An excerpt from a flyer announcing the launch of NE1fm 102.5 on June 8th, 2007
NE1fm 102.5 launched on June 8th, 2007 as Newcastle upon Tyne and Gateshead’s first full-time community radio station, with a weekend of broadcasts from Leazes Park at the 2007 Green Festival.
Since then, we’ve come a long way, bringing the local community thousands of hours of unique radio programming and covering countless events. Here, we present a look back at our history so far.
A poster promoting NE1fm precursor West End Broadcast from 1998
Although NE1fm launched in 2007, our historic lineage can be traced back to a number of short-term broadcasts in the mid-1990s. The first such broadcast was NeTwOrK fM in 1996, and was followed by short-term radio stations including West End Broadcast, Youth Voice FM and City FM, as well as pioneering online-only broadcasts including BELLNET FM.
Many such early projects were operated by New Wave, an organisation that acted as a pre-cursor to Community Broadcast Initiative Tyneside, the parent organisation of NE1fm 102.5 today. Several individuals involved with New Wave are still part of NE1fm today, giving the project over 15 years of experience of radio operation in the area.
Following several years of short-term broadcasts, an application was made for a full-time radio licence, which was successful in November 2005. This granted NE1fm a five-year broadcast licence, to commence on our launch date. West End Broadcast went live for the final time in December 2005, allowing the team to focus fully on the launch of what would become the area’s first full-time community-run radio station.
After a number of test broadcasts in early 2007, NE1fm finally launched in the early evening of Friday June 8th, 2007, live from our first studio in the Shieldfield area of Newcastle. The identity of the first voice on the station has always been a closely-guarded secret, although the first regular programme three days later was Unknown Pleasures.
Our first weekend was spent at the 2007 Green Festival, live from Leazes Park, with successful broadcasts until the festival’s conclusion late on Sunday evening. Other notable events in our formative days included our coverage of the 2007 Mela Festival, broadcasts from the AV Festival, and the likes of Kate Nash and Maxïmo Park appearing live on the station.
Programming in our early days was diverse, and included a few shows that are still broadcast today. The Music and Trivia Show has the accolade of being the only show to be broadcast in the same time slot since our launch week, while Alternation and The Sports Zone also appeared during the first seven days and have been staples of our programming ever since.
Selected shows from the NE1fm Schedule in June 2007:
Alternation
Atomic
The Groove Principle
The Hedley Show
The Live Session
The Music and Trivia Show
Pavement Pizza
The Sports Zone
Unknown Pleasures
NE1fm 102.5 at the Evolution Festival 2010
Toward the end of 2007, NE1fm constructed a second studio in our original station building, thanks in part to the award of £5,000 from the B&Q chain of stores. The following few months of broadcast, featuring further coverage of local events and an expansion of the on-air schedule, culminated in a party at Newcastle Central Station’s Centurion bar for the station’s first anniversary, complete with a live broadcast from the venue.
The second and third year’s of NE1fm’s time on-air were eventful, with broadcasts from venues including night clubs, bars and community centres across the area. We also featured more live music than any other local broadcaster, offering a platform for local bands and musician’s music to be heard that had never previously been available.
The expansion of NE1fm 102.5 led to our relocation to a new, purpose-built studio at Virginia House, located closer to Newcastle town centre and with improved broadcast facilities. This time period saw current programming including The Saturday Mix, Kev and Nixxi and Another Music In A Different Kitchen become fully established.
Throughout 2010, NE1fm made a bigger splash in the local community than ever before, featuring an increasing number of high-profile guests, and appearing at major events such as the 2010 Evolution Festival. Weekday afternoons gained a new look with a wider range of community programming, and our output in morning and overnight hours was diversified to include more independent music, making us the only Newcastle and Gateshead broadcaster to do so.
NE1fm's Amina Evans performs an interview at an event in 2011
Since then, NE1fm has continued to have a commitment to the local community, broadcasting from where it all began in the Summer with full coverage of the 2011 Green Festival, and featuring at other events throughout the year. We were the only live local broadcaster at the Free Thinking Festival at The Sage Gateshead, and we provided the entertainment for large fireworks displays in November 2011 in various locations across the area.
In September 2011, NE1fm attempted to break the Guinness World Record for the longest uninterrupted team broadcast, targeting 72 hours for the benefit of two local charities. The team, led by Gary Barnes and Rob Davies, were successful in doing so, ultimately managing 77 hours to surpass the record previously held by, among others, BBC Radio 1′s Chris Moyles.
Guests interviewed for NE1fm programmes in 2011 included Newcastle United’s Fabricio Coloccini, musicians ranging from Olly Murs and The Futureheads to Battles and Gil Scott-Heron, and a plethora of members of the local community, and over 100 local bands were offered exposure to our audience across Newcastle and Gateshead.
Also, throughout the year, a range of new programming was featured, with the indie and live music breakfast show saturday@breakfast and our daily magazine show The Lunchtime Special among the shows proving popular throughout 2011.
From our launch in 2007 right through to the present day, we’ve remained committed to our philosophy of being operated entirely by volunteers. Every presenter, producer and other member of the team is a local individual that has offered their own time to make NE1fm what it is today, and by being local, we’re able to be the true voice at the heart of the local community.
In the future, NE1fm 102.5 hopes to bring listeners an ever wider range of on-air content unavailable anywhere else. New shows for 2012 already include Classical NE1fm, Newcastle and Gateshead’s first dedicated classical music broadcast, and The Late Show, a look back at recent events every Wednesday evening with comedian Richard Stephenson Winter.
We’ll also be hoping to provide coverage of all of Newcastle’s major events throughout the year, with appropriate coverage for visitors during the Olympic Games, as well as live broadcasts from local festivals, while we’ll be offering a platform for local bands, writers and other talent to get their material heard on the air.
Additionally, we should be able to continue to offer all of this to the local community for the foreseeable future, following the award of a five-year extension to our initial broadcast licence in February to June of 2017.
For now, all we can do is ask you to do is be a part of the NE1fm adventure, by listening to what’s on, or perhaps even by volunteering to become a member of the NE1fm team yourself.
A Station History was produced by Dave Hedley, the Digital Content Manager and Chair of Programming at NE1fm 102.5. You can reach him on Twitter at @ThatHedleyGuy.
