Great Wave of Change, the podcast which captures the pre-eminent in finance, media, politics, and showbiz is this month featuring one of commercial radio’s most successful businessmen, multi-millionaire Phil Riley.
It’s hosted by the veteran City commentator, David Buik and long-time former Sky business editor, Michael Wilson.
Riley is behind a new digital radio station called Boom – which as its name suggests, is targeted at the growing audience of the grey surfers – the Baby Boomers.
Great Wave of Change podcast: Michael Wilson and David Buik talk to multi-millionaire Phil Riley, who is launching a new radio station for Baby Boomers
In his early 60’s, Phil was busy entering a portfolio career, when he and a similar eminence of the commerce behind the commercials, David Lloyd, floated an idea that there just might be a gap for a commercial radio station aimed at the generation before ‘yoof ‘ and who after all, launched and lived the consumer society.
They’d both spent all their working lives getting on and launching and running radio stations – and began to convince advertisers and sponsors that the fixation with a younger audience has left out a hugely important, growing and relatively prosperous section of the UK.
Boom comes at a time when there’s a rising wave of discontent among some people at the funding and output of what is effectively the taxpayers’ broadcaster, the BBC.
Phil Riley comes from a background of commercial radio which has constantly vied with a better funded scion of the broadcasting establishment.
However, Phil Riley believes revoking the BBC licence would be an injudicious decision for wellbeing of commercial radio.
There would be significantly less advertising revenue to go round to sustain healthy competition. He also acknowledges that many of the BBC’S services are of the highest quality.
The Boom microphone crew will be familiar to listeners of a certain age: Graham Dene, Nicky Horne, David Hamilton, Kid Jenson and Roger Day.
All of these could and probably will tell a tale or two about the beginnings of proper pop radio, swerving via a pirate boat and Capital or Radio 1 and the rest.
Boom will also host Anna Raeburn, whom the greyer will remember as the first, unshockable auntie of the air, to whom problems are confessional if not immediately solvable.
Boom is also hosting its own Desert Island Discs, called Still busy living, and Michael Wilson is one of its first guests – revealing, amongst other details, how his mum advised against being a pop star, unlike his childhood chum Allan, and then Robert Palmer.
Wilson eventually did play in a covers band, but decided that his late sixties was a good time to hang up his keyboard, at least for the foreseeable.
He also tells a tale of TV that spans Thames, Sky and beyond, and, like the Boom team, is happy to have been a part of the media revolution that Sky began and that commercial radio was part of, and like Boom will continue.
Meanwhile, the new station launched on Valentine’s Day, probably something to do with one of Phil Riley’s previous radio masterpieces, ‘Heart’. Oh and he launched ‘Magic’ as well. Boom will be hoping some of that rubs off.
