Something for everyone at Black Cat Radio

In addition to Black Cat Radio’s weekday shows, we are proud of how we have specialised shows to cover all manner of musical genres. Saturdays and Sundays typify what we mean, with Paul Rushforth and Steve Cross respectively, present a different style of breakfast show, for the three hours from 7am. Dave Thomas’s Saturday Hangover, from 10am till 1pm on Saturday, welcomes requests and dedications.

Black Cat Radio - Credit: Black Cat Radio 

The ever-popular Gillham Gold with Tony Gillham can be heard between 1pm until 2pm on Saturday, just before our Sports Show. Saturday evening sees John Salisbury present a show that takes you back to those evenings getting ready for the nightclub and after Ade Crampton, at 10am Jay Naselli’s Light Night Picture Show showcases the songs from the movies.

On Sunday, after David Mortimer’s Easy Sunday morning, our presenters take you on a journey from the Mod culture, through the sixties , the seventies and eighties, with Ray Steel, Mike Moore and Dave Wiltsher at the helm. Our very own Mad Cat of Black Cat takes over at 6pm with soul music through the decades, and the weekend is rounded off in style with Jhez Bermudhez.

Black Cat Radio was founded by Tony Gillham, a veteran of 50 years of broadcasting. After being told by a number of pirate radio ships when he was 15 that he was ‘too young’ for a job, Tony Gillham set up his own station, which he broadcast to his neighbours.

Tony said: "After setting it up, the local paper in Colchester heard about it and wrote an article about me, and then the radio ships got to hear about it and one of them invited me to go on one for a day, and that’s where it all started.’"

Tony worked at a hospital radio station in Essex for eight years before working in several nightclubs abroad while still sending demonstration tapes to radio stations in the UK. His radio career has seen him in the role of programme controller at Classic Gold Radio, and he has been a presenter on BBC stations, including Radio Jersey and Radio Cambridge for more than 19 years.

Tony set up Black Cat Radio Ltd and in 2015 Ofcom granted the station a full-time FM licence. Tony is one of the station’s directors.