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We have featured Christian Community Radio here before but this is the best quality recording of the station so far. By ‘quality’ we mean the strongest reception of the station, not the standard of audio which was probably among the worst of the pirate stations. Christian Community Radio was run from Merrion Square by Gerry O’Mahony, a Catholic solicitor opposed to the liberalisation of Irish society in the 1980s. The station began in 1985 on AM and FM but was forced off the air in 1987 after causing interference to the FM signal of BBC Radio in Dublin.
This recording from 90.2 FM is from 1755-1830 on the 25th of June 1985 and consists of roughly edited items including religious music, church bells, the Rosary at a local church and ‘joyful singing of our American Christian community’. Production standards are appalling as everything seems to have been recorded on a basic tape recorder with nothing more than a built-in microphone. There is no audio processing so levels are variable and breakthrough from what seems to be RTÉ Radio 2 can also be heard. O’Mahony announces that Christian Community Radio is to go off the air for two weeks in order to make improvements and repairs. However audio standards never got any better throughout the existence of this eccentric station.
This recording is from the Skywave Tapes Collection. Skywave Radio International broadcast a shortwave station in the 1980s from Baldoyle in northeast Dublin.