Save BBC6music – A Love Letter
I came to England 20 years ago and having to build a new life for my son and me time was sparse and there was no room for music. I didn’t know anything about English radio so I just listened to my records and therefore lost track of what was going on in the music world. I had too much to do so didn’t really miss music that much.
When life became easier I searched for something to listen to but couldn’t find anything decent. With the purchase of a PC 10 years ago things became a bit easier, but with the dial-up taking literally hours to download a song – I did find some nice stuff, but it was quite sporadic. Then, about 4/5 years ago, by accident and via broadband I discovered BBC6music and that was it, I was hooked. And dived head first into “indie” music in all its variations.
I work from home (baking cakes and desserts for restaurants and cafes) and enjoy listening to music in my bakery very much. So I bought my very first DAB radio and quickly got addicted to the point of starting work early as not to miss a minute of the breakfast show, then with Phill Jupitus. And when Phill asked for listeners to write in to get the breakfast show and all its people and paraphernalia into their own living room it took me about two minutes to make the decision. And against all odds I won them. And a few weeks later they were all here in my house, people and machines and controlled chaos and all that at 6 in the morning.
The weather was brilliant, so after the start in the house we went down into the sunny garden and had an amazing time doing the breakfast show which included music, cake and homemade elderflower wine.
Something else happened though: after we told Phill about our taste in music and talked about the bands we like he asked whether we seen any of them live and we had to admit that no, we hadn’t. He sort of laughed at us and that did it. After that sunny day with the BBC6music breakfast show we started looking for gigs and of course finding them all over the place. And we started going. Over the years we must have seen more than a hundred bands live, from folky stuff (Tunng, Fanfarlo) to rock music (Porcupine Tree) and absolutely everything in between – and every one of them you can listen to on 6music. I know that these days you can find nearly everything on the web. I am paying for the spotify prime option, I love it, even have the phone app. and I am looking at many music websites, but only after I heard a song or two on the radio. I am now going every year to the End Of The Road Festival, because there we find all the bands we like – we have seen Midlake, Bon Iver, Micah P. Hinson, King Creosote, British Seapower to name but a few.
Once again my favourite radio station is threatened with closure, and this time it looks so very serious. I am not sure what will happen to me should it close down – I don’t want to go back to the way it was before I discovered this gem of a station.
BBC6music does not only bring me great pleasure but it also does something for the bands – I have spent a lot of money for gigs, CDs and downloads over the years which without this station I wouldn’t have done. All our DABs as well as the radio on the telly are set to BBC6music – in the very beginning of my discovery of the digital world I did listen in to some other stations – but none of them has that unique quality, the very knowledgeable presenters (with only a very few exceptions), the music old and new you won’t find anywhere else, the beautiful live sessions in the hub, the many archive sessions – the whole wonderful package that does make work go quicker and my music days richer.
To finish this little love letter: I do love this station very much and in the last few days, whenever I heard one of those quirky little bands doing a session in the hub, being interviewed by Lauren Laverne I felt close to tears at the thought that this gem might be gone very soon. It might not be a matter of life or death and it won’t save the planet but it makes my world a better place whenever I switch my DAB radio on.
Please save BBC6music! How? Go here and act: http://www.love6music.com/
