1986 Archives - Page 11 of 21 - Irish Pirate Radio Audio Archive

4th July 20223rd July 2022

Closedown of Big Beat Radio

Big Beat Radio is especially important to us as it involved both co-founders of Pirate.ie, Brian Greene and John Walsh. The station began broadcasting on June 17^th 1986 in a room belonging to the community centre on the seafront in the suburb of Baldoyle in northeast Dublin. There were six founders, all of whom were 16: Brian Greene (Bobby Gibbson* on air), Dónal Greene, Michael Redmond, Peter Walsh, Brian Hegarty and Mark Tynan. John Walsh was a year younger and joined as a newsreader and occasional DJ.

Big Beat was on air for seven weeks of the summer school holidays. The original plan was to go on AM with the copper wires running along the seafront behind the studio but the station ended up on FM. Around the same time, the Carroll’s Irish Open Golf tournament was held across the estuary in Portmarnock about 400 metres from the studio. RTÉ set up a dedicated radio station for the tournament on 96.6 FM, forcing Big Beat to move down to 96.2 at the last minute.

Power was about 15 watts but the mast wasn’t more than 20 feet off the ground and therefore the signal didn’t travel far. Audio quality was poor with levels very uneven. The single microphone was wrapped in a cloth to prevent popping and taped to a wooden banister which protruded from a scratchy mixer dating from the 1960s. Two turntables, a cassette deck and headphones completed the studio set-up.

The studio heated up easily and the door to the green outside was usually left open, with a result that passing buses were often heard during shows. The room was invariably crammed with friends of the DJ so keeping people quiet during links was a challenge. News was presented from 11am until 6pm each day and was lifted from RTÉ, BBC and other pirates. The newsroom was in a stifling disused toilet with no window.

There was no phone at Big Beat, so the telephone box across the road was used for requests. The postal address was 3A Brookstone Road, Baldoyle where co-founder Peter Walsh lived. Sunshine Radio engineer Peter Gibney (RIP) visited one evening because of interference caused to the transmitter in Portmarnock a few kilometres to the north. Big Beat also ran discos for visiting Spanish students at the community centre next door.

Big Beat closed suddenly at 6pm on Friday August 8^th with Don’t You Forget About Me by Simple Minds. This recording is of the final hour from that day. Two of the Big Beat founders, Brian Greene and Peter Walsh, went on to set up Centre Radio, another part-time station that operated from Baldoyle and neighbouring Bayside from Christmas 1986 to the end of 1988. For more memories of Big Beat, see here.

* No, it’s not a typo: the extra ‘b’ in Gibbson was deliberate because the name was fake.

29th June 202226th June 2022

Afternoon music mix on Kandy Radio

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Kandy Radio broadcast from Ballinasloe in east Galway from 1986 to 1988. This recording was made on Monday 13^th October 1986 from 1320-1405 from the station’s AM frequency, 1386 kHz. Mark White is on air until 1330 and is followed by Paul Davis for the afternoon show. News is read by Tara and adverts feature local businesses in east Galway, south Roscommon and west Offaly. The music is a mixture of middle-of-the-road, country and chart hits. There is co-channel interference due to congestion on the frequency, suggesting that the recording was made outside Kandy’s core area of east Galway.

This recording is from the Anoraks Ireland Tapes Collection, donated to us by Paul Davidson.

27th June 20222nd July 2022

Kandy Radio on fair day in Ballinasloe

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Kandy Radio broadcast from the town of Ballinasloe in east Galway from the middle of 1986 until spring 1988. Serving the town and its rural hinterland, Kandy sounded very different to the slicker Galway City stations that aped the ‘hot hits’ format of the super-pirates in other cities. Kandy Radio was initially logged by Anoraks Ireland on 1386 kHz AM and 98.2 FM and although manager John McGrath said it had a radius of 30 miles, he also reported reception reports from Norway and Sweden. An Anoraks Ireland survey from November 1987 recorded a move to 1404 kHz and both 98.5 and 100.9 FM. Hours of broadcasting were 0800-1900 and there were plans for programmes 24 hours a day. A log from April 1988 recorded Kandy on 103.5 FM only and the station closed down that month.

This recording of Kandy Radio was made from 1386 kHz from 1636-1721 on Saturday 11^th October 1986, country fair day in Ballinasloe. Paul Davis is on air until 5pm and says that he will be gigging later that night in Hayden’s Hotel where Irish Eurovision star Johnny Logan will also be performing. News at 5pm is read by Tara and she is followed by Steve Jones with more requests and a mix of music. There are plenty of ads for small businesses in Ballinasloe and surrounding areas and the Top 30 is donated by a local record shop. Complete with uneven audio and technical glitches, this is the authentic sound of a small town radio station from the height of the pirate era.

The recording may have been made some distance from Ballinasloe because it suffers from co-channel interference due to congestion on 1386 kHz by both Irish and British stations. It is from the Anoraks Ireland Tapes Collection, donated to us by Paul Davidson.

11th May 202226th January 2025

Easy listening on KLAS 98

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

KLAS 98 (later Class Radio) was an easy-listening music station serving Dublin from November 1986 until the end of 1988. Set up by Hugh Hardy, founder of the popular Dublin station Radio Carousel, KLAS stood out in a market dominated by chart music pirates vying for the youth audience. Aimed more at poaching listeners from RTÉ Radio 1 than Radio 2, KLAS broadcast a range of middle-of-the-road music and also featured jazz and classical. It was was first based in a garage behind Hugh Hardy’s home in the northeastern suburb of Sutton, but used the up-market Hume Street in the city centre as a postal address.

KLAS was later sold to television aerial salesman John May and rebranded as Class Radio, moving its operations to Harcourt Street in the city centre. Many high-profile presenters passed through its doors including David Baker, Pat Courtenay, Bryan Lambert, Chris Barry and Suzanne Duffy. Co-founder of Pirate.ie John Walsh was also a presenter and newsreader. In 1989, Class Radio was involved in an unsuccessful application for one of the Dublin licences.

Our recording is of the early days of KLAS when the station was based in Sutton. It was made from 98.5 FM on Tuesday, 28th November 1986 and features Nick Adams presenting his lunchtime show and reading news. Nick would later be heard on RTÉ. Part 1 above runs from 1117-1205 and part 2 below from 1301-1349. There are plenty of agency advertisements, a sign of the promise of KLAS in its early days.

Part 2 from 1301

This recording is from the Anoraks Ireland Tapes Collection, donated to us by Paul Davidson.

7th May 202210th May 2022

Test broadcast of Radio Free Ulster

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Radio Free Ulster was a paramilitary pirate station operated during the Loyalist general strike called for Monday March 3^rd 1986. The strike was in opposition to the signing of the Anglo-Irish Agreement. The station carried out test transmissions from above an illegal drinking den between Woodvale and the Shankill Road in West Belfast on Sunday March 2^nd on 101 MHz FM. Radio Free Ulster broadcast throughout Monday and Tuesday afternoon before the transmitter was turned off.

The Irish government was aware of the broadcasts, which occurred at a time of high tension in Northern Ireland. The broadcasts attracted national and international attention and a chilling photo of Radio Free Ulster was featured on the front page of The Irish Press and in The Schenectady Gazette, a newspaper in upstate New York. The station was also covered in The Belfast Telegraph.

This recording is of a test broadcast and is presumably from Sunday March 2^nd. Audio quality is terrible with a faint voice breaking through the crackle and hum and eventually announcing Radio Free Ulster. Loyalist marching band music is heard in the background. Thanks to Paul Buckle for the recording and to Eddie Bohan for background information and the image. For more information about stations run by paramilitary groups during the early days of the Troubles, listen here to a podcast featuring Eddie Bohan.