New direction for Triple M Adelaide breakfast?

01 September 2010

Last week, Triple M Adelaide’s brekkie team Kym, Ali & Dzelde announced they were finally hanging up the headphones after eight years on the airwaves together.

The news came as a shock to listeners, especially given the trio – who sensationally defected to Triple M from rival station Mix 102.3 at the end of 2007 – revealed this Friday’s shift would be their last (non-ratings period starts Monday).

The decision also surprised their bosses who only found out a month ago.

“It did come as a surprise to us in the last three or four weeks so we haven’t had really had a chance to [finalise replacements] yet,” says Craig Bruce, Head of Content for the Austereo network who own Triple M.

He says that selection process is still in progress, but he does reveal “we’re working on a good, solid line-up of people Adelaideans will know and gravitate toward.”

While he refuses to name names, Bruce does confirm the new show will be more in line with the other Triple M stations. In the past, given the tone and style of their imported breakfast show, Triple M Adelaide had been known for its softer music position than its hard-rocking Sydney and Melbourne counterparts.

“Kym, Ali & Dzelde came from Mix and we essentially made the station move to the breakfast show, where you normally operate the other way round,” says Bruce. “This time we’ve got the opportunity to build a show closer to the natural fit of the Triple M brand and get some synergy across the four Triple Ms that we haven’t leveraged in the past.”

There’s no word on whether Adelaide would follow Triple M Sydney’s lead of a sport-centric breakfast show (as they did last year with The Grill Team), but Bruce does admit they’re looking at “doing something different” in the market.

“Most of the Adelaide FM stations are three-handers – two guys, one girl. And I think we can break away from the pack with a new show.”

Of course, rumours have already started to circualte, with one particularly strong one suggesting Anthony 'Lehmo' Lehmann, who hosted Triple M’s national drive show with Wil Anderson in 2007-2008, may return to Adelaide for the job. Another name to pop up is Amber Petty, who quit sister station SAFM in June, although she told TMN then “I’m keen to do radio again down the track, but I can’t see it being breakfast.”