{"id":289511,"date":"2025-11-29T10:09:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-29T10:09:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/289511\/"},"modified":"2025-11-29T10:09:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-29T10:09:11","slug":"how-did-manchesters-piccadilly-change-the-uks-radio-landscape-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/289511\/","title":{"rendered":"How did Manchester’s Piccadilly change the UK’s radio landscape?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"PiccadillyPiccadilly Radio<\/p>\n

Philip Birch founded Piccadilly Radio in Manchester after managing pirate station Radio London<\/p>\n

One morning in April 1974, Good Vibrations by The Beach Boys was faded up and with it – the birth of Manchester’s newest radio station. <\/p>\n

Piccadilly Radio 261 went on to become a Mancunian institution and one of the most popular news, music and entertainment radio stations in the UK.<\/p>\n

The city’s first independent radio station, which joined the airwaves four years after BBC Radio Manchester, helped launch the careers of broadcasters Andy Peebles<\/a>, Chris Evans, Susie Mathis and BBC Radio Manchester’s Becky Want<\/a> and Mike Sweeney<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In 1988, after 14 years of news, sport, phone-ins and competitions, Piccadilly Radio split into Key 103 – later becoming Hits and Greatest Hits Radio, both based in the city’s Castlefield area. <\/p>\n

Several of Piccadilly’s former presenters recently reunited to unveil a commemorative plaque at the site of the original studios, recalling stories of how the station became a “bright light” during a “pretty grim time” for the city.<\/p>\n

\"PiccadillyPiccadilly Radio<\/p>\n

Pete Baker, whose son Richard wrote this story, presenting Piccadilly Radio’s breakfast show<\/p>\n

When Piccadilly Radio came on air, the country was in the midst of political strife, a three-day working week<\/a> and energy shortages.<\/p>\n

Factories and schools closed, families ate by candlelight and television channels went dark at 22:30 GMT.<\/p>\n

“We’re talking about 1974, which was pretty grim frankly, it almost meant we didn’t even get on air”, Piccadilly Radio’s first employee Jim Hancock remembered.<\/p>\n

“Piccadilly came as this bright light on the scene.”<\/p>\n

Tony Ingham, who helped set up the station, said only “one-and-a-half” of their four studios were ready for launch day on 2 April 1974.<\/p>\n

“There wasn’t any heating, the presenters had maybe two weeks to rehearse,” he explained.<\/p>\n

“Everything was held together with Sellotape and string initially.”<\/p>\n

\"PiccadillyPiccadilly Radio<\/p>\n

Mike Shaft’s presenter card from Piccadilly Radio<\/p>\n

While his future colleagues were helping build the remaining studios, across the city a young Mike Shaft was listening to Andy Peebles’ soul show. <\/p>\n

“All I wanted to do was the soul show,” he said.<\/p>\n

“I said to my missus ‘I’ll never work at Piccadilly whilst Andy’s there because his soul show was just excellent’.”<\/p>\n

Shaft, who eventually took the reins of the “Taking Care of Business” soul show until 1986, remembered the day he realised a window may be open.<\/p>\n

“I opened up the Daily Mail, it read ‘Andy Peebles Goes To Radio 1’ – I was down there within 30 minutes!”<\/p>\n

The aspiring presenter soon received a letter, inviting him in for a chat. <\/p>\n

“Me and my missus were both jumping around in our flat, it was great times,” he remembered.<\/p>\n

After Piccadilly, Shaft worked at BBC Radio Manchester for 20 years, presenting his final Sunday Breakfast show in 2022.<\/p>\n

\"PiccadillyPiccadilly Radio<\/p>\n

Tony Ingham later became programme controller at Piccadilly Radio<\/p>\n

Piccadilly Radio also reported on Manchester’s vibrant and varied sporting scene – under its “First with News; First with Sport” tagline.<\/p>\n

When the station covered Manchester City versus Liverpool in the 1981 League Cup semi-final, Ingham was asked to think of an idea to show off Piccadilly’s sponsorship of the tie.<\/p>\n

“Two nights before the game, we went to assess whether we could send fireworks off above the stands in the event of a City goal,” he said.<\/p>\n

“On the way back to the studios, we were arrested by armed police who thought we’d set a bomb off. <\/p>\n

“I spent two hours in Moss Side police station under the Prevention of Terrorism Act!”<\/p>\n

\"PetePete Johnson<\/p>\n

Piccadilly Radio’s first employee Jim Hancock at the station’s 50th anniversary reunion last year<\/p>\n

Shaft said: “I loved Piccadilly – anytime Tony [Ingham] or Liz [Bracken] phones up – I’m there because I know what the radio station stood for. <\/p>\n

“There’s other places I worked where I wouldn’t give them tuppence. <\/p>\n

For Hancock, the offering of “shock jocks” and the studios’ prime Piccadilly Gardens location were vitally important.<\/p>\n

“We were seen to be out and about,” he said. “It’s more commonplace now but in those days we had a big van that would go out with the DJs to the Manchester shows and local community events.<\/p>\n

“Twenty-four hours a day [Piccadilly Radio] was coming from the heart of Manchester and that’s what people identified with.<\/p>\n

“Looking back now, I didn’t realise what impact it would have on the people of Manchester.”<\/p>\n

Shaft agreed: “Piccadilly and the other commercial stations came on air and blew the BBC locals out the water.”<\/p>\n

\"CarlCarl Sukonik<\/p>\n

Piccadilly’s presenters reunited: Pete Baker, Phil Wood, Becky Want, Mike Shaft, Andy Crane, Mike Sweeney and Jim Hancock<\/p>\n

Ingham highlighted the camaraderie between staff – several of whom had gained their first big break in the radio industry at Piccadilly.<\/p>\n

“That made Piccadilly so successful and thought of so fondly even after all these years,” he explained.<\/p>\n

“For a period of time, a group of people came together and they implicitly understood how that radio station should behave.<\/p>\n

“It’s the best job in the world, working for a radio station, it doesn’t get any better.”<\/p>\n

Piccadilly Radio’s plaque is available to view at City Tower, aptly enough in Piccadilly Gardens.<\/p>\n

The station’s archived tapes have recently been digitised and are publicly available at Manchester’s Central Library.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Piccadilly Radio Philip Birch founded Piccadilly Radio in Manchester after managing pirate station Radio London One morning in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[96,128,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-289511","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-music","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}