Back to the music: Hitz FM staff reunite 30 years on

30 years after groundbreaking youth radio station Hitz FM went Melbourne-wide, its team has reunited.

After three years of organising (and a pandemic thrown in for good measure) there were cheers, tears and whoops of joy as 50 people attended the first ever Hitz FM staff reunion, held last Saturday at La Porchetta in South Yarra.

Among them was radio creative, writer and blogger Gabe McGrath,who’s been writing a memoir giving an insider’s view of the phenomenal rise of the station.

Hitz inspired a large number of young volunteers to get involved in community radio and set many of them on the path to high profile media careers, with alumni including Corey Layton (known back then as Captain Turntable), Troy Ellis, Ty Frost, Julie Doyle and Simon Diaz.

Layton – now Head of Digital Audio at ARN/iHeart Australia – was among those to attend the reunion, along with Ellis (The Marty Sheargold Show), Kate Arnott (Journalism lecturer, RMIT), Paul Dowsley (7 News Melbourne) and James Ash (Rogue Traders).

Nick Karlas – who as a youth worker was heavily involved in helping get Hitz off the ground – delivered the opening speech on Saturday.

He acknowledged those who couldn’t be there, including Hitz founder Anton Vanderlely and long-serving president Andrew Gyopar.

90s music pumped through the sound system as the Hitz crew reminisced over dinner.

“Over 5 hours it summarised the Hitz FM story from 1992 to 2001,” says Gabe in his blog. “From the early hard rock sound through to the dance pop of the middle years, the rise of Hip Hop and then into club and trance.”

“The soundtrack also included a few special things that sadly you’ll never hear on a Spotify stream.”

Gabe shared with Radio Today the trivia questions asked on the night.

(Do you know the know the answers to these? Have a crack and I’ll pop the answers at the bottom of this story).

1. What were the 4 words on the ‘industry warning’ sticker put on CDs in the Hitz era?

2. Hitz FM’s cheekiest OB was on the doorstep of a big FM station and they put an ‘out of order’ sign on the door. Which station, and why?

3. What was the famous Hitz FM rule for playing music?

Gabe also read a small excerpt of the Hitz FM book he’s been working on.

“I was pretty nervous about this, but the applause and feedback afterwards made it all worthwhile,” he says.

As Gabe told Radio Today in 2022, Hitz pushed pop, dance and hip hop when it was unheard of before 7pm.

“Songs, artists and genres that had previously languished in music directors’ CD piles suddenly got a huge boost.”

The station would go on to turn the industry on its ear, giving the commercial heavyweights a run for their money.

As a significant and much-loved part of Melbourne’s radio scene, its memory lives on.

*Photos in this story with thanks to Gabe McGrath.

Answers:

1. Parental Advisory – Explicit Lyrics

2. Triple M Bourke Street (because there was a Hoyts next door and Hitz did Hoyts OBs)

3. No songs older than 5 years