Take Two Radio Announcers

Illawarra Mercury

Saturday February 2, 2008

Interviews: LOUISE TURK

Radio announcers DAVE GORR and GREG VINCENT struck up a friendship in Darwin in 1982 and now present WAVE FM's breakfast program.

Dave Gorr

I had been working as a deejay for a mobile disco up the west coast of Australia in the early 1980s and, after the work ran out in Broome, I ended up in Darwin.

I got myself a job playing records at a nightclub called Fannies, and that's where Greg and I met. Greg came in one night, stayed the entire night, and I tripped over him on the way out. He told me he worked at the radio station 8DN and I told him I wanted to get a job there.

Greg suggested that I go and see the program director John Howgate. I went and harassed this guy every day saying "John, I want a job". Eventually Greg came and said to me: "Mate, John's given you a job and he wants you to start doing the midnight to dawn shift".

We worked together for three years at 8DN before I left town to work at Cairns and Townsville.

After a few years, I worked my way back to Darwin and got a job back at 8DN (Greg was still there). I stayed there for a year before moving on again.

I didn't hear from Greg for several years until I was living back in Melbourne. I got a phone call out of the blue: "Do you remember me, it's Greg Vincent. I'm coming to town to film Hey Hey It's Saturday". We had the biggest night and we were so drunk the next day, on the day of recording, that my then-girlfriend had to drive him into town to the studio.

We didn't see each other for quite a while but we kept in touch and knew what each other was doing.

Seven years ago when I was working in Newcastle, WAVE FM was looking for a breakfast co-host and Greg rang me and asked me if I was interested in moving to Wollongong. I got here and auditioned for the gig with Phebe Irwin, and I moved down here.

We hang around with each other all the time. We're great mates. We have a great time together and we socialise off-station a lot.

Greg just knows how to shit me up the wall. Sometimes I've got to yell at him and say: "Greg, it's my way or the highway".

It's like a brotherly relationship between us. We've known each other for so long. He's part of my life. I can't get rid of him.

Greg Vincent

My first impressions of Dave were that maybe I could pick up some tips on how to meet girls because he seemed to be having no trouble. Dave has always been confident in front of women. He's very much a ladies man. I just tend to creep them out somehow.

I don't know how he does it. He just has a way with women. I don't know what it is. I always try and keep women at arm's length.

There's a rapport that's developed with our new breakfast co-host Jade Papesch.

After a couple of weeks of being on-air, the dust has finally settled and Dave and I are getting to know a lot more about her. She's already figured us out.

The good thing is that Jade hasn't heard all our bad jokes yet.

Dave is a metrosexual. Dave likes travelling ... London, New York, Spain.

I'm more the guy who likes to call the numbers at the meat raffle and sit with the fellas on a Saturday afternoon and watch the races. I love my sport and I love popular culture. And I love my music.

The ties that bind Dave and I were created in Darwin and have been developed by knowing each other for so long. Our common interest is radio. We both love it.

I'm also close to Dave's family. When I flew to Melbourne, Libby Gorr (Dave's comedian sister) took me to see a Sydney Swans match and I know his parents very well.

When it was Dave's bucks night, a whole bunch of us hopped on a plane and flew to the Gold Coast. It was Dave and I that shared a room.

It's the being different that works in our relationship.

My ideal holiday is taking the family to Bawley Point or going camping somewhere. I've got the trailer always packed so we can just put it on the tow-bar and off we go.

But Dave goes on the internet, looking up sites of places around the world to holiday.

We have a love-hate relationship. Dave says that I shit him sometimes but he shits me sometimes, too. We're very honest.

© 2008 Illawarra Mercury

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