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Media
TeamRock confirms radio service
By Chris Cooke | Published on Thursday 4 April 2013
The new owner of Classic Rock and Metal Hammer magazines has announced that it will also launch a new national rock radio station, which isn’t much of a surprise given that the two men leading the new venture – John Myers and Billy Anderson – both come from radio backgrounds.
Myers and Anderson’s new company, the Harwood Private Equity-backed TeamRock, announced it had acquired Classic Rock and Metal Hammer from Future Publishing in a £10.2 million deal earlier this week, with the intent of establishing a “content creation and distribution company aimed at the “large but under-served community” of rock music fans.
Of course, when it comes to radio stations, the rock music community arguably isn’t under-served, with Planet Rock, Kerrang! and Absolute all already going after that market.
But Anderson said of his firm’s new radio venture: “All rock stations in the UK seem to play the same rock songs. That’s fine, but we are not a classic rock station. Instead, we celebrate the whole spectrum of rock music. Too many great bands go unplayed”.
The new station will also try to stand out by employing a different commercial model, with revenues generated through sponsorship deals and on-air promotions, keeping the output ad break free.
Quite how the radio service will link in to TeamRock’s magazines isn’t yet clear. The station will initially launch on the national DAB digital radio network and, presumably, online, though it’s thought the company will look for other broadcast channels too.
To that end, TeamRock is now a favourite to bid for the Manchester and Central Scotland licences of Anderson and Myer’s former employer GMG Radio, if Global Radio is forced to sell them to get regulator approval for its acquisition of the Guardian Media Group’s former radio business.
