The concept behind Poolside FM is simple. You pair clips exhibiting the carefree spirit of the 80s (the beach bods, oversaturated colors, the sunscreen-thick veneer) with an Internet radio station of a complementary ilk. The results? As fun as the 80s.
It’s the brainchild of collaborators Marty Bell and Grant MacLennan. Appropriately enough, the concept for the site was born on a Sunday. In a whirl surely reminiscent of a bad 80s frame swipe, MacLennan had a working prototype within two hours. A week later, the website was launched.
Videos by VICE
In a matter of three days, Poolside FM had attracted 12,000 unique visitors. They’re now at 20,000 and counting.
A screenshot of the Poolside FM interface.
Bell and MacLennan peg it as the “perfect companion to drinking at a friend’s place before going to a club.” Having tried it, The Creators Project agrees. Users can cycle through user-submitted tracks like Roboteyes’ “Supernatural”or any number of Toro Y Moi remixes but can only skip ahead or pause the track. Bell mentions that this nudging toward forcing listeners to explore new tunes was purposeful. Eventually, Poolside FM will allow tracks to link to the purchase pages of their respective owners.
Poolside FM’s curated playlist reflects the careful execution behind the concept. Their only fumble, Bell and MacLennan admit, might have been unintentionally giving the website two names. (“Poolside Radio” dots the launch page and the top left quadrant of the screen while “Poolside FM” is the website’s URL and the name they’re going with–and the one we like better anyway). But it does little to detract from the cleverness and fun of the site. Along with catchy tunes, users get to see Bell’s obsession with 80s design and VHS movies as you may or may not see clips from classics such as Private Resort, Mystic Pizza, and One Crazy Summer.
Visitors can cycle through videos as they would old school TV channels.
The duo have a version 2 of Poolside FM in the works “which will be a static angular app that calls a poolside.fm app,” meaning, as developer MacLennan explains, that that’ll make the mobile version of Poolside “way more stable than it is currently.” As noted earlier, the creators also expect to build on their MEAN (mongoDB, Express, Angular.js and node.js) stack by adding more video content and links to track purchases.
We can’t wait and neither should you. Give Poolside FM a listen.
