Radio Aire

Here we go then, yet another dissection of a radio stations history, in the first of a series of stations who won't be taken over or rebranded, but deserve some sort of nostalgic wallow.
And this time being the ideal time to do so whilst I've got plenty of spare time before I finally leave Harrow Halls.

The first port of call on my jaunting is Leeds' very own commercial station
Radio Aire, launched in 1981 and broadcasting to the big city
(appropriately enough) to this day.

And as a lot of people on my radio course past and present hail from the area, I thought I'd attempt to find out more about the station that they would have listened to at one time or other.

Remember, this isn't historic or factual account of the station in detail, and is written entirely on my own point of view paying specific attention to the jingles themselves.

And if anyone's got any additional information/corrections, or extra audio then you're more than welcome to help out as always.

Radio Aire began broadcasting in September 1981, with BBC Radio Leeds covering the West Yorkshire area for almost 15 years prior to launch.

The first jingle package was one by a little known company by the name of Crocodile Music where the main theme can be heard here. From my own personal perspective there's a hint of David Arnold in the jingles themselves in terms of the brass, although Aire never went to the man himself for a custom package in their 25+ years on the air.

Anyway here's the rest of them.

1981 Jingles - Crocodile Music

Presenters around the time included Peter Levy who went on to become a familiar face on the BBC's Look North, James Whale who joined the station in it's second year having previously presented at Metro Radio in the North East, and Andy Kershaw on one of his first rungs on the broadcasting ladder.

Top voice over artist Bill Mitchell was brought in to provide some spoken liners which can be heard below.

Radio Aire Bill Mitchell Liners

1983 saw the disposal of the original jingles (but not on a long term basis) in favour of these cuts from an unknown company, with a very synthy 80s sound.
If anyone knows who produced them, it would be very helpful.

Radio Aire 1983 Jingles

A year later they had another package produced, this time by David Reilly and as the lyrics suggest was specially made for use in 1984 on it's own. It's quite a nice orchestral theme with really good vocals although I've never understood the principle aim of the package with regards to the year.

1984 Jingles - David Reilly

In a bizarre twist of fate, 1985 saw a return to the original 1981 package for a few more years.

The late 80s saw what many jingle fans would consider to be one of Aire's
best packages, courtesy of Muff Murfin's Standard Sound based in Worcester.

The programme controller around this time was one Christa Ackroyd, formerly
the station's head of news and by 1990 would be one of the main presenters
of YTV's Calendar for 11 years before crossing over to Look North.

This consisted of custom cuts, as well as resings of cuts from TM's US packages such as "Rock Solid" and Murfin's Capital Radio 1984 custom including the traffic jingle at 8.47.

1987 Jingles - TM/Standard Sound

Although the audio quality on the MP3 isn't 100%, it doesn't add an advantage to the fact that I think the vocals are too aggressive (as per normal for a Muff Murfin package) and in places are poorly sung. One key example being "Radio Aire Main Event" bed at 3.57 which many have misinterpreted as "Radio Aire Merry Men".

There's also that dodgy "Heading Into The 90s" cut at 1.55 although thankfully it wasn't a signifier of the jingles that were to come.

In line with many independent local radio stations, Radio Aire split frequencies in 1990 to become Aire FM on 96.3, and Magic 828 on AM.

There was initally a poor reception on FM due to the "More Music" format and quite a few listeners stayed loyal to AM where a few of Aire's more maturer presenters had moved.

Aire FM had it's first JAM jingle package which was a resing of the much used
KIIS 90 package.

Aire FM 1990 Jingles - JAM Creative Productions

In line with many other US influnced FM stations in the UK, American voiceovers were used in line with the sung jingles, with Aire using JR Nelson.

One such liner that I'm not sure made it to broadcast, can be heard here.

Magic 828's were from Century 21's "Classic Oldies" package which many jingle fans regard to be the best resing of said package for a UK station.

Magic 828 1990 - Century 21


Shortly after they went to TM with US vocals resung from a package called "The Magic Of Boston" which fitted in nicely.

Magic 828 1990 Jingles - TM Productions

Two years later Aire returned to JAM for another package, this time for a resing of "The Beat" for Los Angeles urban station "FM 92 The Beat" which brought back the original name to the station's jingles as "Radio Aire FM".

One of my favourite JAM packages around this time which has some superb solos and a brilliant weather bed, even if it does sound like something from
the Dirty Dancing movie.

Radio Aire FM 1992 Jingles - JAM Creative Productions

Chris Moyles had been at the station for a few years and can be heard in
this clip using the fantastic hour opener as uncovered by JK and Joel at Radio 1
a few years ago.
Whether a jingle as lively and uptempo as that works for a love songs show is debateable.

I refer you to Chris's comments about love song shows on the radio in his 2006 autobiography where he gets it spot on.

Aire went to TM Century in 1994 with a fantastic composite of cuts from "The New WPLJ", "Y-98 FM" and "Dallas Power".

I haven't got the whole package as such at the time of writing, but here's a selection as posted last year by fellow JingleMad member Neal Bowden.

Radio Aire FM 1994 Jingles - TM Century

Another fellow jingle fan and Yorkshire resident Martin Simm once mentioned how the second cut in the above montage was used as part of a fireworks display or something or other on an outside broadcast which would have looked great from a visual sense.

In addition to them there's also a selection of cuts done for Carl Kingston who was a mainstay of Radio Aire for many years, also including a few cuts making use of the earlier JAM packages.

More changes were ahead in 1995 as the programme controller had heard a package by LA based company Groove Addicts for BRMB in Birmingham and wanted to have it done for Aire FM.

However it cost too much money to have it resung so Aire turned to local production company Mezzo who did the theme music for James Whale's ITV Nighttime Show and they came up with the example below which worked well.

Aire FM 1995 Jingles - Mezzo

Impressed by the first effort, more were commisioned with the new on air name "The New 96.3 Aire FM" and a vibrant and uptempo selection of cuts including ones that sounded like Livin' Joy, and another sounding very similar to Incognito.

Around this time Bruno Brookes had joined the station as one of their presenters after being dropped by Radio 1.

Aire FM 1996 Jingles - Music Force

Jingles then made a disapearance from both Aire and Magic from the late 90s
into the early 90s until around 2001 when Aire FM rebranded back to Radio Aire.
They intitially had a jingle package by Reelworld resung from the Kiss 100 custom from the London dance station, which was followed by a resing of a package for Kiss 108 FM in Boston.

2003 Jingles - Reelworld

2006 saw a new custom package in time for the station's 25th anniversary produced in the UK by Wise Buddah. The package included two cuts for Simon Logan's breakfast show and I bet he told the guys at the company to make it as close as they could to their jingle for Chris Evans' Radio 2 show.

2006 Jingles - Wise Buddah

And I had to upload this from Martin Kelner's podcast where he was invited to Radio Aire's 25th birthday do in September that year which included a brilliant speech by James Whale. (Contains strong language)

A good excuse to also upload the song "Bimbo" which was released as a single at the height of the shows success around 1989.

Which brings us pretty much up to date where the station brought some more jingles by Wise Buddah in 2008 picking up from the themes established from a couple of years earlier.

2008 Jingles - Wise Buddah

Overall a diverse insight into the jingles that made up the station sound of one of the UK's most recognised commercial radio stations.

Credit to David Hemsley, Steve Maguire, Sean Martin, Christian Spooner,
Mark Hodgkinson, Aston McNeil, Martin Simm, Neal Bowden,
and Dave Nightingale.

And special mention to Rob Thornton who I'm sure would have been very appreciative of this post, being a man who lived in the area and was a really helpful jingle collector.