In the 80s I worked at a Sydney radio station that used to throw out the American Top 40 records after they had aired. For a while I would take them home to rescue them from landfill. This is before the internet and it was the first time a recording was ever heard in Australia. I’d record the new hit songs and pass them onto my friends in a mix tape before the show aired. I’d often get five to ten new songs from each episode. It made me a popular boy so I owed Casey Kasem a lot.
I still have about 20 different Top 40 shows.
I no longer listen to them as I haven’t had a record player since about 2003.
An interesting question. I am not sure of the answer but I know that 2UE also received the albums of American Top 40 in the 1980s. They did not have the broadcasting rights but may have wanted the records to sample the next big hits from the US.
Without the internet, AT40 was a good link to breaking songs in the US.
Apart from Take 40, were there any other Australian countdowns that did the rounds? Trevor Sinclair had a Stimorol Top 30 on Magic 11. Plus there was also this:
I think Mike Hammond hosted a weekly one in the early 90s, might have just been called the AT40 or Australian Top 40,? I don’t think it lasted too long?
Yes Australian Top 40 was around for a few years on ARN stations plus some of the pre DMG regionals like 3BOFM. The main countdowns during the 90’s from memory were:
Take40
Planet Rock
Australian Top40
AT40/ Rick Dees American Top40
Hot Hits
These were mostly played back to back on the regional stations on a Sunday
There was also American Country Countdown in the 70’s and 80’s, not sure what happened after that.
I remember hearing an Australian Top 30 or 40 in the late 70’s on 3BO and maybe some other regional stations. I can’t remember it being on any Melbourne stations.
There was an Australian top 30 or 40 on 2UW on Sunday evenings in the early 80’s before Father Jim’s show. Is that the same countdown as above?
Some stations had their own countdowns. For example, 3XY had its own weekly top 30 or 40 that I remember listening to in the early 80’s.
Also, there was Chart Attack, a UK new music show that included a short countdown, that was on FOX FM/B105 and presumably other stations for a short time from 1991. It didn’t last long in Melbourne but may have lasted longer elsewhere, e.g. Brisbane.
In November 2004, Osher Günsberg replaced Barry as host. A succession of hosts including Kyle and Jackie O would follow before the show finally came to an end after 32 years.
Its final broadcast went to air on Saturday, September 3rd, 2016.
Today marks 100 years for the original commercial broadcasting licence of what is now on air as KIIS 1065 in Sydney. 2UW officially kicked off its commercial licence on 13/2/1925 with founder Otto Sandell’s radio manufacturing company in Kings Cross, Sydney (called United Wireless). Of course the on air callsign morphed into MIX in the 90s and later as KIIS. With a pang of nostalgia, I always wished they had kept the great UW callsign. Happy 100th !
Yes a lot of stations at ot nearing the 100 year mark lately. I think we sometimes forgot what a long history of truly commercial and independent radio we’ve had in Australia, compared to countries like the UK and NZ.
Certainly something to celebrate and part of Australian history! Otto was only 17 when he was granted a B class licence, first broadcasting from his bedroom with a 10 watt transmitter.
He then moved the station to his father’s house in Victoria Road Belleview Hill, with a 7½ hp generator and broadcasting with an antenna suspended from 130’ masts at either end of the house. He used the positioning statement ‘2UW, the little station with the big kick’.
Apparently, Otto chose ‘UW’ because it ‘sounded good’ (his manufacturing company was called Sandel Radio Ltd).
I’ve been listening to the new 2UW this morning for an hour or so and its sounding good! (And not a single Australian track either, which is refreshing).
There was also American Country Countdown in the 70’s and 80’s, not sure what happened after that.
American Country Countdown still airs to this day in the USA and some other countries. 3UZ aired it from 1978 until 1987 when it was dropped when the Victorian racing interests bought it and country music was removed from the playlist to make way for racing.
I remember hearing an Australian Top 30 or 40 in the late 70’s on 3BO and maybe some other regional stations. I can’t remember it being on any Melbourne stations.
That show would have been called Hit File, hosted by IIRC Nick Bennett. 3BO Bendigo used to air it on Monday nights around 1981, I used to listen to it all the time in my bedroom back then. Oxygene Part II by Jean-Michel Jarre was its fade-to-news theme.
