22.09.2006: Rant about radio...:Ron, IU

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"Hit It" by Shelley today debuted in the official Irish charts at No.10 despite the (as usual) refusal of some of our National radio stations to afford it any radio exposure until after the rest of the world did.

The song hasn't as far as we can make out, been played on the national broadcaster in any of it's hundreds of hours of radio.

Of course, it's only just been released last week and only got into the Charts this week, so what's wrong with them not playing it? Well, they play international singles for (sometimes) months before their official release date.

We're a little bit fed up, to be honest, of Irish radio ignoring Irish artists until way beyond the point where they could have had a huge and significant infulence in promoting our developing Artists and therefore our Industry.

It's very easy to be safe and only play an Artist's songs after they're famous (as happened with dozens of Irish artists before now and will happen to many more) but maybe our national broadcaster, to whom we pay our license fee, should put more emphasis on playing Irish music (and I don't *only* mean traditional nor already-successful) rather than playing international Acts to such a huge extent.

If they play developing Irish acts a lot more, then they give them a stage for their music, they make more Irish people aware of the depth of Irish talent, they generate Royalties so the Artist (and therefore the Industry) can develop, meaning that more and more of the money generated in Ireland by the Music Industry will actually stay in Ireland.

Instead, they tell us that all we apparently want to hear is imported material, which they then play, make the public aware of it, who then buy it, making it Chart high, so radio plays it because it must be what we want to hear if we're buying it, and thereby creating Royalties for for those poor underpriveleged superstars and millionaires. Money that leaves the Irish economy generally.

I once said that it should not be a novelty to hear an Irish artist on an Irish radio station, and I still believe that. Some stations take their responsibilities very seriously, our National broadcaster doesn't seem to. Some presenters make the effort to discover new Artists, new talent and showcase it. Many radio stations think that Joe Public doesn't want to hear new Irish artists, most of us, if asked, do.

Of course, there are some presenters and stations that are better than others but our National broadcaster really isn't doing enough especially when we are essentially paying them to create marketting opportunities for record labels to take our money out of the Country. Imagine if Enterprise Ireland was set up to spend taxpayers money to send jobs abroad? Imagine if the Tourist marketting spend was designed to send people to another Country on holidays?

Radio will tell us that they give us what we want. Unfortunately, as anyone who knows anything about Radio scehdulling will understand, it doesn't. Radio tells Joe Public what's available. What to buy. What to listen to.

I have no doubt that Shelley's debut in the Top Ten will prompt more plays of her song on Irish radio stations but I wonder if that will include RTE. I hope so.

Who knows, I might be surprised.

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