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Writer's pictureliuromaine

Will British radio ever truly embrace controversial urban personalities?

When you compare UK and US radio one major advantage the UK has is it's track-listing.

when listening to UK radio you will hear a diverse level of artist doing different genre's. From UK Rap, Hip Hop, Grime, RnB, UK Drill, Afro beats, dancehall and lot's more on a major station.

The music radio culture has slowly integrated more home grown UK artist with a mix of the traditional US hits.

But one thing that radio programming in the states beats us in by a wide margin are their on air personalities.

UK radio is heavily monitored and censored. But US radio host's are given a decent amount of room to show their unique personalities to attract viewer's.

With UK radio on mainstream station's preferring to use the format of scripted audio content, radio shows unfortunately sound safe and formulaic.

Personalities like Charlemagne Tha God, Ebro,Joe Budden,Angela Yee,Dj Akademiks,Wendy William's,Desus and Mero have built lanes for themselves having risky questions and opinions that while can offend.


still bring unique qualities to the shows they are on and connect with audience's at high numbers.


making the host the driving force of the show. not the show itself.


Fantastic presenters like Julie Adenuga, Rebecca Judd, Snoochie Shy , Kenny Allstar, Reece Parkinson showcase perfect qualities for mainstream radio broadcast but that's only one side of our culture. 


while UK personalities like Very Vee Brown,Alhan,Poet,Mr Montgomery,Zeze Milz have those same traits but are shunned from mainstream attention.


but they give another outlook on our culture that many agree with.


Tim Westood is a brand based around his outrageous personality that has been going strong for decades.


We need to remember that Westwood was something new for the UK when he started to make a name for himself. 

Controversial but he has become extremely memorable. 


Imagine a radio podcast with Grime Report CEO Lordie. I'm positive he has 1000's of grime tales he could share and his straight talking attitude would be a breath of fresh air


UK radio has been called out for lacking dynamic voices especially in urban sectors unlike our united states counterparts in the and it shows from the product.


the scene has greatly expanded where more voices who the mainstream may not at first understand could bear fruit to further improve the current climate the culture is experiencing.

Having talented presenters but giving them no space to breathe in case of hurting industry relationships.

Not to say that it can't backfire but adding a little fire to your product in moderation could work wonders.

As well the added benefit of birthing new fresh content that can be the significant edge against beating the competition.




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