no.1 Kiss103.2 - the only real superpirate,high power,great jocks,very professional and really dented FM104

no.2 Pulse 103 - professional,great jocks/sound

no.3 Energy 94 - this is a very professional sounding station and has already made huge inroads - sounds like a legal

no.4 KIC FM - a very popular station,including the corridors of power!,audio FM104 can only dream about,full schedule and good signal

no.5 Phantom - Made people wake up to the fact that alternative music can make money,on the shoestring phantom where on this station was excellent

no.6 HOT 107 - professional sound and of course the o/bs

no.7 Sunset 107 - it started the dance revolution!

no.8 Freedom 92 - from the ruins of kiss,this station has improved immensely-if only its full potential would be realised

no.9 Sun 101 - great audio,great idea and plating those one hit wonders,it played 65love affair on tuesday morning - what a station!

no.10 DLR 106 - Remember it led to the closure of horizon & Easi,it has survived a long time - now if they could get some processing gear.

Other mentionables-Alices Restraunt -fab audio & signal on 107.1 & 107.7

So do yous agree or disagree???????????
intelligent replies please

• i agree with all except....... - mick, January 17 at 18:33:51
• so did tony d - me ma, January 17 at 0:24:54
• Àgree - AA Road Watch, January 17 at 13:54:38

i don't agree with the dlr thing. perhaps coast fm or nsr fm should be in there somewhere


yes I agree with the order of all the rest . But isn't it amazing that garv rigby worked on all of the above but 2 (freedom and KIC) ...... I think Darrahgh roberts worked on 5-6 of them (hot, sunset, pulse, energy and Dlr was it)

tony d worked on at least 5 of the above also, along with 5 from the 80s and perhaps 5 others from the 70s.........

I was listening to 104 over the weekend and a few others too, the jock on 104 on Saturday night gave out the Lotto numbers from the draw. How can they do that if it's recorded and don't 2FM and 98 use Master Control too? Or do any of these stations?

Just curious...

• 2FM - secret 2fm employee, January 17 at 17:54:25
• computers - Radio MAN, January 16 at 21:09:30
• 98FM - overnight news ?, January 16 at 21:21:04
• NEWS? - RadioMan, January 16 at 21:50:05
• 104 go live 24/7 - I know..., January 17 at 18:43:11
• hahahaah - big bungle, January 17 at 19:30:31
• eh........no! - ha ha ha, January 17 at 21:20:19
• I'm still laughing - big bungle, January 17 at 22:26:49

2fm use a system called radioman and it is used constantly for ads. It contains pre-recorded shows such as world web radio and the national chart replay. It has an automatic system built in which puts a live news feed through the desk on the hour throughout the night for news bullitens and the newsreader has exactly 2mins or so to read the news,

Thats how 2FM does it

98FM and Atlantic 252 both use RCS Master Control. 2FM use Radioman. Today FM use Radiomation, and Lite FM used Encodad. FM104 have a digital cart playout system (wavecart I believe) but no proper automation.

As to live lotto numbers? The lotto numbers come in at about 9pm don't they? So a show can be recorded after that. Don't forget that both 2FM and 98FM run overnight news bulletins as well!!!

Are they actually running NEWS overnight or is it jush a rehash of News from the day before like they used to ?

Both 98FM and FM104 rehash the 1am INN bulletin and replay it at 2,3,4,5am. Its the same bulletin on both stations - if you listen carefully. The only difference is that FM104 insert a sports bulletin at the end of the main news, while 98 just roll back to music.

Circa; the 80's.

Jason Maine jumps from breakfast on Sunshine to Nova. A step in the right direction. But then he goes to the new kid on the block - Q102. Strange move. Was Jason offered loads more cash or was there problems with him and Chris?

While we're talking about the boy Jase - does anyone know where he spent those lost years when he wasn't on Irish radio? Was he UK based for awhile?

Don't get me wrong. I think the man is a radio LEGEND. I'm just wondering like.

• Jason Maine on how he got here.... - The Boy Jase, January 16 at 20:20:44
• An excerpt from this sites profiles - bright light in the night, January 15 at 3:37:45
• The Boy Jase - ..., January 15 at 18:49:03
• I agree excellent DJ - Jason Maine fan, January 15 at 22:57:39
• Nova's Nitecap - Tanya, January 15 at 1:13:57

"I was always interested in radio. So my first step was to work in a nightclub as a disc jockey. Pirate Radio was very big at the time and I got my first break when I was asked to work in A.R.D (Alternative Radio Dublin).

I remember it well. ARD was based in a bedroom in a house in Cabra, later they moved into Belvedere House. I then moved on to Big D Radio in Camden Street. It was a very long apprenticeship but every step of the way, you learned more and more about the business. My first taste of professional radio came when I joined Sunshine Radio in The Sands Hotel, Portmarnock. Having listened to Robbie Dale some years earlier on Radio Caroline it was a privilege to step into his shoes on the breakfast programme at Sunshine.

After a while Radio Nova came on the air and I was asked to join. It was a very professional station, and there was great team work. People often ask me how the Nightcap came about. I used to do the evening programme, 7pm until midnight, and I suggested an idea for the last hour of the programme. Just one hour of nice mellow music and it worked extremely well.

After a couple of years on Radio Nova I was approached to join the new arrival on the radio scene, Q102. I bought my Nightcap Programme with me. Then as we all know the Broadcasting Bill came into operation and all the illegal stations had to close.

After a while the legal stations came on stream, and the rest is history! So here I am in FM104. In this business you never stop learning.

Remember - I'm on your case and in your place."

Words of a true legend....

"The promise of big money and a management position lured Jase to Dublin's latest superpirate 'The quiet storm' Q102 in January 85 where Jase resumed his popular night time slot from 7PM - Midnight. After the birth of his first child, the accounts department at Nova sent Jase a congratulations card with the message "It might be of interest to you that Radio Nova is now paying it's top presenters over £400 a week" It might not seem like much now but how many people working in radio now are earning that sort of money? Incidentally the card was sent by Anne Caffrey, now married to Colm Hayes.

Sometime around mid 87 Jase was relegated to overnights on Q102 and when Bil Cunningham arrived in march 88, Jase was escorted to the door of 8 upper mount street never to be let in again.

The launch of Capital 104.4 in July 89 saw the return of the Boy Jase to the Dublin airwaves where he presented the 11 - 3am shift with the nightcap running from 11 - midnight. In September 1990, the management at Capital were forced to make major changes with the announcement that they were well behind 98FM in the JNLR book for their first year. Casualties included Gerry Stevens and the Boy Jase himself. Chris Barry was moved off overnights with his phoneshow to kick off at midnight from then on.

After leaving Capital Jase presented afternoons on Wicklow's Easy 103 which at that time was being run by Dave C and Alan Hunter. When Jim Kenny took over management of Easy, Jase disappeared.

In early 94 Jase got in touch with Scott Williams at FM104 and was invited back to spin the Saturday overnight. What a waste you might say just having Jase spin and that's exactly what Colm Hayes said when he took over from Scott in early 95. Jase was back linking on 104 and the anoraks couldn't believe it as call after call came through all wondering where he had been all that time.

And, as you all know, he's back presenting the Nightcap weeknights on FM104 from 1am - 3 with the overnighter afterwards"

Not sure where he was for his off-air days in the 90's but he can't have been gone that long as he was with Capital for the launch wasn't he? Then did the Saturday Night overnight on the same station(now FM104). One thing for certain- he didn't leave Ireland and although he has a unique style now, you've gotta remember Jason was THE biggest jock in Ireland in earlier days...nice to see the legend lives on...wonder was he offered some doh from Lite when they were launching?

One of the best in view
what a dj

I used to enjoy listening to Jason on Radio Nova. Check out his picture (and others) from the NOVA days on the chriscarey.com webpage.
Keep it up jason !!!!

just after downloading Coll edit pro demo version, where can you download cool edit pro full version. This was on the site a while ago, but I never paid attention (naughty me) so anyone help me out here!

Thank you my fellowed friends!

i just uploaded a cracked version of Cool Edit 2000 + Plugins to:

www.ctech.ca/callumg/Cool Edit 2000/Cool Edit 2000 + Add-ons.zip

enjoy!

you will not be able to use a download manager (getright,gozilla etc) to download the program...just paste the link in your browser and a small banner should pop up...wait a few seconds and the download should then start

Right lads here it is in black and white!

A lot of bitching goes on here, quite a large amount of it regarding Energy Vs Hot. At last, we have reached a stage where Energy can be complimented and a string of handbag-swinging doesn't follow!
Before I go on, let me remind you that although Energy has the ghost of Pulse 103 lurking around, IT IS NOT PULSE, and in many ways, it's better...

Pulse had a music format that was a cross-over of the format used in Freedom and Energy today. They had a combination of chart, commercial dance and sometimes edging on music slightly more hardcare- not often.
Energy has a format orientated slightly towards more commercial dance and more hardhouse alongside. They have the odd Top 30 hit thrown in with a big tune that may be catching the ear of a lot of people. An example of this is Leann Rimes-Can't Fight The Moonlight, which was and still is (I think) on their playlist. It's not a dance track, but it IS a big song so they play it. A lot of their content is funky dance- Soulsearcher, Junior Jack etc., great uplifting sounds.
This is the part which may get the handbags swinging, we'll have to wait and see: I feel that ENERGY is better, more professional, better organised and sounds literally more legal than PULSE ever did. Now it's clear that ENERGY don't have Mark McCabe and John Power but lets face it, good as they are- I'm not gonna knock a single person in this posting- Conor G, Declan P, Jenny G, this list goes on, are all great jocks too, but they didn't stand out like Mark and John did- love 'em or hate 'em! This is why I think that the jocks on ENERGY are top class too. A certain halo hangs over the PULSE name, but when you delve into the actual presenters that existed, the guys on ENERGY aren't doing a bad job at all.
The website is f**king unbelievable! I know quite a few stations that are legit that don't have websites as good as ENERGY have! Another way that ENERGY stands out from the crowds by a long shot.
Their production is the envy of the rest of the pirate stations in Ireland. It is just as tight as the legals, some of the ideas funnier, and all created without ISDN lines which 98, 2FM and 104 can boast of having.

I think I'll finish up now, as when these posts get too long, I just glance over them, so let me leave you with "Springer's Final Thought"...

In the days of the Super-Pirates, namely Nova and Q102, the stations that made history are above. However, these are also just history and back then, pirates were even bigger and different so I'm not comparing ENERGY to them in any way. The Super-Pirate of the year 2001 I hear you ask? I think we've found it...

Thanks for the time,

An ENERGY fan...

please take note: I wish to state that I'm not involved with ENERGY in any way and you'll just have to take my word for this!

• What Radio Needs - Arse Kicker, January 13 at 19:46:12
• super pirate bullshit - jimmy, January 13 at 20:47:21

That's all very nice apart from the fact that Energy and the rest of the Dublin pirate scene really isn't very good. It's probably reminiscent of the late 70's when you had Radio Dublin, ARD, City, etc going hell-for-leather but still without generating much money or having a large listenership across a mainstream audience. It took a large station (by existing 70's standards) to break the mould and get things moving. So, I wonder in the year 2001 could something similar happen? And if so, will it be "foreigners" that stimulate this new interest.

the laws have changed since the 70s and 80s.

there was a new law brought in arond 1988 yeah!!!

the 70s thing happened again in the 90s with kiss 103fm in the mid 90s.

dlr and sunset were chugging along like the late 70s pirates with tapes, no format, okish signal, no premises apart from a shed and free form presenting.

kiss did come along and blew it open but got raided 2-3 times because it was too big and then the heat came onto sunset.

a big station like kiss will never work again in dublin as it will just get shut down and raided. Pulse were lucky

I was 16 when kiss was on in 94 and everybody in my school listened and i mean everybody


energy is the superpirate of today. Bear in mind sunshine was out of a port-a-cabin with 19/20 year old djs mostly doing 20" links but had advertising to pay people remember. Energy can't do that or they'll end up like Kiss fM

I was wondering if there are any more interesting stories out there? To me Sunset was Tracy Lee, Barry Dunne, Andy Preston and the Sunday afternoon of dance with Benny Ryan, Dirk (Dick?) Montage and the rest. Kiss to me was all about Tony Dixon in the mornings and the way he managed to fit 5 songs into 15 minutes in the Top 5 At 10 seque. Very tight. Dave Lowe was there also wasn't he? Why did this guy give up radio? A great jock. Was Andy Preston there or not? Kiss were sounding shit hot just before they closed. A shame. I also heard Andrew Mangan was set to do Breakfast on Pulse 103 had they got the licence. Can anyone shed any light on this?

• close - but no cigar - Dublin drives home with us, January 13 at 20:42:13
• Sunset - N?A, January 13 at 19:28:15
• more Sunset - pope versus Paisley, January 13 at 20:45:51
• stop stirring shit - mick, January 13 at 20:32:47
• kiss 103.2 lineups - mick, January 13 at 16:18:06
• kiss 103 dublin - been there dunne that, January 13 at 16:43:54
• me again....kiss 103 history of DJs - Her Story again, January 13 at 17:09:34
• you mean - @2, January 14 at 0:50:48
• yeah they did... - the guy, January 17 at 16:41:57
• didn't we just go over this? - ah not again, January 13 at 20:48:25

Dirk Montage never did anything for Sunset. He wouldn't have been allowed in the door (and its doubtful that he would've wanted to work there anyway).

Dave Lowe was in Kiss, I think he did drivetime after Sunset closed. As far as I recall Dave Adams moved to breakfast. Dave went on to work for Hot 107, left to go to Q95, and that was the last I've heard of him. You're right though. Good jock.

And you're correct. I thought Kiss 103 sounded best (although with a lesser audience due to their low power signal) just before they closed down.

When Sunset first opened it was a Rock Station..
Garv Rigby The First DJ To do a Dance Show On Sunset Sunday Afternons I Think. Shortly after this Sunset Became knowen as "Dublins Dance Music Factory". Which also set the whole trend of dance music Radio stations in Dublin??? Garv Then Moved to Kiss 103 And "Schools Out" 7-10pm.

Any Toughts on this..

Garvin was the first jock to play dance music on Sunset. At the time Sunset had a lot of specialist programmes (rock/reggae/soul/classic oldies) and they thought that dance music was just another genre to play.

Garvin brought in Benny Ryan - who replaced Pete Reed in the lineup (yup - Sunset fired Pete, although its doubtful he would've hung around to play hardcore rave!).

I can't remember when "dance factory" came into use - I think it was early in 1993, just before Barry Dunne rejoined the station. The station used to open at 4pm at that stage.

it is messages like yours above NA that start all the shit on this board.

you know, that now all the garv haters and lovers will start a whole thread going......


...if the above post is a genuine one then I apologise for getting at you.

garv and benny ryan both started the first dance shows together on Sunset. Ollie Dowling had the first dance show in Dublin on DLR around the same time perhaps a week or so before sunset....


so between benny, garv and ollie they were irelands 1st credible dance radio djs as opposed to simon young on 2fm playing 12" kylie songs

there were 2 strong lineups AT KISS 103.2 IN 1994

there was

breakfast Andy mangan( Dave Adams)
10-1 Tony Dixon
1-4 Chris Young
4-7 Steve K
7-10 garv Rigby
10-1 Steve Davitt

when garv went to 98 and Steve k went to the Usda it became:


Breakfast Steve Cooper
10-1 Kevin branigan
1-4 Chris Young
4-7 Andrew mangan
7-10 Damien Mc Caul
10-1 Steve Daviitt

then mike ormond got a job in 104 and closed it down.....allegedly

Once upon a time....... remember that in the early 90s, 98fm was classic hits and fm 104 was rock 104 and later fm104 in 1993..... with a very, very slightly more edgy format than 98fm and 2fm was almost as bad and as old hat as it is now. There was no radio Ireland/Today FM in yesteryears as Century had gone bust b 4 the century and lite fm was like a feather in the wind blowing away in Martin Blocks mind...........

when kiss 103.2 went on in mid 93, fm104 were literally blown away, losing almost 50% of under 25's overnight according to in house tracking from 104 and newspaper articles at the time, beating Sunset by about 76-24% (dlr and radio Dublin were the only other decent pirates in early '93).


I remember garv rigby was poached from sunset as PD for kiss fm ( after a flaming moe's row with Gary C aparently , don't know how true that is) and he was also the evening funny farm jock (7-10pm). With him went steve k for afternoons(1-4), ronan scanlon, andy p(preston) for a bit (then he went back to Sunset do take up a better position).

Then on air came chris young from a hospital station, Tony D was brought in from dlr 106 (10-1), Gerry Stevens was about to join but the money was so low he laughed and went shopping and dirk montage came from WNSR along with kevin Branigan(10am-1pm IN THE FIRST WEEKS B 4 he went into PRODUCTION), Steve Davitt (10pm- 1am), Ralph mc Garry and Mike Ormond (Sales and marketing).

Steve cooper left Anna Livia to do breakfast or was it drive time news...... yes later on it was breakfast (he did headlines from 4-7pm on the 1/2 hour)??? and Damien Mc caul took up an afternoon postition (1-4...... after Steve K left and went to USA for the Summer), followed by the very ,very talented, humourous and sadly missed Dave Adams (Andrew Mangan) from 4pm- 7pm.


Weekends were done by people such as the yellow jumper man, Happy Harry (Dark Mark Mitchell, Connor G, G'th Scelly , Ronan Brady, Sean power, Paul Kavvangh, DJ Wicked Willie, Cliff Walker and Smokey Towers (Tom Cole).Later on other radio guys came and went including Miles J, Jeff C and the crew from Ulster, George from the Rude awaking at FM 104 and others to name a few......

overnights were done by Mel Byrne , the red faced man and many others including a magician who disappeared into thin air one night (bless!!!)


we'll leave the raids to another day.

Sean Power & Paul Kavanagh off Freedom actually worked on Kiss, are you sure? I didn't know that

yeah sean & paul worked on kiss

Last Reply from the bottom of the page was : Tony Allen did the N-O-V-A over the slow music track, Chris Cary himself did a dry version, as did some American gent!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The N-O-V-A among the jingles downloaded from the 80's pirate radio site doesn't sound like TA or CC when you listen to it dry - but it is the same one that's on a lot of my early tapes of NOVA - anyone know who it is ?

• The vo's were done by... - aint no maniac!, January 12 at 17:15:31
• Probably The Best Lager In The World - Carlsberg, January 12 at 14:43:49
• N-0-V-A - x, January 12 at 16:06:03
• N-O-V-A - Nova Songs'r'us, January 12 at 17:43:56
• NOVA - Mutley, January 12 at 18:29:58
• voice corrections - novaman, January 12 at 22:40:58
• Really? - Confused, January 12 at 23:47:41
• voice corrections - novaman, January 12 at 22:39:13

Bill Mitchel did the vo's for The 80's Nova, Radio Caroline and Pulse 103FM. Unforunatly Bill is know dead :( R.I.P. Ps. He had a cool voice where do you download the Nova Jingles?

It's not the Bill Mitchell version that was used on the satellite service, was it? Bill did the v/o's for Sunshine where Tony Allen did them on Nova.

Correct it is Bill Mitchell!
He also did some V/Os for Nova in the post NRG 103 days before satellite Nova.

This isn't Bill Mitchell, this jingle was around way at the start. It might be TA slowed down a bit.
it's on the jingle compliation downloadable at:
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/pbuckle
(Takes bloody ages to come down though.)

IT IS Tony Allen!It was probably put thru the pitch transposer.

As someone correctly said earlier, it was Chris Carey who did the dry N-O-V-A and TA who did the v/o one the 'slow' music track !!!!!!!!!

Signed
Someone who worked for Radio Nova

PS - Bill Mitchell featured on the 'All Music Radio' v/o package for Radio Nova. They were run sid by side with the launch of the second sung id package.

I thought that the "All Music Radio" package was from Q102, at least that's the jingle package I have with it.

As someone correctly said earlier, it was Chris Carey who did the dry N-O-V-A and TA who did the v/o one the 'slow' music track !!!!!!!!!

Signed
Someone who worked for Radio Nova

PS - Bill Mitchell featured on the 'All M

I gotta say legal eagle may have touched or should i say wrenched the hearts out of most of you Muppets but at least we are not talking about mobile phones anymore.
I stand with Legal Eagle on this whoever he maybe.
Now there is an interesting question...Who is he/she?
Well we should look at the clues....
We can really assume its not Barry! ok


Most of the postings are posted between 12pm and 2am so that kind of rules out any one working in the clubs (unless there crap and getting no work) but still a late night person none the less.

The Garv and Rusty bit is confusing would it not seem?

Somebody mentioned Legal Eagle did not work on a pirate in the 70s, 80s, 90s. Well i think they know too much for that to be possible. He/She really must be an ex-pirate.

Well whoever it is they started a good argument.

PS: I think many people are now using the name Legal Eagle just to jump on the pirate slagging bandwagon.
They are all right to slag off the pirates because the quality (not the sound) is crap compared to the 70s,80s and the early 90s.

Good Night

the early 90s quality was better??

what are on about. just listen to any old tapes or think back to the early 90s.

dlr and sunset were extremely unprofessional comapred to energy or hot today.

sunset used to come on at 12pm if lucky had some good djs only.

andy p
garv rigby
barry dunne
steve k
darragh roberts
and perhaps benny ryan and gary mathews. that was it.......

dlr had tony d and les vickers.......nobody else.

the presentation and programminig of the early 90s pirates was awful. sunset used to have 1 day of dance on a sunday untill 1993.

Sundays were
daragh hurley
garv rigby
gary mathews
benny ryan
tim hannigan and mark kavanagh( laTER ON )

THERE WAS NO FORMAT AS SATURDAYS WERE ROCK AND REGAE ORIENTATED.

But fair play to gary for getting it all going eventually and credit is due for that.

the early 90s quality was better??

Yep.

what are on about. just listen to any old tapes or think back to the early 90s.

I was there - working in Radio Dublin in 1990 and everything. And I don't EVER want to hear tapes of that. What a kip.

dlr and sunset were extremely unprofessional comapred to energy or hot today.

Not so. Despite the limited resources of the early 90's stations and the fact that most of them grew from small hobby stations, the programming of some of those stations would put a lot of todays stations to shame.

DLR had its moments in 1991. NSR was the station to try to beat in 1992. In 1993 it was Sunset. Come 1994, Kiss FM tried to take it a whole new level. 1995 saw the arrival of Hot 107 and Pulse 103. Both stations had healthy respect for each others progamming.

sunset used to come on at 12pm if lucky had some good djs only.

andy p
garv rigby
barry dunne
steve k
darragh roberts
and perhaps benny ryan and gary mathews. that was it.......

And Chris Murray and Tracey Lee and Tony Quinn and Ronan Scanlan and Ian Redmond and Tom Smith and Wicked and Brian Johnson and Fintan O Hare and Jay Ahern and Dara Hurley and Mr. Spring and many many more.

dlr had tony d and les vickers.......nobody else.

By the middle of 1992 - DLR had gotten stale and complacent. IF you want to talk about their early programming though, you should think of the Creepy Crawly Dan Frawley show, and Al Hughes.

the presentation and programminig of the early 90s pirates was awful.

Not true. For example NSR 105 used to have an excellent programme on in 1992/3 on Friday nights called the "Decadent Dance Hall Dub Session" with Pat Allen? (now, whatever happened to HIM?) It was first rate. I also remember the Sunset Night Network which also went over to NSR 105. A very young Al Gibbs also sounded very well on NSR, and the weekly "JJ McKay Extravaganza" was ... well, an extravaganza!

Mr. Spring (back then he was Mr. Fantastic) also used to present an awesome show every Sunday night on Sunset. So did Jay Ahern.

I never worked for Kiss FM, but they did an excellent job in 1994 of providing a top 40 radio station.

Even as recently as 1995, we saw Hot 107 broadcasting live from Portmarnock beach during a heatwave. They didn't get any cash out of it - they just did it for a buzz.


sunset used to have 1 day of
dance on a sunday untill 1993.

Sundays were
daragh hurley
garv rigby
gary mathews
benny ryan
tim hannigan and mark kavanagh( laTER ON )

And Jay Ahern.

THERE WAS NO FORMAT AS SATURDAYS WERE ROCK AND REGAE ORIENTATED.

At the very conception of the station that was true. Sundays were all dance, and Fridays and Saturdays had a variety of programming including heavy metal, indie and classic rock. The station was doing its best to fill broadcast hours - and as a hobby station did a very good job.

When the station moved to Blackrock for a short time in 1992 it became more pop orientated, and by early 1993 was a chart/dance station (not unlike Freedom 92). The decision was made to go ALL dance in April 1993 (which in reality was just fine tuning the format).

The handbag jocks were on during the day, while the more credible guys were on in the evenings.


But fair play to gary for getting it all going eventually

True.


Of course Pulse 103 was bigger and more successful than Sunset. I don't think that you can compare the early 90s stations to the pirates of today. Todays stations operate in a far safer envioroment (remember the raids of the early 90's), with studio premises and top notch gear. There were a lot of shitty things about the early 90's pirates. You're right. Sunset didn't go on the air till midday every day - they used to relay satellite radio instead. Thats because the station was run by an 18 year old from a garden shed.

In some ways you're right. Lets not remember the early 90's as the halycon days. They weren't. However, some good radio was produced under difficult circumstances.



I don't intend for this to get into a 'legal eagle' shitstirring debate, nor did I post the initial message that started this thread, but I found it interesting. I hope that my post countinues on this thoughtful debate. Any comments anyone?

Once upon a time....... remember that in the early 90s, 98fm was classic hits and fm 104 was rock 104 and later fm104 in 1993..... with a very, very slightly more edgy format than 98fm and 2fm was almost as bad and as old hat as it is now. There was no radio Ireland/Today FM in yesteryears as Century had gone bust b 4 the century and lite fm was like a feather in the wind blowing away in Martin Blocks mind...........

when kiss 103.2 went on in mid 93, fm104 were literally blown away, losing almost 50% of under 25's overnight according to in house tracking from 104 and newspaper articles at the time, beating Sunset by about 76-24% (dlr and radio Dublin were the only other decent pirates in early '93).


I remember garv rigby was poached from sunset as PD for kiss fm ( after a flaming moe's row with Gary C.) and he was also the evening funny farm jock (7-10pm). With him went steve k for afternoons(1-4), ronan scanlon, andy p for a bit (then he went back to Sunset).

Then on air came chris young from a hospital station, Tony D was brought in from dlr 106 (10-1), Gerry Stevens was about to join but the money was so low he laughed and went shopping and dirk montage came from WNSR along with kevin Branigan(10am-1pm IN THE FIRST WEEKS B 4 he went into PRODUCTION), Steve Davitt (10pm- 1am), Ralph mc Garry and Mike Ormond (Sales and marketing).

Steve cooper left Anna Livia to do breakfast or was it drive time news...... yes later on it was breakfast (he did headlines from 4-7pm on the 1/2 hour)??? and Damien Mc caul took up an afternoon postition (1-4...... after Steve K left and went to USA for the Summer), followed by the very ,very talented, humourous and sadly missed Dave Adams (Andrew Mangan) from 4pm- 7pm.


Weekends were done by people such as the yellow jumper man, Happy Harry (Dark Mark Mitchell, Connor G, G'th Scelly , Ronan Brady, Sean power, Paul Kavvangh, DJ Wicked Willie, Cliff Walker and Smokey Towers (Tom Cole).Later on other radio guys came and went including Miles J, Jeff C and the crew from Ulster, George from the Rude awaking at FM 104 and others to name a few......

overnights were done by Mel Byrne , the red faced man and many others including a magician who disappeared into thin air one night (bless!!!)

I don't think Andy P ever worked on-air for Kiss 103 - but he did help the guys get the radio station together. Also, I don't think Cliff Walker ever did more than one show for Kiss - he was working in South East Radio in Wexford at the time.

As well as that - Kiss were effectively over by August 1994 - the low power TX saw to that. The initial high powered 103.2 had long since been carried away by the DOC. Garv Rigby departed and went to 98FM to do sales.

Also departing Sunset were Steve K and Ronan Scanlan - both of whom had the decency to let Gary know they were leaving (unlike Garv who left it till about 24 hours before the launch!). Ronan left Kiss after two weekends because he was totally disillusioned with the station.

Kiss was very successful very quickly. Together with Club FM they badly damaged what had been the citys largest pirate Sunset. The music policy on Sunset went to shit - everybody wanted their say - and the station began to lose focus. What worked for Sunset was having the "radio" djs on during the day, the Tracey Lees, Barry Dunnes etc, while having the 'cred' DJs on at night. Instead of that you had "DJ EL" playing hardcore at 1.30 in the afternoon.

That combined with the raids that Sunset suffered together with Kiss 103 didn't help matters. Eventually wiser heads prevailed, and Sunset began to tighten up again..but at that stage it was all over for both them and Kiss.

Sunset closed down two weeks before Kiss 103. Dave Lowe then went over to Kiss to do drivetime (I think - but I could be open to correction). Kiss jacked it in just a couple of weeks later.

I always thought that Kiss sounded its best towards the end. Despite the dodgy signal and appalling audio Andrew Mangan had the format working very well. He had removed some of the crap "ZYX" label music so beloved of Sunset, and had instead concentrated on playing the proper pop stuff. Kiss 103 sounded great just before it closed. Ironic, eh?

As for other decent pirates in 1993? There weren't any really. DLR was a pale shadow of its former self, NSR had closed down in late 1993 (Kevin was presumably planning Kiss at this point), and Radio Dublin were a non-entity. I always liked Coast FM, but the station was resolutely a hobby station (nothing wrong with that).

btw, can you imagine what the wage costs would be like if you tried to get the people who worked on Sunset or Kiss back together? Just a thought....!

bear in mind garv got a wod of many or so the rumours go to leave sunset along with Dave Adams (andy mangan). garv did tell gary as he left sunset about 2-3 weeks b 4 kiss 103.......

cliff walker was essentialy f*cked out along with ronan scanlon for not being able to use the cart machines......sunset used tapes u see.


somebody else went to kiss from Sunset was it Darragh Roberts?


DON't EVER compare Club Fm to sunset or kiss, ever.

As somebody who was involved in a pretty high (!) level with Sunset, I can tell you that Garv left it till the very last moment to tell Gary that he was leaving - in fact he initally denied that he would be joining them.

Dave Adams never got a bung to leave Sunset to join Kiss for the simple reason that he never worked on Sunset!

Cliff not being able to use cart machines? Thats a good one. At this stage he had already worked for the Voice of Peace, East Coast Radio, South East Radio and FM104.

Ronan wasn't fucked out of Kiss - he left after doing 3 shows there.

Initally Sunset and Kiss didn't get on well (a situation not helped by mysterious late night nuisance calls to Sunset/Coast FM djs and management), but after the shit hit the fan and the raids began the two stations found that they had to have a minimal level of co-operation. Gary lent Kiss FM a low powered TX at one stage - which Sunset had to borrow back a few weeks later when they were themselves raided again.

And I would never compare Kiss or Sunset to the scumbag ravers of Scrub FM! You take that back!! lol

RadioActive 101 :-)

They were pretty fucking cool back in 1993 actually. I remember the christmas nativity play they broadcast one year. Sadly missed.

Now, how about a 5 year on re-union for Urban FM?!

While 99% of Radioactive's output was pretty dreadful the 1% of brilliance they came out with usually made up for it.