In their promo today about giving away the 200k, they said the Cash Machine gave away 5mill this year, and it'll be back in 2024, bigger and better.
So will be switching off more this coming year.
Sorry, I meant 7-10pm. Steve K is class
I honestly don't get the xmas-all-day-every-day thing. I mean, if you want some Christmas music, sure, play a couple of songs an hour. And push the xmas station you have on the app. But all day, every day? I snapped during the week, went to Spotify, stuck Nova on in the car - bliss!
I had to switch over to 2fm, 2fm!!!
It just went straight into Xmas songs so I'm guessing a recording.
I don't think he gets to pick a single song anymore. He used always play David Bowie back in the day
Definitely overkill with the Xmas songs, heard some terrible covers over the last few days. Ian played a destiny's child one after talking about Michael Buble and said something "Michael, never do a song like this".
When do the continuous Xmas songs stop?
Probably tomorrow!They will pretend it's all over and move onto a new year's eve cash machine jackpot.
Looks like they abandoned them at midnight. Quite a dramatic turnaround, most other stations still play one or two an hour for today (which I'm fine with), before they're dropped entirely tomorrow.
So they play songs when it’s not Christmas ie before December 8 and stop playing them when it is Christmas. Makes you wonder really.
They must have the mentality of some folk I see, who put their tree up on 1st November then take it down on 26th Dec.
I think playing them until New Years would be fine. Not non-stop but as supereurope said, one or two an hour would suit the mood.
Appreciate I'm talking about it now that its over, but I thought the decision to go all-in on Christmas songs was an odd one, especially since they stuck to just the well-known ones. Dedicated Christmas stations mix in some obscure or less well-known Christmas songs, but TodayFM just played the usual suspects, i.e., Slade, Band Aid, Spice Girls, etc., so there was never more than three hours before a song would be repeated. That just gets boring.
Slightly off-topic (as it applies to nearly every station), but when did it become acceptable to play Christmas songs from early November? I don't want to sound old by saying "back in my day", but when I was younger (and I'm talking the late 80s/early 90s), you wouldn't hear a Christmas song on the radio until 8 December. They moved up to 1 December in the late 90s, and even up to the early 2010s, it would be rare to hear one in late November. I remember back in 2011, I was living in London and had Heart on one morning (no idea why, since Heart is terrible.) It was the last Friday in November and the breakfast DJs were having a dilemma over whether to play a Christmas song or not, since they thought it was still too early. In recent years, it seems to be acceptable to play them from 1 November. One satellite music channel switches to a Christmas playlist in early October I think.
I'm also in favour of a gentle phase-out, so it was quite a shock to turn on TodayFM at 1am this morning to find they back to their regular playlist with no Christmas music at all. Flicking around other stations, they seem to be going the two an hour route, which is fine. They'll probably be gone tomorrow though. With the exception of MTV Xmas, the satellite music channels have abandoned them today too. MTV Xmas reverts to its 90s playlist tomorrow.
The new gen I think have decided that Christmas starts at the very latest when that godawful toy show is on the LLS and earliest as someone said above on Noember 1. It’s then quickly abandoned on the second or third actual day of Christmas. Radio stations just following suit it seems.
Retail have a lot to answer for too. They push their Christmas stock heavily from November 1st and then from 26th December they push the new year sales and move on the next event.
What 'sales' would these be? There used to be sales! Today I got an add for a 10% off Harvey Norman voucher if I spent €250 in Harvey Norman! But yes, this year has been particularly noticeable for the really long "Christmas" period. And I hate it.
Really? Tomorrow? MTV has really died out...
The short answer is "America", and all the corporate/retail nonsense we imported from it
It could be June, listening to TodayFM today.
A strange decision, I wonder who decided 24/7 Xmas songs for a week or two was a great idea, but it's a terrible idea to play any Xmas songs on St Stephens Day?
Spot on.
Someone in Bauer HQ in Germany I'd imagine, as already mentioned, they have been doing this on radio stations equivalent to Today FM in other countries for years. Mix Megapol in Sweden for example goes 100% Christmas on November 26 and is 100% "Christmasless" by December 26th
Say what you want about RTE stations. The policy is the 1st weekday of December and they're sticking to it.
Bauer don’t centrally program from Germany.
Well, the management crew in Dublin didn't come up with the cash machine themselves
They’ve done it for several years in Britain and NI. Not a dictat from Germany however.
So they do it in all the countries they operate in, but it's not a policy coming from head office. Ok...
This is one Americanism I don't want to see coming over here. There are good reasons why the US gets over Christmas so quickly. They have Thanksgiving, a bigger holiday for them, just a month earlier, and they don't get a bank holiday on the 26th. It's completely different here, so there's no need to remove all traces of Christmas by the 26th.
I wonder how far away we are from some Irish influencer clowns celebrating Thanksgiving here.
Yes, it's back to being MTV 90s this morning.
They don’t do it in all countries they operate in. Ok …
I would take a guess that they were put under pressure to increase revenue. It’s easier to go with what’s worked in other countries than to come up with new tactics.
Are any of their presenters mentioning the Christmas period at all on-air? I’ve heard Jess Spencer on Spin 103 referencing it and I heard a reference on Fm104 yesterday (not sure who it was) but I’ve not heard anything mentioned in the times I’ve listened to Today FM today. It seems bizarre when they spent weeks saying ‘Christmas happens here’ to forget about it so quickly.
That being said, I turned off quite soon after 12pm as they had KC from Red Fm on today and I’m not a fan.
