Country Sound: king of the radio road

For five years from 1979 to 1984, the Keep It Country show on RTÉ Radio 2 (now 2FM) acquired iconic status among followers of the country music genre. It was hosted by Paschal Mooney from Drumshanbo in Co Leitrim and it provided the launching pad for various artists who were making their debut on the scene at the time.

Going across the pond

Paschal, who later went on to serve as a senator in the Seanad for almost two decades, has been a central player in the Irish country music story over the years. It all began for the young Leitrim man when –like so many of his generation – he went to England where he got a job in London with the Emerald Staff Agency which was owned by Seán McGuill from Dundalk.

He secured a weekly column with Spotlight magazine which was the bible of the music scene for Irish readers from the mid-1960s to the late 1970s.

“My column was entitled ‘Dateline London’ and I covered the music scene around London at the time. Spotlight was the best-selling magazine in Ireland back then.

At the age of 21, I ended up as manager of the six London branches of the Emerald Staff Agency

“I also had the good fortune to be approached by Brendan Mac Lua who was the managing editor of The Irish Post to write a column for them as well. He was an iconic figure in Irish journalism and hailed from Co Clare.

“At the age of 21, I ended up as manager of the six London branches of the Emerald Staff Agency. I also started doing part-time work at the Gresham Ballroom introducing acts on stage and where I got to know so many of the visiting Irish singers and bands.

“Seamus Moore from Kilkenny was the stage manager at the time. I spent six years in London and it was a great experience,” says Paschal.

By the mid-1970s, Paschal was entirely caught up in the music scene and it led him to make the decision to return to Ireland.

One of the perks back then was being invited to various record launches

“I was getting more and more into the country music scene. The Spotlight outlet gave me huge inroads and contacts while it also enabled me to meet so many of the American legends when they came to perform at the Wembley International Country Festival which was huge throughout the 1970s.

“One of the perks back then was being invited to various record launches. I met Tony Gaynor at a launch ceremony for John Kerr from Donegal who previously topped the charts with Three Leafed Shamrock and who sold thousands of albums in that era.”

Making it big

“Tony was producer of Country Music Time on Radio Éireann which was hosted by Noel Andrews, a brother of Eamon Andrews. I was doing commercials for some of the country singers at the time and I said to Tony, ‘When are you going to give me my big break on radio?’ He said to me, ‘If you can come up with the top five country songs in America each week, I will put you on the air without any audition’.

“I travelled over and back to London on a regular basis which enabled me to keep my regular columns up to date.

The Aer Lingus girls were brilliant and each week I would give them the American top five singles list and they would pick them up for me at a record shop in New York

“It dawned on me that one way I could manage to get the records over from America was to ask the Aer Lingus hostesses if any of them were also operating on the transatlantic route.

“On a flight to London, I went up to the galley and asked the question about the transatlantic rota. The Aer Lingus girls were brilliant and each week I would give them the American top five singles list and they would pick them up for me at a record shop in New York.

“That gave me my big break and I did an insert into Noel Andrews show with the USA Top 5 for three or four years before Radio 2 came on air.”

Larry Gogan was the first voice on Radio 2 when the station opened on 31 May 1979.

“I had my own show, Keep It Country, from the opening day. It went out every Tuesday and Thursday between 8pm and 10pm with Gerry Ryan before me and followed by Dave Fanning.”

It was at a time when the charts meant so much, unlike today

Paschal’s show became a runaway favourite, not just with rural audiences but in the towns and cities where people loved the country sounds from Ireland and the USA. “The volume of calls and letters to the show was unprecedented in those years. There was a huge demand for this music and content all over the country.

“I had a weekly popularity top 10 which became the definitive country chart in those years. Singers built their careers on it. It was at a time when the charts meant so much, unlike today when most of them are nearly meaningless as indeed are all these awards shows.”

A downward spiral

But all was not what it seems to be and by 1984, just five short years later and at a time when Keep It Country was booming, Paschal felt the cold shoulder of bureaucracy descend in a formidable way.

A decision was taken to drop Keep It Country from the Radio 2 schedule. It led to a major furore at the time with country followers up in arms over the decision.

“In my opinion, this was still, to a large degree, pre-country pirate radio and certainly pre-independent local radio so RTÉ were a law unto themselves. They, quite frankly, had such a monopoly that they did not care how many people were listening to the radio programmes.

The people that ran that station were civil servants

“To them it was a public service obligation, the very same as they would put on a programme on Russian folk music or whatever just to fill a gap. They had no real interest in it and had no real interest in promoting or developing it, not just my programme but others as well, simply because they had a captured audience.

Radio 2 was a terrible place in that it was run by bureaucrats

“The people that ran that station were civil servants. They were not broadcasters and were totally at variance with the people that are running radio today where ratings matter and, where as a result of competition, you have better radio.

“Radio 2 was a terrible place in that it was run by bureaucrats. I was told by an assistant radio controller at one time that he didn’t like what I was doing as it was too parochial.

“Radio 2 was a pop station from 7am to 7pm, but was ethnically driven from a musical point of view from 7pm to 10pm with country, jazz, folk, traditional programmes and middle of the road shows.

To me, Radio 2 has never recovered to this day from that decision taken back in the 1980s

“It was modelled on BBC Radio 2 which was – and still is – one of the most successful radio stations in the world because of its diversity. To me, Radio 2 has never recovered to this day from that decision taken back in the 1980s.

“I was transferred to Radio One with three one-hour shows but they were all over the place and as a result I lost my core audience.”

In part two of our special feature on Paschal Mooney next week, he speaks about his many trips to Nashville, his TV series in the 1980s, the country scene over the years, and his time in the Seanad.

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