“Perfect people. Perfect timing.” Lachie Pringle’s perfect radio gig

Jack Archdale, Luisa Dal Din & Lachie Pringle. Image supplied.

When Triple M signed up powerhouse podcasting duo Lu & Jarch, no-one was happier than Lachie Pringle.

Lachie – then the Mornings host at Triple M Sydney – was already a massive fan of their work.

“I loved their content,” Lachie tells Radio Today. “I thought they were both hilarious. I was like: This is exactly what Triple M needs.”

For SCA, transitioning a podcast into a national mainstream radio show was quite the gamble. But Lachie saw it as a prime opportunity to attract a different, largely younger audience to the Ms.

Little did he know he’d be joining Lu & Jarch for the ride.

Having panelled for The Rush Hour, Lachie had already discovered he loved working within the environment of a radio show, coming up with funny content beyond the parameters of a regular music shift.

He made it clear to Triple M Sydney Content Director Laura Bouchet that, should the right opportunity present itself, he’d like to be considered.

Enter Luisa Dal Din and Jack Archdale.

“Honestly, the whole Lu & Jarch thing is like the craziest ‘right place, right time, perfect scenario, perfect people, perfect timing’ for me that could have possibly been,” says Lachie.

He will never forget the day Bouchet called him into a meeting room and said ‘How about this new show? It’s going to need an anchor.’”

Lachie could barely contain his excitement.

“It’s one of those things where it’s like, ‘Shit!! I’m going to call everyone!’” Lachie says. “Not that I did, because I wasn’t allowed to say anything back then.”

As human beings, Dal Din and Archdale both exceeded expectations.

When he accepted the Lu & Jarch anchor role, Lachie says “I knew their podcast personas (but) I was a bit nervous. I was prepared for that whole sort of – Oh, but what if they’re arseholes?”

“I’m just so lucky that that was not the case at all. When we first got them in to record promos, just immediately they weren’t just chatting to each other, they were including me.”

After feeling like a fish out of water when he first joined Triple M – suddenly, Lachie’s youth became a strength. And he was confident from the outset that Lu & Jarch would work as a radio show.

“I think their comedy lends itself well to the existing audience,” he says. “It’s not just about bringing in the new audience. Jarch has such an Aussie country humour, I knew that would translate well, and the way that Lu and him just go back and forth.”

On-air chemistry is never guaranteed, but Lu, Jarch and Lachie’s appears to be watertight.

“Honestly, how it sounds on air is pretty much how it is off air,” Lachie says.

“They immediately embraced me. They didn’t just treat me like a producer in the room. They treated me as one of the co-hosts. And it’s only gotten stronger.”

Lachie believes humility plays a big part in their success.

“Coming into a timeslot like early Drive, you can’t be getting too big for your boots,” he laughs.

Radio hadn’t exactly been front of mind for Lachie when he finished school. He gravitated towards acting, relocating from Sydney to Melbourne to complete a three-year Bachelor degree at the Victorian College of the Arts.

Signing up with an acting agency, he moved back to Sydney, doing some TV ads and independent theatre. But the novelty began to wear off.

“I was already starting to fall a little bit out of love with the whole audition process and some of the brutality of the acting industry,” Lachie admits.

COVID lockdowns didn’t help.

“It became a very isolated kind of experience, where you’d send tapes off into the ether and not hear anything back,” Lachie remembers.

“I sort of had this part-epiphany, part breakdown through COVID where I thought – What’s something I can do, just say this acting thing doesn’t work out? What’s something that I can put my skills towards that I’ll enjoy?”

He started volunteering at community radio station 2SER, helping to produce the Drive show before scoring a weekend hosting job.

Putting together a demo tape, he decided to try his luck.

“I thought: You know what? Screw it. I’m going to reach out,” Lachie says.

His target was the station he listened to exclusively at that time: triple j.

He never expected to hear anything back, but a few days later came a reply.

“At the ABC, they have to read and respond to every customer email they receive,” Lachie says with a grin. “But it turned out they really liked the demo.”

Lachie was invited to a zoom chat with the program bosses at triple j.

“They were like, ‘In a couple of months, when lockdown’s over, come in, start training up, and we’ll get you doing graveyard-mid dawn shifts over summer.’”

“And I was like, ABSOLUTELY!”

Eventually, he locked down a regular weekend on-air spot. Then he started doing weekday fill-ins, even hosting the science segment with the legendary Dr Karl Kruszelnicki.

Then a job listing popped up at Triple M Sydney for a full-time weekday Afternoons host.

Lachie thought to himself: Holy crap. That’d be cool.

At 24, Lachie was outside the station’s target demographic. He applied for it anyway.

“I still don’t really know how, but I got the job,” he laughs. “Even (then-Content Director) Rex Morris, he was joking, saying ‘You’re not even inside the demo!’ But he gave me the job, so whatever! We’ll roll with it!”

Looking back, Lachie is grateful for the many people who’ve given him opportunities to advance his career.

“But I’m also super proud of myself in terms of making sure that when there have been opportunities, I’ve been there … either ready for them, or putting my hand up for them.”

Of the many people who’ve influenced Lachie’s radio journey, five in particular stand out, the first being former 2SER educator and radio newsreader Geoff Field.

“Geoff was someone who was always curious about my aspirations and what I wanted to do,” says Lachie. “He was someone who made me believe that I can go for things.”

Lachie credits former triple j Content Director Laura McAuliffe and Assistant CD Hannah Thompson with giving him his first professional shot at radio.

“They were both always giving me those opportunities, believing that I was ready for bigger shifts than I thought I was at the time.”

“Rex Morris took a massive chance on me, to give a 24 year old an arvos slot at Triple M Sydney. That was a massive gamble.”

“And Laura Bouchet – she has such a good radio brain. She just had this belief in me from the start, and she was someone that I felt confident in being able to tell exactly what I wanted to do.”

“I think those chats alone led to my appointment on Lu & Jarch.”

And for now, Lachie’s happy to keep enjoying the ride.

After all, perfect radio gigs don’t come around all that often.

Images supplied.