April 30th, 2012 at 09:00pm
April 29th, 2012 at 09:00pm
April 28th, 2012 at 09:00pm
This round seems to have been sparked by 2GB doing the almost unthinkable, dumping their consistently top-rating night time host Brian Wilshire, and replacing him with Steve Price, whom Macquarie Radio (owners of 2GB) still have under a five-year contract from his time at the helm of their now-abandoned foray in to the Melbourne market, MTR 1377.
This alters 2GB’s lineup a bit more than a simple replacement would. Steve Price is taking over the 8pm-midnight timeslot, which means he is replacing the Alan Jones & Ray Hadley highlights hour which was airing at 8pm, The Super Show with Peter Switzer which was airing at 9pm, and some of Brian Wilshire’s timeslot which most recently started at 10pm. Overnights will return to starting at the old start time of midnight, although it is entirely unclear who will be hosting that as the original story was that Brian Wilshire was to be given that timeslot, however he is going away for three months to write a book, so it’s entirely possible that Michael McLaren will return to the overnight show when he returns from annual leave in a week or two.
That said, I was told late last year that 2GB had plans to replace Brian Wilshire with former 2UE afternoon presenter Michael Smith. It hasn’t happened and I have seen no further evidence of it, but anything is possible at this point in time.
Regardless of what happens to the overnight show, Steve Price has announced that Andrew Bolt, who co-hosted the 8am hour of the breakfast show on MTR 1377, will be joining Steve during the 8pm hour of the 2GB show. Andrew is also on a long-term contract with Macquarie Radio thanks to the MTR venture.
It has been reported in Melbourne’s Herald Sun that the other big MTR contract, that of Steve Vizard, has been paid out as a lump sum.
Meanwhile at 2UE, it seems that despite recent improvements in 2UE’s night-time ratings on the back of Mike Jeffreys hosting the show, they have decided that they need to shuffle their presenters if they are to make in-roads from the absence of the Brian Wilshire ratings powerhouse. Honestly, I don’t understand this logic, as any change brings an element of risk. Mike Jeffreys is a well-performing established brand in the timeslot, and I would have thought that having him maintain his existing audience, while capturing a few people who have been put off by Brian Wilshire’s departure, in conjunction with Mike’s existing audience growth, would have been a sufficient strategy…but nothing that makes sense to me ever seems to make sense to The Powers That Be at 2UE.
2UE are moving morning presenter David Oldfield, who has held on to a fairly stable audience, to the night timeslot of 8pm-midnight. The strategy, presumably, is that David is familiar to 2GB’s audience, having rated quite well when he was hosting 2GB’s overnight show a couple years back, and that he is more likely to attract the Brian Wilshire audience than Mike Jeffreys is. 2UE also had planned to move Mike Jeffreys back to his former timeslot of midnight to dawn, replacing Tim Shaw, however this is now up in the air as Mike Jeffreys has decided to take two weeks off to “decide his future”.
David Oldfield’s morning slot is to be taken over by Stuart Bocking “until further notice”, whatever that might mean. Stuart has recently hosted nights for a number of years, before moving to afternoons to replace Michael Smith last year, and most recently weekend afternoons after The Two Murrays replaced him in the afternoon and Tim Webster took on a weekday evening role in the revived Sports Today program. There is no word on who will replace Stuart on the weekend until the “further notice” happens, but my money is on Clinton Maynard, who did the job for a couple weeks when Tim Webster was transitioning to Sports Today.
Confused yet? To clarify, here’s what the weekday lineups looked like a couple weeks ago:
12:00am-01:00am: 2UE Tim Shaw. 2GB Brian Wilshire.
01:00am-03:30am: 2UE Tim Shaw. 2GB Michael McLaren.
03:30am-05:00am: 2UE Tim Shaw. 2GB Andrew Moore/Luke Bona.
05:00am-05:30am: 2UE Tim Shaw. 2GB Alan Jones highlights.
05:30am-09:00am: 2UE Jason Morrison. 2GB Alan Jones.
09:00am-12:00pm: 2UE David Oldfield. 2GB Ray Hadley.
12:00pm-03:00pm: 2UE The Two Murrays. 2GB Chris Smith.
03:00pm-06:00pm: 2UE Paul Murray. 2GB Ben Fordham.
06:00pm-08:00pm: 2UE Sports Today. 2GB Money News w/ Ross Greenwood.
08:00pm-09:00pm: 2UE Mike Jeffreys. 2GB Alan Jones/Ray Hadley highlights.
09:00pm-10:00pm: 2UE Mike Jeffreys. 2GB Supperannuation w/ Peter Switzer.
10:00pm-12:00am: 2UE Mike Jeffreys. 2GB Brian Wilshire.
And the new lineups, with changes in bold.
12:00am-03:30am: 2UE Tim Shaw (but for how long?). 2GB Unknown.
03:30am-05:00am: 2UE Tim Shaw (but for how long?). 2GB Andrew Moore/Luke Bona.
05:00am-05:30am: 2UE Tim Shaw (but for how long?). 2GB Alan Jones highlights.
05:30am-09:00am: 2UE Jason Morrison. 2GB Alan Jones.
09:00am-12:00pm: 2UE Stuart Bocking (until further notice). 2GB Ray Hadley.
12:00pm-03:00pm: 2UE The Two Murrays. 2GB Chris Smith.
03:00pm-06:00pm: 2UE Paul Murray. 2GB Ben Fordham.
06:00pm-08:00pm: 2UE Sports Today. 2GB Money News w/ Ross Greenwood.
08:00pm-12:00am: 2UE David Oldfield. 2GB Steve Price.
It is probably worth noting that Peter Switzer has not been dumped by 2GB. He will stay on, providing finance reports during the Steve Price show, and will continue to fill-in for Ross Greenwood from time-to-time.
One does have to wonder what the network affiliates make of all of this. 2UE lost almost all of their morning show affiliates to Ray Hadley during the time that Steve Price, and later Steve Liebmann, hosted the show. I believe, but can’t confirm, that they only have two left, which is far cry from the 70 or so they had when John Laws hosted the morning show. One of the remaining stations is 2WEB in Bourke, and I could be certain that David mentioned another at the start of each show, but its name escapes me right now, and Google is not helping. Affiliates of David Oldfield have been lumped with yet another change of host and style as Stuart Bocking is a very different host to David.
I don’t think 2UE have any afternoon show affiliates left. Michael Smith had a couple (probably the same ones as David Oldfield), but the afternoon show isn’t even listed on Fairfax Radio Syndication’s website any more. Afternoon affiliates have either joined Chris Smith on 2GB or gone to local programming.
Then there’s the evening and overnight shows, which have seen even more changes of late. Affiliates of these shows seems to be sticking with it and in fact I see that 2ST Nowra is half way through updating their website for the overnight changes as I write this. It would seem that these affiliates are happy to take whatever 2UE give them as Mike Jeffreys mentioned that 2GB have been trying to poach affiliates for the new Steve Price show, but so far nobody has been in the least bit interested, which I find interesting as Macquarie Radio tend to undercut Fairfax on program fees by offering the shows with the proviso that the affiliates have to air some network advertising. I suppose when you’re already receiving Fairfax news overnight as part of the fee for the overnight programming, and your general break format is already configured in your automation, there is more to consider than merely which shows costs less or which host is better.
The one which really intrigues me is what 2AY will do now. 2AY have been taking the Alan Jones and Ray Hadley highlights hour from 2GB at 8pm. That show doesn’t exist any more. Will they replay the Alan Jones Hour at 8pm (surely not, seeing as they already air it at midday), air an hour of Steve Price (back when Steve Price was on 2UE Mornings, 2AY used to air an hour of his show on delay at midday), or just expand their nightly music show?
These are certainly interesting times in Sydney radio and beyond.
Samuel
1 comment April 28th, 2012 at 03:06am
April 27th, 2012 at 09:00pm
An email to Andrew Moore and 2GB’s Continuous Call Team
Good evening Andrew,
I heard you mention this morning that Humphrey B. Bear has come out of retirement. I know that he’s mute, so he can’t join the commentary team, but perhaps he could come on board the Continuous Call Team as the official mascot. I’m sure that a few old Bears fans would be happy about it.
Anyway, looking forward to a great match tonight. One-eyed prediction of Dogs by 22-6 from me.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
April 27th, 2012 at 07:41pm
There are a few movements in the radio industry in regional New South Wales which are of interest to me given my former association with some of the people involved, so hopefully the news will be of some interest to you as well. If not, please indulge me for a few minutes.
Over at 1521AM 2QN and 102.5FM Classic Rock in Deniliquin, local news presenter and senior announcer Graham Munson presented his final news bulletin for the stations this afternoon. Graham is on the move, but he is not saying where he is going just yet, only that he has been offered a job elsewhere, and is not at liberty to make an announcement about it yet. Graham had filled this and other roles at 2QN and Classic Rock since 2006 and I had the pleasure of both filling in for, and working alongside Graham on a number of occasions. At the end of Graham’s final 2QN news bulletin he mentioned that it had “been a pleasure to present the news for you and to do programs as well”. He signed off by wishing all of his listeners all the best for the future.
Graham is a very dedicated and professional man, and I fondly remember a couple occasions where I was filling in for him and he popped in to the studios to hand me a story he had been working on while he was on holidays. He is very nurturing of young talent, and I’m sure that he will be a great asset to whichever station it is that has hired him.
Filling Graham’s shoes will be Rob Harrington, who most recently was the local news journalist and presenter of the news-based Country Lunch Hour on 2LF in Young. Rob previously filled in for Graham a number of times at 2QN and I got to work with him for a week in 2009 when I filled in on 2QN’s breakfast show and Rob was in the newsroom. Rob starts on Monday.
Rob departed 2LF on Friday last week and has, as yet, not been replaced. His duties have been assumed by 2LF breakfast host Neil Langford. It is not currently known if this is a permanent arrangement, but I can say this: I have not seen the job advertised anywhere.
This afternoon I recorded Graham’s final couple of news bulletins. For your listening pleasure, and as a record of a fairly big change in the media landscape in Deniliquin and Echuca, here are the 2QN local news bulletins from 4:30pm and 5:30pm this afternoon.
[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/20120427-GrahamMunsonFinal2QNBulletins.mp3]
Download MP3
Samuel
April 27th, 2012 at 07:10pm
April 26th, 2012 at 09:00pm
6 comments April 25th, 2012 at 09:00pm
April 24th, 2012 at 09:00pm
April 23rd, 2012 at 09:00pm
April 22nd, 2012 at 09:00pm
April 21st, 2012 at 09:00pm
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