWR.
I haven't really gone over Orchard FM in detail as I don't know a great deal about it but they did have a few good jingle packages during their reign since their launch in 1989.
1989 Jingles - ASAP
1994 Extracts (And yes that is the Jeremy Kyle!)
1996 Jingles - JAM/ALFA
1998 Jingles - JAM
The 1989 package is almost reflective of some of the chart records around that time. I love the main theme towards the end of the selection.
The first JAM package from 1996 is also on top form with the highlights being resings from the stunning "Variety Pack" jingle package originally done for WALK in Long Island New York.
The second cut in that selection actually happens to be one of company president Jon Wolfert's favourite jingles.
I also love the custom news theme made by Alfasound towards the end where the intro sounds very similar to the infamous JAM Radio 1 news jingle from the 70s and 80s.
Only in this case it sounds a lot more authorative and driving.
That cut was originally done for Northsound 1 in Aberdeen although they changed the melody logo to one that sounds more like than one used in Essex FM's custom package from ALFA done around the same time.
Overall, whilst commercial radio in Devon may be invaded by Heart,
many radio fans will remember it as "The Heart And Soul Of Devon".
Credit of course to David Harber, Ian Johnson, and Michael Bolton (from Essex) for providing some of the audio.
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