The dumbing down and down of Newstalk
Posted on | April 16, 2008 | 202 Comments
Found this story via Mulley.
Basically a Newstalk reporter brought in three knives to a pyschiatric day hospital. This was to see if security had been beefed up after a man attacked two staff there in January. It was part of the Eamon Keane show, which is no surprise.
This is a lunchtime program which purports to deal with serious issues in five minute soundbites. It generally goes something like ‘Interview – Keane asks needlessly antagonistic question to somebody – calls that person by their name “So, tell me Albert Reynolds / Albert Reynolds, can I ask you …” – feigns some kind of moral outrage – spends subsequent 10 minutes reading out 30c a minute texts from witless listeners’.
Then you have Brenda Power in the mornings. ‘Your call’ is the name of the show and she says ‘Mmmmm’ a lot when people are talking about tries to phone up people who have treated people badly. I stopped listening to that show a while back while she was on her HSE/Mary Harney crusade. I think we all know the HSE is a mess and Harney has done a shite job but having to listen to Brenda Power ring up every day and sound disgusted that she couldn’t get through to the Minister was fucking pathetic.
Years ago in the one of the tabloids there was a column called ‘Captain Cash’, or similar. People would write in with their stories of woe and if the Captain decided it was woeful enough then he’d give them a few bob. ‘Your call’ is like Captain Cash but without the cash. Or the Captain. It’s fucking embarrassing listening to her take up the so-called fight for some person nobody really gives a fuck about.
Now this thing they have where the presenter of the next show comes along to tell the listeners what’s coming up. Haha, you have to laugh. It’s pure 1980s Radio Dublin that.
“So what’s de story witch yor show, Anto?”
“It’s gonna be deadly, Micko. Loads a great choons and don’t forget you can ring for a request an’ all an anyways!”
George Hook used to be interesting, a combative kind of personality he’d argue with people and it was entertaining. Now George only argues about rugby and wants to be everyone else’s friend. Is that down to George becoming a nicer person and seeing the error of his ways or down to station rules? I prefer arguments, I prefer presenters with opinions, not cuddly sponsor friendly radio like we get now.
The kind of stunt they pulled with the knives is the kind of thing The Sun or the News of the World do. It’s tacky, tabloid shite. How long before they get themselves a fake Sheikh to entrap people in hotel room interviews? Staff at St Anne’s in Limerick, where this crap took place, are said to be ‘outraged’, and rightly so. It was stupid and irresponsible and proved what exactly? Only that it’s easy to take a knife into a hospital, which is probably true of every hospital in Ireland. Because they’re hospitals, not prisons, airplanes or any other kind of high security complex.
I know the station is losing money hand over fist and they have to try something but making Ireland’s first tabloid radio station is not something to be proud of.
I’ll turn back on for the sports show in the evening (turning off when the tedious cunt that is Ken Earley is talking) but for the rest of the day I’ll listen to something else. Like static.
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202 Responses to “The dumbing down and down of Newstalk”
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April 16th, 2008 @ 9:06 am
If only they had a station dedicated to the music of Damian Rice – how happy would you be!
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:09 am
I would then have to kill them
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:12 am
Something is terribly wrong. I am beginning to appreciate Ireland much more than the States. I want to come home. No pints here.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:23 am
Pat Kenny?
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:30 am
Commercial radio was a great idea when you needed to produce good programming to attract the advertisers to pay the bills. Now mongs queue up to talk and text at their own cost who needs quality? TalkShite is contagious.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:30 am
Ok confession time, I bought a new MP3 Player and was copying albums from my PC last night and lo and behold there is a Damien Rice Album on my media center. I really don’t know where it came from I can only conclude it is the result of an extremly malicious virus.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:32 am
Ahoy Shipmates – Have you visited the The Irish Pirate Review? ( I know, I’m a cunt)
I loved this from Mulley :
“Will the Catholic Church now object to getting stem cells from menstrual blood? But would we end up with really irritable clones? *ducks*”
Knives into a looney bin? What a stupid stunt. Somebody should be sacked for that one.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:41 am
I would love to watch static
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:43 am
I absolutely agree with you here twenty, but I think you’re a bollix. I have drafted over the last few weeks a complete list of reasons why I am slowly turning off newstalk. And now you’ve gone and fucked up my idea.
But good work anyway, you unconsciously thought pilfering bastard
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:46 am
Ah feck it, arm the looneys with knives. They need a fighting chance. ‘Newstalk: arming looneys near you.’
maggot, irritable clones, good one. Ha!
I have real trouble listening to that sort of confrontational radio show, because when it’s done badly I find the cringe factor so high I have to switch it off. I like Matt Cooper, but eve nhe does this high voiced, devil’s advocate smug thing to rile people, and won’t let his guests talk.
I have to admit I hate current affairs – I tend to avoid the news and I figure someone else will tell me about it if it’s interesting enough.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:47 am
Don’t let me stop you, Rob. The more the merrier.
JTM – there’s a big difference between the shrill moral outrage and a good fucking argument. The devil’s advocate thing is very annoying though, Keane does it all the time on his show, the fucking reedy voiced cunt.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:53 am
Eamon Keane’s raison d’etre, is to ponder along until about 12.55 whereupon he will extract some trite sentence from a political figure a la…
“So let me get this clear, you are saying that you are a definite maybe on the issue of jam”
Cue the 1 o’clock news which leads with “Minister in a pickle over jam” headlines making out like Keane is some sort of Woodward and Bernstein…
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:54 am
heh, very true.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:57 am
Oh yes, I agree about a good fucking argument. It’s the smarmy Anne Robinson style crap that I can’t take.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:59 am
Anne Robinson is a colostomy-bag faced twunt.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:05 am
Oh my god. She’s not even trying to be funny anymore, she’s just insulting people craply. My mother in law insists on watching it.
AR: Do you excercise, Mary, you’re very fat.
Mary: yes I do, Anne
AR: You shouldn’t have worn that shirt.
AR: what do you do Des?
Des: I’m a plumber, Anne
AR: Oh yes? Fix toilets with that haircut do you?
AAAGHH!!
Twenty could do the Weakest Link very well. I imagne he’d call it something else though.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:08 am
I like Off The Ball and the weekend sports shows. I like Ken Early and his snippets the most. The Breakfast Show is better than the as-funny-as-a-kick-to-the-twills Gift Grub followed by ten minutes of Ian Dempsey reading out variances of the following text:
“I’m shaking with laughter of the 46A, everyone around me thinks I’m a lunatic!”
Aside from that, you are spot on. You did brush over Orla Barry and Sean Moncrieff though, who may not be quite as bad as Keane/ Power but are certainly brutal.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:12 am
Does Newstalk still have that Cork twat Daragh something blathering his inane crap?
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:16 am
Anne Robinson is a cunt alright.
AR : “You’re a stupid looking man”
Me : “you are rude old and ugly Ann, and stop doing that disgusting wink at the end of every show, it’s revolting”
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:21 am
Brock – Earley’s voice does my head in. Yeah, I get it man, you’re ‘laid back’ and ‘laconic’. I do like the rest of the sports show.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:26 am
morgor, imagine AR doing the ‘what fucks like a tiger and winks?’ joke. Shudder.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:27 am
that accountancy ad between every break is fairly annoying too.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:27 am
There is some English sounding bloke who stands in for George Hook who can be quite cutting, there was a bloke on yesterday as a guest called Sean Connoly who was the most sarcastic man in the world and ripped fightin’ Willie ‘o Dea to shreds. Twas most entertaining. It has it’s faults but there is not much of an alternative, all the rest of the staions have some kind of obsession with inviting joe public to pass comment.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:28 am
There’s a radio on my MP4 player, but I’ve never tried it out. Don’t see the point. Is there such thing as good radio in Ireland? I don’t think so.
Well, is there?
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:29 am
That’s a little ironic coming from here, PP?
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:29 am
Ahem. I love the Ray D’arcy show, MB.
But that’s not the same.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:30 am
punchline please
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:30 am
tiger joke
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:30 am
Jo, that is horrendous.
especially cos she always wears tight leather pants, so she obviously thinks she’s sexy.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:33 am
AR: what fuck like a tiger and winks?
SG: I don’t know what?
AR: winks (and lears)
SG runs screaming
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:34 am
SG. surely it’s obvious.
punchline is “me”.
In one of the towns near my hometown where there’s a sleazy old barman (about 50) who goes up to 18 year old girls saying “what’s got two thumbs and eats pussy?”.
Followed by a leer and pointing at his own face with two thumbs.
Funny as a joke, horrendous as a sleazy chatup line.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:37 am
It’s not even that funny…
I’ve always maintained that if you’re not sure whether you fancy someone or not, you imagine them going down on you. How you feel about it really answers that question!
Sleazy aging barmen? Bleh!
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:38 am
JTM, I think people expect different things from blogs than radio, which I listen to for informed discussion and news, not some fucking mucksavage from Roscommon telling me an anecdote that wasn’t funny the first time they fucking told it, and quite frankly I don’t care what Larry from Lucan thinks about the current credit crisis.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:39 am
Ah yeah, PP, I know. Just thought it was funny, as we’re hardly unopinionated.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:50 am
oh. thanks.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:51 am
If the Newstalk girl had been wrestled to the floor by security staff, then arrested by the gardai and kept overnight in a cell before appearing in court & convicted of possession of weapons, receiving a 3 month sentence, the station (& probably all the rest of the media) would go ballistic. They want to have it every way – mount their unfair stunts (jesus, what a phrase) to embarrass public servants & then plead journalistic privilege if they go wrong.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:52 am
I’ve always maintained that if you’re not sure whether you fancy someone or not, you imagine them going down on you. How you feel about it really answers that question!
Looks like I fancy a lot of women then!
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:55 am
Morgor’s right, Jo. That might work for girls, but us guys set the bar pretty low when it comes to women we’d let go down on us…
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:56 am
LoL Tinman. Fair enough.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:58 am
I wouldn’t let harney go down on me for fear of being ingested
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:00 am
Have to agree Twenty. Brenda Power does still bring a smile to my face when she’s got some PR bullshitter squirming on the line, and I like the fact that the HSE is so upset they won’t even advertise on NT anymore, but you’ve summed Eamonn Keane up nicely there. Without any great variance, what started out as tight and balanced has turned flabby and smug. I’ve found myself calling him a wanker quite often, and as you know I don’t like giving offence to anyone.
Here’s the thing, all the reporter had to was carry an empty bag that was big enough to contain knives. What if she slipped and accidently stabbed 15 people and then slipped in their blood and broke a nail?
She’d be laid off work for weeks with an injury like that.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:01 am
Anne Robinson is below the bar though. . . just about.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:01 am
Hah. This is a book I had when I was kid.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/images/B000GRCG9A/sr=8-1/qid=1208339979/ref=dp_image_0?ie=UTF8&n=283155&s=books&qid=1208339979&sr=8-1
It goes, ‘Where are you going little cat, why are you so fat?’ and in answer the cat explians that he’s eaten everybody and says ‘and now I am going to also eat you’.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:15 am
Couldn’t agree more with you twenty. They really have turned into a serious crowd of shitehawks. I’m just amazed you didn’t mention the morning show where Claire weathergirl Byrne attempts to pretend to be a serious journalist/interviewer. It seems that her and Keane must have gone to the same training school of moral outrage, f**king slapper. You’re obviously not up that early like the rest of the working public…
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:20 am
I need silence first thing in the morning, the only noise I can stand is the kettle boiling.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:21 am
Esther Ranztsen deserves a testicle punching.
And lynn Fauldes-Wood
And I hate that smarmy professional Norn Irn cunt Gloria Hunnyford
And Jenny Bristow.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:28 am
…and the subject turns to annoying tv people, surely that faux-matey pile of steaming shite that does the weather on tv3 is worthy of a mention.
Martin something or other, I would love to meet him, not in a darkened alley, but a brightly lit concerthall, where people could gather and laugh as I keck him repeatedly in the balls until he coughs up the penis of wheover he had to suck off to get a fucking job the malingering talentless dumbed-down bollix
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:29 am
keck – an angry spelling of “kick”
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:29 am
Bringing sharps into a psychiatric hospital is completely irresponsible. I hope the staff sue the ass off Newstalk and haul them before the broadcasting commission.
With rare exceptions the more radio broadcasting we’ve licensed the worse all radio standards have become. Competition and ‘choice’ have been a recipe for disaster since the 1980s.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:29 am
“wheover = whoever”
I’m still gonna kick him in the balls
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:36 am
Jeeze, rob. Anger management!
maggot – how can anyone hate Jenny Bristow??
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:38 am
I hate that smarmy fucker chef Paul Rankin – if you bump into him you have my permission to kick him in the balls as well Rob.
Just back from the shops – Radio One , Carpark Catchprase was blasting out – Jesus , what crap!
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:39 am
She’s sickeningly saccharine, so Helens Bay I want to puke.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:40 am
Its not perfect but i still prefer newstalk over having to endure the torture of Joe Duffy, Pat Kenny or Gerry Ryan. There can come a point when you’ve been doing the same show for way too long and need to be moved on.
I like sean moncrieff and george hook has his months. Most of the time i listen to phantom though.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:40 am
I was always amused at how man Paul Rankin was to his wife on REady Steady Cook. He’s so narky and self satisfied. And he always got really pissed of when he lost, the tosser.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:40 am
keck – an angry spelling of “kick”
I wondered if you were from Cherry Velley or Helens Bay !
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:41 am
She’s a sweet little lady who cooks stuff, maggot!
what do you want her to do, chop off your testicles and serve them to you?
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:41 am
With rare exceptions the more radio broadcasting we’ve licensed the worse all radio standards have become. Competition and ‘choice’ have been a recipe for disaster since the 1980s.
Absolutely – when you think back at how interesting and vibrant the radio world was before regulation it’s depressing to hear the shite we’ve got now.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:42 am
You didn’t hear the Juice on Edel Coffey last friday, did you, TheDecline?
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:43 am
It’s hard to listen to the radio with other people around, I don’t know why. I only tend to listen in the car. I think it’s a little immature of me, too much reliance on the telly.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:48 am
I was going to explain where i was from and I have just realised that my entire life, I have been creeping southwards, grew up “on da nort-side” of Dublin spend a year living in the city centre, bought a house in Tallaght, now I live in Wexford.
At this rate by the time I am 40 I will be living in Australia.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:49 am
Rob, or else you will have drowned in the sea.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:50 am
She’s utterly false and nauseating – look at how she plays up or down her NI accent depending on audience.
But at least media personalities in the ROI don’t seem to get the arrogant crusading zeal that UK ones do – look at gobshites like that runt in white Martin Bell, Trevor McDonald or most unspeakable of all, that swine weasel king Trevor Phillips!
And hasn’t the luscious Nigella Lawson got curvaceous of late ?
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:51 am
Look, if I survived Finglas, The Quays and Tallifornia, a mere body of water does not frighten me….
(goes looking for big rubber ring…)
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:51 am
TheDeclines says, “Most of the time i listen to phantom though.”
But it’s not as good as it was before licensing.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:52 am
The only thing I know about radio, is that if you compose a song with the word “Radio” in the chorus, you get your song played to death on the radio. If that’s not an indicator of how far up their own arses they are, I don’t know what is.
Personally, I don’t like songs about radios.
A fit young woman, singing about sitting on the washing-machine is more my style.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:54 am
Just for you MB
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LB6Q_oycfQ
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:56 am
I prefer songs about rampaging norse gods myself. but each to his or her own.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:56 am
Fuck off maggot. I thought I was going to get a woman on a washing machine. Had the Kleenex ready and everything.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:57 am
On My Radio by The Selecter was a good one
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:59 am
Fuck off maggot.
Heh heh – count yourself lucky I didn’t give you La Harney in the nip on an industrial washing machine !
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:04 pm
Twenty, I have to agree with your hatred of Dumbing down. It’s happening everywhere, TV, radio, newspapers. TV3 goes into sport after 10 fucking minutes. Nothing against sport but it’s not really news is it? It’s SPORTS news.
As for SKY, fuck those cunts. Can I say cunt? And Joe Duffy, biggest antagonistic prick of them all. And don’t get me started on the HERALD and the Indo. Cheap nasty sell out fucks that they are. Also responsible for most of the litter on the streets every morning the HERALD AM rag of ads.
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:07 pm
hehe, you’re dead right, sports news isn’t news. it’s hobby info.
Anyone else see the film “idocracy”?
It could be quite an accurate prediction…
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:15 pm
Idiocracy- Isn’t that the one where some idiot wakes up in the dumbed-down future to find he’s the most intelligent person left on the planet?
I could really relate to that guy.
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:20 pm
I switched from newstalk when dunphy left
total shite radio
Morning Show with podge and rodge – shite
Brenda Power – moaning minnie freak
that cork bird – mmmmmmmm
moncrieff – a radio show based on text messages?
george hook – yawn
I listen to BBC Radio 4 and/or 5 and/or radiohead new album (If I was in a band I just wouldn’t bother recording a new album – In Rainbows is insurpassable)
have a good day everybody; freedom is winnin’.
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:24 pm
itchybollix – agree on in rainbows. i was laughed at yesterday for saying i ilked radiohead. by a garth brooks fan. for once, i was lost for words.
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:24 pm
ilked = liked
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:30 pm
Garth Brooks…..shiver
In Rainbows is sublime, agreed. I also got my hands on Com Lag recently, some interesting tracks, personal fave I am Citizen Insane.
I’ll stop now……
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:40 pm
That’s it Rob, don’t let parenting ruin you! I haven’t even heard any of the new radiohead, though I may have fallen asleep on the sofa while they were on Jules Holland,
Shane – can you say cunt? Aw, bless! Read some archives!
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:42 pm
well if newstalk are going all tabloid, they could recruit 2 commenters from this site for a smoochy soap opera – The morgor and Jo show…
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:47 pm
Smooching Jo ? There’s a thought!
Form an orderly queue.
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:49 pm
Radio is dead – has been for years – Too many bland accents, too many commercial breaks, too many jingles, and way, way too many cork people with access to a microphone
April 16th, 2008 @ 12:56 pm
switch on Radio one now for a live broadcast of former President Hillerys’ Funeral. Complete with golf-style whispered commentary… Now thats radio!
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:00 pm
that weather wan on sky news … whats her name
yeah lisa burke..she has learning in her and everything from cambridge.
and yer talking about dumbing down, its yee fools who are watching and listening that encourage them.
do yourself and favor and go turn off the tv and radio and this internet and go read a book. no better way to spend a day (well that and molesting myself while looking at me monkey porn collection)
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:03 pm
Good to see you’ve gone ahead about Newstalk on your own blog, Rob. It is true, though, that illegal immigrants get free cars & high class whores when they come here coz a guy in my local said he knew that for a fact – and he works in Governmnet Buildings!
Admittedly, he works for the OPW & does the decorating in Government Buildings, but that’s close enough to the centre of power for all the others in the pub to believe him.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:04 pm
The Morgor and Jo show could work.
Sounds more like a breakfast show than a soap though.
Morgor : ” . . . and that’s how you make soap from human fat over to Jo with a story on giving birth on all fours….”
Jo : “thanks morgor, you absolute cunt. *smile*”.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:04 pm
in the aftermath of the Naillerz episode, I am now refusing to read any blogger who has listed Scarface as his favourite movie…
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:07 pm
Women make such a fuss about this giving birth business.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:10 pm
Well, I know what my angle is, but I didn’t know soap from human fat was a big issue for you – this may be the end of the morgor and jo show before it starts…
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:10 pm
That’s my POINT morgor. The wrong sort of fuss is made. It doesn’t have to be that hard.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:15 pm
Exactly, Twenty
NT has become utter shite, but one exception that hasn’t been mentioned so far is Karin Coleman at the weekend. And I like the History Programme on Sundays, but I’m a bit weird that way …
The only item I can bear to listen to during the week is Off The Ball.
Pity, it used to be good
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:15 pm
Jo, are you confusing me with maggot?
Ok, i can do other stories, I’m flexible.
I’d do a story on getting a camera inserted under a persons skull so that you could look behind you as you walk.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:16 pm
Try listening to some of the radio stations in the states, absolutely class, but it seems that their radio (and tv news) is arranged in 30sec soundbites with loads of repetition. Perhaps the human race is devolving and our attention span is lowering. That would also explain why American TV shows have a recap every week in case you forgot what you saw last week.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:17 pm
Irish radio ads take some beating for sheer mind-melting retardedness. The Baileys Mini & Corona Extra ones still come to mind as particular low points of human civilisation.
Turds & conditions apply.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:17 pm
I think she is Morgor.
But there really is nothing to this childbirth lark – they even give them free drugs! It was harder for me as I wwas the one she insulted and they wouldn’t let me smoke in the delivery room.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:20 pm
I was getting confused, sorry. It’s the m’s…
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:22 pm
they’re little more than Nazis maggot. Nazis.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:23 pm
Mothers or Hospital staff morgor ?
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:27 pm
Did you know that maternity hospitals and prisons are the only exceptions to the non-smoking legislation in Ireland?
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:28 pm
Oh! sorry. One other old folks homes.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:30 pm
On ads in particular – the inanity of the 123.ie stuff takes some beating. And it’s on non-stop on NT. That cunt deserves a serious slapping
On ads in general – I’ve never figured out how/why, given that the Irish are so verbally dexterous and fond of jokes, the ads on radio and television here are almost without exception tedious and unfunny, whereas Holland (which wouldn’t have the most verbal culture in the world) turns out ads that regularly feature in ‘funniest/cleverest’ ads listings worldwide. Maybe that’s becaue we’re good at talk but actually shite at communication.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:32 pm
Oh, and another thing I forgot. Newstalk hired Clare McKeown to take over from Roisin Ingle at the weekends.
Hadn’t anybody noticed how much better the world was without that fake laughing harpie cunt?
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:37 pm
Spot on, Twenty. The only other bright spot on that particular horizon was the replacement of the ‘fake laughing harpie’, as you so elegantly put it.
The reason I got to like NT way back when was Off The Ball – a bunch of blokes talking about sport and having a laugh, but also getting some of teh best pundits around to contribute – and that’s really all that’s left now.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:39 pm
No, I meant Clare McKeown was the fake laughing harpie. Listen to her, if you can bear it, I’ve never heard anybody’s laugh sound so utterly false in all my life.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:39 pm
Women. Maggot. Women.
Name one kind thing that any woman ever did.
At least the nazis built roads.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:40 pm
Tony S – yes! radio advertising is agonising! I have to turn it off, it’s so unbearable, which is totally counter productive. Why can’t they see that?
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:41 pm
Shit, Tony S., I’ve the 123.ie ad stuck in my head now
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:43 pm
It was the midwives who gave me grief about my carry-out – the doc was a decent enough bloke, said what’s the harm in a few tins of beer? But even he couldn’t see that beer needs cigarettes.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:43 pm
Well, I found Ingle unbearable anyway – just goes to show how interchangeable these mingers are. Anyway, he only part of that show that I could ever bear to listen to was the first hour, where the panelists are usually good for a laugh or two.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:45 pm
Tinman 18, isn’t the jingle just fabulous (heh heh)
Lynching the cunt right would be too good for him
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:56 pm
Jo, my comments don’t appear on your site. Were they rebuffed?
*sob* I feel so rejected.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:57 pm
Tony, may you have an afternoon listening to the Telly Bingo jingle
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:57 pm
Shi, now I’ve that in my head instead.
April 16th, 2008 @ 1:58 pm
Shit, that should say shit…
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:13 pm
Agree with most of the above, posted on this on my blog 2 months ago, nice to see Twenty drops by ;-)
http://30sideof40.blogspot.com/2008/02/newstalk.html
Newstalk has gone to the dogs, too many ads, too many annoying accents but very few alternatives.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:21 pm
Radio I listen to (only really listen in the car) – Matt Cooper for a while on the way home.
Carwash on Today FM Saturday evening if out and about – Disco and Funk.
Off the Ball.
Guilty secret – Friday night 80s.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:22 pm
jothemaam
Last word on radio ads – the problem is that most people hear them in the background but don’t actually ‘listen’ to them – therefore the message goes in sublimnally.
In fact, a study has shown that, the blander the ad, the more effctive the message (which is remembering the product/company name) Funny/clever ads are often counter-productive in that people remember the ad but forget the name or the message.
Depressing, isn’t it?
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:25 pm
The trick with ads is this – if it gets into your head, don’t give in.
I have the 123.ie tune in my head. My car insurance is up soon. I will definitely not try 123 for a quote because they have annoyed me.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:29 pm
SG, I’m the same, I deliberately try to avoid anything with an irritating ad.
Unfortunately, although I loathe their ads, 123 did save me about 600 euro getting a quote.
I would imagine mine is an extreme case though.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:33 pm
Tony, that is depressing. People are stupid.
morgor, calm down you big woman, I have been away from the computer as my tyrant daughter insists on playing Playhousedisney. And I’m trying to do some work. But am failing as I’m falling asleep. It’s strange that I can stay awake to talk nonsense on hte computer but try and work and I’m narcoleptic.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:35 pm
yourlocal.ie has the most annoying fucking ad i can remember in lord knows how long, i could be anywhere in the house and hear yer mans droney voice start and i’d go insane.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:41 pm
I have to confess I find the tile ads funny, the 99.99 ones, even though they’re hideous. But you’re right, I can’t remember which company it is.
morgor, what comments? I can’t find any. I didn’t reject any, but sometimes I forget to hit publish. But I don’t see any in my email. The birth one’s there.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:45 pm
Hmm I added 2 today, but I’ve got a few add-ons on firefox to prevent scripting so maybe they got in the way.
I’ll try it from IE later.
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:58 pm
to this day I refuse to drink pepsi, on the basis that they used Michael Jackson, Madonna and Elton John in their 80′s adverts..
Pepsi – the choice of the cunt generation
April 16th, 2008 @ 2:59 pm
Your comments section is quite scary to a computer-dunce like me, coz I wouldn’t know which part to tick. Your site is cool & I will go back & look again once my eyesight has recovered from the pinkness overdose.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:00 pm
Sorry, Jo, that comment was to you.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:10 pm
I figured about the pinkness, Tinman. It’s a girl’s blog, you see ;)
What do you mean, which part to tick?
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:14 pm
Nailerzzzz – should be given his own chat/rap show – He’d rule the airwaves with his fist…
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:25 pm
Well, I’ve either to have a google account, or if I use a name I’ve to have a URL? (I’m looking like a right tit in front of everyone now, & all I was gonna do was say hello).
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:28 pm
Heh, sorry about that. I remember that dilemma. I’ll see if I can change the settings.
Nailerzzzz would have to first take over the airwaves with his fist, or else how would we respect him – if you’re gonna talk the talk…
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:31 pm
Hmm, last point on this (sorry about this Twenty), but Tinman, I have it as free as I can, it seems, sorry! Thanks for trying though.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:34 pm
The worst radio ad ever (& it’s possibly still going) was the one for Northside Shopping Centre. A gang of women sing “Northside, Northside” and then there’s a kind of boom, & then a screeching sound like a cat being passed through a bin lorry, & then they carry on with “the great, great shopping centre.” Yep, in 1971, it probably was.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:35 pm
I miss early eighties farmer ads – the basic black screen with a picture of worm dose, and the big shouty voice to get their attention – ‘FARMORS!!’
Like radio on tv.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:39 pm
Yeh, but that ad was cool in the same way that ‘Get on down to Bargaintown’ was – everything was shite back then, but nobody gave a flying fuck anyway …
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:39 pm
Heh, my gmail just gaveme a Mae West quote of the day – ‘I used to be Snow White, but I drifted’.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:40 pm
Or what about the ad for MiWadi … ah bliss ….
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:41 pm
The great thing about the Bargaintown ad was that they paid Terry Wogan for it once, & then stuck his voice in saying “the prices are only famous” in every ad they made for the next 50 years.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:42 pm
Someone on forninepounds posted a YouTube vid of the big snow in ’81 – not too much video of those days. It looked so old and depressed, like an Eastern European country. Weird.
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:43 pm
di you see Ewan McGregor in Africa for Comic Relief – he went into this sort of shed/shop, and found cases of Um Bongo – they really do drink it on the Congo!
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:44 pm
Anyone else remember the ads where they’d warn farmers about bruce-ell-osis(ohtfyst)?
“Ya bought in, didn’t ya?”
“But I got them at the right price”
“The right price? Do ya still think they’re the right price?”
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:46 pm
Still vitally relevant in these days of Foot and Mouth paranoia…
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:48 pm
Have you heard the Sunday Business Post do specials whenever the Revenue are doing some special investigation?
“The Revenue are after Offshore Accounts – read our report on what they’ll be looking for, & the steps you can take to reduce penalties & interest.”
Who do you think their market is?
April 16th, 2008 @ 3:49 pm
tallaghfortairton car dealers or something like that used to annoy me a lot too.
and all supervalu ads with that annoying as hell “do do da dum ba da” bumbling music in the background the whole time.
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:01 pm
The list of shite ads is endless.
However, like anything that’s awful in its day (such as any make of car from the 70s) it eventually becomes cool, even in a ‘so bad it’s good’ kind of way.
But take it from me, there is nothing in adland today to match the excrutiating tedium of its TV counterpart in the 60s and 70s. No wonder we had to get skulled at any available opportunity to retain a sense of sanity …
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:04 pm
jo, can you link to that video of snow? couldn’t find it…
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:06 pm
in the bad old days of rte only, there was always these christmas ads that was just a still picture of, say, a jewellers in ballina or something and a voiceover wishing all their customers a very merry christmas and a prosperous new year. they used to come on one after the other that time of year.
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:12 pm
living outside the pale, I get some really strange ads attacking my ears, one of which (and this one is fairly nationwaide) is the jingle for Daybreak Convenience Stores
Now the actual words “Daybreak, the difference in your day” are harmless and trite enough, but it is sung with such constipated gusto the word “Daybreak” is elongated to about 14 syllables (day ah hay ay ay bray hake ah) and can last for up to 8 days.
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:16 pm
How come what used to be known as a Shop is now a Convenience Store? Just an excuse to rip us off? Cos it’s convenient? And then they moan when supermarkets, cheaper and more convenient, take their business away. Kunts.
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:19 pm
how many of us are there
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:20 pm
ah , big S small s
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:22 pm
123.ie cut my house insurance in half, at least I got something for having to listen to their annoying ads. I love the Hibernian car insurance ad when the miniture price starts to speak, reminds me so much of a guy I used to work with.
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:22 pm
whatchoo talkin bout willis?
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:22 pm
I’m the punctuation Nazi …
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:30 pm
Does it make you wonder who the fuck sits in a room and decides that adverts ar good or bad. The cunt with the gyms..Dunne.. his adverts are annoying and stupid he reckoned his gyms were best for hygiene which puts a mental picture of chlymidia infected showers and cockroaches running riot at his competetitors.
April 16th, 2008 @ 4:33 pm
PP – Ad agencies. This is why I hate when people send me ‘funny’ ads as email attachments. They’sre not funny because they were thought up to try and sell stuff.
Give me home movies of people falling down and stuff.
April 16th, 2008 @ 5:18 pm
or porn.
April 16th, 2008 @ 5:36 pm
I can’t believe no one has mentioned the Irish Pride adds. Who ever came up with that add deserves to tortured within an inch of his life.
I’d do a story on getting a camera inserted under a persons skull so that you could look behind you as you walk.
Bloody cool idea
I love the Hibernian car insurance ad when the miniture price starts to speak, reminds me so much of a guy I used to work with.
For some reason that always makes me laugh
April 16th, 2008 @ 5:43 pm
I saw a show on a blind person getting robotic eyes.
They never got it working fully but the blind person got flashes of light.
Saw another show on a guy who had his hand cut off getting a robotic arm which read the electric signals in his arms to move individual robotic fingers.
Not perfect, but they’ll make robo-cop soon enough.
April 16th, 2008 @ 5:50 pm
Fascinating.
I don’t reckon they’ll start with a cop though.
Maybe Robo-Binman?
April 16th, 2008 @ 5:56 pm
that’d be cool.
You ever see the Japenese giant walking robots?
They’re shit, but they exist.
April 16th, 2008 @ 5:56 pm
*Japanese
April 16th, 2008 @ 6:50 pm
Lets make a pact not to be embarrassed about typos. I speak fluent typo.
Here you go, SG, sorry for the delay:
http://forninepounds.blogspot.com/2007/12/in-our-day.html
April 16th, 2008 @ 7:15 pm
Should have gone to radio rentals
April 16th, 2008 @ 7:48 pm
Btw the camera at the back of the head idea is great. But surely a rear view mirrow would be more economical?
April 16th, 2008 @ 7:53 pm
A young Texan walks into a bar and orders a drink.
“Got any ID?” asks the bartender.
The Texan replies, “About what?”
__________________________________________
A woman walks into an accountant’s office and tells him that she needs to file her taxes.
The accountant says, “Before we begin, I’ll need to ask you a few questions.”
He gets her name, address, social security number,etc. and then asks, “what’s your occupation?”
“I’m a Lady of the Night,” she says.
The accountant is somewhat taken aback and says, “Let’s try to rephrase that.”
The woman says, “OK, I’m a high-end call girl.”
“No, that still won’t work. Try again.”
They both think for a minute; then the woman says, “I’m an elite chicken farmer.”
The accountant asks, “What does chicken farming have to do with being a prostitute?”
“Well, I raised a thousand little peckers last year.”
“Chicken Farmer it is.”
April 16th, 2008 @ 8:36 pm
She should have tried Easons for a file.
April 16th, 2008 @ 8:47 pm
the department store thingy texas used to have one here last year with a borat imitator caled boris(pronounced bore-iss). kept saying how texas was cheaper than his sister.
…my father didn’t get what he meant and started saying everything was cheaper than his sister.
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:27 pm
Ok, oops. I had a long conversation about you gang of commenters using the word cunt, with my husband on the way home the other night.
He was drunk, I wasn’t, he had much to say, but basically he’s against it, and rather amusingly thinks you’re all D4 teenagers thinking you’re big and clever (hee!).
He feels that anyone who uses it in conversation is not someone he wants to know – and I just walked out of the sitting room while saying, the bank still haven’t emailed me back, the cunts!’ Redner! It’s all your fault, you bastards…
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:36 pm
thinks you’re all D4 teenagers
Surely he means D4 cunts Jo. Has he no vocabulary?
April 16th, 2008 @ 9:52 pm
Jesus, Jo, & he plays in the Noggin Inn?
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:01 pm
The ad for cash and carry kitchens, what a gobshite that eejit sounds like.
D4 teenagers look like retarded almond fingers. Any I’ve encountered anyhow, meh.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:22 pm
hehe only D4 teenagers say cunt?
You don’t see D4 teenagers in D4, they’re all in mummy’s SUV or else on holiday in Italy.
Can I be a 26 year old teenager?
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:24 pm
I know, Tinman, I was sceptical about that too…
In fairness, all his Noggin mates are extremely, extremely nice.
D4 teenagers look like retarded almond fingers? That’s impressively surreal :)
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:26 pm
aw, morgor, are you 26? That would make me the kinky yummy mummy on our morgor and jo show…
I don’t think it’s that only teenagers say cunt, it’s that teenagers think saying cunt is amusing and shocking.
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:49 pm
Almond fingers with big sunglasses and messy hair that say ‘roysh’ and ‘yaas’ (thats kinda Dalkeyish) and who look down on what they call ‘boggers’.
A few years ago one had the cheek to turn around to me and say ‘Oh so you’re from .., you must be a knacker’. She phrased it exactly like that,i just stared at her like a fish for a minute. Can’t remember the rest of that tale..
I find cunt amusing.. eh..
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:51 pm
The AIB ad with the dragon has just come on the telly – the dragon looks like the picture of twenty on the cover of his book…
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:52 pm
I’m nearly forty and I still find it amusing to say cunt especially when it is delivered with venom at inappropraite times…but then I also laughed at Colin Farrell karate chopping a midget last night which probably makes me a bit immature
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:53 pm
No, that was really funny!
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:54 pm
Wasn’t CF good?
April 16th, 2008 @ 10:56 pm
Only saw a clip unfotunately, but anything with midgets has me in stitches, especially visiting violence upon them. I know it’s wrong but fuck it.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:19 pm
There’s a place in the US where they have Annual Dwarf Throwing Contests. When PC came in, however, dwarves – who now insisted on being known as Porgs (persons of restricted growth) got the contest’s name changed to the Annual Porg Throwing Contest. Seemingl it was the name that was humiliating, not the fact they were being thrown.
(I always start to giggle when I think of this story, which is really, really mean, coz I’m only five foot five).
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:29 pm
Tinman, are you Bono?
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:46 pm
Oh, the husband says, you call someone a cunt in the Noggin Inn and you’re ended!
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:46 pm
Midgets are cunts.
April 16th, 2008 @ 11:47 pm
The AIB ad with the dragon has just come on the telly – the dragon looks like the picture of twenty on the cover of his book…
Tinman, you have just proved how that ad is not working as it is for Bank of Ireland and not AIB!!
April 17th, 2008 @ 12:03 am
Ah, but only small ones, Twenty.
April 17th, 2008 @ 12:10 am
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April 17th, 2008 @ 12:13 am
The only radio worth listening to is RTE1 on a saturday morning when they have all that old comedy stuff from the 50s and 60s.
The rest of it is shit, espescially that Rick O’Shea cunt.
in other news, Bald Devil has comitted internet suicide!
http://balddevil.wordpress.com/
April 17th, 2008 @ 1:23 am
50s and 60s comedy stuff is mostly terrible though, especially british stuff.
shelley berman and bill cosby are great, the rest of them have aged pretty terribly.
April 17th, 2008 @ 1:47 am
I don’t think anyone mentioned the fucking newsreaders on NT. I reckon it’s the same girl using a rake of different names. Evelyn Mc Clafferssstthheee reporssstttthhhhing from the coursssttttthhhhouse.
A man is in a crissstttthhhikul condition in a hospisssstttthhhhul in the capissstttthhul
where the fuck do they get this accent.
Twenty, I got your book today. Looking forward to a good read. However I was disgusted when I read the credits/copyright page.
“Hachette books Ireland policy is to use papers that are natural, renewable and recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests the logging and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the envoirnmental regulations of the country of origin”
I thought you were a man of principle
April 17th, 2008 @ 2:28 am
Dublin 4 teenagers… mmmmmmmmmm!!!
April 17th, 2008 @ 2:30 am
I fucking wish!!!
Jo is your hubby a bit of a C**t???
April 17th, 2008 @ 2:39 am
Sam, you should be fuckin’ ashamed of yourself for asking a married Irish woman that question.
Of course he is.
We all are.
April 17th, 2008 @ 3:06 am
I put in those loike stors,(c**t) so the guy wouldnt like fuckin sue me or whatever. the lost time I got into a lawsuit it cost Dad a fortune and he was loike toshally hysterical and wouldnt let me drive his merc or use his golf clubs or anything loike.
April 17th, 2008 @ 8:42 am
“Hachette books Ireland policy is to use papers that are natural, renewable and recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests the logging and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the envoirnmental regulations of the country of origin”
I’d never have signed up if I’d known that was the case. I’m insisting the next book is printed on baby seal skin parchment with ink made from dolphin blood.
April 17th, 2008 @ 9:41 am
Twenty, heading for 200 posts and no one has mentioned Harvery Fucking Norman…How can that be?? O
April 17th, 2008 @ 9:42 am
Harvey Norman, was he the husband of Cagney or Lacey?
April 17th, 2008 @ 10:25 am
I couldn’t agree more on newstalk – and i’m not just lickin your hole here twenty.
Only show that does well is Carol coleman and Off the ball. As for Ken Earley. He doesn’t understand scottish football, doesn’t understand Celtic and allows his opinions to be formed by people like Roddy Forsyth. And for a Celtic fan – its just not good enough.
George still isn’t too bad mind.
April 17th, 2008 @ 2:58 pm
200 posts…nearly there
April 17th, 2008 @ 2:59 pm
Now we are. As the paper of record would say …Is this a record?
April 18th, 2008 @ 11:25 am
I really hate ads for concerts, especially Neil Diamond and especially when he won’t be actually playing for months and you know you’ll be listening to Larry Gogan going on about it for the next 6 months.
What was that one about the musical that told the story of bringing electricity to the west – Major annoying.
April 20th, 2008 @ 7:52 pm
The polonium in Litvinenko’s system took three weeks to kill him-If the Russians really wanted him out of the way they could have hired a thug from Limerick to do it far more efficiently and without half the fuss.
The above is a quote from Brenda Power (your call) in her Daily Mail column from a while back. It is funny that the HSE are giving her the same treatment that she gave the local media down here when they called her out on it.
Just like the HSE won’t engage with her, she refused to engage with the likes of the Limerick Leader after she wrote those comments.
Brenda Power is a hypocrite.