23 January 1992
I’m a child of two-channel Ireland, and in January 1992 both those channels went on strike. The RTÉ industrial action lasted four weeks, during which time RTÉ 1 and the then-Network 2 showed repeats and minimal news headlines, while on the radio 2FM played non-stop music without the intervention of DJs. No one complained much. Sports Stadium one Saturday afternoon, for example, showed the full epic France – Brazil 1986 World Cup quarter-final. Even when a sensational political story—the surprise shafting of the heretofore unshaftable Charles Haughey—broke during the strike, it felt of a part with the general surreal air.
I also remember seeing a newspaper photo of 2FM DJs Ian Dempsey and Larry Gogan outside RTÉ with union placards in hand. If even the famously easy-going Larry was on the barricades then clearly there was only one correct side of the line in that dispute. I wonder how many other impressionable young Irish people of the time may have been subconsciously won over to the left not by the works of Marx or Engels, or by a Che Guevara poster, but by the iconography of Larry Gogan on a picket line.
Anyway, I mention all this, and Larry in particular, because he obviously wouldn’t have been doing his usual Irish chart show on 2FM during the strike. It seems to have caused a bit of confusion about the charts at that time, because my usual Wikipedia reference now shows ‘Twilight Zone’ by 2 Unlimited as number one for the week of 23 January 1992 on the basis of an Irish top ten reported by Europe-wide magazine and chart monitor Music & Media, despite the official IRMA database today still listing it as peaking at no. 2. For the sake of completeness, plus some solidarity, I’ll include it here too; even though his photo greets us from the welcome page of the IRMA database website, I’m sure comrade Larry would approve.
The most famous and—yes—beloved 2 Unlimited hit, ‘No Limit’, will top the Irish charts a year later. ‘Twilight Zone’ doesn’t have any vocal zingers to match that track’s memorable catchphrases; Anita’s chorus is fairly nondescript and Ray’s rap was cut from the version released in the UK and Ireland. So, the success of ‘Twilight Zone’ is mostly down to its means of production: the big, big early-’90s Eurohouse beat and a jackhammer synth riff, wielded with righteous zeal. Techno-techno-techno-technosocialism!
