Jamie Woods, Head of Tech at Insanity Radio, gives us the details on how they managed to score interviews with huge bands, discovered some fantastic new music to be included in their playlists and brought us live visual content and interviews straight from Reading Festival.
Earlier this year, we switched on our visualised radio cameras, an unprecedented step into the future. And now, for the first time ever, we were able to bring you live coverage from one of the UK's most prestigious festivals, Reading Festival. I'll discuss the behind-the-scenes, detailing our interviews with huge bands throughout the weekend as well as highlights we had.
Your University's student radio station is one of very few in the country to hold an FM licence. That means that we operate just like any other radio station (but we're obviously not as big as Radio 1 or Capital) and estimates have shown that about 30,000 people tune into us a month. We reached out to our contacts at Reading Festival and managed to snag two press passes. Boo yah.
We're ultimately a service aimed at you - Royal Holloway students, as well as other local young people. That means we're always looking for ways to do things you will enjoy, and always looking to create content and programmes that are relevant to you. This was our goal at Reading, and we worked hard and played hard!
The Festival And How It Went Down
Armed with tents, a video camera, and a literal bag for life full of microphones, we crammed ourselves into a tiny car and drove to the festival. Our Head of Music's (Phoebe Hagan) industry connections meant we were able to set up a number of interviews in the days leading up to the festival. Festival Republic let us set up a makeshift studio on site, which we ended up sharing with other groups like NME and Ticketmaster.
On the first day, we managed to chat to Yonaka, Fizzy Blood, and some other fantastic indie bands. Over the next few days, we spoke to artists like DMA's (see video below). Instead of following the typical (and pretty boring) interview format, we tried to be creative, asking some of our favourite bands to chat about their festival experiences.
Some great (and gross) stories were shared and aired - you'll have to watch to find out which celebrity drunkenly collapsed on another's tent. Although we didn't get to chat to Brendon Urie (we were so close, though, maybe next time), overall Festival Republic were great at giving our audiences access to some brilliant bands we'd never otherwise get to meet.
We managed to do some live video broadcasts from the festival, which racked up a large number of live streams, with fantastic feedback and reception. Not bad for a small radio station without a fancy budget. Next year anyone? You can check out all our interviews here.
Get Involved With Insanity Radio
Insanity Radio are always looking for new team members to get involved. If you want to help us out at future festivals, create our playlists, want to help with the tech, or even fancy having a go producing your own radio show, just reach out to us through our website. You'll be helping us entertain our 30,000 listeners.
Applications for radio shows in the first term are now open, so if you fancy applying, why not give it a go! If you've never even held a microphone before, we'll train you too.
Jamie Woods // Head Of Technology, Insanity Radio 103.2FM