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Nest audio playing wrong radio stations

Uk57731
Community Member

Hello

My Google nest audio and other Google devices have started playing different radio stations from what I request,  if for example I ask it to "Play Absolute Radio" instead it plays Absolute 80s, Absolute  90s or Absolute Classic Rock.  Until recently a work around of asking it to play Absolute  Radio FM worked, but now that doesn't either.

Please help.

 

Thanks

 

Kev

21 REPLIES 21

SusieQt
Community Member

We’ve got the same problem … we used to be able to simply say Play Greatest Hits Radio Leeds and West Yorkshire and it was fine but pretty quickly it started giving us GH Sheffield or North West (Manchester) We then tried saying GH North Yorkshire and that was fine for a while but it is now giving us GH North East (Newcastle). I notice that sometimes it’s uses TuneIn, sometimes Global Player and sometimes Planet Radio, without me saying anything. 
also if I ask it to play to the speaker group it says “something went wrong” yet I can touch the screen and successfully select the speaker group I want. I have “sent feedback” frequently. I feel like I simply have a house full of Bluetooth speakers and two expensive gadgets with screens that seem only capable of displaying the time correctly. 

frances
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi Kev and SusieQt,

 

Thank you for reaching out. That is not great to hear that your Google Assistant is not playing the requested radio station. I understand your concern and would be more than happy to help look into this issue. First, I have some quick questions regarding this situation.

  • Which Google Home devices are experiencing this issue? (model name, generation number)
  • What app/company are you using for your radio service? (example: iHeartRadio, TuneIn)
  • Is this a new issue? Were your devices able to play the requested station before?
  • How long has this issue been happening?
  • What troubleshooting steps have you tried so far?

Thank you for your patience, I look forward to your response. 

frances
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi All,

 

It's been a few days since we have heard from you. Just checking to see if you were able to see my response above. I look forward to your reply back, we're here to help!

SusieQt
Community Member

Apologies I thought I had to reply to the email I was sent, which I did and it bounced. Here is what I replied:

I am using a Google Nest Hub Max purchased in December 2019 from John Lewis. I have not specified which radio app the Google Max should use in the settings as I am not sure how to. 
 
I simply ask the Google Max to "Play Greatest Hits Radio Leeds and West Yorkshire". It used to play it but for a while now it will play Greatest Hits South Yorkshire or sometimes North West.  So now I specify to play Greatest Hits North Yorkshire as the adverts and travel information are more relevant to me than South Yorkshire. 
 
I do notice that after this command it mostly uses TuneIn but sometimes uses Planet Radio and sometimes Global Player. I once managed to get the right station by specifying to play from Planet Radio but then that stopped working too. 

Bog2803
Community Member

I am having the same problem in my Google mini. I ask it to play Greatest Hits Radio or Greatest Hits Radio Surrey but I always get GHR Bucks,Becks and Herts. 

I wonder if it is a Bauer group issue rather than Google as Bauer own GHR and Absolute radio plus many others.

SusieQt
Community Member

You could be right 😔

Uk57731
Community Member

Seems to now be fixed, thanks!

SusieQt
Community Member

No better here, in fact it’s worse in that it won now play GH North Yorkshire or South Yorkshire let alone West Yorkshire …. I’m now getting Hereford ad Worcester!  It seems to be favouring “PlanetRadio” at the moment. If I specify TuneIn I get GH North East. It’s a joke but it’s not … I really hate gadgets that don’t work. Even the volume is playing up … I can’t adjust the volume manually (by touching the screen) I have to use voice commands. 

Jake
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey all,

 

Sorry for the late reply. I wanted to follow up and ensure you are good to go. Please let me know if you are still having any trouble from here, as I would be happy to take a closer look and assist you further. 

Best regards,
Jake

SusieQt
Community Member

Dear Jake

If I say play GH North East that is the station I get, but if I just say Greatest Hits radio I get Hereford and Worcester. To be honest I haven’t asked for GH Leeds or North Yorkshire for a while …. (I’ve not been in the mood to be disappointed) I’ll try it tomorrow morning. 

Jake
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey all,

 

Sorry for the late reply. I wanted to follow up and see if you are still in need of any help with your device playing the wrong station? I know this is not ideal. Please let me know if you are still having any trouble from here, as I would be happy to take a closer look and assist you further. 

Best regards,
Jake

Jake
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey SusieQt,

 

Apologies again for the delayed reply. I wanted to follow up with you, and provide a helpful article that has some troubleshooting steps. Please let me know if that helps resolve the issue, or if you are still having trouble with the wrong station playing.

 

Best regards,

Jake

Jake
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey SusieQt,


I wanted to check in and see if you are still in need of any help with your device? Please let me know, as I would be happy to assist, and answer any questions you may have.

 

Best regards,

Jake

Rayshields
Community Member

Yes I sorted it, I've now got an Amazon Echo and it works fine, thanks. 

Jake
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey Rayshields,

 

Glad to hear the issue has been resolved and you are good to go. With that being the case, I am going to lock the thread at this time. If you have any questions from here, please feel free to create a new post.

 

Best regards,

Jake

AH1
Community Member

when I started to play absolute radio this morning on my google mini speaker before it started there was a long message from absolute radio saying that this way of streaming was stopping in the next few days and I would have to find an alternative way to listen to the radio station.

Has anyone else encountered this and does anyone know how I will be able to direct a google mini to find the station again once this has changed?

 

RichC3
Community Member

I have been using Home mini's (generation I and II), and Home hub (generation 1) for 2-3 years and have experienced an evolution of problems asking for the same local FM radio station. Early on, I found I could just ask to "Play WVIA" (the call sign for an NPR station); when that stopped responding, I found asking for "Play WVIA from NPR" to work; when that began playing a DIFFERENT station (sometimes the alternate HD channel with different programming from TuneIn; sometimes another local NPR station, WDIY; sometimes responding with a YouTube playlist with various arrangements of the letters WV... in the title, or other strange non-NPR stations with various arrangements of Wxxx call letters, or sometimes it said it was "Playing WVIA from NPR", but NOTHING was audible; when asked it said it was "Playing NPR", but it was still silent. I've recently been asking for every arrangement this station of call signs, frequency, locality, "from NPR" but always getting something other than the FM station WVIA. The erroneous responses are not consistent across devices nor consistent from one time to the next. The same is true for a "repeater" station of WVIA called WVYA; which a few months ago tuned in the parent station, WVIA, but in April, 2022, has stopped responding and will now tune in only the WVIA HD station from TuneIn radio.

Most other stations I've tried will tune to the appropriate stations from its call sign, except this WVIA which happens to be the local NPR station I've listened to for years and of which I am a member. 

I purchased Home speakers and Google Music (now YouTube Music) subscriptions primarily for a good alternative broadcast radio reception, but am soo frustrated right now; purchasing home radios so I can listen to what I want to hear, sounds like an easy answer.

No one seems to be responding to radio reception problems except with the same "all you have to do is..." answers that no longer work. I have no other media selected except YouTube Music; but I end up with a bunch of stations from TuneIn in response to requests from Google Assistant. 

If anyone has any suggestions to this evolving problem except buying over the air receiving radios, I am all ears.

Thanks

Rayshields
Community Member

If I ask my nest mini gen 2 to play greatest hits radio, it always plays mfr2. I can't get it to play any ghr. 

RichC3
Community Member

Google Nest Mini speakers seem to behave differently from Nest Hubs; and Mini gen1 speakers vary in response differently from Mini gen2 speakers. I find the Nest Hub responses more consistent. That being said, response to play radio station commands have been changing over time.

User does have to experiment with variations of the command to "Play (station call letters)". It has been increasingly more successful to be more specific using various combinations of the station call letters, the broadcast frequency and/or the specific network being used. Most recently I have had most consistent success tuning in a station by using the combination "Stream 89.9 WVIA on NPR" (frequency, call letters and network) when I used to be able to tune in a station just by saying "Play WVIA". I won't even mention the frustration involved in having the Mini's responding with a variety of wrong responses from other networks (from TuneIn, from iHeart, or from YouTube Music networks or playlists).

I don't know what Greatest Hits Radio is; a radio station or a playlist from a network (Like TuneIn) but it sounds like user must be more specific. 

Google has been responding with more network related stations and playlists. I'm guessing that their algorithms are searching networks first for call sign letters (usually guessing wrong). I hear a lot of responses of "playing XYZ on TuneIn" where the letters XY or Z are actually radio call letters, but not the station I usually get. So things are changing in Google recognition, usually wrong, but user can often hit on the right combination.

Google has been no help in their customer service, often pretending they don't even know what you are talking about. I've been able to eventually hit on the right Nest command to get the Mini's to respond, but the frustration level is high. I have no experience with Alexa, but difficult to imagine that both Google and Amazon would both be so unresponsive to their customers.

Google and PlayMusic services and equipment; and YouTube Music have worked very well for me generally, but it is only the Google Assisted radio commands that have been the most problems because something is obviously changing and Google won't tell us what, where, why and how we can use their service and equipment.

Thanks for the reply, it is a streaming radio station here in the UK. I have discovered that MFR2 (another radio station) use the term "all the greatest hits" in its tagline and this seems to be what is being picked up. I have discovered if you ask for the regional variation of GHR (eg Greatest Hits Radio Liverpool) then Google picks the correct station. Strange as Alexa doesn't have this issue

SusieQt
Community Member

For my part if I ask my Google Nest Max Hub to play Greatest Hits Radio North Yorkshire it plays GH Radio North East. And if I don’t specify the region I get Hereford & Worcester region. I suppose in the scale of things it’s not a huge issue except, travel info and local news is irrelevant as are most adverts …. Not that I listen to adverts anyway!