Steve Conway Joins 8Radio.com As It Launches On FM In Dublin, Cork, Limerick
Posted: March 25, 2013 Filed under: 8Radio.com, Music, New Music, radio | Tags: 8Radio.com, broadcasting, Cork, Dublin, Ireland, Irish Radio, Limerick, Music, radio Leave a comment »Delighted to return to the Irish Airwaves - Steve Conway “thrilled” to be joining “interesting and passionate team at 8Radio.com“
Steve Conway is to join the team at 8Radio.com, Ireland’s brand new online radio station, which will also operate on FM in Dublin, Cork and Limerick for 15 weekends starting this Saturday.
8Radio.com is the brainchild of Simon Maher who was previously a founder presenter and General Manager of Phantom 105.2 from its early days as a pirate station through to its days as a fully licenced operation.
Following his departure from Phantom in early 2011, Simon has been working on putting together a group of like-minded individuals with a love of music and radio. “I’ve been asking people what they listen to for a year now and so many people have deserted traditional radio altogether which is a great shame” Simon comments.
“People still love music though so they have replaced their terrestrial radio listening with online radio/spotify/deezer and their own playlists which are by their nature a bit less structured than traditional radio. So, when we started putting the music for 8Radio together, we have gone for a much more random selection. Think Tom Waits followed by Dutch Uncles followed by The Blades at lunchtime!”
From studios in Dublin, 8Radio.com will broadcast live online through its website http://8radio.com, as well as stylish apps for Android and iPhone.
From March 30th though to July 7th 2013 8Radio.com can also be heard on FM every weekend in Dublin (94.3), Cork (106.7) and Limerick (105.5).
Steve, who will be be heard every Saturday night / Sunday morning from 11pm to 2am says:
“I am really thrilled to be joining this exciting project, and to be working with such a passionate and dedicated team to bring this new station to life. In particular it is great to be working with Simon Maher again, a man for whom I have huge respect. I worked for him at Phantom for 11 years, and his drive and enthusiasm never failed to inspire me“
Simon Maher (left) 8Radio.com founder, with Steve Conway (file photo)
Steve continues “Over the years I have worked for some wonderful radio stations, including Caroline and Phantom, and not forgetting South East Sound the rock pirate in South London where I started my career 28 years ago. I’ve always been very picky about the places I choose to broadcast, as I feel that I do my best work in environments where I feel really enthused and inspired by the team around me. So I’ve leapt at the the chance to work for 8Radio.com, because here is a station that is born out of genuine enthusiasm for music and radio, with a brilliant team made up of a mixture of all ages and backgrounds, but all believers in how great radio can be if it is made with passion“
For more information on the station visit 8Radio.com.
Steve will be on air every Saturday from 11pm through to 2am Sunday morning.
The Day I Realised I Was One Of THEM
Posted: January 10, 2012 Filed under: Classic Rock, Early Phantom, Events, IT, IT Support, Life, Listeners, Music, New Music, Phantom 105.2 | Tags: Getting Old, Microsoft, Music, New Music, radio, Rolling Stones, Windows 95 1 Comment »
I was always on the rebel side.
It was Us versus Them, the forces of rock and roll and musical freedom struggling against the older generation, those in power, the corporate and musical estblishment whose music was of a bygone age. I was always on the side of “Us” and would never change. Or so I thought . .
Of course, my friend and onetime Caroline colleague Christopher England would tell me differently. Chris has many hobby horses, and one of them is a dislike of “oldie music” and a disdain for how quickly the new young thrusting generation become oldies themselves, despising newer music from a younger generation, and believing that theirs was the only true generation of revolution. Chris talks about this a lot, but it was not Chris who brought me to see the error of my ways, though funnily enough my moment of realisation did come when I was in his company, sitting beside him in a darkened theatre in central London, waiting for a tech launch.
Chris is my tech mentor in life you see. Even though I have been involved in IT for more than 30 years, and have worked either directly or on projects for the biggest names in the business - Microsoft, Apple, Dell, Compaq, HP – Chris has always been at least two steps ahead of me when it comes to living in the future.
My first ever mobile phone? Reccomended and procured for me by Chris (who had earlier got me into that great yuppie trend of the late 80s, the pager).
It was Chris who told me about the Orange network, which had this unique new geeky feature not available on any other network, the facility to send short SMS text messages. My first messages were to and from Chris.
Christopher England, in hiding.
When, at a technology exhibition in Earls Court in 1992 I tried out a very early video-phone on the BT stand, it was Chris who was the blocky, pixellated face at the other end, jerking around at a rate of about 2 or 3 frames per second (or that’s what it seemed like anyway). Skype was far, far in the future in those days.
It was Chris who first mentioned some weird tech start up called Twitter, long before it was anything other than a curiosity, and at least two years before it became mainstream.
Not all of his playthings went on to success however. I vividly remember a huge, multi-caller, interactive premium-rate phoneline called “The Villa” which he was an administrator of, into which you could dial if you wanted to meet and interact with people. By pressing commands on the phone you could go into different areas of the villa, meet different people in different rooms, play games, chat etc. It was woefully clunky and terribly expensive, but I can’t help thinking back to it when I see some of the interactions on Facebook.
And so it was that when Microsoft were launching their huge step forward that was Windows 95, it was Chris that I was sitting beside in a large theatre or other such place somewhere in central London. I can’t remember the exact date, but a look back at the launch schedule for Windows 95 tells me that this must have been sometime around, or just before, August 1995.
As we sat waiting for the show to begin, I was very pleased to hear a Rolling Stones track “Start Me Up” being played. (of course, prior to the launch we would not have known that this was a planned part of the whole Win95 theme, in reference to the “Start” menu).
I remember thinking that, after years of big corporate giants being very conservative and oldies focussed in their music for events like this, that it was great that finally they were moving forward, and recognising the value of “our” generation’s music, being young and rebellious, rather than middle aged. Maybe we were winning our battles after all!
And then it hit me, and that one single moment changed my whole worldview on music. This was not big business recognising the value of youthful rebellious music. This was my generation, and our music having been around for long enough that people of my age were now moving up into positions of corporate and government responsibility. This was my generation’s music, in effect, becoming the new “safe” choice, favoured by people drifting towards middle age. This was the moment that I realised that, without so much as a whisper of warning, time had played the cruellest trick of all, and now “we” were becoming “them”.
And sure enough, the signs were there. A new generation of music bubbling under that was not really listened to by my generation, the fact that our music was now increasingly playlisted on mainstream radio . .
From that day on, I could see the truth in Christopher England’s polemic about how closed people’s minds became to everything new over time, and I resolved to think and act differently myself. And this was a good time to do it, as around about the same time as Microsoft was launching Windows 95 another giant was rethinking its strategy, as the BBC started a revemp of Radio 1, to howls of protest from established presenters and audience, that would see a new generation of presenters coming on board, bringing with them the new wave of dance, rock and alternative sounds that had been there, but ignored for quite some time.
Later I was to end up at Phantom FM in Dublin, where for 11 years I was constantly fed a diet of new bands and live gigs. That really helped me to stay up to date, and I couldn’t help but smile when, on the station’s message board in the mid noughties, I saw listeners complaining about how the new music it was playing now was not the same as the new music it had been playing five years earlier.
“They are playing crap aimed at 16 year olds” these 21 year olds would complain, “not like when we were 16, the music was much better then”.
Having recently left Phantom to strike out on my own, I’m working harder than ever to keep up to date on new music, and try to feature a minimum of 50% new material on my shows each week on Radio Seagull. I don’t have the dislike of oldies that Chris has, but on the other hand I don’t have the dislike of modern music that so many of my contemporaries seem to have grown into.
And, though it is itself an “oldie” now in computing terms, that’s as good a reason to be thankful for Windows 95 as any.
Steve
Christmas Greetings – and Shows
Posted: December 22, 2011 Filed under: Music, New Music, radio, Radio Caroline, Radio Seagull | Tags: Music, New Music, Radio Caroline, Radio Seagull Leave a comment »
Wishing you a very Happy Christmas & a peaceful New year.
I’m on-air at my usual times, with some extra hours over Christmas:
Christmas Eve on Radio Seagull: Instead of the normal show on Radio Seagull from 7-9am CET (6-8GMT) repeated in the evening, I will be presenting two individual shows at thos times, so twice the music:
24th Dec Radio Seagull www.radioseagull.com 0600-0800 GMT (0700-0900 CET)
24th Dec Radio Seagull www.radioseagull.com 1800-2000 GMT (1900-2100 CET)
Then on Boxing Day / St Stephens Day my show on Caroline has an extra hour:
26th Dec Radio Caroline www.radiocaroline.co.uk 1300-1600 GMT
On New Years Eve my Seagull show is a special featuring the best of the new music I’ve played throughout 2011
31st Dec Radio Seagull www.radioseagull.com 0600-0800 GMT repeated 1800-2000 (0700-0900 CET repeated 1900-2100)
Then normal show on Bank Holiday Monday Jan 2nd on Caroline:
2nd Jan 2012 Radio Caroline www.radiocaroline.co.uk 1400-1600
I hope you get the chance to join me at some stage over Christmas, if not, may I wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year now.
I’ll be back in the New Year with details of my forthcoming book . .
Steve
So Who Are Radio Seagull?
Posted: October 24, 2011 Filed under: broadcast engineering, Classic Rock, Music, New Music, offshore, Radio presenting, Radio Seagull, Ships, storms at sea, Weather | Tags: Music Radio, Offshore Radio, radio, Radio Seagull, Ships, The Netherlands, Transmitters, Waddenzee 1 Comment »
Radio Seagull, from the lightship Jenni Baynton
The recent test-transmissions on 1395Khz by Radio Seagull have driven quite a few Google search requests to this blog, so I’ve decided to give a quick run-down on the station for any new visitors, as well as for those who follow me for my other content and might be curious.
Please note my disclaimer: I am a Radio Seagull presenter myself (Saturdays 7-9am and pm CET, 6-8am and pm UK/Irish time) so you are reading an insider rather than an outsiders point of view. Having said that, I also have to point out that all views are my own, and not neccessarily endorsed by the station.
Hey, these are just some guys I was close to when I took this picture. Pretty supportive too.
So, what is Radio Seagull?
Radio Seagull is a full-time, permanent, licenced terrestrial, English-language radio station based in The Netherlands, specifically the town of Harlingen, in the northern coastal area. As well as AM coverage emenating from Harlingen, the station can be heard worldwide via its online stream, accessible from the station website - www.radioseagull.com
How can I hear Radio Seagull?
In The Netherlands the station shares its AM frequency (1602Khz) with Radio Waddenzee, a regional station servicing the north of The Netherlands in the Dutch language. Waddenzee is heard from 7am-7pm and Seagull from 7pm to 7am on mediumwave, however Seagull is available 24 hours a day online.
(Radio Waddenzee takes its name from The Wadden Zee, a large area of sea on the fringe of the North Sea, but partly protected by a chain of islands 20km or so from the coast.)
As well as terrestrial and online outlets, Radio Seagull is sometimes carried as a sustaining service on other stations around the world. Currently the station is being relayed as the content of a series of test transmissions on 1395Khz on AM, which are being made from the Radio Seagull ship, the Jenni Baynton. These are scheduled to continue until mid-November (but Seagull will continue to be available on its permanent frequency of 1602Khz, at all times).
What type of programmes does Radio Seagull have?
Radio Seagull features both modern alternative and classic rock, as well as a wide variety of specialist music shows. Some presenters specialise in new and alternative music, others present more general shows. Details can be found at the website www.radioseagull.com.
In order to cater for international listeners in different time-zones, the schedule is organised into groups of programmes in 12-hour blocks, repeated once the same day – so that, for example, a show aired at 3-5pm will also be aired at 3-5am, giving people in different parts of the world the chance to hear each show in their “daytime”.
Seagull presenters (left to right) Steve Conway, Chris Kennedy, Mandy, Dave Foster
How is Radio Seagull different from other stations I can hear on the internet, or local stations on FM?
Radio Seagull’s programming philosophy is to gather together experienced and professional presenters from around the world, people who are passionate about the music they play, or very knowledgeable in their specialist area, and to give them complete creative freedom to produce the best shows that they can. Unlike larger commercial radio stations, there is no restriction on playlist size, and as a result the music you hear on air is incredibly diverse and wide-ranging.
Radio Seagull's Martin Smith samples life at sea
Presenters come from all across Europe and further afield to work on Seagull, and many are people who have been involved in radio for a long time.
So what’s all this about a ship?
Radio Seagull (and its sister station Radio Waddenzee) are housed on board a former British Lightship (LV8), the Jenni Baynton, which is normally berthed in the harbour at Harlingen. The ship itself is an attraction, bursting full of history, and much restored since its acquisition by Seagull in the early 2000s, and it makes a wonderful base for the radio station – lots of room for studios, engineering facilities, radio mast, and cabins where crew and visiting DJs can be accomodated during special offshore broadcasts. The station also has landbased transmission facilities.
But the ship is more than just a static base.
Once a year, for the last several years, the station has put to sea for periods of about a month each summer, with crew and DJs living on board, a great opportunity for friendships to be rekindled and knowledge to be swapped, as well as recreating some of the excitement of the old offshore radio days (a number of the Seagull presenters, myself included, are veterans of the former offshore pirate stations such as Radio Caroline).
Sietse Brouwer, founder and owner of Radio Seagull & Waddenzee.
Who is behind Radio Seagull?
Seagull is the brainchild of Sietse Brouwer, a Dutch businessman and radio presenter who also spent some time working with Radio Caroline in the 1990s. Sietse has a passion for good radio, and a great love of ships, and putting the two together in his home town of Harlingen has occupied a great part of his time for the last 10 years.
Where can I get more info / how can I listen?
The best place to start for both is the website – www.radioseagull.com
You can also see more of my pictures from Radio Seagull’s offshore adventures at the following pages:
http://steveconway.wordpress.com/seagull/the-jenni-baynton-at-sea/
http://steveconway.wordpress.com/seagull/inside-the-jenni-baynton/
http://steveconway.wordpress.com/seagull/jenni-baynton-crew/
http://steveconway.wordpress.com/2011/06/07/dreamy-seagull-pics/
If you are a new visitor, I hope this has answered your questions, and made you curious enough to listen.
I can be heard every Saturday 7-9am and pm CET, (6-8am and pm UK/Irish time).
But don’t just listen to me – the rest of the presenters are superb!
Steve
Another Rebel Gets Old, Disses New Music
Posted: October 5, 2011 Filed under: Music, New Music | Tags: Creation Records, New Music, Sony Leave a comment »It’s a depressingly familiar scenario.
A Musician/Record Producer/Radio DJ (delete as appropriate) makes/signs/plays lots of wonderful new music in his/her youth and early 30s. The world is aflame, it is brilliant, there is so much talent out there . .
Then he/she gets older, mourns the loss of all that wonderful creativity of their era, and decries todays music as “shit”.
See the Phantom 105.2 website for the story of Creation Records founder Alan McGee who laughs at the destruction of the Sony warehouse in London (which wiped out the stock of dozens of indie record labels, and artists as well as DVD stock) because, in his view, it was full of “shit” new music which “you couldn’t sell”.
Just like the people who decried his music as “rubbish” when he was busy signing the talent of the 90s, Alan has now fallen into the trap of viewing the past through rose-tinted glasses and the future through blinkers.
Never mind. There is a whole generation of new musicians waiting out there, and these days they don’t even need a record label or the approval of an Alan McGee to get heard.
And I welcome them all. I’m nearly 50, but I haven’t stopped being excited by new bands yet . . and hopefully I never will.
Check out my show on Radio Seagull every Saturday 6-8am and 6-8pm (7-9 CET) for at least 50% brand new music mixed in with recent and older classics.
Steve
Music Variety – Sample Seagull playlist – 1st October 2011
Posted: October 2, 2011 Filed under: Music, New Music, Radio Seagull | Tags: Alternative Rock, Indie Rock, New Music, radio, Radio Seagull Leave a comment »Every Saturday I present on Radio Seagull, from 6-8am UK/Irish time, repeated later the same day 6-8pm. (or 7-9 European time)
If you enjoy indie and alternative music, you’ll get lots of it, with the occasional folk or country and the odd piece of classic rock. I aim each week to have a minimum of 50% of the show made up of brand new material – mostly tracks from forthcoming or just released albums, EPs and the odd single, along with demos and unsigned bands.
Below is my running order from yesterday, to give you a flavour of the kind and variety of music played.
You can pick up Radio Seagull on AM in The Netherlands and eastern UK (1602khz and currently testing for a limited period on 1395khz) and online everywhere else via www.radioseagull.com
| Artist | Name |
| HOUR 1 | |
| Von Shakes | Happy Song |
| Chris Rea | Never Tie Me Down |
| Arcade Fire | Neighborhood #3 (Power Out) |
| Juliana Hatfield | Sex and Drugs |
| Liz Phair | Ride |
| The Retrospective Soundtrack Players | Send Me the Hell Back Home [20" fade] |
| Ham Sandwich | Floors |
| Grateful Dead | Touch Of Grey |
| Ida Maria | 10,000 Lovers |
| CSS | Rhythm to the Rebels |
| Wolventrix | Wanderlust – Single |
| Joe Bonamassa | The Meaning of the Blues |
| Cheap Girls | Cored to Empty (Demo Version) |
| Rush | Red Barchetta |
| Dinosaur Pile Up | Birds & Planes |
| HOUR 2 | |
| The Presidents Of The United States Of America | Truckstop Butterfly |
| Sum 41 | Crash |
| The Waterboys | White Birds |
| Rocket from the Tombs | Romeo & Juliet |
| The Rapture | Children |
| Sleeper | Click…Off…Gone |
| Big Audio Dynamite | E=Mc² |
| *** RS Jingle *** | xxsj-DRY-Seagull ID only ACP |
| Warpaint | Undertow |
| Howling Bells | Gold Suns, White Guns |
| Lanterns On The Lake | A Kingdom |
| Samiam | Happy for You |
| Chris Rea | Dance With Me All Night Long |
| Lace Weeper | Parhelion |
| Michael Schenker Group | Armed And Ready |
After 11 years, I bow out from Phantom
Posted: March 22, 2011 Filed under: Early Phantom, Music, New Music, Phantom 105.2, Radio Caroline, Radio presenting, Radio Seagull | Tags: Dublin, Funny clips, Goodbye, Ireland, Old Phantom, Phantom 105.2, Pirate Radio, radio 2 Comments »
- Feeling relaxed in the Phantom studio on a Sunday afternoon
After 11 very happy and eventful years with the Dublin Indie-rock station Phantom, I presented my last show on St. Patricks Day. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my time with Phantom, but increasing time pressures from my other activities mean that I have had to make some choices about what to focus my energies on.
I can still be heard every Saturday 6-8am (repeated 6-8pm) on Radio Seagull(AM in The Netherlands and online) with a show devoted to rock in all its forms and featuring a minimum of 50% newly released material, and each Monday 2-4pm on Radio Caroline (Sky Digital ch.0199 and online ) playing album tracks from the last 50 years, including new releases. And I am currently in the planning stages of a new venture that will give exposure to independent and unsigned Irish bands and artists.
I have very many happy memories from my 11 years with Phantom, and I will post some of them here over the next little while.
For now I’d like to thank everyone from all of the eras of Phantom, pirate to temporary to commercial, for making me so welcome, and to wish the great team charged with taking the station into the future all the success in the world.
I’ll leave you with a little memory from my early days with the station, when we broadcast from a secret base above Whelans of Wexford Street, and an “unexpected splash of colour” on the breakfast show:
Phantom Breakfast – Aug 2001 (click to play – format: mp3)
- In Phantom’s old studio, in the pirate days.
Those were the days my friend . . .
Steve
Does it Matter If They Sank Without A Trace?
Posted: March 4, 2011 Filed under: Early Phantom, Music, New Music, radio, Radio Caroline, Radio presenting, Radio Seagull | Tags: ex Girlfriends, Irish Music, Milk, Music, New Music, Old Phantom, Popular Culture, radio, Radio Caroline, Radio Seagull, Unsigned Bands Leave a comment »
It’s just after sunset on a weekday evening sometime in the late summer of 2001. I’m in the front room of a suburban house somewhere just off the Rock Road in Dublin, within a stones throw of the sea. I can’t remember exactly where, now, but I do remember the excitement of all involved, especially myself.
I was in a house I’d never been to before, facing four lads I didn’t know, who were about to give me a wonderful gift – their dreams, inspiration and pespiration, all wrapped up in that little package of hope that is called a demo CD. They gave it to me, freshly burned and unlabelled, and I was out the door promising them that yes, I would listen to it, and yes, I would give it a spin on the breakfast show on Phantom (this was back in the pirate days when we were glouriously un-corporate and unbranded ourselves).
I was the breakfast DJ on Phantom FM back in those days, and had developed something of a reputation amongst newly formed bands for my willingness to put new material straight on the air, without letting my own opinions moderate, and without any vetting process other than making sure that the contents were not obscene. I was always willing to give a new band their first play, and indeed later developed a feature or “hook” on my show whereby I would ask people to send me in their demos, and I would open the package, and put it straight on, live on air, giving a running commentary of what it looked like and anything else in the envelope. The music wasn’t always outstanding, but it often showed promise and sometimes greatness, and best of all it made for wonderful live radio.
There were unintended comic interludes too, like the time that a then unknown band called Ham Sandwich left me a CD, and to pique my interest, they included a Ham Sandwich in the package. Sadly I was away for a couple of days, so when I did open the package on air, it was to a quite noxious smell . . .
Better still was my dumbfounded silence and quick switch to music one morning when the package I opened during a live link, expecting a musical treat, turned out not to be a demo from some new band, but an ex-girlfriend returning some belongings to me c/o the station a few weeks after we split up!
But to go back to the lads in the house somewhere off the Rock Road, I did indeed play their music, and liked it so much that I still have the CD some ten years later. There were two epic tracks and one very passable 4 minute single-candidate on their, with a depth of lyrics that matched the passion I had seen on their faces during our brief encounter.
Nothing ever came of this band, indeed I never heard of them again, and as far as I can make out, they must have split up and gone their different ways many years ago without even the faintest glimmer of the success that I felt they deserved. I can find no trace of them now, and an internet search only reveals a new, and seemingly unrelated Dublin poprock band who have taken the same name – “Milk“.
Now, by any defination of those involved in mainstream radio, my demo tracks from the original 2001-era Milk band are unknown, unplayable, in effect worthless. But I ask myself – why?
Does it matter that these people had no rise to fame, no chart success, no record deal? If I like what I hear when I play the CD, does it matter that no one knows them? If a piece of music deserves to be heard for the passion put into it, why should it be discounted just because it is unknown?
For me, music, once committed from the soul of its creator to the medium of storage, is a valid choice forever, even if it is the tree falling in the forest that nobody is there to hear.
I still seek out and play brand new music on my shows on Radios Seagull and Caroline to this day, alongside the better known material, and i still dig out and play, from time to time, the songs of the forgotten bands who came and went unknown despite their talent.
Join me, this Saturday (5th March 2011) for my regular weekly show on Radio Seagull, for two hours of music worth hearing, old, new, successful and unknown alike, including a track of that 2001 demo from a forgotten band called “Milk” (no apparent relation to the current Dublin band of the same name).
And I may even throw in some Ham Sandwich too, though without any noxious smells!
Saturday 6-8am (repeated 6-8pm) Irish time (or 7-9 CET)
or 1602Khz AM in the Northern Netherlands
Steve
Free (choice) Radio – Putting Together A Typical Seagull Saturday Show
Posted: February 19, 2011 Filed under: Classic Rock, Music, New Music, offshore, radio, Radio presenting, Radio Seagull | Tags: Classic Rock, DJ, Indie Rock, MegaSeg, Music, New Music, Radio Automation Software, Radio presenting, Radio Seagull, Software Leave a comment »
- Steve Conway with the Jenni Baynton in the background, taken on the tender back to shore
Every Saturday from 0600 to 0800 and again at 1800-2000 GMT (or an hour later if you are in Central European Timezone) I present a two-hour rock and indie show on Radio Seagull, an English-language station based in Northern Holland, which can be heard locally on 1602 AM, or globally via the Seagull website.
Once a year, usually in early summer, Seagull puts to sea in its lightship the Jenni Baynton, and the crew of broadcasters and engineers live and work together for a period of weeks, but for the rest of the year I prepare and present the shows from my own studio in Dublin, and link across to the Seagull transmitter through a fast broadband connection.
The joy of Seagull is that within the parameter of being broadly a rock station, it is entirely free format, so I have 100% free choice in what I choose to play, and how I structure the show each week. As long as I include a couple of scheduled adverts/promos, and time correctly to let the local studio in The Netherlands insert an ad-break at the top of the hour, the show is absolutely my own to do with as i please.
If I want to play an ultra-long prog-rock track, I can, if I want to put a softer pop tune inbetween some new rock releases I do, and no one will query my judgement. There is no need to “play safe” so I can goas far down the road of new releases from little-known bands as I like. Or I can theme the show on a whim if I want.
Seagull works on the principle of using presenters who are passionate about what they do, and trusts them totally. It’s a heady freedom, and I love it.
Working free-format is a breeze if you are doing a one-off, but can be more demanding if you are doing a show every week – avoiding the trap of going down the same routes too often, keeping it fresh, and knowing when and where you have played something before. Thankfully technology makes this so much easier these days, but even so, I probably spend about 5 hours – an entire evening each week – preparing the Saturday shows. It’s always worth it though.
A few people have asked about Seagull and what we play, and others about the mechanics of it, so i thought a quick walk-through of how I prepare a show, and the finished playlist would be fun to write and put up.
So here is my Seagull show for Saturday 19th February 2011, from blank page to finished playlist.
I use a wonderful piece of software called MegaSeg to manage my personal music library, put together playlists, and act as a ‘virtual studio” when I am presenting the shows. I purchased this rather than using one of the various shareware packages that are around because of its depth of features – you could run a complete radio station via MegaSeg if you needed to, and I find that it has paid for itself several times over in the ease of access it gives me to store and search my music, and the flexibility it allows me in building and presenting a show.
So, looking at the playlist window, we start of with a clean slate:
- MegaSeg playlist window, starting off with just the adverts I need to play.
In the screenshot above, I’ve added in markers to indicate the two hours of the show, and the couple of promos that need to be played in each. At the bottom is shows me the total running time of the current playlist (2 mins 39 secs ).
The first thing I will do will be to select and put in all of the new music that I am going to feature in the show. I generally like to have about 50% of the content of the show being brand new or very recent material. Again, there is no specific rule for this on Seagull – I am free to use as much or as little new music as I like, the 50ish 5 is my own personal preference, based on the fact that I enjoy discovering and sharing new sounds, and that having a high content of new material is one way of keeping a free-format show sounding fresh month after month.
Step 1 - I've added in the new and recent tracks I'll play today
OK, so in the shot above, I have now added in my new music content, and the playlist comes to 1 hour 13 mins, so probably around 60% or so on this occasion. From the current timestamp (the number bottom left) compared to the previous shot, you will see that it has taken around an hour for me to settle on the blend of new tracks I’ll be playing today.
Most of these will be very new (just out, or possibly pre release), some will be from within the last 2-3 months, and a couple may possibly be older, but from a newly released album or compilation.
At this point, the tracks are not in a specific order, I have just placed them into the playlist roughly equally distributed between the two hours. I’ll know better what running order I want once I’ve added the other material. I do however know that I want the 16 minute Trail of Dead track, “Tao of the Dead Pt. 2″ to come out of the ad break in the first hour, so I’ve put it in place there.
These tracks are a mixture of album and EP tracks, with the odd single. Usually each week there is one album or EP which I have just bought, and I will feature two tracks from, one per hour – this week it is The Fallen Drakes.
The Library window allows me to choose from all music on the system
In the shot above we are looking at the Library window, which allows me to choose from the roughly 10,000 tracks I have available (including jingles, promos, adverts as well as music). MegaSeg has a very powerful search function which is instant as you type in the words to be searched for, or you can view the entire library listed by Artist, by Album, by Song Title, by duration, by Genre, or by Date Added (the latter being useful for isolating the newest material).
In this view above, we are looking at the library by duration – this is very useful when you need to complete a playlist to time exactly to the finish of an hour, and need, for example, a choice of all the tracks that are 5 mins 43 in duration, as seen here. I also use the view-by-duration as a good way of randomising the library when i am picking older tracks to play – whereas when viewing by album or artist your eye might be drawn to better known tracks, if you pick a randon time on the list and scroll up or down from it, you will quite often pick up a good collection of varied tracks that might not have lept out at you in the more ordered view.
Playlist closer to completion - all tracks added
I have now added enough older material to fill out the the remaining 47 minutes (and it’s taken me a bit more than two hours just to make those choices!). The total playlist length is now 2 hours, 2 mins and 21 seconds – slightly over-long, but that will get cut down shortly. It’s still not neccessarily in the final order though, but I’ve made sure to choose the start track in each hour carefully – I like to have something reasonably strong, and not too quiet to start off the hour.
You will notice that whereas some of the songs have just a duration, others have more info – for example “Wild Angels” by Magnum says :24/5:32/F. This means that the intro on the song is 24 seconds before vocals start, it is 5 mins 32 long, and ends with a gradual fade (the other options are “C” for a “Cold” or sudden ending, and “S” for “Sustain” when it ends on a drawn out note or flourish).
I will need to go through and set this on the other tracks in the playlist – once I have done this, the library will remember this information, so I’l never have to do it again for that track.
Editing track start/stop info and other details in MegaSeg
In the picture above I am editing the details for Heather Nova’s “Walk This World”.
Setting the intro length is handy, but setting the endpoint is essential. Almost all commercial CD releases of music include a couple of seconds of silence after the end of the track, sometimes as much as 4 or 5 seconds, and it is important to tell the system the exact point at which you wish it to cut to the next track if you are to avoid gaps. Similarly, it is occasionally neccessary to set a start point a second or two into the recording if it starts with silence – this is especially a problem with non-commercial and demo CDs from bands. You also have a drop-down menu for recording the ending type.
Going through and doing this for each track on the playlist will usually take another hour. As the system stores these settings, gradually more and more of my library will be already done, but I’ll always have to edit the details on the new arrivals.
Playlist with all tracks info edited
Here is the playlist somewhat later – all track details now recorded, and endpoints set – note this has knocked a full 2 minutes of the duration of the playlist – that’s a lot of little silences!
I have also put in a couple of jingles (will drop in more when I’m actually presenting), plus there are some spots marked “BREAK: Wait for Segue“. This is where I have commanded the system to stop, and wait for me to manually restart it – this is for places where I want to speak for a bit longer, and won’t be using the song intro, and also for the end of the hour, where the studio in The Netherlands will insert an ad break at the top of the hour.
All of this, which has taken probably around 3 hours or more, can be done at any stage, several days in advance of the show if neccessary. All I need to do at this point is save the playlist (which I’ve been doing regularly as i built it of course) and it is ready to be called up when it is time to do the show.
Almost always i will make odd adjustments on the spot as I am going through the show, and the odd song will be changed as the whim, or the mood of the music inspires me to a new choice. And usually one or two tracks will end up being dropped in the end, as the speech bits in the BREAK segments take up some time.
In the end, I always re-save after finishing the show, so that I have a record of what was played, which can be useful to check back on.
Mega-Seg can also output the playlist as a PDF, so here is the final version of todays Seagull show, so you can see the entire list that we couldn’t fit in the screenshots.
So there we have one of my Seagull Saturday shows, from conception through to transmission.
If you enjoyed reading this, why not give it a listen some Saturday?
Radio Seagull – 1602khz in Northern Netherlands
Steve Conway – 6-8am and 6-8pm Saturdays (7-9 am and pm European time)
Shows on Phantom this weekend (15/16 Jan 2011)
Posted: January 13, 2011 Filed under: Music, New Music, Phantom 105.2, Random Access | Tags: Dublin, Ireland, P J Harvey, Phantom 105.2, radio Leave a comment »
I’ll be getting to try out Phantom’s snazzy new studios this weekend as I am on covering two shows on 15/16 Jan 2011.
Saturday I’ll be in from midday to 2.30pm, and back in my old stomping ground Sunday 7-9pm hosting Random Access, the all-request show.
It’s also worth mentioning that our Arts show, The Kiosk, hosted by Nadine O’Regan will be giving away P J Harvey’s entire back catalogue on Saturday morning, 11 to midday (i.e. just before me).
Phantom is on 105.2fm in Dublin and surrounding counties.
On UPC cable ch.935 in Irish cities.
Worldwide via the Phantom iPhone app, and at www.phantom.ie
Steve
New Years Day New Music Special
Posted: January 1, 2011 Filed under: Music, Music Reviews, New Music, Radio Seagull | Tags: Carolina Chocolate Drops, Cathey Davey, Frank Turner, Heart, Iron Maiden, Joanne Shaw Taylor, Lloyd Cole, Music, New Music, radio, Radio Seagull, The Netherlands, Warpaint Leave a comment »
Today on Radio Seagull I’m devoting my show entirely to music released during the last year (or, to be more accurate, from albums released during 2010, plus a couple of 2010 EPs and singles/demos).
You’ll hear tracks from Warpaint, Cathy Davey, We Should Be Dead, Vampire Weekend, Von Shakes, 6 day Riot, Lloyd Cole, Iron Maiden, Frank Turner, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Joanne Shaw Taylor and much more.
They are all good, but I’d single out Cathey Davey‘s demented “Army of Tears” for special mention, while the Carolina Chocolate Drops “Knockin’” is a wonderful fusion of sounds and funky sassiness. Lloyd Cole gives a glimpse of the alpha/beta sexual dynamic with female mate choice in “Man Overboard” while Heart‘s “Red Velvet Car” is the lush title track from their best new album in 30 years.
I’ll edit this post to include a full track listing after broadcast.
EDIT: Here it is: 1101-sconway-NewYearsDay-playlist
These are some of the artists whose releases I’ve most enjoyed playing during 2010, I hope you enjoy hearing them.
From 6-8pm UK time (7-9 in Central Europe) on 1602Khz MW in the Northern Netherlands, and worldwide at RadioSeagull.com
Steve
In 2010, I Lived.
Posted: December 31, 2010 Filed under: 10 Things, 1980s, Dublin photos, Fiction, Irish writing, Love, Music, New Music, New writing, non-Fiction, Odd photos, offshore, Phantom 105.2, Prose, radio, Radio Caroline, Radio presenting, Radio Seagull, Ross Revenge, Sex, Shiprocked!, Ships, storms at sea, Weather | Tags: 2010, Bristol, Dublin Airport, emotion, Growth, Hot Air Balloon, Music, Offshore Radio, Opera, Radio Caroline, Radio Seagull, review, RNLI, Sunrise, Sunset 2 Comments »
- Looking back . . the sun and all that is Dublin can be seen from the very tip of the Great South Wall in the centre of Dublin Bay
Looking back, I can’t recall another year in my life when I have lived as vividly as I did in 2010.
Despite 2010 being bleak economically and politically both home in Ireland and pretty much everywhere else in the west, despite long hours and stress in various workplaces, despite some non-threatening but quite inconveniencing medical blips, despite my car heater dying just in time for the coldest December since records began . . 2010 was a year in which I really lived, in which old emotions were reawakened, and new ones discovered, and my store of life experience grew more than it has done in a long time.
I had set myself a challenge at the end of 2009 to start doing things I had never done before, to open myself to new experiences beyond my comfort zone. And while I didn’t get to the arbitrary goal of “10 things” during the year, I reached 5, two of which were experiences that profoundly moved or enriched me, and a third which brought back childhood memories entwined in a futuristic setting.
Not all of the great things that happened to me during the year were as a result of this self-challenge, but perhaps the attitude it engendered in me of being more open filtered through to other things too.
So what made my year?
Well, some unique experiences came about as i sought to push myself into new things.
Taking part in the Bristol Balloon Fiesta was certainly a “high” point of the year, and my first ever hot-air balloon flight, as part of a mass ascent of more than 80 balloons within an hour at dawn, was a unique and moving experience, so much so that I felt to write about it in purely descriptive journalistic terms would be . . to miss some indefinable element of the experience.
Twisting it in my mind, it instead inspired me to write a short story “A Bristol Awakening” that is neither fact nor fiction, but also both. A very intimate story, it has been received well at a number of public readings, especially by women, and I am hoping to see it published in 2011.
Launching from a Bristol hillside at dwan, with ballons of every shape and size coming before and after us
Drifting lazily and silently through the sky over Bristol, with the Avon Gorge, the Bristol Channel and Wales visible in the distance
Slightly more down to earth, though involving a different sort of (non) flying, as one of my challenges I put myself forward to the Dublin Airport Authority to be one of the special testers of the new Terminal 2 before it opened. Apart from fulfilling my curiosity about the new building, and allowing me a sneak peek at new transport infrastructure, which I’ve always been interested in, the experience reminded me of aspects of my past that I had long forgotten, and also gave me a chance to get my own back on customs, just for once. You can read the details in my post Mr. Beagle Goes To London (Not).
Something I have never wanted to do, and felt I would always avoid, enriched my life and gave me a wonderful experience when i tried it as part of the “going outside my comfort zone” element of my 10-things challenge. A visit to the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, accompanied by a an impossibly glamourous companion, opened a whole new world of experience, sight, sound, and stimulation to me. I enjoyed it more than I could possibly have imagined, and do intend to write up the experience here at a later date.
Somewhere I never thought I would see myself!
Pushing myself outside my comfort zone, doing what I would not normally consider doing was one of the elements i wanted to achieve in drawing up my list of 10 things, and I am so very glad I did this.
As the year comes to an end, I’ve so far ticked off 5 things, and have more still in planning, with some space left on the list for spontenaity.
So 2011 should continue in similar vein, and to be honest, when I reach 10, why stop there?
Of course, there were other things which made 2010 an exceptional year for me, some planned, others unexpected.
A couple of things that really moved me were radio related, and did not come about as a result of my challenge list.
Going in March to Ramsgate to do a reading from Shiprocked for the benefit of the RNLI, brought me face to face with the men who came to my rescue on one of the darkest days of my life, 19 years earlier.
Meeting the crew of the lifeboat who battled through a Force 10 NE to come to our aid when the Caroline ship was aground on the Goodwin Sands was a profoundly humbling experience, all the more so because of the warmth of the welcome I received, and the support they showed for Caroline despite having been put through hell that morning and nearly losing their own lives on account of our stubborn decision to stay on board the apparently doomed vessel.
- The high point of my year, meeting the Ramsgate Lifeboat crew, left to right is John G Ray, myself, and Ray Noble.
I won’t forget the men of the Ramsgate Lifeboat, and will be making another fundraising trip to see them in November 2011, on the 20th anniversary of the grounding.
The same weekend I revisited the Ross Revenge for the first time in many years, and was invited to join the current-day lineup of Caroline on satellite, which, despite the many years of my absence, felt like a real homecoming.
(I can be heard on Caroline every Monday 2-4pm, Sky Digital Ch.0199 and via RadioCaroline.co.uk )
Another emotional moment came about in May, after I had been invited to join the crew of the Dutch station Radio Seagull, which was celebrating a month long offshore broadcast, 8 miles of the coast of Friesland.
There were many memories stirred by being offshore for the first time since 1991, though the most intense of these was to come on me unexpectedly.
- Back at sea, and approaching a radioship . . . ah, the ghosts are stirring!
- To raise my head from sleeping, and peer through a murky porthole to see nothing but grey rolling sea is, for me, a heaven of moody solitude.
The week I spent at sea with Radio Seagull was bliss, with old memories awoken, and new friends and new memories made at every moment of each day. (See the posts OFFSHORE AGAIN and Seagull Day 1 and More Seagull Pictures and Clear White Light and A Ferry Large Tender as well as Seagull Offshore – The Pictures for the week as I blogged it at the time)
But the most vivid experience of that week came for me, unexpectedly, in the middle of the night and alone, and had nothing to do with the radio side of the visit. Being given the job of staying up on watch overnight for one of the nights, while usually regarded a something of a chore, for me brought both fear and redemption, as I was finally able to lay to rest the ghosts of what had happened on the Caroline ship, many years earlier, when we drifted, unheeding, onto the deadly Goodwin Sands.
For all that the storm in 1991 had been so fierce, and our ship so run down and unable to navigate that we could not have resisted being swept onto the Goodwin Sands even if we had realised earlier that our anchor chain had broken, I had carried with me these many years a nagging sliver guilt that I should have known, should have been more alert, should have done better.
Now, here I was again, and for the first time since that fateful night, entrusted to watch over a ship at anchor at sea, and in the grips of bad weather too. I was both siezed with fear that it would all go terribly wrong on my watch, and grateful for the chance to prove myself dilligent and keep the most careful of watches. I checked our position regularly, I did a full round of the ship and checked the anchoring cables every hour, I saw us safely through to dawn, and I slayed a dragon that had slumbered in a corner of my mind for many years.
3am and all is well on board the Jenni Baynton
The week was over too soon, but I was delighted to be asked to join the staff of Radio Seagull and to contribute a weekly show from my own studio in Dublin, with my own choice of music – a mix of new and alternative music as well as classic rock, with a bit of blues and soul mixed in. Presenting these shows on Seagull have been an immensely satisfying experience for me.
(I can be heard 7-9 am and pm each Saturday, on 1602Khz MW in The Netherlands, and worldwide at RadioSeagull.com )
Phantom 105.2 in Dublin also continued to be a source of great enjoyment for me, and though I had to move away from regular weekend shows towards the end of the year due to domestic commitments, the station and its staff still feels like an extended family for me, and keeps me informed on new music trends.
There were lots of mini high points in 2010 – from an unexpectedly beautiful sunrise encountered one morning on my way to work, to, finally after all my years on this earth, a proper White Christmas.
Sunrise over Dublin Bay on a winter's morning
Snow lies thick on the furze on Christmas Day
There was also another experience, quite unexpected, which made me feel like a teenager again, one unremarkable Saturday afternoon at a railway station in an unremarkable British city . . but I won’t go into that one here!
Suffice to say that, for me at least, 2010 has been a year in which i started living and growing anew, despite being at an age where comfort and stagnation would be more usual.
May 2011 have more of the same . . and new . . for me . . and you.
Happy New Year
Steve Conway
Does My Bum Look Big In This?
Posted: January 12, 2010 Filed under: Music, New Music, Sex | Tags: Naked, NSFW, Nude Photography, Ruth Medjber, Steve Conway, The Red Labels Leave a comment »
Attack of the spooky-faced arse people!
Back in December I wrote about how I put myself out there as part of a naked photo shoot for an indie rock album cover for The Red Labels, being shot by the talented Hotpress photographer Ruth Medjber.
I’ve now seen some of the pictures, and am really pleased with the results – the album is going to stand out on the shelves, that’s for sure!
Apart from the different shapes and sizes, the one thing I never really noticed on the day was how many different skin colours and tones there were, even though the group was almost wholly Irish.
The Red Labels new CD will be out soon, so my big ass and their great music will be coming to a store in a mall near you.
And check out Ruth’s blog for her great selection of band and gig photography.
Steve
Extra Slots, Snow Patrol, and Top 105.2
Posted: October 24, 2008 Filed under: competitions, Music, New Music, Phantom 105.2, radio, Random Access | Tags: Bank Holiday, DAB, Dublin, Gary Lightbody, Indie, Ireland, Irish, Music, Phantom 105.2, radio, Rock, Snow Patrol Leave a comment »
I’m going to enjoy this weekend.
Here in Ireland it is a holiday weekend (the October Bank Holiday) as as usual this means extra slots for me on Phantom 105.2
In addition to my normal Sunday evening 7-9pm Random Access all-request show, I will also be on Saturday 5-7pm, and Monday morning 8-11am.
We are celebrating our 2nd official birthday on air with a number of events, including the Top 105.2 countdown on the Monday from 1030 onwards. Not to be missed if you are an indie music fan.
Also, across the weekend we will be giving away Snow Patrol gift packs and running interviews with Gary Lightbody.
You can tune in on 105.2 FM or via DAB in Dublin and surrounding counties, we are also available in a number of cities via UPC Cable Ch.935, and around the world on www.phantom.ie
Steve
More on Gerry Stanek
Posted: September 22, 2008 Filed under: Music, Music Reviews, New Music, Song Lyrics | Tags: Music, Palin, Politics, Rock, Sarah Palin, Singers 1 Comment »Writing yesterday about the differences between how election ads and songs are regulated (or not) in the USA compared to Ireland, I mentioned the musician Gerry Stanek, who has brought out a great and very funny track “I’m In Love With A Girl Named Sarah Palin” done in country balled style.
At the time of writing, I only really listened to the track itself, but have since gone back to Gerry’s myspace page to sample his other material, which is well worth a listen.
It’s hard to classify him exactly, as he lies somewhere between country and indie rock, and each song is quite different in style from the last.
“Gravity” is nice, “It Ain’t For Me” is quite catchy, but my personal favourite is “They Know My Name” which mixes resigned and downbeat lyrics with 70s sounding backing to produce a song which is suitably plaintive without being over emotive.
A lucky musical discovery for me when I was surfing for a news fix!
Steve
