Alans Real Audio Collection

Caroline Overdrive During 1985 the Ross Revenge had been operating on two frequencies, 50KW on 963Khz with the Dutch service Radio Monique, and 10Kw on 576Khz with the English service of Caroline. Following the closure of Laser 558 from the MV Communicator in November '85, Caroline quickly retuned its 576 transmitter to take advantage of this clearer frequency, and pick up some of the estimated 12 million Laser listeners. Carolines music was quickly watered down from a AOR/Album style to a more Top 40 style to appeal to the new audience. As the programmes of Monique finished at 6PM, Carolines evening programmes were usually radiated on both frequencies. However, a number of separate programmes were broadcast in late '85, including a short run of sponsored reggae programmes "Jamming 963". On 1st January 1986, the New overnight service, Caroline Overdrive was launched by Tom Anderson, on 963, as a progressive rock and indie music outlet. The format was very loosely controlled, and quickly became an electric mix of music styles, old and new, with the emphasis on non-mainstream. Overdrive ran throughout 1986 although as Tom had less time to devote to the project, it started to flounder later in the year. By early 1987, the service made only irregular broadcasts, and it is generally accepted that the last "overdrive" programme was presented in February of that year, by a posse of people, including Andy "Cosmic" Johnstone and Mike Barrington, under the name "Testing 963" This was taken as a snipe at the recently re-launched MV Communicator which was frequently broadcasting "Tests for Laser Hot Hits 576". Other names featured during 1986 on Overdrive include: Fergie McNeil, Bagwhan, Jon Tyler and Mark Matthews (where are they now?). This 15 minute snippet features cuts from March 1986, and November/December '86. It finshes, with a few minutes of "Testing 963" from February 1987. This is thought to be the last time that Cosmic and Mike Barrington were heard on air.

Radio Monique Between 1984 and 1989 three different Dutch stations used the facilities onboard the Ross Revenge:- Monique, Radio 558 (vijf vijf acht), and Radio 819 (acht een negen). Monique was the most succesful of these, and broadcast from 84 through to the collapse of the main tower in 1987. This recording is just a few minutes of the station from December 1986 and includes the start of programmes from "Viewpoint 963" - the evening sponsored religious programmes which formed the bulk of the stations income.

Radio Nova During the early/mid '80's, Radio Nova went from strength to strength in both its native Dublin market and across wider parts of the UK. Compared with the sound of commercial ILR in the UK at the time, Nova was fresh, exciting, and progressive, in both attitude and music and was never far from controversy. This 20 minute snippet features mainly Summer 1985, by which time the station was prominently "rotated top 40", but just listen to the "energy" and delivery of the programmes. Check out some great Tony Allan production work, including the infamous AM-Stereo April Fool of 1985 and listen to the competitions, bearing in mind that at the time a typical UK station would offer nothing more than a few (naff) albums or a pair of cinema tickets as a star prize. The recording finishes with a few cuts of the final hours broadcast, including Chris Careys farewell message from 19th March 1986.

Sunshine and Others A few minutes of early (1982) Sunshine radio, a quick ad and jingle from Sunshine on FM, TTTR, a rare "To Dublin - Nova 828" ID, and a few moments of ERI (Eastside Radio Ireland) and South Coast Radio (both from Cork). Listen carefully to the ERI clips and you can hear co-channel Boyneside Radio in the background. Finishes with a poor recording of the last few minutes of Sunshine Radio at 6pm, on 30th December 1988. As an interesting aside, after the station closed the 10KW RCA Tx of South Coast Radio found its way to the Ross Revenge where it was stripped and used to repair the 5 and 10 KW standby Tx's.

Sunshine and Nova Raided Listen to the news on Sunshine as Radio Nova was silenced by the government on 19th May 1983. Then listen to a brief mention on RTE Radio 2 news of the fate of Sunshine Radio the following day (and RTE couldn't even get the name right!) The government later apologised for raiding the stations, saying it never meant to close them down! See "jamming" below.

Jamming Sunshine Listen to the news on Sunshine, as RTE continue to jam their programmes in March 1984, and the political pressure brought to bear upon RTE by the government to stop the action. Includes an apology from the Minister of Communications for the raid the previous year!

Q102 Whilst Nova were aiming for a UK audience from their Dublin base, several disgruntled staff left to form their own station Q102, solely for the Dublin market. At 250 miles from Dublin, my reception of the station on AM was never particularly good. However, during the wee small hours of warm summer evenings, it was often possible to hear the station on the (then uncluttered) FM dial. This is a few minutes of recordings, made between 2-3 AM, in September 1985. (I really should have had better things to do at that time of the day!)

Zoom 103 Following the sudden loss of Radio Nova on the 19th March 1986, several ex-staff put together Zoom 103. However, due to various unsettled legal reasons, the station lasted only a couple of days. This very short recording was taken from Radio Netherlands Media Network programme at the time.

Energy 103 After Zoom 103 left the airwaves, several weeks of silence passsed, before the ex-Nova crew were able to put together a new station. Energy 103 took to the airwaves on 26th April 1986, the day after Chernobyl nuclear power station exploded in the Ukraine. This recording is mainly from early summer 1987. Compared to Nova, Energy was much weaker, although these recordings are made worse by a (not uncommon at that time) fault on BBC Radio Scotlands transmitter (about 10 miles from me), which caused severe splatter and noise over several hundred Khz of the dial. Listen carefully to the Energy news jingle and you can hear the BBC's time pips in the background! This 5 minute recording features a rare on-air appearance by the legendary Tony Allan, and several examples of his production work.

Early Atlantic 252 Once the irish Communications Act 1988 became law, it effectively saw the end of the "Super Pirate" era, leaving just a few stations operating on an ad-hoc basis. However, spurred on by the success of stations like Nova and Laser 558, Radio Telefis Eireann (RTE) teamed up with RTL (operators of Radio Luxembourg) to put Irelands allocated but unused Long Wave channel into use. Primarily aimed at the UK mainland, Atlantic 252 took off to a slow start but peaked at around 4-5 million listeners in the early 90's. This is a snippet of test announcements on the day before launch and the official 8AM launch on 1st September 1989.

Coast to Coast There's such a maze of W's and K's, and every city's got a Kiss. So join me on a 1998 coast to coast Radio Tour across the USA, start in Boston and end in San Francisco. Mainly features New England, Northern Arizona, and California.

All recordings on this page are encoded with Real Audio 5, Mono, at 12kb/s. All original recordings were made by the author, in Edinburgh, or other close-by locations in central Scotland, using a variety of equipment. Recording quality varies a lot - all hetrodynes, fades and crackles are included at no extra cost! Download Real Audio Now!

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