Midlands Radio plc was an independent radio operator, which operated seven radio licences in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

Coventry Coventry ( or ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands, England. It is on the River Sherbourne. Coventry has been a large settlement for centuries, although it was not founded and given its ...

Leicester Leicester ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city, Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority and the county town of Leicestershire in the East Midlands of England. It is the largest settlement in the East Midlands. The city l ...

Nottingham Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east ...

and surrounding areas in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

Stations owned

FM

BRMB Free Radio Birmingham is an Independent Local Radio station based in Birmingham, England, owned and operated by Bauer as part of the Hits Radio network. It broadcasts to Birmingham and the West Midlands. As of September 2022, the station has a ...

Leicester Sound Leicester Sound was an Independent Local Radio station which broadcast to Leicestershire. The station merged with two other East Midlands stations, Trent FM and Ram FM to form Capital FM East Midlands (part of Global's Capital FM Network) on Mo ...

Radio Trent Trent FM was an Independent Local Radio station which broadcast to Nottinghamshire. The station merged with two other East Midlands stations, Leicester Sound and Ram FM to form Capital FM East Midlands (part of Global's Capital FM Network) on M ...

Mercia Sound la, Merciorum regnum , conventional_long_name=Kingdom of Mercia , common_name=Mercia , status=Kingdom , status_text=Independent kingdom (527–879)Client state of Wessex () , life_span=527–918 , era=Heptarchy , event_start= , date_start= , ye ...

AM

* GEM AM - operated on the medium wave frequencies of Radio Trent. *

Xtra AM Xtra AM was a United Kingdom radio station which was on the air between 1989 and 1998. It was broadcast to much of Birmingham, Coventry and Warwickshire and was the 'oldies' station which took over the mediumwave frequencies of both BRMB (servi ...

- operated on the medium wave frequencies of BRMB and Mercia.

History

Under the control of Ron Coles, Midlands Radio plc was floated on the full stock market in 1990. Following the introduction of the Broadcasting Act of 1990, a number of major groups began to lead a consolidation of the market. This led to Midlands Radio plc being purchased by for 18 million by

Capital Radio plc Capital may refer to: Common uses * Capital city, a municipality of primary status ** List of national capital cities * Capital letter, an upper-case letter Economics and social sciences * Capital (economics), the durable produced goods used fo ...

, who then sold Trent, Leicester Sound, and Mercia Sound to GWR in 1993, but kept hold of BRMB. As Mercia and its medium wave frequency were sold in the bundle, GWR announced that 1359 kHz would be rebranded as

Classic Gold Classic Gold was a network of three "Gold" music formatted stations which broadcast on AM in Bradford, Hull and Sheffield. They were the sister stations of Pennine Radio, Viking Radio and Radio Hallam respectively and they were part of the Yo ...

. This meant Xtra AM would only continue in Birmingham, and due to the presenters urging Coventry listeners to retune to the Birmingham frequency GWR pulled the plug on Xtra AM in Coventry earlier than provisionally agreed. Under the new ownership, the FM stations were re-launched under GWR's ''Better Music Mix'' uniformed format. GEM continued to be live and local 24 hours a day until in 1997, when Tony Lyman's programme was networked from 12 midday - 3 p.m. across most of the Midlands and the Home Counties on the Classic Gold network, at this point the name of the station was changed to Classic Gold GEM. More and more shared programming began to creep in and the name GEM finally died on Friday 3 August 2007 at 7.00 p.m., when Classic Gold GEM became part of the Gold Network, following the merger of Classic Gold and Capital Gold. The only remaining local programme (12-4pm weekdays) is pre recorded. GWR later merged with Capital Radio to form

GCAP Media GCap Media was a British commercial radio company formed from the merger of the Capital Radio Group and GWR Group. The merger was completed in May 2005. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. ...

, this led to the stations giving less and less commitment to the areas they served and often sharing programmes from other bases. GCAP was then acquired by the

Global Radio Global Media & Entertainment Limited, trading as Global, is a British media company formed in 2007. It is the owner of the largest commercial radio company in Europe having expanded through a number of historical acquisitions, including Chrysa ...

empire based in Leicester Square, London.{{cite web, url=http://media.europages.co.uk/business-directory-europe/did-media22/hc-21687H/cc-GBR/United-Kingdom/Radio-production-and-distribution.html , title=Details of current company address , accessdate=2010-06-02 , url-status=dead , archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110821013348/http://media.europages.co.uk/business-directory-europe/did-media22/hc-21687H/cc-GBR/United-Kingdom/Radio-production-and-distribution.html , archivedate=21 August 2011 Now all stations have lost their heritage names and are simply known as

Heart The heart is a muscular organ in most animals. This organ pumps blood through the blood vessels of the circulatory system. The pumped blood carries oxygen and nutrients to the body, while carrying metabolic waste such as carbon dioxide t ...

with only 2 local programmes during weekdays.

References

External links

Details of principal subsidiaries of GCAP MediaHistory of Trent FM (including ownership)
Former British radio networks Radio broadcasting companies of the United Kingdom Radio stations in Leicestershire Radio stations in Birmingham, West Midlands Mass media in the East Midlands Radio stations in Derbyshire