While I lived under my parents’ roof there were three things I wasn’t allowed to do – eat nutella, watch Home and Away and listen to triple j while they were in earshot (TURN THAT RUBBISH OFF!). There was other, bigger things, but the three mentioned seemed the most ridiculous, and later affected my own parenting. We always, for example, have nutella in the cupboard, even though I don’t like it that much.
One of my most vivid memories was when, aged 17, I was in the care with a group of my girlfriends going somewhere I’m sure I hadn’t told my parents about. I was in the front passenger seat and we were listening to triple j very loudly and singing along. My girlfriend driving got caught too far forward at an intersection when the lights turned red and made the turn rather than block the intersection.
Next thing we knew we had a police car flashing its lights at us to pull over. We were all on our Ps and none had experienced this before as we were all good girls really. As the police officer walked to our vehicle my friend hissed at me:
“Change the station! Change the station!”
So I did, but not the volume. As my friend rolled down her window the officer got ABC Classic and some operatic aria blared loud enough to wake up the neighbours. I got the nervous, hysterical giggles as my friend turned the radio OFF. She got a wry look and a gentle warning.
As we drove off she said to me that the officer would never have believed that ABC Classic was what we were listening to anyway. It was probably the first time I’d ever really thought about the demographics of a radio audience.
triple j turns 50 today, January 19, 2025. There is plenty to read about the inceptions of Double Jay, as it was originally called with the ABC’s Double J replaying the first day in its entirely too.
The Prime Minister at that time was Gough Whitlam. His government was socially progressive, especially with initiatives that benefitted youth, like the termination of military conscription, the end of Australian involvement in the Vietnam War, free university education and a national youth broadcast network, so that young people would grow up to be ABC listeners. The network didn’t happen with Gough’s dismissal in 1975, but Double Jay did and in that part he succeeded in that aim of generational ABC devotees.
Double Jay / triple j was designed for, targeted at and brought to you by youth and young adults, from the moment they discovered music to somewhere around 30. I think Robbie Buck said it best when, at ABC Radio Sydney’s 100th birthday celebrations last year, he said he experienced a moment 13 years into his triple j career where he realised the station was no longer playing ‘his’ music. That’s when he knew he had to move on, and making good on Gough’s hopes, headed straight to ABC Radio National.
Last year my prediction for 2024 was less music and more talk with the stoush between APRA / AMCOS and radio then in full swing and the huge salaries paid to Kyle and Jackie O a seeming precursor to way less songs on music stations.
This year, an election year, my fear is that on this day when we should be celebrating everything that triple j offers to give youth a sound and a voice, that the 10-25 age group will further find other options to discover new music, and personalities they relate to, other than on radio. And thus we stop creating the next generation of passionate radio listeners.
I thought I would go back and compare the 18-25 age group listening to triple j from last election (GfK Survey 3, May 2022), where we were also emerging post Covid which had actually provided a high boon to listenership, to Survey 7 2024, before much of the chaos and shifting seats at the end of last year. triple j, except in Perth, saw a very large drop in 18-25 listening already between Survey 2 and 3 in 2022, perhaps because of the election. But the continued drop since then is staggering. I’ve selected Sydney and Melbourne figures below:
Sydney:
Survey 3, 2022 18-25s – KIIS No 1 followed by Nova, triple j’s audience nearly halved, down from 15.4% to an 8.0% audience share
Survey 7, 2024 18-25s: triple j a 1.4% audience share
Melbourne:
Survey 3, 2022 18-25s – triple j was No 1, just ahead of KIIS, but down 6.6 to 14.4%
Survey 7, 2024 – triple j a 2.9% audience share
Our current Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has shown himself, since he was elected, willing to visit all the different radio stations and networks across the country. He consistently shared his triple j Hottest 100 votes (2024 voting closes tomorrow January 20). Honestly, my 18 year old son who will vote for the first time this election, is most likely to tick Labor because he and Albo share a song in common on these lists.
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has long been a talk radio person, happy to speak to the ABC, Nine and the Super Radio Network, but not the commercial music ones, yet. With the election date pending, neither has shared fully what their Governments might be offering.
The Australian population aged between 18-25 is around 3,000,000. They can swing an election. Write our future. Become rusted on radio listeners.
While I celebrate triple j’s 50th birthday and legacy, and can’t wait for the 2024 Hottest 100 next weekend, I’m not sure they’re the clearly defined voice and place for young Australians that they once were.
Jen Seyderhelm is a writer, editor and podcaster for Radioinfo.