Xfm have announced that while Lauren Laverne will front the station's breakfast show post-Christian O'Connell, she won't be presenting it on a Friday. That job will go to current morning show host and recent breakfast show fill in guy Shaun Keaveny.
While the decision will give Ms Laverne one more lie in a week, it seems to be primarily motivated by a plan to make Fridays on Xfm quite distinct from the rest of the station's weekday output. Iain Baker will present mornings on Friday, which means request slot the X List will be on between midday and 1pm, rather than 1pm and 2pm. Then Lauren will reappear to host a Friday afternoon version of Xfm's listener voted Music:Response chart. Confused? Yeah, me to.
Xfm Programme Director Andy Ashton explains: "I decided to use the new breakfast show as a chance to sit down and totally rethink the way we put the station together. Friday has a very different feel anyway, and from 4 Nov we're going to reflect that on the station. This is just the start of some big plans I have for the weekend as a whole and I'm looking forward to seeing it all take shape over the next six months."
Confirming he will be hosting Friday breakfast, Keaveny added: "I don't know about anyone else, but I'm quite a fan of Fridays. I like their lack of Monday-ness, and the general feeling that they nearly always signal the imminent arrival of the weekend. It's even more exciting to me than the phrase 'free bar'. What will be in the show you ask? It will be packed tighter than Dolly Parton's sports bra with top Friday-feeling tunes, special giveaways, stupid stories, occasional bad impressions, the odd libelous statement, a monthly Friday-payday event, live bands and (I have been promised) a life-sized effigy of Robbie Williams."