I don’t recall Mike ever on 2uw, only when they converted to FM as MIX 106.5, he was on air. I might be wrong. No doubt he would of been employed by "2UW“. One reason why they used MIX instead of 2uw as a call sign was too many people got confused between 2ws and 2uw so they said on a promo. The only real success on MIX (in my view) was the Richard Mercer show, love songs dedication. The music was significantly different to 2uw. I remember they dropped 60s music which a huge part of the 2uw music playlist in the early 90s. It was very repetitive with the Mix artist theme. I once requested Hold the line by Toto, but they declined to play it, only Africa by Toto. George Moore once said (on the George and Paul show) the repetition got to him with Mariah, Boys to Men etc on the “music station he worked at”.
To me it felt like an attempt of the old 2day FM from the early 80s. Maybe 2day FM when it launched, was better than MIX but the target adult audience was similar.
Yea indeed … Mike states in his book “Actually, the MIX playlist seemed to consist of about ten songs aired on high rotation, half of them by Mariah Carey. The other half were by somebody called Michael Bolton.”
Talking about his contract hire Mike wrote “The understanding was that we would try it out and polish it on 2UW, then take it across for the breakfast show on the new FM station, MIX 106.5”.
Although it doesn’t matter for branding (as much as “2UW FM” would have been an absolute mouthful!), it’s not like they could have kept the official callsign easily as, presuming they followed the 2WS and 2WL/Wave FM conversion precedents, they would have likely had to be officially “2UUU” - and besides being ambiguous, that was already taken by the Shoalhaven Community Radio station on the south coast (which picked it up in 1990 by the looks of it).
Could have of course bought the callsign like the 5MMM situation, but I suspect they ended up comfortable enough with 2WFM as their FM callsign - both gives them a small sliver of history, but also the airspace they needed to eventually target a different market from 2WS at the time.
Yes, it definitely would’ve been on-air, given that 2UUU gained its full-time licence back in 1990 according to ACMA (via RRL).
It was also the first station within a 200km radius of Sydney to be broadcast on 104.5, long before Star 104.5 on the Central Coast came on-air in March 2004. However, I do recall a TCBL broadcasting on 104.5 in the Hunter Valley back in the late 90s/early 00s.
Yes, 104.5 was shared between Radio Maitland (RM FM) and 2CKR Cessnock back in the mid 90s, which merged to form 2CHR. Radio Rhema also used it once in the early 90s.
2BOB Taree also used 104.5, but moved to 104.7 around 2004 to allow Star 104.5 to operate at 16 kW in all directions (it was originally going to be restricted to 2.5 kW towards Taree).
Which logo was 3XY using just prior to its closure in September of 1991? Anybody remember? Or better still, does anybody have a copy they can share, please? I’m just in the process of putting together some 3XY audio from that era.
It was a version of this one but with the “Easy Rock” slogan removed and the “1422” stretched upwards to cover part of where the slogan appeared. I vaguely recall, though might be incorrect, that the 1422 numbers were changed to red as well. I can do a hunt around but unfortunately I do not think that I have that later version.
EDIT: Turns out I did have a copy of it but it’s only taken from some old letterhead so it’s not the best quality
Given that the we were listening to a less than perfect AM mono signal back in the day, this is gold quality! I had a listen to it again. For a station that was run on the smell of an oily rag it still continued to put out a decent presentation, even if some of the song selections were a bit random and recycling old jingles that were probably a decade old, but at least it provided an alternative to the pub rock and hits and memories being belted out on FM. And it still sounded like a “real” radio station with real presenters, not this sort of pre-recorded and automated jukebox stuff that we get on its successor now.
Thanks, that was always a grey spot in their history I couldn’t confirm, but yeah, absolutely great to read everyone’s memories on this station. Though I didn’t listen to 2UW ALL the time, it was a staple through my childhood along side with 2Day Version 1.0, so sad that not one original thread of these stations no longer exist. But like your first home as a child, they are always the happy memories.
Yep similar for me as 2UW was the big station during my teenage years in the 70s. 2SM was “cool” for my age group but I preferred the more adult sounds of 2UW. After all they did have John Laws on air for 10 years throughout the 70s. My first fixation with 2UW was meeting Lawsie at the Sydney royal Easter show in the mid-late 70s as 2UW would broadcast there live every year from the Commemorative Pavilion in the old showgrounds next to the SCG. 2UW struggled for ratings during much of the 1970s. The big catalyst for change was when Ron E Sparx left 2SM and came over to 2UW as PD in 1979. Brought with him several SM jox including one Trevor Sinclair. Great times!
You also mentioned 2Day in their first iteration. It was a major struggle for them to get going when launched in 1980 alongside 2MMM run by the mercurial Rod Muir (MMM was known then as Muir’s Money Machine). 2Day then had very high profile owners including Mike Willesee, Graham Kennedy and John Laws. 2 of those 3 esteemed gentlemen would be rolling in their graves at how badly 2Day is going some 40+ years later.
Yep also fond memories of 2WS … “We’re your station from out of the west, 1224 , 2WS”. They started in 1978 from an old fibro house in Seven Hills. Built new studios next door in Leabons Lane (home now to Hope 103.2). They were the strong voice of Sydney westies for years until FM conversion in the 90s. Hans Torv was a major personality i recall. Also Dave Norman and Dean Matters.
