As Tracy Clifford celebrates ten years of her afternoon show on RTÉ 2FM, we caught up with her to ask ten questions about her last decade on air.
The Dublin broadcaster will be hosting a Big Tune Afternoon as part of her special ten-year show in Studio 1 in the Radio Centre today.
Tune in to RTÉ 2FM from 12-3pm to hear live music from Gavin James, Chasing Abbey and Aimee.
1. Your show started back on RTÉ 2FM in 2015. What's your everlasting memory of that first show?
Oh god, the first show I was so, so nervous. It was a big deal because I was such a 2FM fan growing up, so getting to 2FM felt like a massive step for me, because I was fulfilling a dream. I always remember the trepidation of doing it on my own and all eyes on me. I remember feeling - don't mess this up. That was the goal, and not to get pulled off the air within six months! It was a tough six months; it was a huge learning curve.
2. What has been the most memorable or unexpected moment on air over the past decade?
When you're on air, anything can happen, a caller can say anything! I remember playing a quiz with a woman, and she was in isolation [during COVID] - she hadn't seen her family in about five weeks. We just started having a chat about how she was feeling. She was upset - I think the nation was upset. It was one of those conversations - that lady needed to talk, she texted into a radio station to play a quiz, I asked her how she was and she told the truth. That always stands out to me because at that time, people were just looking for connection, so that was really memorable for me.
Then we have brilliant interviews where you get to interview Dua Lipa, Liam Gallagher, U2, Stormzy and they're sound! You don't want to mess it up for the listeners because it could be their favorite artist and you're like, Jesus Christ, this has to go well! And I hope we get a laugh out of them and they're not boring, or tired, or jaded, or cranky. Interviewing people like that when it goes well and you've made a listener laugh or you've asked a question where it reveals something about the artist that people might not know - it's always a bonus.
3. Do you still get those jitters now talking to these big music stars?
No, not at all. The only person I remember kicking the producers out of the studio, because I didn't want them looking at me, was Liam Gallagher. He was a hero of mine when I was a kid. This was before Oasis got back together. He was the dream, he was so funny, he answered my questions about a comeback and he was absolutely brilliant. He was so honest about his relationship with Noel [Gallagher] at the time and he also had me creased over laughing.
4. You're known for championing Irish artists. In what way is spotlighting homegrown talent still so important to you?
When I started out in 2FM, I realised that we have a responsibility to highlight and champion new Irish music in a way that I wasn't able to do before in other radio stations that I worked in. I wasn't aware of the amount of genres, from pop to rap to rock, indie, that we have in Irish music and I just got obsessed with it. I started realizing that I could play it in this radio station and also that there was a responsibility to do it as a national broadcaster. There seems to be a new heightened sense of cultural nationalism about Irish music at the moment, it's always been there for me. It seems like that there's a lot more that have gone international over the past decade. The success of Hozier, Dermot Kennedy, CMAT, Kneecap - the breadth of that is just amazing to see, and if you delve deeper, there's even more amazing people that deserve international success that are still working their way to try and get it.
5. What are the top 5 artists that shaped your taste in music over the past decade?
Artists that stand out to me - For Those I Love, he was the Choice Music Prize winner and singing about grief on a national daytime radio station is not what we had in our bingo card, but it just resonated with so many people. Stormzy, a grime artist that went mainstream, and I loved him from from the small gigs in Dublin. Getting to chat to him and be a station that championed him at the start is so cool - and look at him now! Watching the rise of Dermot Kennedy from a small interview that we did with him at Other Voices in 2017 to now has been amazing, he's such an international star. Hozier has always been one for us as well, what a success. CMAT's album Euro-Country is one of the best albums I've heard this year and Kneecap, I love my artists to be political and I love what they do.
6. How has your approach to presenting evolved over the past 10 years?
I think now my style is just to throw up the mic and chat. Whereas before it would have been more performance based and 'Everything is great!' and 'Yay!' Now I'm just me, and that took a while to get there. At the end of the day, you just want to sound like a comfortable voice to somebody, and then throw in a bit of craic. There's nothing like when you break your heart laughing with your pals on the radio. It's so addictive and it emulates through the radio and makes people smile.
7. How important is your relationship with your listeners to you?
It's gas because like I feel like we've created a little gang. I always know the people who want to play Panic and then on Fridays when we play old school dance music, there's definitely a whole cohort of people that tune in and are texting their friends about songs. There's even a farmer in Cork called Sean Collins, he's a famous TikTok tractor fella, and he gets people in Newfoundland in Canada and Essex to listen in. It's brilliant.
8. If you could replay one moment from the show over the last decade, which would it be and why?
I love ringing somebody up and giving them the best prizes - whether they've won a holiday or tickets to Taylor Swift - and it's their dream. I mean, I cry. I don't know whether that's me getting older, but I'm becoming more sensitive. I'm just balling with them, they're screaming crying. Those moments are priceless, I feel a little bit like Santa Claus.
9. What’s the most memorable gig you’ve ever been to?
Most recently my most memorable gig was Fontaines DC at Christmas-time in the 3Arena. I've gone to Oasis and everything, but the Fontaines gig was reminiscent of me being 15 at Oasis. It was absolutely incredible to see a band.... you just know that this is it for them. It was brilliant to witness.
10. And as you celebrate 10 years of The Tracy Clifford Show are you excited about the next chapter?
I haven't a clue what it's going to be! I take each day as it comes. I'm so privileged to have a job that I really like, I never thought it would last 10 years. If it ended tomorrow, I'd be absolutely delighted with what we've achieved and if it continues tomorrow, we're delighted. Once I'm working within something that I love to do, then I'm happy. That's all we can hope for - to actually enjoy what we do. Or to teach somebody something, or make someone smile, or give a prize away, or just be a comfort to somebody in the background when they're working from home. That's all we can hope for, really.
