Also known as: Radio U, UFM
Frequency: 98.5FM
Coverage: Christchurch city-wide
Location: 147 Lichfield Street, Christchurch (Boxed Quarter, from 2015)
Format: Independent / Alternative
Founded: 23 February 1976
Active: 1976–present
Website: rdu.org.nz
History
Christchurch has long been perceived as a conservative, more-English-than-England town — but beneath that surface a counter-culture has always stirred, and for fifty years its loudest outlet has been the station that would eventually become RDU 98.5FM. On 23 February 1976, Radio U signed on from inside the University of Canterbury Students’ Association (UCSA), broadcasting on 1503 AM. The facilities were rudimentary at best: presenter Michael Higgins recalled transmitting from “a dressing room in the Ngaio Marsh theatre with egg cartons for insulation.” Broadcast windows were brief and seasonal, timed around the university’s orientation periods.
The station shifted frequencies several times in those early years — 1422 AM by 1985 — before making the leap that would change everything. In 1986, Radio U became UFM and moved to 90.5 FM, making it the first FM station in Christchurch and the first in the South Island after Radio 1. A year later it settled on 98.3 FM, where it would broadcast for the next fifteen years. During summer breaks, the station sometimes filled the schedule with Channel Six, a children’s programme; a wry 1986 Press article noted that “Channel Six was better than Radio U because you didn’t have to be on drugs to listen to it.” By the end of the 1980s the station had rebranded again, as 98-RDU, and in 2002 it moved to its current frequency of 98.5 FM and settled on the name RDU 98.5FM.
A 20-year broadcast licence obtained in 1991 enabled year-round continuous broadcasting and a flourishing of specialist shows. But creative output rarely aligned with financial health. In 1993, the Canta student newspaper reported that RDU had lost $50,000 in the two years since going “private,” and the station remained in more or less constant financial chaos — dependent on UCSA subsidies to survive — through the 1990s and into the 2000s.
Despite the money troubles, the station was building its reputation as the heartbeat of Christchurch’s independent music scene. In 1998 RDU launched the RoundUp band competition, originally held at the Dux de Lux in the city’s Arts Centre precinct. RoundUp — born out of an earlier contest called Not So Young Entertainers — gave local bands a genuine stage and a chance at radio airplay. Over the years it would help launch acts including the Puffins, Tiger Tones, Bang! Bang! Eche!, and The Undercurrents. In 1999, Clowndog (the band of emerging RDU legend Joshua “Spanky” Moore) won RoundUp, beating out a young Shapeshifter in the process. That same year, RDU launched Decknology, a DJ competition modelled on RoundUp’s format; a later Decknology winner, Ruse, would go on to reach the Top 10 at the 2016 Red Bull Thre3style world finals.
Spanky Moore and his co-host Glenn “Wammo” Williams became perhaps RDU’s most celebrated double act. Their breakfast show attracted listeners well beyond the student audience, with guests ranging from Prime Minister Helen Clark to National opposition leader Don Brash — the latter, Spanky recalled, having been convinced to answer audience “love advice” questions. Wammo later moved on to Kiwi FM and Kate Gorgeous took his seat; Spanky eventually carried the breakfast slot alone under “Breakfast with Spanky.” Long-running shows across the schedule — Girl School, The Mixtape Sessions, The Joint, Guitar Media, Dollar Mix, Hauswerk, Vintage Cuts — mapped the full breadth of alternative music culture the station championed. Among the most enduring was The Sheep Technique, a dedicated New Zealand music specialist show that over the years drew on a rotating cast of local music figures as hosts, including Paul Kean of The Bats.
In 2002, James Meharry — DJ Pylonz, and a presenter and sales staffer at the station since the mid-1990s — was handed the unenviable task of managing a business that was, by his own account, “a really struggling” mess. By 2006 the UCSA, unable to resolve the station’s mounting debts and equipment failures, sold RDU’s assets and a portion of its debt to Meharry and his partner Karyn South — for $2. The sale was immediately controversial. Students and long-time listeners accused the UCSA of a “corporate takeover” that betrayed the station’s student-radio heritage; anti-RDU posters appeared around campus, and a group of masked activists staged an attempted studio takeover, only to find they could not operate the equipment. Some press reports — fed by selectively leaked information — stated the price was $1. The reality was that assets changed hands at market value and a new annual licence fee and rental were agreed; what was actually transferred for next to nothing was the station’s mountain of debt. In 2017, shortly after celebrating RDU’s 40th anniversary, Meharry registered RDU98.5FM Ltd as a not-for-profit, formalising the arrangement under which the licence — ultimately controlled by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage — is managed in partnership with the UCSA, with no profit permitted.
RDU’s 30th birthday in 2006 was marked in characteristically large style: the Cheap as Chips festival drew more than 12,000 attendees, with Fat Freddy’s Drop headlining.
On 22 February 2011 at 12:51pm, the Christchurch earthquake struck. The UCSA building at the Ilam campus — where RDU had broadcast since its inception — was severely damaged. Spanky was in the studio at the time. The station’s advertisers and sponsors across the devastated central city were suddenly fighting for their own survival. Rather than go dark, RDU went mobile. Within six months, the team had converted a horse truck into a mobile broadcast unit, christened the RDUnit, and took to the streets. Scottish producer Rachel Morton managed the daily logistics: collecting the truck at 4am from Phantom Billstickers in Sydenham, positioning it for a clear transmitter line of sight to Huntsbury Hill, and handing off to DJ Messenjah (Gabriel Calcott) at 6pm for the return. By 2013, the RDUnit had relocated to Gloucester Street near the recovering CBD, sharing facilities alongside Work and Income staff. In that makeshift studio the team still managed to land notable interviews — including actors James Rolleston and Cliff Curtis discussing the film The Dark Horse.
In 2015, the wandering came to an end. RDU moved into a purpose-fitted studio in the Boxed Quarter development at 147 Lichfield Street, adjacent to music venue BeatBox. The new space finally gave the station a permanent home in a rebuilt central city, with the capacity for live band broadcasts.
RDU’s 40th anniversary in 2016 was marked by the “Alternative Radio” exhibition at Canterbury Museum (18 March – 14 August), curated by former HDU bassist Neil Phillips. The exhibition drew on extensive memorabilia and public programming that featured The Bats, Pacific Heights, The Shocking Pinks, The Transistors, and Lawrence Arabia. The station’s app, with more than 13,000 users, extended its reach well beyond Christchurch’s FM footprint. In 2026, RDU marks its 50th anniversary — half a century of independent broadcasting, student politics, music obsessives, makeshift studios, and Christchurch counter-culture.
The RDUnit was an amazing feat — it was a great icon for the innovative post-quake environment.
Spanky Moore, quoted in AudioCulture, 2017