Sunday 29 July 2018

URY 1350AM: Summer 2003 - What's Korfball?

This is my third compilation of audio memories from University Radio York fifteen years ago, and we've reached the end of my first year, and the long hot summer of 2003.



If you've missed round 1 and round 2 then let me fill you in.  In my student days I presented on the University of York's student radio station URY, and recently I've found the tapes.  As well as my own, there's plenty of random unlabelled stuff that I recorded for reasons unknown, but thanks to my odd devotion to C90 a lot of material that was presumably otherwise lost forever lives on, admittedly as fuzzy medium wave recordings.

The desk in 2003.  Photo courtesy of Simon Taghioff

So, without further ado here is 42 minutes of student radio from April, May and June 2003 - the good, the (often) bad and the (hopefully not) ugly, featuring game show scandals, student politics, Roses, a playlist rebellion, a surprising amount of Craig David and very bad karaoke. In what I think was a first, the previous term's schedule was used for week 1, rather than the station being largely off air until week 2 whilst the new schedule was arranged.   Due to the very late Easter that year, the term oddly began on Wednesday 23rd April, and so URY sprang back into life the day before.



00:05 The J Team take a "radio jog" around campus (22/04/03)
01:52 May Contain Nuts with Jonathan Bufton and a ever-so-slightly tongue in cheek tribute to S Club 7, who had announced they were splitting two days previously (23/04/03)
03:26 Stop Broadcasting Now with Simon Taghioff stops broadcasting (for now), with a nicely edited package that makes us sound quite funny at times (25/04/03)
05:15 Sunday Early Breakfast with yours truly, Michael Brothwell and Simon tackling the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire coughing scandal in our own inimitable way (which is basically embryonic Nation's Favourite material).  And yes, that is the Weakest Link bed, it was the closest I could get... (27/04/03)
07:17 and the transmitter is sounding even more fuzzy than usual leading to an on air apology.  Anyone know who the presenter is? (30/04/03)
07:56 Sourcenight with James Doughty and guest Iain Lindley look at the shortage of campus accommodation for final year students, featuring a slightly astonishing statement from the uni.  URY's own Adam Bell was one of those who missed out, and ended up taking the remaining room in our shared house as a result (02/05/03)
10:56 Weekend Early Breakfast with Jonathan Bufton - yes you read that correctly.  This term Michael and I conquered earlies between us, after we snapped up vacant slots so that I held weekends and Michael owned weekdays.  It seemed like a good idea at the time.  But living on campus and it being summer meant the early starts weren't too painful, and we actually had a lot of fun with the vast amounts of airtime we had to play with, "Shame Academy" (with added Taghioff) being a case in point... (04/05/03)
13:07 Complain! This was on the adverts mini disc but I don't remember ever having to play it.  Maybe we were obliged to air it once a term?  Anyway, here are the defunct watchdogs that you could complain to if we stepped out of line.
13:59 Roses 2003 and a selection of output from the weekend when Lancaster came to York to, er, play sport.  Our output was also transmitted on 87.7 Bailrigg FM and we had special jingles, all of which was quite exciting even though I had zero interest in sport.  Here we have a preview of the weekend (what's Korfball?) and Owen Murphy and Simon Taghioff run through Friday's action (what's Korfball?) No actual sport, just talking about it, which was basically what you got most of the weekend.  Spoiler: York won. (08-09/05/03)
16:57 Roses Early Breakfast and Breakfast - for the simulcast a 24 hour schedule was organised which meant my early start became an hour earlier.  Features James Brookes complimenting this achievement and an SBN promo for the Student Radio Chart. (10-11/05/03)
20:19 A monologue on student ambivalence.  I have no clue who this is, but it's quite...something.  Any ideas? (11/05/03)
22:05 URY Breakfast with my good self standing in for Wickham and Alice.  My first proper try-out at the Breakfast Show which I was very excited about indeed.  It also meant I was on air for a total of ten hours that week, a record I (thankfully) never broke (16/05/03)
23:03 Soldiers of Hell with Spencer Vale, where it appears to be about 1995 (20/05/03)
23:55 URY Breakfast with Sam & Simon attempting to remove a track from the URY playlist by hiding the CD and crossing it out from the chart sheet, all of which sounds prehistoric now.  No idea who the caller was (21/05/03)
25:22 Sourcenight features Louise Wheeler on the apathy towards Union General Meetings.  Louise is currently producing Politics North for BBC Yorkshire (23/05/03)
27:44 Oxfam Week advert with Adam Bell and James Dickin.  Quite a unique effort compared to the usual ads we had to play out (24/05/03)
28:57 Weekend Early Breakfast/Breakfast handover where I finally confront the nicest man in radio about being called mad each week (24/05/03)
29:30 James Alexander really really wants us to pass the YUSU budget so he can go to Ikon, Toffs and Ziggys in quick succession again (02/06/03)
30:31 URY Breakfast with Jameses Wickham and Gallagher, and the debrief from the previous night's URY social (06/06/03)
31:30 Adam Leith (who appears to be presenting The Best of Pages from Ceefax) has trouble with the news not appearing.  Play-and-record jingle fans, it's the full News In (08/06/03).
32:24 URY Breakfast has a tricky start as Robbie Dale enters the studio moments before the three beeps.  He's particularly unlucky here as SBN elect not to put out stacks of ads and promos after the news bulletin.  Robbie would often arrive with seconds to spare and still be effortlessly better and cooler than I had been directly before him (08/06/03)
33:43 Epiclectic reminds me that this summer URY had someone in on work experience!  No doubt highly illegal these days, but somehow the station managed to keep Idris occupied for a fortnight (11/06/03)
34:09 Weekend Early Breakfast breaks the news that URY has new CD players (and my god we were ready for them) and airs a brain fade moment from when I covered Michael's show a few days previously (15/06/03)
34:54 URY Breakfast with...well.  Robbie overslept a couple of weeks running at the end of the term because he clearly had more exciting things to do the night before than I did, so Michael and I took control (and the piss).  If you listen carefully you'll note all the early mornings have paid off and we've been told we're on Breakfast from the Autumn (15/06/03)
36:07 The Hype Guide to What's On which for a while replaced the DJ-read guide during the breakfast show.  I love the jaunty samba music in the background as the Islamic Society's meeting in the Prayer Room and a Roman Polanski film is promoted (16/06/03)
37:48 James Scott and "Kevin Bowman" who after his op sounds surprisingly similar to Gill Rickson... (23/06/03)
38:56 Soldiers of Hell comes to an end after four years...until it came back the following term, that is (24/06/03)
41:00 URY Breakfast and who else but James Brookes gets the honour of switching the station off for the summer as the 2002/3 academic year comes to a close.  Listen carefully and you'll notice this is from the new webstream, as I'd been kicked out of my campus room and returned home the previous day (28/06/03)
Hardcore early noughties kit.  Photo courtesy of Simon Taghioff

Coming next: Autumn 2003.  Make sure you've updated your Real Player.




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