EBC 3FM

EBC 3FM is a Euroish national radio station owned and operated by EBC Radio. It specialises in modern popular music, current chart hits, pop, dance and rock throughout it's daytime schedule.

Meanwhile, it's evening lineup provides alternative genres, including electronica, rock, metal, indie and alternative, experimental, drum and bass, instrumental, jungle, ambient, dance, live sessions, current affairs and comedy. It's main sister station - 3XM, plays black contemporary music, including rap, R&B and drill.

3FM also runs two full-time online streams, 3FM Dance, dedicated to dance music, and 3FM Happy, dedicated to feel-good music, both available exclusively on EBC Hub.

3FM broadcasts throughout the Euro Republics on FM between 97.1 MHz and 99.7 MHz, digital radio, digital TV and EBC Hub. 3FM started 24-hour broadcasting on 5 January 1992.

1970-1978: Launch
EBC Radio 3 launched on 12th October 1970, to rival and provide a legal alternative to pirate radio stations that were attracting younger audiences with their mix of modern popular music and light-hearted chat. Charles Falk was the first voice on the station when it came on air at 7am.

1978-1990: Most listened to radio station
By 1978, EBC Radio 3 was the biggest station in the Euro Republics, with DJ's such as Tony Fisher, Phil Osman and Charles Falk becoming household names in the country.

1990-2000: Revamping
By the late 1980's, EBC Radio 3 began to fall out of favour of younger demographics, with the blame put majorly on the DJ's on the station. Whilst Radio 3 was originally launched as a youth station, many of it's listeners and DJ's had aged throughout it's 20 year history, with most presenters being in their 40's, 50's and even 60's.

Younger voices, such as Daniel Rogers and the team of The Audiowave Reception Sound Experiment were shunted towards late night hours with little promotion or respect from the station.

This was not helped by the legalisation of commercial radio in the Euro Republics in 1976, with trendier stations for young audiences launching throughout the country from late 1977. Despite this, Radio 3 remained the country's most popular radio station, although by this time the age of the average R3 listener was 47 years old, 13 years ahead of the 16-34 demographic.

August 1990 saw EBC Radio 3 undergo a major rebranding as EBC Radio 3FM, in an attempt to target the younger audience that were moving towards independent radio stations.

The EBC ordered a revamp of Radio 3FM to take place throughout 1991, involving a reset of the music playlist, to only allow music from 1982 onwards. Charles Falk - who by this time was age 59, quit the station in frustration about this new music policy, leaving Michael Tarbuck to take over the drivetime show from October 1991.

This did not improve the relationship between Radio 3FM and the country's youth. An experimental "more music week" in which speech output was cut down to be less than a minute long, with the exception of Newsbeat. DJ's also favoured early 80's music over the more recent tracks.

Ultimately, the blame was put on the personalites themselves. A public consultation was done with people aged 15-32 between September 1992 and April 1993, in which the results criticised the DJ's as being "too old" and "stuffy", although praising the station's comedy output and late night dance music that was presented by Daniel Rogers. The report also damned the station's playlist being too far oriented towards middle of the road rock.

The EBC dismissed Neal Brookes, who had been Radio 3FM's controller since 1978, in September 1993, where he was replaced by Justin Haughley, an ex-3FM Newsbeat newsreader and Talkaround presenter from 1983 to 1986, before becoming a producer for Gary Woolacombe's breakfast show show from 1986 to 1988 (an experience he has admitted to hating) before beginning a managerial career upon relaunching local Euro City station City Radio as Play in late 1988, turning the station into a launching pad for new local talent, before leaving the station in 1990, joining ERTV as the producer for music chart show The Chartdown and alternative live music session show Beat Box.

Justin was hired to give the station a younger, fresher, varied, multicultural and modern sound, hiring new presenters, and revamping the music playlist to appeal to an audience under 30.

Long-standing DJ's including Gary Woolacombe, David Churchill, Joseph Pearce, Simon Johnston, Roger Price, Donald Ghey, Jackie Harris, Michael Tarbuck and later Nicholas Parke left the station or were dismissed, and replaced with newer faces. There was also to be more diversity, particularly with black, Asian, female and gay personalities, as the station had been dominated by white straight male DJ's for a long time.

Many behind the scenes staff were also given the boot, notably the producers and directors of 3FM's programming, replaced with younger production teams with a better sense of how to target a youthful audience,

Many listeners over the age of 40 boycotted the station as the first all new DJ's who joined the station from January 1994 represented crossover from Play.

Mike Lowe - the first voice of Play after rebranding from City Radio, took over from Joseph Pearce as the host of the weekend mid morning show beginning on Saturday 1 January, Steven Buxton - presenter of a Saturday morning show on Play from 1998 to 1993, who went to air on weekday afternoons from Monday 3 January, and Dave Cooper - who replaced Mike Lowe on Play's breakfast show in 1991 when Lowe moved to drivetime, replaced Donald Ghey in the early morning slot on Tuesday 4 January after a farewell show for Ghey (his only 3FM show of 1994) the previous day.

Nicholas Parke was promoted from the 2pm-5pm slot to the breakfast show replacing David Churchill, as Justin Haughley believed his zoo format that had been the focus of his show since it's 1985 debut, was innovative, fun and still modern enough.

The name of the station was also shortened again to 3FM on 1 January 1994, to co-incide with the new year and first edition of The Mike Lowe Show. The sound of the jingles were also refreshed, with the 1990 JAM jingles ditched in favour of a jingle package produced in co-operation with JAM and the in house audio imaging unit at the EBC, which remixed the earlier jingles (from 1990) and distorted them with a sound more akin to dance music. The sung "3FM" was replaced with a 3 note mnemonic, with 3FM now said rather than sung in jingles.

Simon Johnston - presenter of the lunchtime show from 12pm to 2pm, was dismissed in August, and replaced by Joanne Mbappe, the first ever black female presenter on 3FM and former presenter on Choice FM. Roger Price quit the mid-morning show in December 1994 and replaced at the start of 1995 by Daniel Rogers, given a promotion from the 11pm-1am late show, which Steve Galloway took over with a new format known as Late & Live, which mixed offbeat phone in discussion with new music from emerging artists.

Michael Tarbuck ended his run as the evening presenter from 7pm to 9pm on 9 June 1995, replaced on Monday 12 June by Chris Nightingale, formerly a presenter of the breakfast show for Rythym Radio in Belton. Jackie Harris also left weekend breakfast in the same week, with Kirsty Davies taking over the following week.

Friday nights became focused around dance music, with club DJ Jim Sachsen presenting a new dance music show. Saturday nights were focused on urban music with Chris Curtis presenting Curtis: The Urban Show and Frank Sherry presented The Rock Show on Sundays. The latter programme also regularly covered heavy metal, indie and alternative music in addition to rock.

Overnight hours included The Breezeblock - a wide ranging experimental music show presented by Jason Carter

The reinvention of the station came at a lucky time for 3FM, with the rise of britpop, rave culture, jungle and rap, the specialist shows began to pick up a loyal audience.

In another effort to appeal further to a youth demographic, when The Bottle Boys - a rock band who had a particular following with older listeners and who were played very regularly on 3FM in the 70's, 80's and early 90's, released Paper Rounds in 1995, 3FM refused to play any songs from the album, even on The Rock Show. When they attempted to sue 3FM for this, the station barred other artists that were previously overplayed, such as Tina Turner, Cyndi Lauper, The Police, Midge Ure and Dire Straits. Whilst the bans were eventually lifted for the latter five, 3FM have not played any music by The Bottle Boys since at least 1993.

Heavily critical of 3FM's refusal to play The Bottle Boys, Nicholas Parke and Roger Price (presenter of the Euroish Top 40 on Sunday afternoons) left the station in October and November 1995 respectively, with both of their programmes going out for the final time in December 1995.

Ray Cokes was chosen by Justin Haughley to take over the 3FM breakfast show from 2 January 1996 after he became a popular face with cult figure among teens and young adults as the host of , a mix of comedy, chat and music that aired on MTV Europe from 1992-95, and had ended the previous month. The producer of Most Wanted, Will Macdonald, also jumped to 3FM.

Paul Mellor - who had previously presented a show on Play called The Big Gay Parade, aimed at an LGBT audience, being homosexual himself - replaced Roger Price on the Euroish Top 40.

Jeremy Kyle, who for 10 years had been a salesman for life insurance, recruitment and radio advertising based in the UK, was trialled as a DJ for two weeks throughout May 1996 becoming the main cover presenter for Steve Galloway on Late & Live.

3FM recieved another audio imaging relaunch in September 1996. The revamp, which was heavily influenced by dance and jungle music of the period, alongside heavy distortion of voices and random soundbites, was designed to revolutionise the sound of 3FM, and be different from the previous jingle packages, abandoning JAM for the first time since the 70's.

Dave Cooper departed 3FM in January 1997 to join sister station EBC Radio 6 as presenter of the breakfast show on the station. Steve Galloway took over the 4am-7am early breakfast slot and Jeremy Kyle went permanent with Jezza's Confessions replacing Late & Live, which was another phone-in show, although instead of a comedy aspect, Jezza's Confessions gave advice on serious problems being faced by callers.

Ray Cokes departed 3FM in November 1999 and presented his final show on Friday 31 December, to "avoid the show going stale". He also joked about his age and the previous era of 3FM (41 at the time) by stating "3FM shouldn't be thriving on people who should have left years ago."

Music
Because of it's youth oriented nature, 3FM plays a broad mix of current and potential future hits, including independent/alternative, hip hip, rock, dance/electronica, ambient, drill, grime and pop. This makes the station stand out from other top 40 stations around the world and within the Euro Republics, including it's main rival Play, which notably bans frequent airplay of rock music, and rarely plays black contemporary.

With it's progressive view on new music, EBC 3FM is well known and liked in the worldwide drum and bass, experimental, alternative and chill-out communities.

The station has - throughout the years - recorded many live performances. Studio sesssions also supplement the live performances. 3FM also broadcasts music documentaries and interviews, conducted by station DJ's.

News and current affairs
3FM has a public service broadcasting obligation to provide news and current affairs for 30 minutes on weekdays supplemented by bulletins throughout the day. Newsbeat, broadcast at 13:45 and 17:45, are the main news programmes heard on 3FM, with updates at the half hour (between 6am and 10.30pm) that are shared with 3XM.

Newsbeat in Focus, a half hour investigative journalism slot from the Newsbeat team airs on Sundays at 9pm. 3FM also transmits entertainment news, under the name The Net (Newsbeat Entertainment Transmission), with a daily bulletins at 2.30pm, and updates at every hour from 10am to 4pm.

Comedy
Since the late 1980's, 3FM has established itself as a major source for new comedy talent. The first comedy programme to be transmitted on 3FM (then known as EBC Radio 3) was The Audiowave Reception Sound Experiment in March 1988. This led to more comedy-based programmes being launched on the station within the next few years. ARSE ended in December 1993.

Experimental comedians and ARSE contributers Simon Groves, Justin Coleman and Neil McCole had evening programmes on 3FM in the early 90's, that blended comedy speech content with a music playlist less mainstream and more experimental than the regular 3FM schedule.

UK radio comedy such as ', ', ' and ' also featured on 3FM during this era.

After Simon Groves and Justin Coleman left 3FM to co-present a show together on sister station EBC Radio 6 in January 1996, they were replaced. In place of Simon Groves's Monday night programme, Claudia Keegan, whilst British comedy duo presented in the Tuesday night slot left vacant by Justin Coleman, and would alternate every three months of the year with Lee Rouch's Sound of Nothing.

Sketch comedy returned to 3FM in October 1997 with Bile, which featured Chris Brown, Ashley McCall, Jocelyn Burell and Sanjeev Dudley.