GRAHAM GILL

Born Graeme Gilsenan on 15th April 1936 in Melbourne, Australia, he started in radio at the age of 14 at Radio 3UZ in Melbourne. After about a year he transferred to 3KZ where he worked as studio panel operator for Alan Freeman before becoming a broadcaster in his own right. From there he moved to Griffith in New South Wales, to 2RG as well as MTN-9 TV. At the end of 1965 Graham moved to Europe and, like many Australians of his generation, ended up living in London's Earls Court, sharing with three other theatrical gents. they all had the same manager. After about three days, their manager asked Graham 
whether he could work that night at the Wimbledon Palais comparing a show — bringing on The Small Faces, taking them off and spinning a few records in between. He didn't fancy it because he wanted a holiday but the pay was very good, so he took the gig. Halfway through the show he was at the bar — and halfway through a Guinness — when Gordon Shephard, talent manager for Radio London, approached him, told him he liked the way he worked and asked if could he go to the office on Monday morning in Curzon Street — which he did. And the next day he was out on the Galaxy, alongside Mike Lennox, Tony Windsor, Chris Denning and Kenny Everett.Shortly after, Graham was offered a job on Britain Radio England. He'd come off the Galaxy with Kenny, Mike and Tony on the tender and were waiting to take the train to London from Harwich. There was this big Greyhound bus at the front and this guy called Don Pierson the man behind Britain Radio and Swinging Radio England. He asked us if they wanted a ride back to London which they did and when they got on the bus he asked Graham whether I would like to work for him, to which he told him he would. Consequently Britain Radio England became Radio Dolfijn and Radio 355 which he was on as well. Then he was offered a job on Radio 390 — Your British Family Station. Graham recalls "That was also very good because it was on a fort and they had the most wonderful English cook". Despite all programmes being scripted, conditions were "very good. Wonderful heating, warm good beds, no rocking about ... Not that I was ever sea-sick, of course, and also it was a week on, week off.". Then came the Marine Offences act.

Graham then relocated to Holland, initially with some relatives in Schiedam, near Rotterdam. After about a week he was out walking one day and needed the men's room and came across this place called The Birds Club which hadn't opened at the time but was being renovated. As he came out of the men's room a man asked me what the hell I was doing. He told him that he was just a disk-jockey from Radio London and that he was on my way out. Suddenly this voice shouted him over who turned out to belong to John Rosinger, who at the time was a very famous Dutch film director. He asked if Graham would like to work for him as his entertainment manager. Graham had to book the artists, put them on stage and act as a disk-jockey at the weekends."

After six months of that, the manager of the club, Peter Maartens suffered a heart attack and they changed over management and Graham thought it was time to move on. Another guy called Koen Bakker came in and wanted to manage Graham and take half hour package shows of artists around Europe. So they did Belgium, Germany and Holland for about six months. In 1972, Radio Caroline was starting again and he ran into Chris Carey and finished up on the mv Mi Amigo for Radio Caroline. He joined on March 6, 1973, but left on March 12th, joining RNI four days later. In August Graham 1973, put out an appeal for someone in Holland to run a branch of his fan-club for him. He already had an established fanclub in England run by Mrs. Pam Wood. He was one of the rare breed of announcers who made sure that every letter was acknowledged on the air, and the sender received a reply by post.

As Graham recalls: Life was more luxurious on the MEBO II but, on the other hand, the Mi Amigo had all the Guinness and the tins of sardines that I like very much on toast. All of us disk-jockey's were as thick a thieves and we went off the ship and got together in little small boats and drank together. Of course, all of us had girls names. I was Griselda, Andy Archer was Agatha, Brian McKenzie was Brenda, Keith McLaughlin was Jessie and Bob Noakes was Roberta. About midnight a sailing boat would come over from Radio Caroline with a plastic note from Andy Archer which said: 'Dear Griselda, I know you're out of Guinness. I've sent you some sardines as well with some Melba toast — love Agatha.' The next day we'd go over to them with things which they didn't have. It was a happy existence." 

At RNI, he achieved a certain kind of fame for singing his theme tune live every night over the backing of Junior Walker's Way Back Home and was particularly associated with the popular "RNI Request Show"

Graham's last programme on RNI was broadcast at 0100-0400, CET, on May 24, 1974. He  returned to Radio Caroline. When  the Dutch version of the Marine Offences Act he was able to carry on for a short time by doing his programmes in Amsterdam, recording them in a local record shop.

Thereafter, Graham went to work for Radio Netherlands World Service & carried on working until 1984 when he retired, as, in his own words he "felt I had done enough." However, in 2002, he was tempted back onto the air to present some shows on the short-lived Radio Caroline cable service in Holland.

Graham currently resides in Holland.