Radio 1's New Playlist WDR Asks For Fee Hike 6 Metropolys ... · 3/16/1991 · act Harry...

Radio 1's New Playlist 5WDR Asks For Fee Hike 6Metropolys, EMI Promo 7New Italy Radio Survey 9

Station Operations 12Off The Record 22

Europe's Music Radio Newsweekly . Volume 8. Issue 11. March 16, 1991. 3, US$ 5, ECU 4

Capital RadioGreets FrenchConnection

by Paul Andrews

Capital Radio/London sharehol-ders and affiliates have welcomedthe interest shown by Frenchmedia conglomerate Havas(M&M March 2). The Paris -based group is currently negotia-ting to buy up to 20.6% of thestation.

Control of over a fifth ofCapital shares would make Havasthe largest single holder in thefirm, ahead of Radio Invest-ments, with 11%.

Comments Radio InvestmentsMD and Capital director RobertStiby, "This investment is goodnews. In terms of its experience,Havas can only strengthenCapital. Talk of a takeover bid ispure speculation."

Stiby adds that Radio Invest-ments, one of the original backersof Capital, would be unlikely todivest its stake in the event of atakeover. (continues on page 22)

HOFFS CAPITALISES ON SINGLE - Former Bangles lead singerSusanna Hoffs visits with Capital FM DJ Pat Sharp. Hoffs is in London topromote her new single "My Side Of The Bed", which debuted onM&M's EHR Top 25 at no.17. It has now climbed to no. 5.

Adams Hits The Big ScreenPhonogram Holland is claimingan "experimental" cinema cam-paign for Oleta Adams's albumCircle Of One has pushed salesup 300% in the country.

And theatre -goers are not justseeing a commercial-they arealso hearing the album as back-ground music.

International marketing ma-nager Dries v.d. Schuyt has bud-geted Dfl 50.000 (app.US$29.000) to use 55 cinemasacross the Netherlands. Of these,20 theatres received promotionalCDs. While playing the album isnot part of the package, most the-

atre owners are co-operating.Details Schuyt, "The 90 -se-

cond screen commercial featuresthree cuts from Adams's videos,gives information on who she is,and explains how she has pre-viously sung with Tears ForFears."

The month -long campaignends on March 22 and is not alig-ned to any particular theatrechain. .

This is the second time Schuythas used cinema. In January, hespent Dfl 50.000 to market Dutchact Harry Sacksioni. However,though sales tripled, they were

not sufficient to cover marke-ting costs. No recouping figuresare yet available for the Adamscampaign.

This is also the second timearound for Adams' Circle OfOne. The LP was originally re-leased last April and August 4reached a high of no. 95.

It is currently no. 57 inHolland, no. 3 in the UK, andhas risen six places to no. 14 onM&M's European Top 100Albums listing.

The American -born singercame to prominence after shewas found singing in a bar. HS

AD CLIMATE BRIGHTENS

Radio CelebratesGulf Ceasefire

by Howard Shannon

Just as the outbreak of war alteredadvertising and programming,radio is welcoming the ceasefireand a return to business as usual.

On the ad front, pan-Europeansales house Information EtPublicite (IP) is optimistic therewill be a return of two importantadvertising sectors, while a num-ber of stations say a legacy of theconflict is that overall news air-

time has increased. IP expects tosee airlines and travel companiesresume advertising. That sectorwas hit heavily during the war asadvertisers cancelled virtually allbooked spots.

Comments IP director interna-tional marketing ClaudeMatricon, "Airlines and travelfirms have not altered yearly ad-vertising budgets, so I expect tosee cash held back during the war

(continues on page 22)

BCM Shrinks By Half;Looking For PartnersGerman dance label BCM is stillin business as an independent, buta slimmed down company will beearning half the revenue.

There have been weeks of un-certainty about the company's fut-ure, and investment talks withseveral majors have been confir-med.

At press time BCM MD BrianCarter has yet to succeed in brin-ging in a major label as an inve-stor. While he has talked with,among others, PolyGram andWarner Music International.negotiations, he says, will likelycontinue.

The primary stumbling block?"No distribution deal was availa-ble," he admits. Carter alsoclaims suitors wanted to seealbum success, despite the labelbuilding its reputation on 12"dance singles.

The going -it -alone route meansa drastic cost-cutting programmeis now in place. Staff will bedfrom 25 to 10, the company willmove to smaller offices and ware -

(continues on page 22,

No. 1 in EUROPE

European Hit RadioCHRIS REAAuberge(East West)

Eurochart Hot 100 SinglesENIGMASadeness Part(Virgin)

European Top 100 AlbumsL,)LJELN

Innuendo(EMI)

NIAGARA:EUROPEAN TOUR WITH MTV

AmericanRadioHistory.Com

13 Track A

lbum18 T

rack Com

pact Disc &

Cassette

21 Track V

ideo


2,MUSIC MUSICMEDIA CONTENTS &MEDIA

PolyGram Reports Record Sales

UK: Radio l's New Playlist 5G/A/S: WDR Asks For Fee Hike 6BENELUX: Antigoon 'Shop' A Studio 6FRANCE: Metropolys, EMI France Promo 7SCANDI: English Spoken At Danish Grammys 8ITALY: National Radio Study Released 9NEW RELEASES/NEW TALENT 10SPOTLIGHT: Eurythmics 11STATION OPERATIONS: Jonathan Booth 12STATION REPORTS 13TOP 10 IN EUROPE 17EUROPEAN HIT RADIO 18HOT 100 SINGLES 19EURO & NATIONAL AIRPLAY 20TOP 100 ALBUMS 21OFF THE RECORD 22

'Gimme' Adds To Charityby Howard Shannon

Capital Radio/London charity"Help A London Child" is to benefitfrom all artist and producer royaltiesearned from the cover version of aHowie Casey song, Gimme Some.

The money will be added to the270.000 already raised by three pre-vious singles.

The dance track, released onMarch 11, is performed by Capitalpresenters Pat Sharp and Mick

Brown, and was produced byStock, Aitken & Waterman. Thisis the third year PWL has Workedwith the charity. The label's MDDavid Howells details, "PeteWaterman was first approached by[Capital programme director]Richard Park three years ago. Wehave since gone on to produce asingle each year, last year evengoing so far as to make theBillboard dance chart with Use ItUp And Wear It Out."

NEWSMAKERS

Radio Midlands Radio has promo-ted former head of marketingDavid Bagley to group head ofsales and marketing. Followinghis appointment, John Probynhas been promoted from marke-ting executive to marketing ma-nager.

French station RadioMetropolys has appointed anumber of new people. FormerNRJ employee Philippe Belinjoins as station manager.Philippe Danten has taken overfrom Bruno Allain as assistantto programme director PhilippeSchemberg. Allain returns tohis position as DJ, co -hostingthe show "Morning Zoo".

Former M&M sales execu-tive Peter Nelissen is now GMat Ad Roland Media Servicesin Holland.

Jorma Hokkanen is newMD at Finland's Radio 957/Tampere.

Saimaan Aallotaappeen-ranta in Finland has appointedJorma Hallikainen as MD.

New programme director atFinnish station Radio Paka/Hyvinkaa is Maarit Harju-salmi.

Javier Gimeno replacesPedro Antonio Martin as presi-dent of AERP, the Spanish pri-vate radio association. Gimenowas previously adviser and assi-stant director-general at Antena3 (full story page 8).

Music

EMI Music PublishingFrance business affairs and legaldirector, and CSDEM VP PierreHenry, has been appointed pre-sident of Comite National de laMusique (CNM). The post lastslvr taco ears.

Pierre Henry

Sony Music Entertain-ment Finland has appointedHeikki Pirhonen as newColumbia label manager. HansRautio is head of artist liaisonand special marketing. AkuValta is Epic label manager.

The three tenors were worth theirweight in gold. LucianoPavarotti, Placido Domingo andJose Carreras contributed heavilyto PolyGram's record revenueslast year. Their In Concert recor-ding sold more than five millionalbums and 500.000 videos world-wide.

PolyGram cited the tenors' glo-bal reach-and that of Elton Johnand Jon Bon Jovi whose most re-cent albums have each sold morethan four million copies-duringthe presentation of the company'spreliminary 1990 financial resultsin London on March 5.

PolyGram president/CEO AlainLevy reported record revenues ofDfl 12.252 million (app. US$3.1billion), an increase of 27.9% over1989. Net income rose 7.2% to Dfl1357 million. Half of the increasewas attributed to the performanceof A&M and Island.

The company is proposing topay a gross dividend of Dfl 10.50per share in May, its first full yeardividend payment since 20% ofPolyGram was floated publicly inDecember 1989.

Levy said it was "an excellentyear", despite a period of transitionand a lack of anticipated superstar

releases. He said worldwide marketshare grew from 15% to 17.5%while it maintained a dominant23% in Europe.

Later Levy confirmed to M&Mthat PolyGram France continuesas the largest affiliate in terms ofrevenues and profitability, but healso cited the contribution of theUK company to the record results.

Chief financial officer Jan Cookconceded that PolyGram remainsunprofitable in the all-important USmarket but said he was confidentthat the restructured American ope-rations would move into the blackby the end of this year.

Ex -CBS Execs Move To TimbuktuFormer CBS Records Inter-national executives Peter Bondand Mike Edwards have set up anew company with label, publish-ing and artist management inte-rests. Offces will be located inLondon and Sydney, Australia.

The label entity is TimbuktuRecords, which Bond says will de-velop a roster of three to five acts inits first year, drawing from the ta-lent pool in the UK and Australia.

Timbuktu Music, the publish-ing unit, has already signed UKsinger/songwriter Bernard Mac -Mahon while the managementarm, Flame Tree, has contractedAustralian singer Margaret

Urlich. The latter's first albumfrom Sony Music, Safety InNumbers, has sold an estimated250.000 units in Australia. Urlich isbeginning work on her secondalbum this month.

Bond was a London -based se-nior VP at CBS Records Inter-national, responsible for Australia,New Zealand, Asia, Africa andEastern Europe. He left the com-pany last autumn for the startupventure. Edwards was GM for CBSAustralia's music publishing divi-sion; earlier, he worked for theIFPI at its antipiracy arm inLondon.

The new company's priority "is

M&M Publishes MRIB ChartsM&M is changing its UK chartsource and the result will be a gre-ater emphasis on radio airplay inreflecting the popularity of hitsingles in the market. Effective thisweek, M&M will publish the sing-les and album charts produced byLondon -based Media ResearchInformation Bureau (MRIB).These will also be integrated re-spectively into the Coca-ColaEurochart Hot 100 Singles andEuropean Top 100 Albumscharts.

MRIB combines airplay infor-mation with retail sales for itsNetwork Singles Top 75, and upto 40% of the data is airplay -deri-ved. This is similar to the approachused in the US by Billboard for itsHot 100 chart.

The airplay component ofMRIB's singles chart is drawnfrom the playlists of the leadingUK independent radio stations.

The charts sales component iscompiled from data supplied by arepresentative sample of UK rec-ord retailers. The MRIB albumchart uses only retail sales informa-tion.

The Network Singles Top 75 isaired as a countdown show bymore than 40 commercial stationsin the UK. The programme has aweekly reach of 2.5 million list-eners, and grew in audience sharefrom 32% to 37% in the most re-cent JICRAR figures (M&MMarch 2).

M&M's switch to an airplay -inf-luenced UK chart occurs as singlessales continue their decline. TheBritish Phonographic Industryrecently reported that membercompanies shipped 58.5 millionsingles to the trade in 1990, downfrom 61.1 million the year before.Deliveries of the configuration arenow at their lowest for 14 years.

IR Hopefuls Talk Strategyby Andy Bantock

About 40 prospective applicants forUK commercial radio licences wereon hand in London on February 26.to learn more about the opportuni-ties and pitfalls of running a station.

Chaired by Moray Firth RadioMD Thomas Prag, the one -dayconference at Kensington TownHall, called "Getting On-Air...AndStaying There", addressed the sub-ject in three main sessions.

One of the highlights was thefirst session "Planning to GetOn -Air". A thorough introductionto the financial considerationsand technical requirements, thesession offered insights into howIsle Of Wight Radio co-founderStephen Oates and his colle-agues planned and raised moneyfor their successful bid.

M&M will report further onthis conference in a forthcoming"Station Operations" column.

to break acts, not a record label".says Bond, and Timbuktu artistsmay be signed to majors on a case -by -case basis. "We have no precon-ceived ideas. A lot will depend onwhat comes out of the studio."Deals for a couple of UK -basedperformers are close to fruition, hestates.

Bond, Edwards and two out -of -industry partners are principals inthe new enterprise. Bond says it is"seriously capitalised" to developits roster of artists, writers and ma-nagement clients, and could evenconsider independent label or pub-lishing acquisitions, given the rightopportunity.

dierks studios

20 years and many more tofollow.

Thanks for the partnershipin the past and in the future.

Re -opening of Studio Ill- SSL 64 channel, G -series

- Sony 3348 digital- Neil Grant flcoustics

dierks studios gmbhtel. (49) 22 38-20 04/33 33

fax (49) 22 38-34 99

MUSIC & MEDIA MARCH 16 1991 3


Peace Rally Lifts Stocks

The market celebrated the end ofthe Gulf war in February, andradio and music industry stockslead the way. Every Europeanstock tracked by M&M advanced,led by Crown Communications,which rocketed 44% as investorsbid the stock up on the hopes thata recovery is just around the cor-ner (see accompanying story).

Other M&M stocks postingmonster gains: Havas (+32%),Hachette (+26%). German pub-lisher Axel Springer Verlag--which owns stakes in several ofthe country's radio stations --wasthe only Euro stock to drop(-4.8%).

M&M stocks in France and theUK in general outpaced the mar-ket. In France, industry stocks onaverage jumped 17% versus an11% increase in the CAC 40.Across the channel, UK industrystocks increased on average10.5%, while the FTSE rose 9.7%.

M&M STOCKS

UNITED KINGDOMPrice YTD Mo.

Co. Dec. 31 Jan. 31 Feb. 28 % chg. % chg.

Crown 51 32 46T'world 97 97 121EMAP 202 185 225Capital 146 144 174Chrysalis 44 41 49Rad. City 226 165 187Rad. Trust 65 53 60Metro 129 125 140Invicta 55 52 58TV -AM 200 177 195Pickwick 217 208 228Rad. Clyde 224 223 244Thorn 677 646 701GWR 253 198 213Yorkshire 247 238 254WH Smith 383 340 357Chiltern 132 128 130Midlands 102 94 95

Avg. 192 175 193FTSE 2,143.5 2,170.3 2,380.9

-9.824.711.4

19.211.4

-173-7.78.55.5

-2.55.1

8.93.5

-15.82.8-6.8-1.5-6.90.8

11.1

43.824.721.620.819.513313.212.011.510.2

9.69.48.57.66.75.01.61.1

10.59.7

FRANCEPrice YTD Mo.


Havas 426 395 521Hachette 150 177 223Europe 1 1,090 1,060 1,249NRJ 238 230 -253Canal + 823 828 895

Avg. 545 538 628CAC 1,517.9 1,580.7 1,759.8

22.348.7

14.69638.7

15.2415.9

31.926.0

17.8910.0

8.116.84

113

THE NETHERLANDSPrice YTD Mo.


Philips 203 23.4 26.8 32.0 14.5PolyG. 30.1 29.6 29.8 -1.0 0.7

Avg. 25.2 26.5 28.3 12.3 6.8CBS 168.3 1673 182.5 8.4 9.1

GERMANYPrice YTD Mo.


Springer 712 730 695FAZ 603.1 608.6 663.0DAX 1,398.2 1,420.1 1,542.1

-2.49.9

10.3

-4.88.98.6

UNITED STATESPrice YTD Mo.


T. Warn. 85.75 96.13Westwood 1.75 1.88Sony 43.00 47.63Matsu. 118.00 127.00CapCit. 459.13 454.00S'stream 1.13 138Viacom 26.25 25.63Tribune 35.25 43.25Westing. 28.50 28.50Avg. 88.75 91.71DJIA 2,633.7 2,736.4S&P 330.2 343.9

109.002.13

52.00137.25466.00

13825.0041.0026.5095.58

2,882.2367.1

27.121.420.9163

1.5

22.2-4.8163-7.07.79.4

11.2

13.41339.28.12.60.0

-2.4-5.2-7.04.2536.7

Share prices are listed in the country's currency.

THE BOTTOM LINE

NRJ's Revenue Jumps 17%by Steve Wonsiewicz

Spurred by a rapid growth in thenumber of affiliate stations, French'radio net NRJ increased turnover16.8% to Ffr320 million (app.US$61.5 million) during the fiscalyear 1990.

With 153 networked stations --upmore than 30 since spring last year--NRJ ad revenue (net of barter) grewsix points more than the entire in-dustry, based on Secodip's estima-tes.

But keeping the numbers up isgoing to get harder.

Comments president Jean -PaulBaudecroux, "Because of the war,we probably will not be able tokeep up the fast rate of advertisinggrowth. I do not think 1991 will bea great year for advertising."

The company's strategy is topush the Cheri FM format andlook for acquisitions. SaysBaudecroux, "Cheri will becomethe legs of our second network."

On the acquisition front, NRJ hasbeen looking at a truckload of dealsin Germany, the UK and Belgium,but has yet to make a major pur-chase. Expect that to change, hintsBaudecroux.

35030025020015010050

0

NRJ Turnover & Cash Growth(1986-1990)

1986 1987 1988 1989 990(c) 1991 Music & Media. Revenue in millions of Ffr

The company continues to ope-rate one of the most profitable radionetworks around, with cash -flowmargins in the 50%+ range. That isa far cry from the US average ofabout 20%.

But, NRJ is showing signs ofslowing down and that it is gettingmore difficult to increase marketshare. Cash flow rose 9.3% toFfr164 million, but margins slid acouple of points last year to 51.3%.

"Growing networks will havelower margins, and we've inves-ted a lot of money in new sta-

tions," says Baudecroux.The company is also facing toug-

her competition. Comments JamesCapel/Paris analyst Jean -JacquesLimage, "One reason [for slowerNRJ ad growth] is that the marketfor advertising is not increasing asfast. Second, there is stronger com-petition in the market from Europe2 and Skyrock. Both hit break-evenlast year, estimates Limage.

But Baudecroux has heard thecomments before. "People say wewon't earn the margins, but eachyear we keep doing it."

Crown Focuses On Core AssetsThe light at the end of the tunnelcould be near for UK broadcasterCrown Communications, with thecompany's stock price rising by43.8% during February.

Investors had shunned the stockbecause of high gearing and'develop-ment costs that weakened cash flow.After hitting a 52 -week low 23p, thestock has doubled to 46p.

While not out of the woods yet,Crown has been working overtimeto dig itself out of a financial mess.Development costs at both itsnews/talk station LBC and 35% -owned French radio net RFM havedropped dramatically. Reportedly,Crown has sunk £10 million intoRFM and another £7.3 million tosplit LBC. Those investments con-tributed to a f140.000 operatingloss for the fiscal year endedSeptember 30, 1990.

This year, LBC and Crown'sIndependent Radio News benefi-

EMAP Ups TWC StakeUK publisher EMAP has boughtEric Morley's 7.6% stake inTransworld Conununications(TWC). The deal increasesEMAP's ownership in TWC to15.6%. EMAP reportedly hasbeen interested in further incre-asing its stake in the OwenOyston-controlled company.

TWC and EMAP shares weretwo of the biggest gainers duringFebruary, up 24.7% and 21.6%,respectively.

ted from a higher profile during theGulf war. RFM is also about to hitthe magic 2% ratings plateau, a keyfigure to advertisers in France.Another help is a £4 million settle-ment with BSkyB for terminationof its news contract, though part ofthat includes recovery of expenses.

To reduce debt, Crown is paringdown its wide-ranging portfolio ofradio investments. Gone are its 9%stake in Moray Firth Radio and15% of FTP/Bristol. It has also re-duced its ownership in MarcherSound from 38.5% to 27.4%,Radio Forth from 30.1% to17.7%, and Radio Mercury from29.9% to 26.5%.

Comments Crown finance direc-tor Ian Stevenson," We're cutting

back to core investments in Londonand Paris. We'll build up fromthere." Translated, this means lookfor more divestitures in the UK, butnot France.

Such moves have pleasedCrown's bankers, Bank of Scotlandand Australian & New ZealandBank. "Our bankers have supportedus all the way. We plan to reduceour debt to £10 million by nextyear," says Stevenson. That is cmcial, because bankers could techni-cally call in debt of some £18 mil-lion by the end of next year (seetable), though that is not likely tohappen.

Meantime, it's back to basics forCrown, with investors and bankersbreathing a sigh of relief. SW

Comparison Of UK Radio Companies 1990Cash flow

Company (mil. £)

Radio Clyde 2.010Capital 13.241Chiltern 1.223Metro Radio 1.918Radio City 0.828Invicta 0.737Crown 0.570Total/Avgs. 20.527

Debt* C.f. as(mil. £) % of debt

1.90212.623

1.5172.7311.2631.359

18.000#39.395

105.7104.980.670.265.654.2

3.252.1

(c) 1991 Music & Media. * Debt due within one year. # Estimate

Send news and queries to Steve Wonsiewicz at M&M's editorial office: Rijnsburgstraat

11, 1059 AT Amsterdam, the Netherlands or call (20) 669.1961; Fax (20) 669 1951.

MUSIC & MEDIAPO Box 9027, 1006 AA AmsterdamRijnsburgstraat 11, '1059 AT AmsterdamTel: 31-20-6691961 - Telex 12938Fax: 3 1-20-6691 94 1E-mail: DGS1113

Publisher: Leon ten Hengel

EDITORIALEditor -In -Chief: Jeff GreenSenior Editor: Machgiel BakkerManaging Editor: Steve WonsiewiczFeatures Co-Ordinator: Robin PascoeUK Editor: Hugh FielderSub -Editor: Karen SeekingsStaff Reporters: Paul Andrews,Howard ShannonMusic Editor: Robbert TillChart Editor: Mark SperwerEditorial Assistants: Paul VVightman,Claire Heffernan, Raul CairoStation Reports : Peter BartlemaCorrespondents: Emmanuel Legrand(France); Jacqueline Eacott (France);David Stansfield (Italy); Robert Lyng,Mal Sondock (Germany); Anna Mariede la Fuente (Spain); Paul Easton(UK); Kari Helopaltio (Finland); MarcMaes (Belgium); David Rowley(Scandinavia); Ken Stewart (Ireland)

PRODUCTIONProduction Manager: Rim EderveenDTP: Pauline VVitsenburg,Will van LitsenburgAutomation Manager: John LangridgePrinter: Den Haag OffsetDesign: Peter van Seuren

ADVERTISINGSales Director: Ron BetistAdvertising Executives: Irit Harpaz,Suzanne Meltzer, Erika Price,Salvatore di Muccio, Lidia Bonguardo,Carin Thorn, Kirk BloomgardenSales Co-Ordinator: Inez Landwier

MARKETINGMarketing Manager: Annette KnijnenbergMarketing Assistant: Kitty van der MeijSubscriptions: Lex Sternfeld

ADMINISTRATIONFinancial Controller: Edwin LoupiasAccounts: Betty Knibbe, GeertjeStarreveld, Bob van SchooneveldExecutive Assistant: Deanne BlondeelReceptionist: Jan Willem Bergmeester

EUROFILEEditor: Cesco van GoalAssistant: Steven Roelofs

INTERNATIONAL OFFICESUK: Hugh Fielder, 23 Ridgmount Street,London WC I E 7AH; tel: 44-71-3236686;fax: 3232314; tlx: 262100France: Editorial Co-Ordinators:Emmanuel Legrand, tel: 33-1-42-543461Jacqueline Eacott, tel: 33-1-47046430Germany: Editorial Co-Ordinators:Robert Lyng tel/fax: 49-69-433839Mal Sondock, tel: 49-221-32-1091fax: 49-221-317600Italy: Advertising:Lidia Bonguardo, Via Umberto I° 13,20039 Varedo, Milan; tel: 39-362 584424;fax: 39-362 584435Editorial Co-Ordinator:David Stansfield, tel/fax: 39-2-6684270MAM/BillBoard USA:1515 Broadway, New York, NY 10036;tel: 2127647300; fax: 212-536-5358;

M&M is a publication ofBPI Communications BV,a subsidiary of BPI Communications Inc.President European Operations: Theo RoosExecutive Assistant: Caroline KarthausInternational Editor -In -Chief: Adam White

'Hot 100' is the registered trademark ofBillboard Publications Inc.Credits Hot 100 Singles/Albums:MRIB (UK); Bundesverband DerPhonographischen Wirtschaff/MediaControl/Musikmarkt (West Germany);Europe 1/Canal Plus/Tele7Jours(France); RAI Stereo Due/Musica EDischi/Mario De Luigi (Italy);Stichting Nederlandse Top 40 (Holland);SABAM/IFPI (Belgium); GLF/IFPI(Sweden); IFPI/Johan Schlueter(Denmark); VG (Norway); Gallup/AFYVE(Spain); Seura/IFPI (Finland); IFPI (Ireland);UNEVA (Portugal); Austria Top 30(Austria); Media Control/Musikmarkt(Switzerland); IFPI (Greece)

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Copyright 1990 BPI Communications BVNo part of this publication may be repro-duced in any form without the prior writtenpermission of the publisher.

4 MUSIC & MEDIA MARCH 16 1991


UNITED KINGDOM

WHAT A CHARMED LIFE - Billy Idol (centre) hangs out with key Chrysalis execs during the Grammys. From l -r:Chrysalis Records VP of marketing Cliff O'Sullivan, Idol's manager Tony DiMitriades, Chrysalis North America vice chair-

man Joe Kiener, Idol, Chrysalis North America president John Sykes and Chrysalis worldwide chairman Chris Wright.

Stations Take AdvantageOf New Sponsorship Rules

by Julian Clover

The new sponsorship rule changesare having the desired effect. Twogold stations are launching promo-tions in which listeners can win ahouse, the first time such a prizehas been given away in the UK.XTRA-AM/West Midlands hasstarted its "Guess Who's In It ToWin It" in April with a £53.000luxury Walker home up for grabs.Red Rose Gold/Preston will beginits giveaway to coincide with theOctober JICRAR sweep.

XTRA-AM MD Ian Rufussaid the station had been talkingwith Walker Homes for sometime, but were unable to come toan agreement until the removal ofprize restrictions by the RadioAuthority in January.

Explains Rufus, "As the mar-ketplace becomes more competi-tive we have to come up withnew ways to win audience. Thisis the first big increase in prizes,in the past it's been cars and holi-days." The promotion is backedwith an advertising campaign on

Central TV, which will run atthe end of March.

Red Rose Gold has developedtwo tiers of prizes: presenter pro-motions offering the more tradi-tional CD and video giveaways,and station promotions with holi-days and cars.

Comments Red Rose Goldhead of programmes JohnMyers, "Gone are the days whenyou can fob off your listener witha goodie bag. Once you do a sta-tion promotion you have to conti-nue."

Radio Authority Announces1991's First Local Licences

by Paul Easton

Independent local radio (ILR) li-cences for the Shetland Islandsand the city of Lincoln are thefirst two areas to be put up forbid, the Radio Authority an-nounced on March 5.

The two franchises are the firstof up to 30 ILR stations a year the

Authority plans to award. Bothstations, which will broadcast onFM, are part of plans to fill in theso-called "white areas", unservedby existing ILR stations. TheAuthority will begin acceptingbids on March 7 and 8; closingdate for the Shetland Islands isMay 14, while for Lincoln it isMay 29.

Sony Show Gets Big ResponseThere has been a massive re-sponse to this year's Sony RadioAwards with a total of 670 en-tries for the 26 open categories.The new category recommendedby last year's judging panel --Best Documentary Rock andPop --has proved exceptionallypopular.Local Station of the Year andBest Community Service Station

have also achieved a recordnumber of entries. And there is adistinct gender bias for RadioReporter Of The Year with fourof the six nominations being fe-male.

The awards will be presentedat London's Grosvenor HouseHotel on April 29. M&M is pro-ducing the special award winnersbrochure for the event. HF

The Shetland Islands licencewould make it the UK's smallestlocal radio station, with an adult(aged 15+) population of about15.000. Reportedly, the only likelyapplicant is the Shetland IslandsBroadcasting Company (SIBC),whose founders have been cam-paigning for a local commercialstation in the area for nearly 25years. Shetland MD IngaWalterson says the company "willbe examining the Radio Authoritybrief for Shetland, and the condi-tions of the licence, with greatcare. Our familiarity withShetland, and our experience incommercial broadcasting, willhelp us to calculate whether such aself-financing service is viable."

In Lincoln, the licence wouldcover both the city and much ofthe county of Lincolnshire.Midlands Radio is one of severalgroups understood to be interes-ted in a possible application.

More Singles, LPTracks At Radio 1

by Hugh Fielder

Far from dropping singles from itsplaylist, BBC Radio l's new play -list features more of the records, aswell as an additional albums playlistof at least six tracks.

The current A and B lists of sing-les remains, with the A list expan-ded from 15 to 20 singles that willeach receive at least 15 plays perweek. The 20 singles on the B listwill each get about 10 plays perweek. A new C list will comprise aminimum of six album tracks thatwill receive four daytime plays perweek. It will be the first time thestation has ever included albumtracks in its format.

Comments head of music ChrisLycett, "The new playlist will meanmore music in daytime program-mes, across a broader range. Theexpanded A list means we can givemaximum exposure to new bandson both A and B lists.

"The new C list of album tracksis a clear response to the changingtastes of our audience, while allo-wing producers the freedom to in-clude a greater range of music indaytime programmes."

Says editor of mainstream pro-grammes and chairman of the play -list panel Paul Robinson, "Whileour competitors play only 10 re-cords an hour, we can play at least14. Devoting more airtime to musicmeans we can offer listeners a bro-ader range of singles and albumswithout losing out on speech areaslike news, interviews and DJ input."

The composition of the C list isbeing kept deliberately loose. Thenumber of plays from any albumhas not been cast in stone. The sys-tem also allows for a single release'from an album to appear on the Aor B list and for other tracks fromthe same album to be included on

the C list. And a track which appe-ars on the C list and is subsequentlyreleased as a single could then bechosen for the A or B list.

A Radio 1 spokesperson details,"The idea is to create a familiaritywith album tracks. We now havethe freedom to select our own tracksto highlight on the station. If we be-lieve that a single released from analbum is not the best track we canchoose another. Each daytime showwill now feature one C list track."

"The C list will also bring ourdaytime and night-time output clo-ser together. Presenters like BobHarris, Nicky Campbell andRichard Skinner already featurealbum tracks and their producerswill have a crucial role in drawingup the list."

While the C list will featurealbum -orientated artists which donot necessarily have strong singlessales, the spokesperson emphasisesthat no restrictions are being placedon drawing up the list.

Playlist material now comprisessome 53% of Radio l's daytimeoutput compared with 47% pre-viously. The spokesperson says thatthe extra allocation comes from acombination of improving the sta-tion's computer software to allocateplaylist records more accurately andtightening up the speech content ofthe station. Now that the Gulf war isover, Radio 1 is reverting to hourlynews bulletins.

Radio l's First Album Tracks

Artist Song

Big Dish 25 Years

Chris Rea

Farm

Gloria Estefan

Jesus Jones

Joni Mitchell

Looking For The Summer

Family Of Man

Svc In The 90's

Welcome Back Victoria

Nothing Can Be Done

More Cuts At LBCLondon news/talk station LBC isto make further staff cuts despiterecent assurances that therewould be no further redundan-cies. The troubled station has re-cently reduced its separateAM/FM programming to justtwo, three-hour slots a day, inmorning and afternoon drivetime.

Most of the people involvedare freelance presenters and pro-ducers who will not have theircontracts renewed. However,another four programming staffreportedly are being made redun-dant. Full details have not yetbeen given to the staff, and thereis concern about further losses inadministration, sales and enginee-ring.

Also, MD Peter Thornton hasannounced his intention to leave"in the spring", although no firmdate has been given. Thornton,who has been with LBC since itslaunch in October 1973, has held anumber of posts, including editorand MD of Independent RadioNews, and editorial director andMD of LBC. Comments Thornton,"I have been considering my fu-ture for some limb. My departureis entirely amicable." ChristopherChataway, chairman of LBC'sowner Crown Communicationsadds, "Peter has made an enor-mous contribution to LBC overthe years and I know he will makea great success of whatever hechooses to do." PE



WDR Asks For DM5Licence Fee Hike

by Mal Sondock

Germany's largest public TV andradio station, WestdeutscherRundfunk (WDR), has announ-ced a shortfall of more thanDM 100 million, despite a 1991budget of some DM I .6 billion(app. US$1 billion). In an attemptto raise funds, WDR chairmanReinhard Gratz has announceda possible annual increase ofDM5 on the licence fee by 1992.

A tentative allocation for thenew income: DM1.50 for alimited time to finance publicradio and TV stations in the fiveformer DDR states; and DM1.50for WDR's contribution to the

planned German -French culturalTV channel and to improve thebudgets of national radio stationDeutschlandfunk and ofRIAS/Berlin, previously fundedby the US government.

Comments WDR and ARDspokesperson Stephan Piltz, "Ithas been five years since we lastincreased licence fees. The pre-sent budget deficit will be paidfrom the station's financial reser-ves, but in order to continue ope-rating at our current high -qualitylevel, increases in income are ne-cessary. Licence fee increasesand TV advertising increases willpermit us to ease off a little whenit comes to radio advertising."

Residenz Joins Air ForceRadio Residenz/Karlsruhe hassent a special shipment of gamesand books to German troops sta-tioned in Turkey, in co-operationwith a local air force base.

The base has teamed with thelocal station in the past, by put-ting on gigs featuring the Air

Force Big Band and donatinghelicopter flights to lucky win-ners of station promotional con-tests. Special broadcasts are alsoplanned from Turkey, and severalof the station's air personalitieswill be broadcasting the showson location. MS

Correspondents WantedDue to M&M's plans to increase coverage in ...the G/A/S territories,we are looking for Swiss and Austrian correspondents with extensiveknowledge of and contacts in the radio and music industries. Pleasecontact managing editor Steve Wonsiewicz, Music & Media,Rijnsburgstraat 11, 1059 AT Amsterdam.Tel: + 31 (020) 669 1961 Fax: +31 (020) 669 1951

FUNNY DEALINGS AT BMG - Hope Kerkeling, one of Germany's most popular TV personalities, has beensigned by BMG-Ariola. An album of some of his best material has already been recorded under the title'Erwarten se nix' and will be released soon. Gathered together at a recent sales conference are (1-r) BMG Ariolasoles manager -west Harry Enck, BMG Ariola sales manager -south Paul Kolbl, Hope Kerkeling, BMG Ariolahead of distribution Matthias Gibson, BMG Ariola assistant MD Albert Czapski and BMG Ariola head of A&Rfolks -music Georg Bergheim.

Pay -TV Net Premiere Debuts 'Airplay'by Robert Lyng

New German pay TV station,Premiere, owned by FrenchCanal Plus, Bertelsmann andLeo Kirch, will commencebroadcasting on March 1.

One of the first programmes tobe aired in decoded form, makingit available to all cable viewers,will be the new music show"Airplay". Produced by former

RIAS editor Jorg Grabosch, theshow's music and lifestyle con-tent will be geared towardsyouth.

It will include the MediaControl airplay charts, as well asdance, pop and heavy metalcharts.

A weekly feature of the newmusic show is a radio stationportrait. The series kicks off withclassic rock station Radio

BENELUX

Radio Antigoon Gets EquipmentFor Outside Broadcast Demo

by Marc Maes

Radio studio supplier Mediacomis to give equipment to RadioAntigoon/Antwerp to provide a"live" demonstration for its otherclients. The hardware will equipan open studio at a city centreshopping mall, from which thestation is to broadcast for at leasttwo hours daily.

Says Mediacom MD JoeLimbach, "We are no radio sta-tion, but at last we have the possi-bility of showing our customershow things really work with liveradio. The studio we supply toAntigoon is worth US$100.000,but we think that having it in theopen, visible for all, will make itworth our while."

The deal between RadioAntigoon, Mediacom and theCentury Center is signed for an

initial three years. The shoppingmall will pay expenses incurredduring the broadcast, estimated atabout Bfr 36.000 (app. US$1.200)per month. In return, Antigoonwill broadcast free ads for theCenter.

Antigoon MD Piet Keizer says,"We had the idea when the ownersof the shopping centre saw us or-ganising a charity event. Theyoffered us a free studio in the mall,and were prepared to pay for allexpenses. The new situation willoffer us other possibilities as thereis also a stage in the marketplacewhere artists can perform."

The station's two-hour weekdayshow from the Century Centerwill be presented by Keizer.Saturday's "Top 50 show" willalso come from the complex, from11.00-17.00. Keizer says broad-casting time could increase, as

most of the station's promotionalactivities will shift to the open stu-dio.

Radio Antigoon has also re-cently invested about Bfr2.8 mil-lion in new studio equipment fortwo brand-new studios at its mainbroadcast headquarters. Hardwareincludes two Alice Soundtec R2000 broadcast consoles and aDigital Spot, allowing two sepa-rate studios to programme adverti-sing into shows.

Xanadu/Munich, which recentlyhired radio and TV personalityThomas Gottschalk as its musicdirector.

"Airplay" is directed andfilmed by video directors RudiDolezal and Hannes Rossacherfrom Vienna -based DoroProductions. Presenting the showare Radio Hamburg personalitiesStephan Heller and MarzelBecker.

WHEN PUBLIC RADIO MEETS PRIVATE - Holland's two radio sec-tors recently came face-to-face at the launch of Radio 10's new EHR out-let, Power FM. From l -r: NOS head of programmes Willem vanBeusekom; Radio 10 MD Jeroen Soer, M&M publisher Leon ten Hengel,"Veronica" magazine editor Robert Brief, and new Radio 10 Gold DJTom Mulder.

Mulder Joins Radio Amsterdam's 10 Goldby Paul Andrews

Well-known Dutch radio perso-nality Tom Mulder has joinedAmsterdam -based satellite -to -cable station Radio 10 Gold, tohost its 10.00-13.00 weekdayshow from March 4. The slot is

Radio 10's most popular daypart,with the station claiming it re-aches about 2% of Holland'scable subscribers.

The addition of Mulder to theRadio 10 air -team is part of ashake-up of programming on thestation from March 2. New

weekend shows are being intro-duced, including classic chartcountdown "Top 40 Gold"Sundays 13.00-16.00, and"Ladies' Night" Sundays 19.00-01.00, hosted by female DJsPetra Lugtenburg and Edith deDoosch.



FRANCE

LESSER KNOWN TALENT PUSH

Metropolys, EMI FranceTeam For Artist Promos

by Jacqueline Eacott

The Radio Metropolys networkand EMI France are collabora-ting on a press and retail cam-paign to promote lesser -knownEMI International artists. Thepromotion is aimed at a select pu-blic rather than mass appeal au-diences.

The campaign currently invol-ves product from a total of 15artists, ranging from CabaretVoltaire and Tackhead to SteveBower. Starting this month, two

albums will be promoted eachmonth via displays in retail out-lets and the press. Metropolyswill contribute to the promotionby devoting a special segment at17.30 daily to a track from oneof the albums of the month. Inreturn, Metropolys's logo will bedisplayed in record shopsthroughout France.

Comments programme directorPhilippe Schemberg, "It is agood image operation forMetropolys. The retail displayswill be going to smaller specialist

record shops rather than hyper-markets and retail chains. We'retargeting thoughtful buyers, at-tracted to new and rather offbeatproduct."

Metropolys is also launchingits own advertising campaignfrom March. It is the first cam-paign since the station's namechange from Kiss Metropolyslast September, with black andwhite visuals promising "a hitevery four minutes". A nation-wide press and poster campaignis to follow.

French Artists Get HigherProfile At Japan Festival

by Emmanuel Legrand

French music is set to enterJapan following the appearanceof five acts at the February 19-24 Halou Paris Tokyo festival.

The five were Noir Desir,Algerian -born rai singerJimmy Oihid, flamenco rockperformer Roe, comic quintetVRP and jazz vocalist ArthurH. All are signed to PolyGramFrance labels, except Oihid(Musidisc).

The festival, which also fe-atured local artists, was beingheld for the second time.Organised by local concert pro-duction company Conversa-tion, it was held at the 600 ca-pacity Club Quattro in Tokyo'sShibuya. French co-ordinator

for the event was ChristianMousset, organiser of theAngouleme Jazz Festival.

The FFr1.2 million (app.US$240.000) festival itself wasfully financed by the Japanese.However, the French partici-pants' costs were coveredthrough financing fromPolyGram France (Ffr100.000),French professional organisa-tions SACEM, Adami, SCPP,FCM and Fonds de Soutienand the Ministry Of Culture(Ffr60.000 each).

A third Halou (the namemeans "spring" in Japanese)festival is due to take placenext year.

The event was sponsored bybroadcasting group TBS. Aspokesperson explains, "Paris

is the key point for worldmusic among the Westerncountries, and this festivalhighlights the fact. Sponsoringsuch an event is important forthe image of TBS-it is a wayto appear in a different sectorthan other radio stations, whichfocus their concert sponsorshipon English -language acts."

For the French acts, the festi-val was a unique opportunity toperform before a Japanese au-dience. To coincide with theevent, Nippon Phonogram re-leased VRP's LP Retire LesNains De Tes Poches whilePolydor KK released ArthurH's self -titled LP and Roe'salbum Soledad and indie labelQuattro issued Jimmy Oihid'sVivre Libre.

UP 'N' COMING FROM DOWN UNDER - Top names in the Australian music industry gathered for abreakfast meeting while gearing up for- the recent MIDEM conference. From 1-r: Austrade trade services ma-nager Archie Wilson, Australia ambassador to France Ted Pocock, Festival Music Publishing Group MD PeterHebbes and Export Music Australia GM Brian Peacock.

MAXXIMUM JOY - M&M takes a look at the 'invisible' broadcastingpersonalities around Europe. First up: the Maxximum/Paris posse atwork. Clockwise from top: Lunchtime DJ Lorenzo "Lobo" Pancino,Communications manager Xavier Bise and early morning DJ Dominique"Domdom" Parrain. PS: We'd love to publish pix from your station.Send photos and info to M&M's editorial office: Rijnsburgstraat 11,1059 AT Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Ricard SponsorsSecond Rock ShowDrinks firm Ricard is spon-soring the second EuropeanRock Festival, taking place atthe Zenith in Paris on March 15-16. The festival is part of a pro-gramme of music sponsorshipby the brand under the RicardSA Live Music flag.

Recent legal limitations pre-vent alcohol brands from adver-tising on radio and TV, as wellas sponsoring events such assports competitions. They donot, however, affect music.

Ricard president Jean-MarieLaborde says, "The law cur-rently allows us to sponsor suchevents. But if for any reason thegovernment adds new restric-tions, we will hold the festival

elsewhere in Europe where it iseasier. Our drinks brand is inter-national and so is rock."

Bands scheduled to appear in-clude Olive, Screaming Target,Urban Dance Squad, TheSugarcubes, The Pogues, KatOnoma, Seguridad Social,Soup Dragons, Elmer FoodBeat, Dave Stewart & TheSpiritual Cowboys and PrefabSprout.

All festival costs are beingcovered by Ricard. Laborde de-clines to give specific figures forthe event but says that music -re-lated activities represent 10-15%of Ricard's total annual mediabudget of Ffr250 million (app.US$50.2 million). EL

Country Mourns GainsbourgProvocative singer and composerSerge Gainsbourg died in Paris, onMarch 2 of natural causes. He was62.

Following the announcement ofhis death, many radio channelschanged their programming tobroadcast tributes to the artist.France Inter added two specialshows on Sunday, while RTL re-broadcast a 1985 interview withGainsbourg.

Gainsbourg started his career in

1958 and his life has been a mix-ture of controversy, success andcreativity ever since.

His biggest success was the1969 single Je'Tilime, Moi NonPlus, with Jane Birkin. The songwas banned by the BBC for its ex-plicit lyrics, which did not stop itfrom selling 5.5 million copiesworldwide.

Gainsbourg reached the peak ofhis fame in the '80s, with a string ofsuccessful albums and tours. EL



Av. SCANDINAVIA

AND THE WINNER IS - Danish Grammys presenter Maiken Wexo takes centre stage, along with multiplewinners Sko & Torp.

Telegram Wires Into Dance PrizesThe February 24 Swedish DanceMusic Awards have underlined thestrength and importance of nationaldance product, as well as the conti-nued influence of the Telegram label.

The awards, organised byStockholm record import-exportcompany Pitch Control, were com-bined with the DJ Mix Club(DMC) Swedish mixing champions-hips and a concert by BMG danceact Snap.

The event was held atStockholm's Palladium before anaudience of 1.800, and awards weregiven in 16 different categories.MTV Europe covered the cere-mony.

As in the Swedish Grammys aweek earlier (M&M March 9),Telegram artist Titiyo scored well,

winning both the Best FemaleVocalist and Best Album categories,the latter for her self -titled debut LP.

Her producer, MagnusFrykberg, took the Best Produceraward and label -mate Papa Deewon both the Best Hip Hop Album(Lettin' Off Steam) and Best MaleVocalist title.

Dr. Alban, whose single HelloAfrika on SweMix is developinginto a major European hit, won boththe Best Newcomer and Best DanceAlbum categories.

Awards in the different categorieswere based on votes cast by 800radio and club DJs from aroundSweden. The categories included theusual purely record -based awards,as well as awards given to clubs, re -mixers and even dance promotions.

Stockholm's Ritz, home to theSweMix DJs, was named best club.Clubland's Let's Get Busy was BestHouse Record and public broadcas-ter P3's Claes Af Geijerstam wasnamed best radio DJ.

Best remix was by ChristianFalck and Stonebridge, of TheStoneFunkers' track Bassrace. TheStoneFunkers themselves took outthe award for Best Live Band.

Just D won the award for BestSwedish Language Dance 12", forVaar Egen Paase, SweMix theaward for Best Record Company,and WEA Sweden's Lars-AakeWinuner the award for best DJ pro-moter.

The DMC Mixing Championshipwas won by 20 -year -old BjornStarfeldt from Gothenburg. DR

English Spoken AtDanish Grammys

by David Rowley

English -language music domina-ted the Danish Grammy Awardsheld on February 23, signalling astrong shift away from the pre-vious Danish -language orienta-tion of the domestic scene.

Of the 13 main pop and rockawards given at the third annualceremony at Copenhagen's BellaCenter, nine went to acts or pro-ducers working in English. Lastyear, no major awards went toEnglish -language acts. The mainwinner of the evening wasMedley's Hanne Boel, whose se-cond album, Dark Passion, tookthe award for Best Album. Boel,who did not attend the awards,was also named Best FemaleSinger. Medley MD Poul Bruunwas awarded Best Producer forhis work on the album. The LP'sfirst single, I Wanna Make LoveTo You, won the Best Single title.The Boel project also won BestVideo for the clip to the secondsingle, Light In Your Heart.

Dark Passion has now sold280.000 copies in Denmark andreached 80.000 in neighbouringSweden.

Night, achieved gold status(40.000 sales) in four months,also scored well at the awards.They won the Best New Actaward, and vocalist Soren Skotook the prize for Best MaleSinger.

The award for Best Dance/RapAct went to Medley's Yasmin,newly signed internationally toGeffen with the album WannaDance. The Best Heavy Rock Actaward was given to anotherMedley act, Skagarack, with thealbum A Slice Of Heaven. TheBest Danish Band title was awar-ded to pop act Ray -Dee -Oh, whoare signed to Replay Records.

Debut group Love Shop, onGarden Records with theiralbum 1990, took the award forBest Pop Act, and veteran Danishcomposer CV Jorgensen wasnamed Best Songwriter.

WEA Denmark A&R chiefLars Bennike says the Grammyawards accurately reflect a grow-ing trend towards anglophonemusic on the Danish domesticscene during 1990-a shift aimedat trying to gain international suc-cess.

Comments Bennike, "1990 has

"1990 has been the year of English -language music in Denmark."

- Lars Bennike

The awards, held before an au-dience of 700, were televised liveby public broadcaster DanmarksRadio. The show was hosted byDanish former MTV VJ MaikenWexo and covered a total of 24awards, ranging from jazz andclassical to children's records.

Sonet's bright new hopes Sko& Torp, whose English -languagedebut album, On A Long Lonely

SPAIN/PORTUGAL

Privates Move To BlockSenate's Muni Ad Proposalby Anna Marie de la Fuente

Spain's private broadcasting asso-ciation AERP announced onFebruary 15 the latest steps in itscampaign against municipal sta-tions being allowed to advertise.Private stations are now fre-quently airing spots to increasepublic support.

Newly appointed AERP presi-dent Antena 3 executive JavierGimeno says the campaign willprobably continue throughout

March. Comments Gimeno, "Thefact that we only have the backingof right-wing opposition partyGrupo Popular is worrying."

He adds that attempts to securean audience with the prime minis-ter Felipe Gonzalez have fallenflat. "He claims he has a busyagenda," details Gimeno, whosays that a sector providing12.000 jobs and broadcasting to14 million people deserves to beheard.

The AERP's accusations of un-

fair competition are aimed at theseven regional radio and TV sta-tions who are financed by bothlocal government funds and ad-vertising revenues.

The association plans to takethe case to the country's supremecourt, and if necessary, to theBrussels -based EC high courts,citing the violation of the TreatyOf Rome's article no. 92.

The Spanish congress ratifiedthe bill last December and delibe-rations began in late February.

been the year of English -languagemusic in Denmark. We are ob-viously still going to have Danishartists like Kim Larsen, but thereare a lot of acts, particularly newartists like Hanne Boel and Sko &Torp, who will sing in English.

"The, standard of Danish musicis so high it can only help our in-ternational prospects if it's sung inEnglish," says Bennike.

Official Debut For Radio OleSpanish music FM station RadioOle/Madrid began broadcastingon February 17. The launch wasfollowed by that of a Seville sis-ter station shortly afterwards.

Private broadcaster Antena 3has invested about US$250.000in the new station, which isequipped with digital audiotape (DAT) and is situated in animpressive hi -tech studio at theAntena 3 headquarters.

Antena 3 has also put up anot-her US$250.000 in a print andposter campaign. Additional bac-king includes spots on Antena 3TV channel, and on its existingnational AM and FM networks.

Head of music programmingJose Ramon Pardo says,"Radio Ole's 24 -hour output fe-atures a different DJ everythree hours, in common withformula FM stations." He addsthat the daytime programmingincludes traditional Spanishmusic from the '50s as well ascurrent releases from artistssuch as Isabel Pantoja andRocio Jurado. Sevillian dancemusic in the early evenings isfollowed by copla classics."From 01.00-07.30, we will beairing a programming mix ofall the types played," saysPardo. Ad1F



Arbitron DelaysItalian Plans

Arbitron is still not committed tomaking its entry into the EurOpeanbroadcast market (M&M January19). Final negotiations betweenthe US broadcast research com-pany and the Milan -based researchinstitute Datamedia have been de-layed, partly because of the Gulfwar and illness to a top Arbitronexecutive.

A delegation from Datamediawill be travelling to New York onMarch 28 for a meeting withArbitron. Radio Deejay station di-rector and former Datamedia con-sultant Claudio Astorri was a dri-ving force behind Arbitron's Italianinvolvement, and is attending themeeting in what he describes as a"middle -man" role. DS

NATIONAL SURVEY COMPLETED

Study Shows 70%Tuned In At Home

by David Stansfield

Italy's first national radio studyshows that more than half of thepopulation tunes into radio often oralways, with some 70% listening at

LATIN LOVER - Eugenio Finardi goes gold for 100.000 sales of his LP "La Forza Dell' Amore". His recordcompany Warner Music Italy teamed with national radio station Radio Italia Solo Musica Italiana for a promo-tions and advertising campaign. From kr: RISMI president Mario Volanti, manager Angelo Carrara, EugenioFinardi and RISMI MD Franco Nisa.

Capitol's The Box Poised ToTop Charts; RAI TemptedNewcomer Canadian band TheBox look set to scale the chartswith the single Temptation onCapitol/EMI.

State pop station RAI StereoDue liked the track so much, itincluded it in the chart show"Magnifici Dieci", which recei-ves daily rotation between17.00-19.30. It is also beingplayed on later shows.Comments station DJ SimonettaZauli, "We think it could be ahit, although we can never besure. It was given initial airplayand was liked by listeners. Thatis why it is included in'Magnifici Dieci'."

Radio Babboleo/Genoa hasbeen giving the single heavy air-play. Says programme directorLenny says, "EMI sent in a cas-sette and I added it immediately.The record company then sent thealbum and I will certainly bescheduling tracks from that."

Radio Babboleo has been ro-tating the record for a couple ofweeks. It has been receivingcirca nine plays a week andLenny confirms he will continuewith that same policy until hegets tired of the track.

National network RadioDimensione Suono picked upon the record after hearing theM&M Canadian Talents CDsampler, issued early Decemberlast year.

Explains programme directorBruno Ployer, "Our music di-rector Carlo Mancini liked thesong. It fits our EHR music for-mat so we cut it from the CDand started to give it airplay, be-fore the local record companybegan promotion. We did thesame with More Than WordsCan Say by Capitol Canada actAlias, which is another track onthe CD."

The station gave the singlemedium rotation (twice a day)for a month. It will be givenmore limited airspace in the fu-ture.

EMI marketing directorFranco Cabrini says that thecompany has been adopting atraditional approach with pro-motion. "Strong airplay is amust, but we did not have topush too hard because the pro-duct is excellent. A video for thesingle is receiving heavy rota-tion on the VideoMusic channel

and we are planning a promo-tional visit by the group thismonth. We may begin an adver-tising campaign to coincide withthe visit."

Cabrini maintains it is not justabout a one-off single. "We aretalking about a quality album.That is why we are backing thisproject." DS

home. Those were two of the keystatistics that came out of GlobalRadio Research, a recent radio sur-vey by Datamedia.

Major players in privateradio-including national stationsRadio Deejay, Rete 105, RadioDimensione Suono, Radio ItaliaSolo Musica Italiana, RTL 1025Hit Radio and Radio MonteCarlo-all supported the project,which offered the first qualitative re-search on national territory.

Datamedia interviewed 1.000 pe-ople from the age of 10, fromOctober 8-16 last year. The aim wasto establish the type and number ofradio receivers in use, where andwhen people listen to radio, morninglistening habits, the ideal station, andmusic genres preferred (see table).Each subscribing station was givenits own breakdown, but at a nationallevel the findings showed there are3.64 radios per family with the por-table transistor being most used.

More than 53% of Italians tune inoften or always, with women andyoung people making up 58% of theaudience. 70% of Italians listen athome (77% women, 87% teenagersand 88% senior citizens), while 21%(27% male, 28% adults) have it on inthe car; 47% of the population wakeup with the radio. 58% of listeners

Italian ListenerFormat PreferencesItalian singer/songwriters 7.5%

Melodic Italian music 6.6Italian rock 5.6

Italian dance 5.1Rock music 5.8

Folk/country 5.7Black/soul 5.5

Pop music 5.3Dance 5.2

New age 4.8New wave 4.6

House 4.3Hard rock 4.3

Source: Datamedia

Radio Dimensione Suono pro-gramme director Bruno Ployer saysthat while there is room for improve-ment in the research, it is the first at-tempt and should be welcomed."Research should not ask what so-meone thinks about this or that. Itshould tell you whether a person'sperception is positive or negativeabout something. A question like'Do you like Italian singer/songwri-ters or not?' should be asked and not'What genre of music do you pre-fer?"'

Ployer also questions the concept

More than 53% of Italians tune in often oralways. 70% of Italians listen at home while21% (27% male, 28% adults) have it on inthe car; 47% of the population wake upwith the radio.

prefer a music/news format, while30% like those two ingredients plusgeneral entertainment. Only 12% arekeen on music -only stations.

RTL, Dalla Link UpRTL 102.5 Hit Radio is offi-cially backing Lucio Dana'sMarch tour, the first time the sta-tion has been involved in a con-cert promotion.

DJ/producer Grant Bensoncomments, "The news may notsound too thrilling on the interna-tional scene, but Dalla has alwaysbeen one of the major forces onthe local market. If the BBC didthe same thing with PaulMcCartney, they would beequally excited."

Km 102.5 Hit Radio will haveits logo on all tickets and postersfor the tour and will be allowed to

display a banner at each venue.The station will air promotion inreturn.

The deal was struck with Dalla'stour promoters Smemo Music inRome. Sweet manufacturerCharms is official tour sponsorand RTL 102.5 station directorGuido Monti describes the role ofthe station as "technical sponsor".Guido also hints the station willstage a special Lucio Dalla day, inthe presence of the artist.

Dalla was the best-selling na-tional artist in 1990. His latest albumCambio (RCA/BMG) has sold 1.15million copies to date. DS

of rock music in the research."When I look in the newspaper I seeMadonna, rock star. Is she a rockstar?" Ployer is more interested inhow many radio receivers there areon national territory, and where pe-ople listen. "

Radio Deejay station directorClaudio Astorri is also interested inthe number of existing radio recei-vers. "That sort of information isnew. The research also breaks downwhich types of receivers are used tolisten to particular stations."

Astoni underlines that it is thefirst attempt at any extensive radioresearch on national territory and ag-rees it will improve with time. RTL102.5 Hit Radio station directorGuido Monti says that the researchsupports the station's decision tobroadcast on just one frequencythroughout national territory. "Thenational share of those who listen inthe car is 21%. The figure is 25.3%for our station. That confirms our po-licy of using iso-frequencies is right."



NEW RELEASES

SINGLES

The Big DishBig Town - East WestGrowing bigger and bigger. Second singlefrom their sophisticated, soulful popalbum Satellites and follow-up to their re-cent hit Miss America. Big Dish, BigTown, Big Hit....

C +C Music FactoryHere We Go - ColumbiaGonna make you sweat again. Theirgrooves are just right. Presenting FreedomWilliams and Zelma Davis, C+C will bethe chartbusters of 1991.

Clouseau1k Wil Vannacht Bij Je Slapen - HKMVoulez vous coucher avec moi (ce sok)?Don't ask this twice to any Belgian orDutch schoolgirl, they will certainly faint.Singer/actor Koen Wauters is a star in thelowlands and this powerful tearjerker isanother mega hit for the Belgian five -piece.

Deee-LiteHow Do You Say ...Love - ElektraIn the trend -sensitive world of dance, yes-terday's news is tomorrow's fish 'n chipspaper. Dance maniacs who embraced theirGroove Is In The Heart (on the flip sidethis time) and are already looking for newmessiahs, shouldn't look any furth6-: thisband continue to be at the frontline of in-novation.

EnigmaMea Culpa Part II - VirginFollow-up to the mega hit Sadeness PartI: this time there's also the choice of aCatholic mix. How long do we have towait until Pope John -Paul II takes action?

Happy MondaysLoose Fit - Factory/LondonGrooves to generate Saturday night fever.The Mondays form the ideal bridge be-tween the clubs and top -40 radio. Justcross it.

JJIf This Is Love - ColumbiaBlonde ambition captured in less than onecigarette's time. It has a nice Bangles feeland will do extremely well on air. Love atfirst hearing.

Kiss Like ThisWhat The World Don't Know - ChrysalisThanks to producers Steve Jolley andTony Swain, this UK outfit are reminis-cent of the days of Spandau Ballet.Although not in the big league yet, a realgood song could make them big.

The Neville BrothersSons And Daughters - A&MThe pride of crescent city New Orleanshave used up all their guitar licks on thistune, and go into politics. A slow rap isunderpinned by African percussion,exactly what the inventors of rap, The LastPoets, used to do years ago. Very impres-sive. Also check the KRS One remix onthe CD -5 single.

The RembrandtsJust The Way It Is, Baby - AtcoFerry cross the Mersey, and follow yourtrip to the US. Every now and then bandswill be writing songs that the Beatles hadno time for.

R.E.M.Loosing My Religion - WarnerFirst single from the forthcoming ScottLitt co -produced album Out Of Time.Hearing such a beautiful song with a stri-king mandolin arrangement, provides anample religious substitute.

Scritti Politti & Shabba RanksShe's A Woman- VirginSinger Green Gartside and Jamaican rapperShabba Ranks profit cleverly from the dan-ceable, rocking nature of this Beatles tune.

Sting

Mad About You - A&MMostly he sounds calculated, but Sting canstill be a thrill. This second single, the besttrack from his new album The Soul Cages,is destined for greatness.

Womack & WomackUptown - AristaFirst single from the upcoming albumFamily Spirit, features the well-known re-cipe: an enjoyable, danceable tune and thetrademark vocal interplay.

ALBUMS

AparecidaBahia Danca Yoyo - CarrereIntroducing a new rhythm: the lamba-zoule, a mixture of the lambada from theBrazilian province Bahia and the FrenchAntillian zouk. This dance music goes upand down like a yo-yo. DJs tuned intoKaoma and Chico & Roberta should takenotice.

Bass CutSay You Love Me - TenNo guitars, no horns, no signs of orthodoxmusic instruments. Apart from the mono-tonous female vocals and a sparse piano(sample?), everything on this dance albumis computerised. Nevertheless, the bandmanage to sound inspired and full of life.

Blue RodeoCasino - WEAProduced by the best modern country androots rock producer of our time, PeteAnderson (Dwight Yoakam, MichelleShocked, Tommy Conwell), nothing couldgo wrong on this album. And it didn't.Together with MCA act The TragicallyHip, Canada is back on the map. Thesemaple leafs play some kind of rockin' rou-lette and the ball rolls in between TheByrds (Till I Am Myself Again) and LennyKravitz (Two Tongues).

Junior Brown12 Shades Of Brown - DemonThe most amazing country debut in years:although traditional like a Hank Williams,it still breaks C&W conventions. Brownsings his own songs with the nicest unste-ady vocals --right in the middle of JohnnyCash and Willie Nelson. He plays his owninvention, the "guit-steel", a combinationof a steel guitar and a normal guitar.Strongly recommended by Nick Lowe, heexpresses a fine sense of humour in titlessuch as My Baby Don't Dance To NothingBut Ernest Tubb and What's Left Won't GoRight.

Die BriiderDifferent Kind Of Truth Hey U (LP)(Austria)Aggressive and raw rock with punk ap-peal, played by five young Austrians.Gritty voiced singer Marc Worster andhis brother Boris, heavily pushing thewah-wah pedal, are the main attrac-tions. Contact Karin Leinwather on tel.(43) 222-88 55 25; fax: 222-88 56 09.

Go For ItSomebody - Virgin (Sweden)Based in Norway, but featuring threedifferent nationalities --Norwegian,Swedish and Italian, Go For It are areal small multinational unit. For therecording sessions they went to LA,San Francisco and Stockholm. Theircatchy pop tune is sure to cross bordersand EHR programmers looking for ayounger version of The Bee Gees, must

go for it. Contact Ulf Waldekrantz ontel. (46) 8-98 64 20: fax: 8-98 57 12.

Josi Without ColoursTreasure - Survival (UK)

A surrealist pop song that, withChris Birklett's crystal-clear produc-tion, evokes an Alice In Wonderland -type of atmosphere. A real treasure,confidently sung by Josi. Contact Tessaat Survival on tel. (44) 81-847 2625.

Toys Of JoyOne Of These Days - Olafssongs (LP)(Denmark)Listening to this album, great names ofFM rock like Chicago, Toto, MichaelMcDonald and Bryan Adams come tomind. Imagine big football stadiumsand long rides on US highways.Contact Frank Marstokk on tel. (45)42-29 22 59; fax: 42-29 16 29.

Claudia BrackenLove: And A Million Other Things - IslandA voice recognisable among 10 millionothers. Former Propaganda singer Briickendelivers a multi -functional debut albumwith music to listen and to dance to. Thetrack Baby Sigh is especially suitable to al-most every radio format.

FreeThe Best Of Free/All Right Now - IslandSince its first release in 1970, Free's AllRight Now has now become a hit for thefifth time. That simple blues rock guitar riffcombined with Paul Rodgers' passionatevocals will stand for ever. BobClearmountain remixed all the tracks onthis compilation with great respect. The de-finitive Free story for home and highway.

The GodfathersUnreal World - EpicBack to reality! The angry young manPeter Coyne expresses social commentaryin the title track and on This Is War. Buthe can be more than a fighter, he's a lovertoo; check Drag Me Down Again. The gui-tar driven -sound remains on this album,their fourth, but due to new producer SteveBrown --follow-up to the late great VicMaile--it has softened a bit.

Tara KempTara Kemp - Giant/WarnerAn instrumental Prologue and Epilogue,and in between 10 highly danceable tunes inthe domain usually reserved for Madonnaand Paula Abdul. Try the irresistible trackBe My Lover, and you'll be hooked.

Saigon KickSaigon Kick - Third Stone/AtlanticThe name demonstrates bad taste, themusic is much better though. Hard-hittingrock is their business, Sometimes theysound frightening as in the opening trackNew World. But good melodies and strongharmony vocals are also provided. Indis-creetly produced by Michael Wagener.

Young Black Teenagers

vonyoungblackteenagers

cd

Young Black Teenagers - MCADespite the band's name, these are whitepunks playing black rap music. No vanillaflavour though. Produced by The BombSquad --Hank and Keith Shockley (PublicEnemy), real street credibility is guaran-teed. Punks, Lies & Video Tape is an excel-lent statement from the backstreets.

Singles and albums featured in New Releases are listed alphabetically. Selections include those which have achieved significant airplay within the last four weeks and those releases judgedto have musical merit. Records mentioned in this section are by acts signed to independent labels for which license and/or publishing rights are available, except as noted. Pleasesend your samples to Machgiel Bakker, PO Box 9027, 1006 AA Amsterdam, Holland.



SPOTLIGHT

EurythmicsIn 10 years' time, the Eurythmics have become a rock & roll institution.

The band's singles are regular airplay favourites and the best of them havenow been compiled for the very first time on the new jubilee "Greatest

Hits" album. Simultaneously released by RCA/BMG in all European terri-tories on March 18, it marks the label's biggest catalogue item of this year.

by Robbert Tilli

The Eurythmics were formed out of the ashesof new wave band The Tourists, whose big-gest hit was the Dusty Springfield cover ver-sion, I Only Wanna Be With You from 1979.Two years later, Annie Lennox and DaveStewart formed the Eurythmics and debutedwith the album In The Garden. In 1983, theyhad their first European hit single with the titletrack of the second album, Sweet Dreams(Are Made Of This).

From this point, the duo released a newalbum every year except in 1988. Specialisingin subtle, synthesizer -dominated pop, the duochanged style on the fifth album Be YourselfTonight (1985) featuring more soul and R&B-orientated material. Highlight of that albumwas the spirited duet with Aretha Franklin,Sisters' Are Doin' It For Themselves, also fe-atured on the new compilation. TheEurythmics' previous album, We Too Are One,reached no. 3 in the European Top 100Albums for three consecutive weeks in 1989.

Love Is A Stranger, their first UK hit in1982, was reissued on February 25 as a remin-der of the album's release. The new samplerpresents an excellent overview of theEurythmics' development throughout theyears. The vinyl version contains 13 tracks,while the CD/cassette holds 18 tracks, most ofthem produced by Dave Stewart. The LP willalso be released on a 21 -track video and laserdisc (Compact Disc Video) simultaneously.This marks a first for BMG. There is also asongbook containing all lyrics.

Compiling the album --with Dave Stewartplaying an active role --took a considerableamount of time. BMG UK head of interna-tional marketing Chrissie Harwood explains,"We had enormous problems with the track -listing. When we thought one of the singleshad been a hit, we had to cross-check it chart -wise. We didn't want to limit ourselves to the

UK charts. So we had to drop some singles.We wanted to put together an internationalpackage, the strongest we could possibly thinkof." The hits are not compiled in chronologicalrunning order, as initially planned. "That didn'tfit at all, so we did it on sequences. We wantedthe tracks to match. But for anyone who reallywants to know the exact order the singles werereleased in, we've put shots of the originalsingle sleeves plus the year of release on theinner sleeve."

BMG started a very intensive marketingcampaign to promote the album. "ThisEurythmics Greatest Hits album is BMG'smost important catalogue item this year. Wehave never had a compilation as big as this,maybe only Elvis Presley. We did market re-search in every territory. We worked on it for along time, in fact since August last year"

Harwood continues, "The main bulk ofthe money is spent on television and everyEuropean country is involved. even in Spain,where TV advertising is not the norm at all.But since the CD is more or less a doublealbum for the price of one, they joined thecampaign."

The campaign centres on two separate 30 -second advertising spots, each containingbits of four different videos, and two other10 -second ads, each containing one track.Sweden and Norway do a combined promocampaign, which will be different from otherterritories; TV monitor sets will be hired forretail, as the artwork of the album is basedon a shot from one of the band's videos.

A special promo interview will be servicedto press and radio while BBC Radio 1 willhave exclusive interviews with Annie Lennoxbetween March 18-21. From March 18 on-wards, competitions will run on all independentlocal radio stations. No promo or concert tourare scheduled. Harwood concludes, "No, it ispure marketing. It is a fantastic opportunity toshow the strength of marketing the BMG way."

Tracklisting Greatest Hits

Love Is A Stranger (1982); Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This) (1983); Who's That Girl? (1983); Right By Your Side

(1983); Here Comes The Rain Again (1983); There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart) (1985); Sisters Are

Dein' It For Themselves (1985); It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back) (1985); When Tomorrow Comes (1986); You Have

Placed a Chill In My Heart (1987); Miriwle Of Love (1986); Sex Crime (1984) (1984); Thom In My Side (1986); Don't

Ask Me Why (1989); Angel (1989); Would I Lie To You?(1985); Missionary Man (1986); /Need A Man (1987).

Sko/Torp Signed to Sonet. Publisher: Copyright Control. New Album: On A Long Lonely Night.

released on November 8 and peaking atno. 2; currently holding at no. 3.

Recorded at Sonet Studio and EastSound, both in Copenhagen.

Producer: Mats Ronander. Marketing: A three -track radio promo

CD has been released three weeks be-fore the official release of the album.

Danish tour from February till the endof August.

European releases are planned, alt-hough nothing has yet been confirmed.

Sko/Torp are an Arhus -based duo, featu-ring guitarist Palle Torp and singer SorenSko. They received two national Grammys(best new act/best male singer) onFebruary 23 for their debut album, whichhas already reached gold status (50.000copies sold).

Although Torp is a well -establishedname on the Danish rock scene --he used toplay with Thomas Helmig and Mek Pek--the new project made them instant domes-tic stars.

Sonet initially released a 3 -track promoCD, including the album's title track, withthe purpose of breaking the record on the

radio. That plan worked, as Sko/Torp deli-ver a set of radio -friendly West Coast pop,that has great crossover potential to othermarkets.

Although TV was initially reluctant,heavy radio airplay has helped the duo,who have recently appeared on nationalTV shows, including the prime -time talkprogramme, the "Michael MeyerheimShow".

Local broadcasters like the Copenhagen -based radio stations The Voice, UptownFM and Sydkysten as well as RadioViborg, Arhus Nterradio, RadioVictor/Esbjerg and Radio Roskilde allplayed the record in heavy rotation.

Sonet is planning to release the recordoutside Denmark, although all offers arestill being considered. The popularity ofthe band is still increasing: an initiallyplanned Danish tour in February has al-ready been expanded till the end ofAugust.

UNITED KINGDOM

RailwayChildren Signed to Virgin worldwide. Publisher: Ten Music. Management: Sinclair/Manchester. Album: Native Place released in June

last year. New Single: Every Beat Of The Heart

initially released in February last year.Re-released on January 21; currently atno. 75 in the Coca-Cola EurochartHot 100 Singles.

Recorded at Town House/London. Producer: Steve Lovell and Steve

Power. Promotion: TV appearances on "Top

Of The Pops" and "Wogan"; the videohas been played on "Going Live" andthe "Chart Show".

European releases to be scheduled.

Justice at last, the re-release of last year'ssingle Every Beat Of The Heart gaveWigan -based Railway Children theirwell -deserved first UK hit. The track isalso featured on the band's second albumNative Place, produced by Steve Powersand Steve Lovell (of Julian Cope, HollyJohnson and James fame).

Frontman Gary Newby is a true all-rounder; apart from being the band's sin-ger, guitarist and composer, he graduatedas a graphic designer, and designed alltheir artwork. Apart from being influencedby early '80s Liverpool bands like Echo &The Bunnymen and The Teardrop

Explodes, the band's music has a definiteByrds/REM touch to it. Melody is thekeyword. Due to the band's success in theUS --where the single reached no. 1 inBillboards Post Modern Chart --it was re-released in the UK.

Airplay has been reported from BBCRadio 1, Piccadilly Radio/Manchester,GLR, Trent/Nottingham, Chiltern Radio& Northants Radio & Severn Sound,GWR/Bristol/Swindon, RadioForth/Edinburgh, Red Rose/Preston/Blackpool, Hallam/Sheffield, Broadland/Norwich, Beacon Radio/Wolverhampton,Fox FM/Oxford, Swansea and CoolFM/Belfast.

Pan -European -Spotlight: Artists featu-red have achieved Top 15 chart status inthe European Top 100 Albums within thelast five years.National Spotlight: Artists featuredhave achieved Top 15 chart status in theircountry of origin.



STATION OPERATIONS

THE DISCIPLINE AND THE ART

Creating Great Radio CommercialsFVO: It's all right, here's doctor now.

MVO]: (Briskly) Aha, and what have we here?MVO2: (Extremely feeble, high, wavering voice) I'm a

'weakly' repayment, Doctor.MVO1: I see, and what seems to be the trouble?

MVO2: It's my APR, Doctor. It's... it's...MVO': Well, let's have a look then...

by Jonathan Booth

This script was presented to theclient, who loved it. He wanted itproduced and put on -air imme-diately. Except, he said, financialterms had changed slightly.

Now you have your armround the listener's shoulder,what do you do? Well, you wouldnot go up to your friends in thepub, put your arm round theirshoulders and shout in their ears,"Bloggs summer sale is now on

Radio has unique strengths, one ofwhich is the ability to get the listener'smind to do half the work for you.

"Repayments are now everymonth," the client explained."Just change the word 'weakly' to'monthly', and off we go."

This client's failure to under-stand how radio works beyondtechnicalities of the product andinto the mind of the listener, istrue, and depressingly common.

In what other medium couldyou conjure up a picture of an in-tangible thing like a finance re-payment, make it come alive inan amusing way, and make it me-morable? In a few seconds thewriter, in this case Mike Bersin,gave something unpopular a littlelife and humour. The ad plantedfirmly in the listener's mind hisor hers own mental picture of thistiny and unthreatening repay-ment. That thought will be retai-ned, and the client's message, thathis finance deals are more attrac-tive than his competitors', willhave hit home effectively.

Talking To A FriendRadio is a one-to-one medium. Astation may broadcast to a mil-lion people, but it is only ever tal-king to one person, the listener.He or she looks upon the radio asa friend, a companion, someonewho is talking to him.

People take their radios toplaces they would not take any -

with great savings in all depart-ments. Everything marked with afunny -coloured cross has a bitknocked off it, so get down toBloggs now! Don't miss it!"

You would not shout at yourfriends like that, so do not do iton the radio, people do not like it.And you do not need to shout atthem, you do not need to grabtheir attention. You do not needto be ear -catching like you needto be eye-catching in the pr".

tally picture your ideal concept,it cannot help it. Your imagina-tion will do half my job for me,you will already be feeling goodabout the product. When you arein the market for a new car, theleast you will think is "let us godown and have a look at it". Thisway the client has much lesschance of losing the sale at thepoint of advertising.

And do this as far as possible.After all, radio is an entertain-ment medium. Listeners get use-ful news and information, butthey tune in primarily to be enter-tained, so why should commer-cials be boring? Be adventurous,be silly, be different-you will beremembered.

Do not forget that with radioyou have the unique opportunityfor a double impact. First, youhave a captive audience-if theradio is on they will hear your ad(unlike press, where they can turnthe page, or TV, where they canzap to another channel). Second,you have a chance to stand outfrom the ads either side. If youget the message across in anamusing and different way, it willremain in the listener's mind andwork for you.

The BriefLet us look at the most important

A station may broadcast to a millionpeople, but it's only ever talking to oneperson.

because they are listening any-way. What you do need to be ismemorable.

The goal is to get the potentialconsumer to remember a productand its benefits so that when theyare in the market for it, they buyyour client's brand. Of course, allmedia are after memorability, butradio has unique strengths, one ofwhich is the ability to get the list-ener's mind to do half the workfor you.

If I show you a picture of acar, either a photograph or on theTV, and I say this is your idealcar, this is the car you want, youare quite likely to say "no it isn't,

Be adventurous, be silly, be different -and you'll be remembered.

one or anything else, like theirbed, their bath, even the toilet.Their radio is the arm round theshoulder, the trusted whisper inthe ear, and that makes the radiocommercial the closest thing tothe best form of advertising thereis-word of mouth.

I don't like the colour, or theshape, or the way the headlightsstick out".

But if I play you a radio adwith emotive music, powerfulsound effects and a smooth de-scriptive voice painting a picture,then your mind will automati-

influence on a radio commercial,the brief. Only three questionsneed to be answered by theclient, but how they are answeredis crucial, so they must be quali-fied.

The first question is who arewe talking to? This should be asspecific as possible -25-34 yearolds, AB housewives, C2teenagers etc. The ad should beaimed as accurately as possible.

The second question is whatdo we want them to do? The ans-wer to this is usually one of threethings: call in to the premises;phone up for details; or feel goodabout the product or service.

Of course we want them tobuy, but it is not the job of the adto sell the product. We have toget them through the door, thenthe client sells them something.

Finally there is the killerquestion, why should they do it?Why should the listener call in,phone up or feel good? Certainlynot because the client is best forservice, or claims he has courte-ous, friendly staff. There has tobe a positive incentive-like gen-

Keys To Writing Good Radio AdsStrict briefBe simpleBe memorableBe entertainingBe differentWrite to effect, not timeInvolve and educate the client

uinely being better, closer, mostunique, largest, best -equippedand even cheaper.

Finding the Unique SellingProposition (USP) is not a newtask, but combined with using ra-dio's strengths properly it willmake the campaign work.

Having detailed the brief, youthen have to unravel it again andpick out the specifics for eachcommercial to keep it simple. Fartoo many radio ads chuck ineverything and expect the listenerto remember them all. You mustidentify a specific message. Inour creative presentations, I takealong a box of tennis balls andsay, "If I throw you a tennis ballyou will probably catch it. But ifI throw you six, you'll probablydrop the lot." Similarly, if yougive the listener too much infor-mation at one time. their mindwill overload and sss itL h off.

Deciding The LengthHow long should a radio commer-cial be? This is a much-discussedquestion to which the answer isusually, and wrongly, 30 seconds.If you need 40 or 50 seconds to getthe message across, do not try andcram it into 30. Similarly, if youcan do it in 20, why spread it out?

The answer is write the com-mercial that will be the best, timeit, and that is how long it shouldbe. If you have to adjust the sche-dule to make it fit, do it. Never sa-crifice the effectiveness of the adto get more spots. Better to air agood ad 20 times than a bad orcramped ad 40 times-that is just40 chances for the listener to beput off.

What to put in or leave out of acommercial is another subject formuch thought. You will be under alot of pressure from the client toinclude peripheral material whichthey consider important, but willconfuse the message. One exampleis a car dealer who wants to put hiscar and truck -hire service into hisad about parts and MOT. Not onlyhas vehicle -hire got nothing to dowith parts and MOTs, but car -hireand truck -hire are totally separatemarkets so you are aiming at threecompletely different sets of consu-

mers hitting none of them.Another example that baffles

me is the insistence of clients whoadvertise concerts or shows byputting the ticket prices in, ie:Elton John in concert on Fridaythe 25th. Tickets available now,priced £18.50, £16.50, £12.50 and£10.00 with concessions for stu-dents and senior citizens.

What a load of unnecessarypadding! If a listener wants to seeElton John in concert they willbook a ticket anyway, at whateverprice they are prepared to pay. Ifthey do not want to see him, theycertainly will not be persuaded bya list of prices. Much better tospend the valuable time playingmore of Elton or repeating howand where to book tickets.

Good radio advertising is acontinual fight with the client andwith yourself to find a way of get-ting the listener to remember andfeel good about the product or ser-vice. If you can entertain as well asinform and use radio's special pro-perties to the full, you will get itright most of the time.

Jonathan Booth has been wri-ting and producing radio coin-mercials for seven rears, bothin radio stations and freelance,and has won over a dozen in-ternational an for radioadvertising fbnn London, NewYork, Chicago and LosAngeles. As creative directorBroadstar Creative Consul-tants. he divides his tine be-tween writing radio ads andundertaking creative consult-ancies for UK radio stations.Jonathan can be reached in theUK on + 44-(081)-673-7307.



STATION REPORTS

Station reports include allnew additions to the playlist,indicated by the abbrevia-tion "AD". Reports from cer-tain stations will also includerecords on the "A" list(heavy rotation) and, in somecases, on the "8" list(medium rotation). A numberof stations feature a "PowerPlay" ("PP"), a track whichreceives special emphasis forthe week. The "LP designa-tion reflects the new album(s)added.

UNITED KINGDOMBBC RADIO 1/LondonPaul Robinson - Editor MainstreamA List:AD Bee Gees- Secret Love

The Clash- Should I Stay OrINXS- By My SidePet Shop Boys- Where TheSimple Minds- Let There Be

B List:AD Chesney Hawkes- The One And

R.E.M. Losing My ReligionRick Astley- Move Right OutSoho- Love GenerationStevie B. Because I Love You

CAPITAL RADIO/LondonRichard Park - Prog. Contr.A List:AD Mike & The Mechanics- Word Of

Pet Shop Boys- Where TheSimple Minds- Let There BeJive Bunny- Over To You JohnAlexander O'Neal- What Is

ATLANTIC 252/County MeathPaul Kavanagh - Head Of MusicA List:AD The Clash- Should I Stay OrB List:AD Bingoboys- How To Dance

Roxette- Joyride

METRO FM/NewcastleGiles Squire - Prog. Contr.A List:AD Jesus Loves You- Bow Down Mister

L.L. Cool J- Around The WayR.E.M. Losing My ReligionQuartz- It's Too LateHale/Pace/Stonkers- The Stonk

B List:AD Susanna Hoffs- My Side Of The

Holly Johnson- Across TheAlexander O'Neal- What IsMike & The Mechanics- Word OfPet Shop Boys- Where TheSimple Minds- Let There BeSoho- Love GenerationNed's Ato

Radio 1's New Playlist WDR Asks For Fee Hike 6 Metropolys ... · 3/16/1991 · act Harry...

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Transcript of Radio 1's New Playlist WDR Asks For Fee Hike 6 Metropolys ... · 3/16/1991 · act Harry...