It’s Flashback Friday. Every Friday we bring back a golden oldie article from yesteryear. A chance for you to re-read it and see if it is still relevant today!
I am not one of those mad radio anoraks who believes that just because a person has a fetish for calling a new radio station the same name as a very dead one, that somehow the original radio station has come back to life. The obsession with wanting to recreate old dead radio stations is at best a compliment to the power and impression made by the originals such as Radio Caroline or Radio London, and at worse some advanced form of mental illness.
One man obsessed with the original offshore radio station Radio London, or “Big L” is Ray Anderson. Ray is not a stranger to the radio world having had important connections with offshore radio from the 70s onwards, and at one time owning his own radioship. A local radio station even broadcast from his premises in the 80s with a lucrative deal that significantly enhanced his business of providing high quality radio memorabilia and other radio presenter aids and props.
Throughout the ups and downs of his own business life, the passion for Big L remained. Despite the station having closed in 1967, as the years have ticked slowly by Ray has been behind annual legal recreations using small low powered 28 day licences. His fascination is with the jingles and the lively way presenters weaved their magic in and out of them, in and out of the commercials, and in and out of the songs. A presentation style which never really made it ashore to the developing commercial radio network that eventually replaced the pirate stations of the 60s.
Ray’s either a hero or a villain in the eyes of radio enthusiasts, very few people aren’t polarised. Whichever he really is, he definitely isn’t a quitter. Finally he raised enough investment to bring back Big L full time. Ok, maybe it’s not bringing Big L back. Maybe that should read that he’s raised enough to recreate Big L full time.
The original Big L covered most of South-East England with a single high powered transmitter operating on Medium Wave at a time when there was little else to tune in to. This millennium’s Big L has a permanent home on Sky channel 940, beaming into 8 million homes in the UK and Ireland. In addition, a transmitter based in the Netherlands will attempt to bring Big L to Eastern coastal regions on 1395 kHz Medium Wave.
Sadly, this leaves Big L at a disadvantage compared to modern day competition. To compete on a fair and level playing-field Big L needs to be beaming its format via FM and DAB alongside the many and varied services from the current providers of commercial radio. This isn’t the case, so just how will Big L survive?
Indeed, should Big L survive? Despite my knee-jerk feeling of a need to lift my eyes to the heavens and tut because it’s yet more playing at radio, my answer is actually yes, it must survive. Maybe this is because Ray Anderson’s passion is so strong that it would be wrong for him to lose the battle to keep the Big L name alive.
The original Big L, although so much rosier in people’s memories than it actually was in real life, was an innovator, giving us the likes of Tony Blackburn, Kenny Everett and John Peel, people who went on to shape established radio.
Maybe a modern Big L should be taking on the BBC all over again. In 2005, where Radio 2 is the most listened to station in the land with its unique mix of personality based broadcasting with a big playlist of a wide range of songs and ability to appeal to most 35 – 55 year olds that listen to music radio, there is no commercial equivalent or competition. This is who Big L should be trying to steal back.
With luck, the new Big L will have certain sounds and philosophies born of the original, but overlayed with a modern approach to bring innovation and fun back to the airwaves. For too long the commercial sector has sounded boring and robotised. Big L has the opportunity to make that happy difference by giving presentation back to the presenters.
Despite the stumbling block of no FM and DAB carriage, but with people such as Sir Cliff Richard and Olivia Newton John enthusiastically putting their names behind the station, and presenters like Mike Read having a go at a format they used to listen to as a child, Big L has an opportunity to make people sit up and listen. However, only if it uses the legacy of the original station to move forward, not move backward. If the desire to just recreate the past is resisted, Big L may well be the most important UK radio development in decades.
England's England 