The Radio Times
Jun. 3rd, 2006 01:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusThroughout my life, the best-selling British magazine has consistently been the Radio Times, the BBC's listings guide to radio and television in the UK. (It was only recently overtaken by The Reader's Digest and What's On TV.) Copies of the RT used to lie around our family house, and when, as a first year Sociology student at Aberdeen University, I had to do a dissertation, I chose to write a semiological analysis of the advertising and editorial messages in one edition of Radio Times; "Barthes meets the British class system", you could say. I remember one sentence from my essay (which got the highest possible marks and resulted in my tutor begging me to stay on and do a Sociology major instead of English): "Myth thrives by incest, but there's always room for the reader in the happy family". (I returned to that a couple of years later, when I called my first band The Happy Family.)
Well, last night I found a website called TV and Radio Bits which, with admirable thoroughness, displays covers of the Radio Times throughout its history. I started in 1960 and followed the magazine's front page designs and featured shows down to 2006. It was a bit like seeing my whole life pass before me -- or, rather, parts of my life, because I spent big chunks of time outside the UK.
I don't remember much before about 1966. That's when I come onstream as someone who's aware of TV shows, cultural trends and design. Dr Who, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and chat show host Simon Dee (I think I actually pinned this dandyesque picture up on the side of a crate in our wine cellar at 6 Ainslie Place, Edinburgh) marked my life in the year or two before my family headed off to live under the colonels in then-fascist Greece. (Another influence on my Happy Family album, which concerns the assassination of a fascist dictator.)
In late 1969, as Robin Carmody (a Click Opera reader, as it happens) explains in his thorough guide to the history of the Radio Times, a new editor, 29 year-old Geoffrey Cannon, gave the Radio Times what I think of as its definitive look: a distinctive logo in the form of a black, fancy type flourish for the title, complemented by clear and crisp layouts featuring Franklin Gothic condensed, and reminiscent of the quality advertising and album sleeves of the era. This look continued for fifteen years, and represents, I think, the magazine's best period.
Britain's rightward swing and increasing class differentiation are all too aparent in the 80s, as costume dramas and aristocratic poise dominate the Radio Times cover. Around the time of Band Aid the magazine begins to use other typefaces, seemingly influenced by the more cluttered, post-modern style of Smash Hits. Then begins a terrible decline into visual hell. 1989's Angela Rippon Come Dancing cover looks like Woman's Own. In the early 90s the magazine becomes a supermarket celebrity title. As Carmody explains, this is because Thatcher's broadcasting de-regulation had allowed it to list ITV, cable and satellite shows as well as the traditional, more up-market BBC ones. The result of reaching out to more readers, though, was a certain loss of the magazine's soul. Not only did it lose its identity, it began losing readers (this was the era when any magazine could print TV listings -- they were everywhere).
In the 90s, as computers and the internet took over, I stopped watching TV. (Actually, to be more honest, I specialized my way out: early 90s, porn on Westminster cable and Twin Peaks, mid-90s MTV's The Real World, late 90s Arte via satellite, 00s TV replaced by internet, with occasional glimpses of UK TV in the form of Nathan Barley torrents or The Office DVDs.) I also left the UK to live in Paris. The Radio Times, meanwhile, re-designed its title in an apparent nod to Rolling Stone magazine, featuring endless grotesquely grinning celebrities. Charity-friendly comedian Lenny Henry became as unavoidable on the cover of the Radio Times as Oasis were on the front of the NME. The magazine's type got cluttered and garish, mixing styles and weights, adding drop shadow, random italicization and lots of "exclusive", "free" and "special" flashes. Like a whole new generation of British magazines (Q, Mojo and Heat, for instance), The Radio Times looked more American than British. The predominant theme of the 90s in the UK is all too clear from these covers: product formats are endlessly rejigged according to the requirements of a ruthless form of Thatcherite-Darwinian ultra-marketing. This continues under Blair.
The visual nadir for the Radio Times comes in 2001, when the magazine switches to Gill Sans and starts to look like an in-flight magazine or in-house corporate title. From that point on, I no longer care. There's no longer the slightest connection to the Britain I grew up in. I'm elsewhere, anyway. My own country's core narrative has become an irrelevance, a book I haven't read, a show I haven't watched. I wouldn't even bother to write scathing sociology about it; waste of bile, mate.
Well, last night I found a website called TV and Radio Bits which, with admirable thoroughness, displays covers of the Radio Times throughout its history. I started in 1960 and followed the magazine's front page designs and featured shows down to 2006. It was a bit like seeing my whole life pass before me -- or, rather, parts of my life, because I spent big chunks of time outside the UK.
I don't remember much before about 1966. That's when I come onstream as someone who's aware of TV shows, cultural trends and design. Dr Who, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and chat show host Simon Dee (I think I actually pinned this dandyesque picture up on the side of a crate in our wine cellar at 6 Ainslie Place, Edinburgh) marked my life in the year or two before my family headed off to live under the colonels in then-fascist Greece. (Another influence on my Happy Family album, which concerns the assassination of a fascist dictator.)
In late 1969, as Robin Carmody (a Click Opera reader, as it happens) explains in his thorough guide to the history of the Radio Times, a new editor, 29 year-old Geoffrey Cannon, gave the Radio Times what I think of as its definitive look: a distinctive logo in the form of a black, fancy type flourish for the title, complemented by clear and crisp layouts featuring Franklin Gothic condensed, and reminiscent of the quality advertising and album sleeves of the era. This look continued for fifteen years, and represents, I think, the magazine's best period.
Britain's rightward swing and increasing class differentiation are all too aparent in the 80s, as costume dramas and aristocratic poise dominate the Radio Times cover. Around the time of Band Aid the magazine begins to use other typefaces, seemingly influenced by the more cluttered, post-modern style of Smash Hits. Then begins a terrible decline into visual hell. 1989's Angela Rippon Come Dancing cover looks like Woman's Own. In the early 90s the magazine becomes a supermarket celebrity title. As Carmody explains, this is because Thatcher's broadcasting de-regulation had allowed it to list ITV, cable and satellite shows as well as the traditional, more up-market BBC ones. The result of reaching out to more readers, though, was a certain loss of the magazine's soul. Not only did it lose its identity, it began losing readers (this was the era when any magazine could print TV listings -- they were everywhere).
In the 90s, as computers and the internet took over, I stopped watching TV. (Actually, to be more honest, I specialized my way out: early 90s, porn on Westminster cable and Twin Peaks, mid-90s MTV's The Real World, late 90s Arte via satellite, 00s TV replaced by internet, with occasional glimpses of UK TV in the form of Nathan Barley torrents or The Office DVDs.) I also left the UK to live in Paris. The Radio Times, meanwhile, re-designed its title in an apparent nod to Rolling Stone magazine, featuring endless grotesquely grinning celebrities. Charity-friendly comedian Lenny Henry became as unavoidable on the cover of the Radio Times as Oasis were on the front of the NME. The magazine's type got cluttered and garish, mixing styles and weights, adding drop shadow, random italicization and lots of "exclusive", "free" and "special" flashes. Like a whole new generation of British magazines (Q, Mojo and Heat, for instance), The Radio Times looked more American than British. The predominant theme of the 90s in the UK is all too clear from these covers: product formats are endlessly rejigged according to the requirements of a ruthless form of Thatcherite-Darwinian ultra-marketing. This continues under Blair.
The visual nadir for the Radio Times comes in 2001, when the magazine switches to Gill Sans and starts to look like an in-flight magazine or in-house corporate title. From that point on, I no longer care. There's no longer the slightest connection to the Britain I grew up in. I'm elsewhere, anyway. My own country's core narrative has become an irrelevance, a book I haven't read, a show I haven't watched. I wouldn't even bother to write scathing sociology about it; waste of bile, mate.
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 12:00 pm (UTC)The Sun newspaper still lists all main channels except BBC Radio 3(Classical and Arts) and BBC4 TV (Arts and Classical)in some consistent anti intellectualist stance.. one day i will be a Sun letter writer and ask why.
I want a good media coverage journal to return in the Uk. I wrote about it here (http://niddrie-edge.livejournal.com/tag/listener).
Currently the Radio Times is giving away Dr Who collectable cards and has a crossword where one can win a Sony DVD Recorder.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 12:04 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 01:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 01:47 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 02:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 02:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 02:40 pm (UTC)Jools.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 02:57 pm (UTC)These heroes fought terrorists. Evil geniuses who wanted to destroy the world just because that would be kind of a cool thing to do. They weren't States, they were organizations with names like T.H.R.U.S.H and 'Get Smart's' K.A.O.S.
And now we have A.L.Q.U.I.D.A. Didn't Blair and Bush learn anything from T.V. (in Blair's case The Tele). We need Napoleon Solo and Stephanie Powers ,and if he promises not to sing, Noel Harrison with little ball point pen communicators, tuxedos, dinner parties where you can poison people and stick a stiletto in their back.
Maxwell Smart would make a better president. He had a shoe phone.
Although I'm pretty sure Bush and Cheney have a "Cone of Silence"
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 04:14 pm (UTC)BTW what are your plans for the world cup? Will you be following England??
Darren J
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 04:20 pm (UTC)My only contact with the World Cup is likely to be at the Sonambiente (http://www.sonambiente.net) music festival, which has a World Cup Lounge (http://sonambiente.net/de/01_spektrum/worlcuplounge.html) where various experimental sound artists will provide an alternative soundtrack to the matches as they unfold on TV. Even that's a bit too much football for my liking...
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 06:23 pm (UTC)Nathan Barley &tc...
Date: 2006-06-03 06:34 pm (UTC)i should try torrents, i suppose, because the best of what i saw is not available in the US.
you mention Nathan Barley [i only watched the first few episodes but found it somewhat painful], but have you by chance seen Big Train, Jam, Black Books, or The League of Gentlemen? i know you don't watch TV...neither do I [internet and dvds on projector]...but these were sort of the glinty kernals stuck between an otherwise foul set of teeth. but then British television is still novel to my poor culture, nutrient, and patina deprived american brain.
[[[oh and just randomly curious...how is Berlin for wireless internet?]]]
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 08:14 pm (UTC)Re: Nathan Barley &tc...
Date: 2006-06-03 09:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 10:01 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 10:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-03 10:35 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-04 12:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-04 01:14 am (UTC)I empathise with the lost Britain angle, the land without...I am wallowing in various renaissances of the early 20th C in order to innoculate myself..
I wish I had capped the recent repeat of Mark Cousin's(Moviedrome?) Ian Hamilton Finlay tribute (http://www.sundayherald.com/55548) on Scottish BBC. Perhaps you could employ your redoubtable search skills after that one.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-06-04 07:28 pm (UTC)Well you certainly seem to bang on about it enough considering you haven't lived here for years. Stop wasting your bile, mate. Move on.