When all is said and Dunne

Tom Dunne attracts a certain type of person. In his days as singer with pop band Something Happens, his ‘groupies’ would call backstage after a gig with their homework, looking for answers to mathematical equations from the engineering graduate.

Now, twenty years since the band released their first single, the same type of people are speaking to him over the airwaves, providing some light banter to Newstalk’s midmorning schedule.

I’ve caught Tom on a tiring day for him, but every day is tiring for the broadcaster at the moment. His two daughters, aged 2 years and 3 months, have been keeping him awake, and the results of this are obvious on his face.

Tom has just finished that day’s show when we meet. That morning he talked about men’s sexual habits, the US elections and the addictive properties of lip balm. How far the man has come from his days in front of the microphone as Something Happens’ lead singer.

Reflecting on the pop band’s heyday with a wry smile, Tom says: “It was good craic. I only ever joined a band for the craic. It’s a very foolish person who joins a band for any other reason. “

The group recorded four studio albums, the second of which, 1990’s ‘Stuck together with God’s Glue’, providing the critical acclaim that earned them fame at home and abroad. However, with their record label Virgin being taken over by EMI, they soon found themselves out on their own. As the record labels changed, so did the band’s drive to continue.

Their tour with singer/songwriter Warren Zevon in America proved to be a turning point. “That was really ‘get me out of here’ time really,” says Tom. “Warren was so much more successful than we were and so miserable. We were thinking: ‘if we came back from this tour, get back together and record a good album, we could be this unhappy,’ so I think we were all going: ‘I’m not sure about this anymore’.”

From Something Happens came radio, first as a late-night DJ with Dublin Station 98fm on an all-Irish music programme. However the format proved unsuccessful at first so Tom decided to give the show an international flavour. “I remember playing Radiohead and saying they were Irish, and then I played the Pixies and said that Frank Black was Mary Black’s brother. Nobody cared and everybody was enjoying it, so very quickly the show stopped being Irish and they just left me alone to learn how to be on the radio, which was good.”

With ever-changing programme directors came different time slots for the new music presenter. Tom lasted for two weeks on an evening show at 8pm before a new director tried to fire him, but only succeeded in losing his job and leaving Tom with no show, but still getting pay cheques from the station. “Eventually I was gone but it was a strange, uncomfortable position to be in, because I was getting paid but I wasn’t doing anything.”

After two years the move to Today FM occurred. Tom had his dream show, allowing him total control over the music he played between 7pm and 10pm, four nights a week. But it was also a challenge.
“Being a totally international show I was expected to know about loads of stuff, like hip-hop, because I never listened to hip-hop, but I started listening to loads of it. So it was just daunting on one level but exhilarating on another, because the music was so great.”

However the challenge of the show and its perks began to fade for the radio presenter over the years.

“It was like a boy who said he likes chocolate and then was made eat chocolate for nine years and then he goes: ‘please don’t make me eat any more chocolate for a while.’”

It was little surprise then that an offer to move to talk radio seemed so appealing. While the show is a new departure for Tom, the move was relatively straightforward, with Newstalk and Today FM now sharing the same premises on Digges Lane in Dublin 2. While convenient, Tom describes the change as “turning a flight of stairs [between the Newstalk and Today fm studios] into a parallel universe.” While the workplace was familiar, the radio concept was not.

For the moment he seems happy with the challenge of his new programme and “delighted” with the prospect of becoming the new Gay Byrne, as some critics have predicted. Certainly, he recognises the value of what was Byrne’s loyal fan base – the cohort of housewives that are available as daytime listeners and, with their texts and calls, as contributors as well. Who knows – maybe someday they’ll ask him for help with their maths homework?