TXFM (formerly much missed Phantom) line up

room_149

It appears that is the case- closing in October according to the Journal.ie
http://www.thejournal.ie/txfm-going-off-air-2688837-Mar2016/

Howard the Duck

Hurrah

Twizzler

Am I the only person here genuinely gutted about this?

Twizzler

And the poor DJs then having to be all upbeat about their birthday this week!

room_149

Twizzler wrote: »

And the poor DJs then having to be all upbeat about their birthday this week!

Yeah, tomorrow will be a strange one for them.
I'll be tuning into Joe Donnelly when I leave the office in a few minutes. He'll surely make some reference to this news.

Howard the Duck

Twizzler wrote: »

And the poor DJs then having to be all upbeat about their birthday this week!

Feel sorry for people losing their jobs of course. Hopefully whoever gets the licence can employ some of them. But glad to see TXFM gone

everlast75

Ah FFS!

Having an alternative taste in music in this Country sucked.
There were f**k all nightclubs or pubs to go to when I was growing up, and one alternative radio station (Phantom).

Now the only alternative radio station is closing down.

Balls Balls Balls

Twizzler

I'll really bloody miss it. Hope to God the DJs all get jobs elsewhere. Whether you like what they play or not, they all seem like genuinely nice people. Well, fxxk that now.

Howard the Duck

everlast75 wrote: »

Ah FFS!

Having an alternative taste in music in this Country sucked.
There were f**k all nightclubs or pubs to go to when I was growing up, and one alternative radio station (Phantom).

Now the only alternative radio station is closing down.

Balls Balls Balls

The licence will still be there so someone will pick it up, you'll have an alternative station and hopefully a better one. It's a difficult licence to make money off i really think it should be a national licence. People outside Dublin deserve an alternative station too

Twizzler

everlast75 wrote: »

Ah FFS!

Having an alternative taste in music in this Country sucked.
There were f**k all nightclubs or pubs to go to when I was growing up, and one alternative radio station (Phantom).

Now the only alternative radio station is closing down.

Balls Balls Balls

"There were f**k all nightclubs or pubs to go to when I was growing up" - literally my life growing up too. Stuck listening to effin Garth Brooks in crap country nightclubs and wondering if there was any sense to be made of life at all.

ghostdancer

pity no-one else applied for the licence, would have been interesting to see what someone else would have done with it rather than making it more and more commercial and losing more and more listeners as Phantom/TXFM did, running themselves into the ground.

Pudsy33

Well thats **** news.

Howard the Duck

ghostdancer wrote: »

pity no-one else applied for the licence, would have been interesting to see what someone else would have done with it rather than making it more and more commercial and losing more and more listeners as Phantom/TXFM did, running themselves into the ground.

Did Simon Maher not declare interest in it? I would be very surprised if it's not picked up by someone

former total

Damn. TXFM is not perfect but it's better than anything else on the dial.

Maybe others didn't apply as they figured TXFM had the renewal sewn up, might get some more interest if it's now re-advertised?

L1011

Howard the Duck wrote: »

The licence will still be there so someone will pick it up, you'll have an alternative station and hopefully a better one. It's a difficult licence to make money off i really think it should be a national licence. People outside Dublin deserve an alternative station too

The BAI are very unlikely to readvertise the licence. The AM licences for the west vanished when the winners declined to use them, etc.

Twizzler

room_149 wrote: »

Yeah, tomorrow will be a strange one for them.
I'll be tuning into Joe Donnelly when I leave the office in a few minutes. He'll surely make some reference to this news.

I've been listening to Joe for about a half an hour and he hasn't made any reference to it, so I assume they've been told not to say anything on air about it.

Twizzler

Twizzler wrote: »

I've been listening to Joe for about a half an hour and he hasn't made any reference to it, so I assume they've been told not to say anything on air about it.

Oh he is literally just saying it now

Flatzie_poo

Twizzler wrote: »

Oh he is literally just saying it now

You really jinxed it!!

Twizzler

Flatzie_poo wrote: »

You really jinxed it!!

He dealt with it well

everlast75

Twizzler wrote: »

He dealt with it well

what did he say?

I replied to a post on their FB page and the post is no longer there?

Pudsy33

I'm not listening, what did he say?

Twizzler

He basically said there was something he should address - that people had been contacting him saying was it true and he was sorry to say it was, that they only heard themselves today, that they're a small team who look out for each other and they'll continue to do so while they remain on air - and now he's playing a song with the lyrics "Turn off the lights when you leave". (The song is Lucius - Two of Us on the Run)

loyatemu

shame - only station I have on in the car (use Spotify everywhere else). I actually preferred TX to Phantom, seemed more professional and had more consistent DJs. I was down the country last week, stuck listening to 2FM and TodayFM, the amount of times I heard those bloody Adele and Bieber tunes...

So what's the story here - are the BAI license requirements too stringent for niche stations like this (the country music franchise seems to have similar problems) - should they be relaxed? If you turn on any FM station at the "top of the hour" you'll hear the news - why? what's the point in making every station carry current affairs and news when there are dedicated stations already providing this?

StaticNoise

They're getting very honest about it now. Message posted on social media from them, presenters referring to it, etc.

Joe just said he won't read a text as he would be too upset and might cry. Genuine I wonder?

Big Nasty

Very p1ssed off to hear this. Pretty much the only station I listen to lately. Fvck it anyway! :mad:

Birneybau

I sincerely hope Simon Maher gets back in there.

Twizzler

StaticNoise wrote: »

They're getting very honest about it now. Message posted on social media from them, presenters referring to it, etc.

Joe just said he won't read a text as he would be too upset and might cry. Genuine I wonder?

Joe always seems very genuine in his interactions with listeners, IMO

That_Guy

Well there goes the only decent radio station in Dublin.

qb123

Best station in Dublin for music disappearing - sad reflection on most radio listeners. Where do we go to now for good music and djs?

soc160

loyatemu wrote: »

shame - only station I have on in the car (use Spotify everywhere else). I actually preferred TX to Phantom, seemed more professional and had more consistent DJs. I was down the country last week, stuck listening to 2FM and TodayFM, the amount of times I heard those bloody Adele and Bieber tunes...

So what's the story here - are the BAI license requirements too stringent for niche stations like this (the country music franchise seems to have similar problems) - should they be relaxed? If you turn on any FM station at the "top of the hour" you'll hear the news - why? what's the point in making every station carry current affairs and news when there are dedicated stations already providing this?

The stations have a quota of news and current affairs to hit every day, it's up to them how they fill it, I think it just makes sense to have your news at the top of the hour, for a number of reasons really. Spin do it at a quarter to the hour.

Some stations have relaxed rules now regarding current affairs but if you keep relaxing them it's not fair on the other stations who are abiding by the rules if you scrapped them then a station could just play music nonstop and give itself a competitive advantage.


In my opinion TXFM would have died off had it not been housed by communicorp. Not enough was done to make it commercially viable when Phantom went under and they had alot of advantages that other stations wouldn't. Be good if someone else outside of the main owners had a crack at making it work. If it can make a mark in dublin it might open up multi city in some way like 8radio.