Boys and girls go out of play as Virgin grows up

IN between the daft jokes on his Virgin Radio breakfast show yesterday morning - about old people's favourite high-street shops ("Marks and Pensioners") - Chris Evans had an important message for his listeners. He played The Jam's 1979 hit, Eton Rifles. "You'll be hearing a lot more songs like that," he announced afterwards.

And indeed, you will: Virgin has announced to the industry that it is jettisoning music from boy and girl bands such as All Saints and Boyzone in favour of more grownup tracks. It is a return to Virgin's roots - and an effort by SMG (formerly the Scottish Media Group), which bought the station 10 months ago, to differentiate the channel from its London rivals Capital FM and Heart.

Chief executive John Pearson says the new policy, to be backed by a multimillion pound advertising campaign, involves reducing the number of chart hits on the playlist and increasing the airtime for what he calls, in a ghastly phrase, "heritage acts".

"We've never played Westlife and we're not likely to," he says. "But we are taking people like All Saints, Craig David and Ronan Keating off the playlist. There will also be less music by crossover artists such as The Corrs, Robbie Williams and Texas."

Virgin had to do something. Its national AM frequency has seen its share fall from 2.2 to 1.7 per cent.

In London, where it has an additional FM frequency, its share is 3.1 percent, compared to Heart's 5.2 and Capital's 11.3. Few observers are expecting brilliant news from tomorrow's Rajar figures.

"Our audience figures have started to plateau," claims Pearson delicately.

The new policy is a response to research undertaken among its core audience of, mostly male, 20- to 40-year-olds. This revealed that 65 per cent of Virgin's audience prefers music from the Seventies to Nineties to either chart music or "golden oldies".

Pearson, who has been with Virgin from its birth and was instrumental in signing Evans from Radio One in 1997, insists the change in direction will be felt across all areas of Virgin's schedule. "Chris is very much behind the changes," he says.

But Virgin's most bankable star is also its trickiest problem.

Pearson's approach to Evans is somewhat different to that taken by former Radio One controller Matthew Bannister. He doesn't go drinking with Chris; according to one insider, Pearson "realises that Virgin is a commercial operation, rather than part of the rock 'n' roll industry." Nevertheless Evans's Ginger Media used to own the station, having bought it from Richard Branson in 1997, and the millionaire presenter retains a substantial stake in new owner SMG Radio.

Isn't it difficult being your ex-boss's boss, especially when it's Chris Evans? "No, I run this station," he says. "Chris is passionate about doing his radio show. You've got to remember that Chris has been here for almost three and a half years. He left Radio One because he wanted to work four days a week but for most of his time here he's worked six days a week. The music we play is the music he likes."

Copyright 2001
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.