Rolling Interminable 6Music Daytime Canon

tbh if you're listening to Radio 6 on a Friday evening maybe reconsider your life anyway

Disagree with the Pinefox in that the weekend shows are the highlight for me, especially Cerys Matthews who is in a way the closest thing to an heir to John Peel in that she regularly surprises and confounds with what she plays. My taste in music syncs best with Mary Anne Hobbs, but I find her 'hello trees' persona a bit twee sometimes.

XP I have two small children and therefore no social life to speak of, basically I am their target audience

Gilles Peterson on a Saturday afternoon is a combination of excellent and frustrating, but is one of the better shows, I think. Cerys also good, but she tends to use that awestruck tone that is the 6Music voice (Mary Ann Hobbs, Guy Garvey et al) which is as distinctive as the Radio 4 comedy show voice.

thank you for putting your finger on a thing that makes me grind my teeth

tbh if you're listening to Radio 6 on a Friday evening maybe reconsider your life anyway

― coombespair gaz prices (Noodle Vague), Friday, January 12, 2018 3:09 PM (eleven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is true, but it's also a case of is this the best they can come up with? Rave nostalgia is problematic, I know, but at least play something fun!

It's fair to recall that Peel was not only avant-garde but also suburban / comfortable / familiar -- as in a long-ago ILX thread debate about his Radio 4 programme, Radio Times column, etc. I remember some of his late broadcast work as being rather predictable -- always ready to host a big session with Camera Obscura, etc.

In that particular sense he is closer to eg Gideon Coe or other 6music than one might think.

The thread !!

Home Truths

re: the Radio 6 awestruck voice. One of the first threads I started on ILM was moaning about this exact thing: DJs you love to hate

Right now, LAMMO is starting his programme with 'Teenage Kicks'.

In many ways, it's in the spirit of the late, great John Peel.

lol

He then stated that this week has been 90s WEEK: with the theme: 'records from the 1990s that you never hear on the radio anymore'.

cue Shed 7

They are back!

it's like they never went away

Last time I heard Lammo he was interviewing the Senseless Things for like 4 hours or something. This was a couple of months back

you still suffering from those weird dreams then, DL?

There's a disconnect between what the daytime presenters talk about and what they play, which I find irritating. Like Thundercat winning their presenters' album of the year poll, but before that win I'd never heard any of them play anything off that album ever. And at the moment there's a really simpering indie track that's just a knock-off of Fleetwood Mac on heavy rotation, and they're all going nuts over Shame, who just sound like Hard-Fi, so there's as much annoying playlisting going on as at any other mainstream radio station (obviously). The over-earnest quiet enthusiasm is definitely a house style, too, and I find it a bit sick-in-my-mouth most of the time even if I quite like what;s being enthused about.

And that's the thing, there isn't anywhere else where I can turn the radio on and be confident I'll get a favourable ratio of stuff I like to hear. I doubt I'd have heard Ratio by Floating Points on any other daytime station last year, for instance. Yes, they pander to 90s kids now in their late 30s and 40s by playing The Bluetones or Shed Seven every so often, but there is at least an attempt to broaden horizons too.

I feel like they should be bold and stop having a playlist entirely. The existence of one seems to go against the whole supposed ethos of the station.

I don't like that 'house style', but am unsure if it's really that common. Riley, Radcliffe, Huey Morgan (!), Iggy Pop (?!) don't do it?

I think for me it comes down more to M A Hobbs having a peculiar voice.

I tend to agree about 'playlist' stuff -- why do they need one at all? The repetitiveness of it is tiresome and it usually feels like they're promoting mediocrity; which they're not when they veer off it.

(G Coe doesn't play to any playlist.)

Last night Coe played 'coney island baby' - it sounded like a different version to me, the lead guitar was so elaborate - but perhaps it was just the same old version and it had never shone through so much. It sounded epic. I suppose it was a good use of radio, even though in theory I could have played the song myself.

TBF only LAMMO really plays old Bluetones + Shed Seven records! I think others would be too embarrassed to do that.

Guardian last week said SHAME are the greatest new guitar band. Have not heard but from the report, must be abysmal.

The playlist seems completely arbitrary, all these songs by minor indie bands with no wider impact at all being hammered to death while so much similar stuff gets ignored. I probably enjoyed more indie last year than I did in the last decade but I don't remember hearing Sacred Paws or Hannah Peel or the Weather Station on there at all.

I never put any radio station on at home but we have 6music on in the office and while there's a 50:50 mix of decent stuff and utter shit, the station as a whole is just insufferably smug and self-congratulatory. This sense of preserving the flame of "underground" and "new music" as defined by tastemakers in their 40s and 50s. At one point there was an ad with one of the Marks going "it's great that 6music still plays underground music because no-one else does", which was admirable for its sheer brass neck if nothing else.

xps I've not really listened to 6music in years so I didn't realise that the Mary Ann-Hobbs awestruck voice had become a house style, I always thought of the 6music house style as being the John Peel-esque wry mildly blokey northerner? I guess you can synthesise the two e.g. Professor Brian Cox

There was a time a couple of years ago when I used to turn on 6Music on a regular basis and I heard some bloody awful song by The Coral every time. It put me off listening to the station entirely. I find it hard to believe that presence on a playlist is not down to payola.

payola feels...unlikely?...on the BBC nowadays. whereas having some people with awful taste picking songs they think other people with awful taste will enthuse about seems more likely

It's also the increasing desperation of people who want British guitar music to come back as that prospect appears more remote than ever.

For the sake of convenience I'm overlooking the sort of rock music that gets played on Radio 1 than these guys wouldn't touch with a bargepole.

I'm honestly baffled what anybody sees in the sound of "British guitar music" post about 1990 but chacun a son gout. it feels like a small minority to get their own national radio station tho.

"sees in the sound" lol

I dunno it's just boredom use other noises please

I'm honestly baffled what anybody sees in the sound of "British guitar music" post about 1990

Post-1980 and I might agree with you.

I was being dead generous

I know how you all hate it when I talk about broad churches like they're just one thing

i'm not making any claims other than i don't want to go to church

6Music is basically about easing the slide into dementia - nice friendly nursey voices, music that takes you back to the happy days of your youth, stick to the familiar, don't confuse your patients with all this new modern stuff, keep away especially from new black music unless you want that one resident to go off on some awful racist monologue, you can play the old unthreatening stuff though, a bit of funny party music before we brew up some horlicks

Does every tedious Elbow single still get A-listed for some reason

I think this song by 'This Is The Kit' might be the worst thing I've ever heard, and I've heard that Belle and Sebastian single with the oboe solo.

lol half their Wikipedia page is about how much 6Music wuvs them

Re "Different/Unfamiliar versions"

They do seem to substitute a "Radio 1 Session" version for the "familiar/single" version whenever possible. I reckon its because they save on paying for "NeedleTime"...

I remember Jarvis playing something that turned out to be a weird session version and apologising afterwards - "we'll find the proper version and play it next week"

I find myself in the unusual position of wanting to defend 6music. Well bits of it anyway. Don't have a problem with MA Hobgoblin's voice and she plays some v nice stuff weekend mornings. Most recent playlist is pretty solid for a breakfast show I think (if you ignore RHCPs, Artic Monkeys) http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09mhyr8

Everything but the Girl
Each and Every One

Sunflower Bean
I Was A Fool

Abul Mogard
Above All Dreams

Tom Waits
Back In The Crowd

The Pioneers
Long Shot Kick De Bucket

King Krule
Biscuit Town

Nas
The World Is Yours

Insecure Men
Teenage Toy

The Stone Roses
Waterfall

The Go! Team
Mayday

Sam & Dave
I Thank You

St. Vincent
New York

Nightports with Matthew Bourne
Exit

Red Hot Chili Peppers
The Zephyr Song

Nadine Shah
Evil

Warren G & Nate Dogg
Regulate

Baxter Dury
Prince Of Tears

Otis Redding
Hard to Handle

Kendrick Lamar & SZA
All The Stars

Hot Chip
Night & Day

Anna Calvi
Suzanne And I

Laura Marling
Don't Pass Me By

Billy Bragg
A New England

Beck
Dear Life

Pangea
Router

The Creatures
Miss The Girl

Arctic Monkeys
Fluorescent Adolescent

Boy Azooga
Face Behind Her Cigarette

Sly & The Family Stone
Everyday People

Sylvan Esso
Hey Mami

Jamie xx
Far Nearer

Gengahr
Carrion

Sylvan Esso
PARAD(w/m)E

Commodores
I Feel Sanctified

Basement Revolver
Bread & Wine

Jimi Hendrix
Purple Haze

Sunflowers
Signal Hill

Deftones
Be Quiet And Drive (Far Away)

Ghostpoet
Many Moods At Midnight

Aukia
Colorado

Richard Hawley
Darlin'

Invisible Minds
Yo Mae Leh

Big Audio Dynamite
E=MC2

Etta James
I'd Rather Go Blind

.

I'd rather go deaf myself

lol

can't say I much approve of that playlist

Richard Hawley is one of those people who must have a stash of incriminating material on the DG, there's no other explanation as to why he still gets airtime (see also: Guy Garvey)

I was going to agree with Stevie T, then realized I actually haven't heard most of the things on that list.

But in principle I still agree with Stevie T.

DESERT ISLAND DISCO

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09l8dh2

Today's DESERT ISLAND DISCO is Mod / Northern Soul focused. I welcome this.

It is odd how people still think 6music is all mediocre rock.

It definitely does play mediocre rock.

But right now, before noon on a Friday, it is playing a long instrumental in some kind of experimental techno genre. The last two tracks were also instrumentals in some kind of related fields.

In fact LL hasn't played any 'rock' for at least half an hour or so.

Now it's a First Aid Kit session. Country?

Lauren Laverne has better and more diverse/interesting taste than most of them do. It's when you get to Radcliffe and Lamacq in the afternoons that it gets really bad.

I agree that they are different.

LL: 5 x 3 hours per week, + her 6music recommends slot = LL takes up a big chunk of the 6music schedule every week!

Tom Ravenscroft has a new weekly Rinse FM show 3pm - 5pm on Thursday's


starting today
https://rinse.fm/episodes/tom-ravenscroft-05-06-2025-1500

BBC Radio 6 Music autumn schedule includes Kate Moss and Beth Ditto

https://radiotoday.co.uk/2025/08/bbc-radio-6-music-autumn-schedule-includes-kate-moss-and-beth-ditto/

BBC Radio 6 Music’s autumn schedule features Kate Moss, Beth Ditto, and a new series dedicated to celebrating neurodivergent identity and creativity.

c-cha-changes...

Kate Moss will present Music Uncovered, David Bowie: Changeling, an eight-part podcast exploring Bowie’s artistic evolution between 1970 and 1975.

more info:

Kate Moss and Beth Ditto to present new programmes on BBC Radio 6 Music as autumn schedule revealed
https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/2025/bbc-radio-6-music-kate-moss-and-beth-ditto-autumn-schedule

A new series dedicated to celebrating neurodivergent identity and creativity also features in the autumn 2025 schedule

BBC Radio 6 Music, the UK’s biggest digital-only radio station with 2.6 million listeners each week (RAJAR, Q2 2025), reveals new programmes for autumn 2025:

Kate Moss hosts Music Uncovered, David Bowie: Changeling, a world exclusive, eight-part podcast exploring David Bowie’s artistic evolution between 1970-1975

Beth Ditto joins the 6 Music family with a new series, Indie Forever Disco, and a regular spot on Nick Grimshaw’s Breakfast Show

In a 12-part series titled Grounding, four neurodivergent artists share their lived experiences: composer, DJ and radio host, 6 Music’s AFRODEUTSCHE, author and podcaster Blindboyboatclub, musician, producer and DJ Emma-Jean Thackray and singer, songwriter and musician Gary Numan

6 music really pushing things forward with stunt DJs who were in the zeitgeist 20+ years ago

tbf i guess they know their audience

40+ years in numan's case 8)

neurodivergent identity and creativity among the approved couple of dozen presenters and musicians they have on rotation anyway

2 years ago it was Belfast, last year it was Glasgow and this year it's Sheffield

BBC Radio 6 Music presents New Music Fix Live in Sheffield this November
https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/2025/radio-6-music-new-music-fix-live-sheffield

Deb Grant and Nathan Shepherd will broadcast from the city for four days to celebrate its music scene and emerging artists

On their New Music Fix Daily show on BBC Radio 6 Music (Mondays – Thursdays, 7-9pm), Deb Grant and Nathan Shepherd announced that this year’s New Music Fix Live will take place in Sheffield from Monday 24th – Thursday 27 November.

For four days, Deb and Nathan will broadcast from the city, celebrating its music scene and emerging artists.

From Monday 24 – Wednesday 26 November (7-9pm), they’ll present live from the BBC Radio Sheffield studios, Shoreham Street. They’ll bring listeners sessions and interviews - recorded in Sheffield in the lead-up to New Music Fix Live - from singer-songwriter, guitarist and producer Richard Hawley, musician and songwriter Self Esteem, and members of the nine-piece collective blending jazz, hip-hop, afrobeat and more, Nubiyan Twist. These three shows will also feature DJ sets - recorded at Sheffield’s Grub Records - from Sheffield’s most exciting labels and club nights including Off Me Nut Records and Control.

On Thursday 27 November (7-10pm), Deb and Nathan will broadcast an extended edition of their show from Yellow Arch Studios, where DJs from the not-for-profit, DIY music venue and community space Gut Level, producer and bassline queen Big Ang, and electronic producer I. JORDAN perform sets for an audience of 6 Music listeners in the room, and for those tuned in across the UK.

BBC Radio Sheffield will simulcast New Music Fix Live on Thursday 27th November (7-10pm).

BBC Radio 6 Music announces its Artists of the Year 2025
https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/2025/bbc-radio-6-music-artists-of-the-year-2025

The list features twelve acts, a mix of established and break-through acts who have dominated 2025

Blood Orange
CMAT
Deftones
Ethel Cain
FKA Twigs
Geese
Jacob Alon
Jasmine.4.t
Kae Tempest
Maruja
Pulp
Turnstile

Surprised that the following didn't make it:

Cate Le Bon
Nourished by Time
Clipping
These New Puritans
Decius

Obviously I know about the album but "we're celebrating 50 years of horses" is still a very funny statement.

Huey Morgan is leaving 6 Music (re: his Saturday Mid Morning Show), last show will be next Saturday.
https://www.instagram.com/p/DSc3KZtChJ4/?img_index=1

No announcement of a replacement yet.

sure there's another singer from a late 90s indie band they can ask, they haven't gone through all of them yet.

Jarvis seems to be wandering back into view...

Plans announced for a new BBC Radio 6 Music stream, available exclusively on BBC Sounds
Plans to launch a new extension for indie fans would be dedicated to the biggest and best indie rock and pop from the 1980s - 2010s
https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/2026/bbc-radio-6-music-stream-on-bbc-sounds

Completely a daft idea.

BBC Radio 6 Music announces plans to launch a new extension for indie fans, available to stream 24 hours a day, only on BBC Sounds.

The stream will be dedicated to the biggest and best indie rock and pop from the 1980s - 2010s and will feature:

An extensive range of nostalgic tracks which have soundtracked listeners lives and memories. Audiences can expect to hear artists such as Arctic Monkeys, Florence + The Machine, Oasis, Pulp, The 1975, The Killers, The Smiths, The Stone Roses, The Strokes, The xx and Wolf Alice, with UK artists making up 70% of the playlist.

Some new programming, as well as historic interviews and live sessions from the unrivalled BBC Archive, which tell the story of UK independent music in a way only the BBC can do.

A programme which will platform emerging British artists, spotlight independent venues and explore the UK’s regional music scenes, past and present, celebrating the UK grassroots sector’s contribution to the rich legacy of indie music.

Music mixes to match listeners’ moods, as well as a chance to revisit indie-focussed playlists previously broadcast on 6 Music.

A simulcast of 6 Music’s flagship indie music show, Indie Forever (Fridays 9-11pm)

Samantha Moy, Head of BBC Radio 6 Music, says: “Since its launch in 2002, 6 Music has evolved significantly to embrace and champion a wide range of alternative music genres. This extension aims to honour 6 Music’s beginnings and apply the station’s curious spirit and storytelling strength to a sound and scene that is loved by so many.”

The new stream is a continuation of the BBC’s commitment to evolve BBC Sounds to represent the tastes and experiences of all licence fee payers and reflect how they consume music today, and to give audiences, especially underserved audiences, even more choice and value from the BBC. It will also provide new commissioning opportunities for the UK radio production sector, in line with the BBC’s commitment to supporting creative industries across the country.

The launch of the stream on the BBC Sounds app, web and smart speaker is planned for summer this year. It is subject to a regulatory process which is underway.

Radio X and Absolute Radio already exist to cater for this. Even Virgin Radio has a Britpop Radio station.

Note: It is subject to a regulatory process which is underway.

Surely, Ofcom blocks this unnecessary and unwanted radio station.

Why not a dedicated station for

Balearic Music?
Experimental Electronic Music?
Goth / darkwave / dark pop?
Jazz?
Metal?
Progressive rock?

instead we get more British indie. Samantha Moy, what are doing with this nonsense proposal?

I am reminded of this article written by Neil Kulkarni

Please Please Just Fuck Off With This Bullshit: Lamacq & Whiley & The Lie Of 'Britpop'
https://neilk.substack.com/p/please-please-just-fuck-off-with

A jazz and "world" station would be brilliant and I reckon possibly younger than this will be, with the right treatment

But no

i thought i'd paid for the ILX without ads

lol

8. Music Policy
We’re targeting 25-44 year old indie fans, particularly those who use indie music to soundtrack their daily lives. They enjoy using social media and are usually part of fanbases.
They are a diverse audience from across the UK and are frequent gig goers. We know that they are listening for a simple, nostalgic hit of alternative spirit wherever and whenever they want.
Tracks should lean towards the instrumental with a handful featuring non-distracting vocals, and should satisfy the listener’s desire to hear indie classics (80% nostalgic to provide comfort and familiarity) alongside newer tracks (20% from new artists/new tracks from established artists that blend in with the former). They should be sequenced in such a way that the soundtrack is secondary to whatever the listener is locked into, helping them to focus, and keeping them from feeling overwhelmed.
The music should feel familiar and nostalgic, and include a broad range of indie music from the 1980s2010s, centred on music from the 90s and 00s.
Examples of Hero Artists: Radiohead, James Blake, Tame Impala, Bon Iver, The National, London Grammar, Big Thief, Laura Marling, The xx, alt-j, Michael Kiwanuka, Sufjan Stevens, Bombay Bicycle Club, Sigur Ros, Khruangbin

the forever dark thing i used to listen to, I'd not seen any updates since Christmas so i went and had a look and they are just repeating them now.

xpost absolutely brutal

i'm open to the idea that there is a compelling case, but i would love to see the compelling case as to why that demographic meets the threshold for needing its own public service radio station

I'm against planning things based on marketing demographics in general, but this is from me having the idea of pitching something to them, reading that and saying "oh fuck no"

if you find yourself the target audience for that, might as well start digging your grave now (to a soundtrack of Dig Your Own Hole, but not too loud in case its overwhelming)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001622l/episodes/player

Dermot's Alternative Sounds of the Nineties. Dermot takes you back to 1990 with music from The Stone Roses, The Charlatans & St Etienne. Meanwhile, Dom Joly & Steve Cradock pick their favourite 90s bands.

That show is on Radio 2 though, not 6Music. R2 have been doing decade-specific mainstream retro shows since forever, so this one just seems logical.

it just felt like it was the worst, most obvious of the 6 music daytime canon of the thread title.

but it's on at 3am and a few of them seem to be repeated from the exact same time in 2024 and 2025.

(i recently realised that the Forever Dark thing i was listening to is still on but every weekly episode is a repeat from exactly a year previous, like they can't find anyone to generate new gothy playlists)

it doesn't help that dermot is the last person I'd think of as alternative