A Love Letter to NTS
Dear NTS,
As someone that has often tired from spending too long in the company of one other individual, it is remarkable that I find myself writing as impassioned a love letter as this. Perhaps it is your impeccable versatility that keeps me so intrigued. That is certainly what your parents had in mind for you: when you were just months old Femi Adeyemi, your father, stated that ‘Musically, radio was really repetitive’.
It was his express intent for you to go on and challenge this. As was desired, you have managed to remove the burdensome shackles of sonic tedium by challenging traditional radio. As a result, I fell overwhelmingly in love. I cannot remember the first time that we met, but I remember much since. In the morning your calming familiarity brings me around delicately, dressing me in the mental armour required to battle through the day. In the evening you always convince me to shake a leg. Last December you even had one of my favourite artists Bladee over every Friday. Needless to say, I enjoyed that!
ARTWORK BY PEARL SALAMON WHITE
The best thing about our relationship is that I like to think its reciprocal. Last night I made dinner for us. However, you aren’t a fussy eater, which always makes things easy for me. I just let you talk whilst I chop, blend, and fry. Yesterday, in the process of cooking, I certainly learnt a great deal. You told me about the world of Appalachian Folk music, its history and significance. Throughout the course of one evening and one delicious meal, I had learnt about musicians such as Bradley Kincaid and Charlie Poole. Tomorrow it will be a different meal, a different topic of conversation, but equally exciting. It might seem incongruous that you can, at the turn of the hour, seamlessly transition from bumping Hyperpop and Euro House to a musical journey through Appalachia but somehow it always makes sense.
Even the most intimate moments of my daily routine are shared with you. My tiny, grubby shower feels more cramped but far more entertaining when you share it with me. My mundane daily rituals are imbued with an infectious intrigue when you are present. Last night I fell asleep with you and never have I found a guest in my bed to be so welcome. You don’t take up much space, nor do you snore. In those moments you exist as a pacifier, seeking to lull me into an ever-elusive state of sleep: something which tends not to come easily to me. Maybe it is the fact that I know you will be there again tomorrow, ready to wake me up? Maybe its because in those moments at four in the morning you known exactly what to play to send me into a slumber? Whatever the reason, I can fall asleep to your ambient sounds knowing that tomorrow, at breakfast, you will put something on to accompany my morning coffee. Your unwavering reliability is admirable.
I suppose, in some respects a love letter is a thank you of sorts. A thank you for letting me love you. A thank you for being so wonderful that I cannot help but love you. So, thank you NTS for being with me throughout the day, keeping me going. Curiously however, the best thing about you is that its not just me that you are with at any one time. In May 2020 it was estimated that NTS had acquired 2.5 million monthly listeners. The remarkable thing about NTS radio, I find, is how it has been able to grow so spectacularly whilst maintaining its commitment to providing listeners with a vast array of music. On top of this, it has remained free to access. If you wish, you may become a supporter: I regret to admit that even someone as enamoured as me has yet to do this.
It is an undeniable fact that NTS is an industry leader of Online Radio. It has come to provide truly essential service, challenging those who have historically occupied our soundwaves by offering a real alternative. An alternative that works for anybody’s taste of music, at any time. However, NTS has diversified, becoming a force for good in the ever-elusive music industry. Partnering with Carhartt, NTS selects a group of aspiring musicians to mentor for a year at the beginning of their career. The fact that this scheme is done in conjunction with Arts Council England only further highlights NTS’s industry significance. Similarly, NTS has served as the platform through which artists might choose to release new music. To be trusted to this extent by a plethora of artists who are characteristically cautious about how they release new music is high praise indeed. It is evidence that NTS must have done a huge amount of groundwork to command such a large degree of industry respect. In this regard, the work you do and the way you give back to avid listeners in such a charitable manner is truly inspiring.
Whilst these examples are indicative of your eminence, they aren’t the reasons I love you.
The reasons I love you are because at any moment you can make me smile, you can make me dance, and you can teach me about things. You behave like a sonic shapeshifter, curiously transitioning from one genre to another, mastering them all. You keep immaculate company, serving as a prestigious space in which musicians can exhibit their finest work, and best of all, you do it in a humble and simple way.
So, thank you NTS for brightening my days and by the way,
I love you.
Dylan