DLR/HITS 106

TheBMG

Some of the older posters here may recall the pirate station DLR 106 operating from Mackintosh Park in Dun Laoghaire back in the early 90s.

It was one of the high profile pirates of the early post 1988 era and enjoyed a couple of great years of success. It later became Hits 106 but eventually lost its way somewhat and faded into obscurity.

Question for anyone who may know .. when did Hits 106 close down? To my memory they were well gone by the time Newstalk took their 106.0 frequency.

zoobizoo

I always remember hearing a tennis report on DLR..... 2 French players at Wimbledon.

The report mention Guy Forget and pronounced it as Guy Forget in a Dun Laoghaire accent rather than the way the French would as "Ger Forg-jay".

Guy was playing another French man whose name I can't recall but it was funny hearing both of them pronounced phonetically.

Loved it. Great station too.

zoobizoo

Actually, think it could have been Henri Laconte

;)

Infoanon

DLR aka HITS 106 was a great radio station with a po box number 106 (handy to have a postman working for the station ).

DLR stayed on air until 2001 i recall correctly.

By that stage the FM band was fairly full compared to when DLR first came on and basically had south Dublin to itself.

Raided for being a commercial threat to the launch of 'East Coast ' , others can confirm but this was possibly the raid where the wrong address was on the warrant ! , and left the airwaves after further threats of raids in 2001.

Declan A Walsh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118982742#Comment_118982742

I didn't realise it went into the 21st century - I thought it was gone by the late 1990s. I remember that some time after the rename to Hits 106 that there was a subtle frequency change from 106.0 to 106.1 FM. Over the years, a lot of people now in licensed radio went through that station. Quite a few went straight to Wicklow's East Coast FM. When I have time, I might come back with a post about some of the ex-DLR/Hits 106 presenters. I remember having a thread about this before - it might have been on Radiowaves.

Losty Dublin

You'd know that Big John Daly was off on his holidays when the station would do 180 degree format flips for a fortnight or so 🤓

Max Power 2010

I remember those well 😂

They were definitely still around in 2000, Pulse and Vibe/Club closed in 99 to apply for a licence and I remember DLR being around quite a bit longer.

Declan A Walsh

Here are just some of the names that went through DLR and/or Hits 106 and ended up on licensed radio.

Nikki Hayes - currently with East Coast FM. It's gone full circle for her, having started her legal radio career with East Coast and being involved with many other stations including 2FM.

Dave Harrington, aka Captain Fantastic - Programme Director with East Coast FM. Like Nikki, it's gone full circle for him, having started with them and been with other stations for a number of years.

Mark Kavanagh - had a dance show on DLR. He was given a dance show on Radio Ireland (now Today FM) in its early days.

Mr. Spring, aka Tim Hannigan - 2FM. Although more associated with dance pirates and his dance events with former business partner Mark Kavanagh, he did do a brief stint with DLR.

Barry Dunne - 98FM. Barry went through a number of pirates in the first half of the 1990s.

Rob Gormley - East Coast FM and FM104

Ryan O'Neill - East Coast FM and iRadio

Les Vickers - was with East Coast FM, Dublin's Country Mix 106.8 and RTE Radio 1

Ronan Scanlan - was with South East Radio. Ronan turned up on many pirates during the 1990s and into the early 2000s.

Paul Osbourne - temporary licensed stations Choice FM and only last year Easy Radio.

Mark McCabe - iRadio

Brendan Whelan - he had been with the then licensed station for north Wicklow Horizon Radio, before the merging of the two Wicklow stations, and then returned to pirate radio on DLR/Hits 106 with his traditional Irish music programme.

If I think of more...

TheBMG

Hi Declan,

you mentioned Dave Harrington as Captain Fantastic; are you sure you’re not thinking of “Mister Fantastic” which was Tim Hannigans name on the pirates at the time.

Also, didn’t Jim Nugent (Jim Jim from the Strawberry Alarm Clock) do some shows on DLR? Seem to recall a lot of Prince being played!

Declan A Walsh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118987075#Comment_118987075

No, I wasn't confusing the two. I read that about Dave Harrington a number of years ago. Tim Hannigan used the pseudonym Mista Fantastic in his engineer role on dance records (nearly always stuff he did with Mark Kavanagh, such as their own combo Sound Crowd). I never personally heard Tim on DLR so I don't know what he called himself there, but I did hear him on Sunset and successor Rhythm FM using his real name.

I never heard anything about Jim Jim's radio career, pirate or otherwise, prior to his initial involvement with FM104.

jimmyriddle

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118986840#Comment_118986840

Incorrect. Dave Harrington was Captain Scarlet and Mark McCabe was never with DLR/Hits at any stage.

Max Power 2010

I don't recall Mark McCabe at the station, but one more is John Power who started there before moving to Pulse, went by John O'Shea IIRC.

Declan A Walsh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118988090#Comment_118988090

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118988213#Comment_118988213

I got Dave's radio name wrong - sorry about that. At least, I got his first name right! Re Mark McCabe, there was a reference to DLR in some article some years ago. I wish I could find it or anything else. I stand corrected on that, but I definitely did read it and I accept that the article may have been wrong.

I never knew about John Power being on DLR/Hits 106. That's interesting. He was to turn up on 2FM and Spin1038.

TheBMG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118988583#Comment_118988583

In fairness there was a good bit of cross pollination between a lot of the early 90s pirates .. jocks doing one or two shows before moving on.

My best memories of DLR are Al Hughes and some of his mates playing very cool album rock late at night.

You mentioned Mark Kavanagh; he replaced the original DLR Friday night dance show which was “The Sweatbox” with Jeff Collins aka Ollie Dowling. Ollie would go on to form Jazz FM a few years later.

Declan A Walsh

Here's another one (for definite this time!): Claire Beck - Today FM.

Signore Fancy Pants

I manned the phones a few times there in the late 90's. Maybe spoke once or twice.

Always loved DLR.

jimmyriddle

The Big 106. It broadcast from the Daly's home which had a good view of the city from South Dublin. It was also rebroadcast in Wicklow town and on shortwave at 6220 KHz at one stage. Musically it was a unique station with a varied format and even a Friday night rave show in the early days. It was a hot bed for radio talent, quite a substantial number of big name legal jocks made their way through the doors of Mackintosh Park over the 90s and early 00s to cut their teeth in the business. Some names to add include Al Gibbs and Ben Murray from FM104 also John Public who worked with 2FM for a time. I'm sure there are more? Good thread.

Declan A Walsh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118991342#Comment_118991342

I had wondered if Al Gibbs had been with DLR. Maybe I saw mention of it somewhere. Was Ben Murray one of the later presenters during the Hits106 era? I forgot about John Public - I had read that before. He has basically presented the same reggae program - Black Echoes - for about 40 years on various radio stations in Dublin, largely on the southside, as well as Bray's BLB. His last pirate was Jazz FM which he left in 2003 after it was raided. He has been with Anna Livia/Dublin City FM ever since, and he used to have a monthly slot with 2FM as mentioned.

California Dreamer

Brays BLB not BLR.

What happened to Bud Johnson?

Declan A Walsh

Quote stopped working for me:

Fixed BLB!

What was Bud Johnson's real name if that helps to locate him?

nuttyboy79

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118989076#Comment_118989076

Al Hughes's radio name was Bruce Foxton iirc and for what's going on at the moment his brother is the snooker player Eugene Hughes 😁.

Can anyone remember the woman that did the rock show on Sunday nights in the mid 90's

TheBMG

Bud Johnson was John Daley’s kid brother. Last I heard he was living out in Wicklow

TheBMG

http://www.dxarchive.com/ireland_a_to_z_irish_pirates_dlr_dunlaoire.html

according to the fantastic dxarchive site Hits 106 were still with us up to May 2001. I’m still wondering when and why they eventually pulled the plug? Don’t recall any raids but it seems a shame that such a trailblazer station of the early 90s simply slipped away.

Newstalk did come on the air a year later (initially serving Dublin only) and that would’ve forced DLR/Hits off their 106.0 frequency.

Declan A Walsh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119218608#Comment_119218608

Hits 106 had moved to the frequency of 106.1 during the '90s, but it would still have been too close to Newstalk on 106.0.