Absolute to go on FM in West Midlands: 12 years late

History could have given us this rather earlier

I read this news story with some amusement. From Monday 7th September, Absolute Radio will replace Planet Rock on 105.2 FM in the West Midlands.

Planet Rock itself replaced Kerrang on FM just two years ago, which meant the closure of the Birmingham studios for Kerrang, and the 105.2FM transmitter simply relaying Planet Rock from London.

Bauer decided to close Kerrang in May 2013, and Kerrang made its final broadcast in June 2013. Only a month later, Bauer bought Absolute Radio.

With hindsight, Absolute was clearly the better station for an FM - it's much less niche, and should deliver much better value for the transmitter. It's "good news for listeners", as the cliché goes.

So, it's amusing to note that back in 2002, the licence that Kerrang ended up winning was contested by... Virgin Radio West Midlands, run by the station that's now named Absolute. They ran a station in Wolverhampton as a test - the website partially exists in archive.org - though, sadly, no images.

While the station promised "Virgin Radio West Midlands will be a completely separate station, broadcasting 24 hours a day from studios in the West Midlands.", later Ofcom changes in regulation would clearly have allowed the national station to be rebroadcast.

Kerrang won... but now it's Absolute née Virgin which wins the FM prize.

What goes around comes around...