In Praise Of… David Lloyd

When I first began my radio career, David was a part of it. I started at Radio Trent in Nottingham, where David ruled supreme, on mid-mornings.

Scroll back just a little bit, to when I was still trying to get into radio. I went into my loft the other day and found a box with around 20 or so rejection letters from stations up and down the country. I also have the letters I got from Trent. This is a story I told when I was a guest on “Crunch & Roll” with John Fox at the beginning of this year. My oldest friend, Gary Burton, from hospital radio days in Derby and I started at Radio Trent on the same day. Previously we had both been sending tapes and Gary got an interview at Trent (which was in the process of starting the station in Derby and so on the look out for presenters). My tape got a reply saying to listen to David Lloyd and be more like him! Annoyed, I sent another tape doing an “impression” of David and got a job! Great! Except I had to carry on doing the impression, (at least for a little bit).

From the very first time I met David, I was struck by his boundless energy, not least demonstrated by the way he would run down the staircase in the Castle Gate building three steps at a time. Looking to expand my impression at one point I tried it when no one else was around and nearly fell to my death.

David lives and breathes radio. Again, somewhere in my loft, I have a recording of his last morning show on Trent which was an emotional rollercoaster ending with the Carpenters- Goodbye To Love as a fitting last song of the show and his time at Trent. A hometown boy leaving his hometown station where he really was “Mr. Trent”. He actually wasn’t going very far, staying within the Radio Trent Group and managing Leicester Sound, but even so the emotional ties to Trent are always strong, and still evident today.

I was still doing some swing shifts I think around that time and both Gary and I would deputise for holidaying presenters in Nottingham, Derby and Leicester so David was very much still an influence in our formative programming years. As such David is a great coach and mentor, as passionate and energetic in the nuances of radio presenting as he was at coming down the stairs. As a person listening, you couldn’t help be inspired by the passion, insight and the wisdom.

Scroll forward passed spells at Lincs and David landed at the Radio Authority. At this time I was Programme Controller at Trent and so we met in different circumstances, but still with the same passion. Trent largely stayed out of the gaze of the regulator and so our meetings and contacts were rare in any official capacity.

David’s insight into radio is honed in hands-on experience. Presenting from an early age, managing commercial stations large, small and national, BBC Local Radio presenting and managing a region, regulator of the industry, owner of a group of stations and then owner of a start-up national forging a service for a forgotten demographic. That’s if you also ignore his authoring of books, writing of blogs, hosting of events, hosting of podcasts and speaking at conferences.

It’s a bit more than that though, because he is also a really nice bloke. Yes radio flows through his veins but he also sees the humans working in it, the colleagues working their backsides off, the effort and the care that the people put into it, often unacknowledged. You could have had all of the achievements in the previous paragraph without being such a nice guy, but it makes it all the nicer, warming and rewarding if you are.

When I left Global, David sent me a really helpful, kind and lengthy message which I still have, offering advice. When Jack Media went bang, David called me and asked if I would be interested in helping out with some consulting for three months at Notts TV, where he is Chair. Those three months turned into nineteen in the end. He knew I have always been a fan of the genius that is Les Ross, and so when he interviewed Les on his “Conversations” podcast, he messaged me again to let me know as he thought I would be interested. Kind, thoughtful and helpful- that’s David.

Recently David has been vocal, and insightful about the changes across BBC Local Radio. He has the authority to speak about it having been there and got the t-shirt, but he also is the sort of person who puts in the leg work, research and analysis to find the critical details and points to consider. That takes a special skill, to not only analyse but then articulate the argument in a cogent way for those uninitiated. I know he believes the points he makes about BBC Local Radio, but I also know that he cares about the impact on the people, the listener’s friends and on-air talent who have been the victims of the change.

It’s the mark of the man, caring about the people, passionate about the craft and knowledgeable about the job.