Something mentioned by Eddie McGuire on Hot Seat today.
3XY/2SM giving away ‘surf wagons’ in the late 70s/early 80s apparently called “Freedom Machines”.
Any idea what he was on about?
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I remember 2SM sponsored surf competitions at that time and leveraged the popularity of the surf culture to attract listeners,
My slightly older neighbour had one of those “surf wagons” in the '70s except he didn’t have a surfboard in the back and called it something different…
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This would’ve been around the time when Southern Cross Broadcasting, who owned 3AW & 6PR at the time, had bought 2UE from the Lamb family, which occurred in 2001. I think that ownership change was the main motivator for Jones & Hadley to defect to 2GB the following year, whilst Steve Price was brought up from 3AW to present 2UE breakfast as a replacement for Jones.
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I think they were the Holden “Sandman” panel vans.
Looked like this
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When 4IP moved to St Helen Island they gave away a “VW Blue Bug of Happiness” - a VW Volkswagen covered in denim.
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they still do, don’t they?
Meanwhile, here’s one from 5AD, October 1985, seemingly marking the end of top 40 “5AD Music”
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Does anyone have a photo of this sticker?
“Send your complaints” to Geoff Harrison, he would’ve loved them, him and D-Mac.
It was a terrible campaign but something which could not be done now with the decimation of both stations.
On this 40th anniversary of the Granville train disaster, some interesting archive material of 2SM’s coverage of the day, including “backstage” recordings (although those parts may be reconstructions?) has been uploaded to YouTube
Source: The Hack
These days you just couldn’t imagine a music station handing over large slabs of airtime to real time news coverage, extending well into the evening.
I guess this was at a time 2SM was at its peak. Not just as a music station but also with a strong profile of news and sport and, of course, Catholic Mass every Sunday night.
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I was listening to 2SM that morning and remember Ian MacRae calling the Public Transport Commission for news on the disaster, however the person who answered the phone hadn’t heard about it yet.
2SM was at its peak then, and was rating through roof. They played the Top 40, and had a comprehensive news service. Frank Hyde’s call of the rugby league on the weekend had an audience then that easily beats 2GB’s current NRL ratings.
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True, of course but then there was no Pay TV around to dilute the radio audience.
Hard to compare eras when there’s so much more choice around these days.
Other people are probably just happy with getting score updates these days via the internet as well.
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Admittedly this is well before my time but back in the '70s, TV coverage of the rugby league here in Sydney probably would’ve been all on delay?
So back then, the radio calls very well might’ve been one of the only ways to follow the match live unless you were at the game.
I can vaguely remember being on hols with the parents just across the border in Tweed Heads. I think we were watching test cricket on Channel O from Brisbane and they interrupted the sport to show coverage. Without the link to Sydney for the cricket, there probably wouldn’t have been any coverage outside of nightly news.
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In Brisbane, Billy J Smith on 4IP used to make “pirate” radio calls of the local BRL games at Lang Park. IIRC 4BH had the rights to have a booth at the ground with George Lovejoy calling games. 4IP found an elevated site outside the grounds where the commentaters could still see the action. 4IP’s younger announcers suited their audience. Eventually, they were also granted a booth inside the grounds. I think 4BK also may have called games.
If you wanted to see the game on TV, you had to wait for ABC’s edited 55 minute broadcast at 6pm or the full game on TVQ. Different images and commentary from the two networks with two sets of cameras covering the action. Billy J later moved to TV and became the chief caller for O.
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Yes, I think only the Grand Final was live back then.
State Of Origin was on delay in its first few years too I think.
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I think the mid-week Amco Cup was live - Wednesday nights, played in 4 quarters to suit commercial TV with Ray Warren in his first commentary role AFAIK for Ten.
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It was delayed, played at 7:30, broadcast at 8:30pm. The school boy Amco Shield which was played before the Cup game was for a while delayed until 4:30pm Friday. Both games were exclusive to Ten with no radio call.
Edit: I just remembered the fourth State of Origin match in 1987 played in Los Angeles. Nine must have had some sort of first rights to the game, and iirc there was a delayed broadcast on the Friday night. 2GB’s Peter Zorba Peters and Greg Hollywood Hartley called the game, but somewhat bizarrely their call was delayed to coincide with the Nine telecast although it was not synchronised.
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Just found another one from a post on Facebook - get ready for it.
Sydney’s Continuous EASY Mix from the of the 70s, 80s & 90s
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Yep, that rather wordy line was even sang in their jingles at one point!