Bauer rebranding 53 stations to The Hits/Greatest Hits

And yet Bauer stick it out with the current GHR breakfast presenter who sounds dated.

So local shows will air in the afternoon. Will they have local traffic during drive time?

They'd probably have to pay Simon Mayo an awful lot of money for him to get up at 4am

The idea is that local programming is on 1-4 instead of drive now I believe, because they're still bound by the license terms to do it.

Interesting that Mark Forrest is to replace Mayo in the morning Scala slot. Filling 4-7 will be a challenge though. Quite what happens to Wittertainment on Fridays will be interesting to see. A very quick turn around needed now.

Wonder how this is going to affect the film review on 5 live? Currently 2:30-4pm due to the pandemic but had been 3-5 immediately before that.

Wittertainment has been pre-recorded (usually on a Thursday) since the pandemic began, I imagine this is a strong indication this will continue. It was live once in the summer in an edition without Mayo. Sounded like they were trialling a return to the studio but as Mayo has essentially been housebound since last March I can't see that changing any time soon.

The shift from 3-5 slot for Wittertainment, previously 2-4, was done in part I suspect to give Mayo some breathing room when his Scala show finished at 1 so it wouldn't be unheard of for 5 Live to move the show again if they want it to be live. Could potentially swap them and Elis and John in the schedule - on their podcast recently it was stated that the plan is to go back to two hour shows for both them and the film review this year, but no timescale attached yet.

Although it happens from time to time on TV I guess it would be quite rare for presenters to appear on two rival radio stations at the same time.

I think it probably happens with Tony Blackburn, who has multiple gigs on BBC and Commercial radio

I'm quite happy to hear that Simon is returning to drivetimes. I just wish they'd have local programmes at breakfast.

I wondered why they moved Andy Crane off afternoons, he was the best DJ in the line up. Makes sense now, although as London Lite says their breakfast show needs someone better.

A very good move for GHR, although I feel a bit sorry for the local drivetime hosts who've been relagated somewhat, though in the current circumstances 'drive' is even more of an outdated term and not the peak listening it once was.



I'm sure I've heard him say he never wants to do a breakfast show again

Yes, he said that right at the start of him standing in for the then recently and suddenly departed Chris Evans on Radio 1.
I can't remember how long he was doing that for, it was a few weeks before Mark and Lard took over.

He certainly has said he has done breakfast, and wouldn't be doing any more.