Paul Golder writes for the Brentwood Gazette
Last weekend was one of the big festival events for the Phoenix FM as a team of us were back at the Latitude Festival in Suffolk joining 40,000 music and art fans on one of the hottest weekends of the year.
We were back for the 12th year and other than the BBC I don’t believe that any other radio station has covered as many acts there as Phoenix FM has – we’ve conducted over 150 interviews in that time. I’m really proud of the working relationship we have there and it demonstrates the power of community radio to reach niche performers that wouldn’t necessarily get airtime anywhere else.
Latitude is more than just a music festival – over 200 musical acts play there but there are also hundreds of other events encompassing art, theatre, dance, film, cabaret and literature.
Our team, including myself and Steve Robertson, Nick Field and Gareth Williams, managed to interview 27 artists and organisations – as well as many local up and coming bands and a few international acts we spoke to local and national charities too such as Greenpeace and Every Can Counts.
As I’m now a bit of an oldie my personal highlights were performances from 90s bands Sleeper, The Charlatans and The Breeders as well as another amazing set from up and coming punk band Idles, who are not to be missed live. And the surprise set from Liam Gallagher wasn’t bad too.
All of the interviews can be found on our website at phoenixfm.com and we’re also preparing our annual special programme for broadcast next month.
Our next event is Hertfordshire’s Standon Calling this coming weekend – Phoenix FM is official media partner of the event this year.
* Danny Macklin, Chief Executive Officer of Leyton Orient FC, will be our special guest on The Orient Hour this Sunday, which has been rebooted for the new football season.
* Other guests coming up on air in the next week include Laura Cook from the Beeches care home and Chelmsford Cathedral theologian Canon Edward Carter.
* There will also be live performances in the studio from Paolo Morena, Jim Kahr and Perfect Blue Sky.
