Tommy Vance

Richard Anthony Crispian Francis Prew Hope-Weston (11 July 1940 – 6 March 2005), known professionally as Tommy Vance, was an English radio broadcaster. He was an important factor in the rise of the new wave of British heavy metal, along with London-based disc jockey Neal Kay, in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Vance was one of the first radio hosts in the United Kingdom to broadcast hard rock and heavy metal in the early 1980s, providing the only national radio forum for both bands and fans. The Friday Rock Show that he hosted gave new bands airtime for their music and fans an opportunity to hear it. He used a personal tagline of "TV on the radio". His voice was heard by millions around the world announcing the Wembley Stadium acts at Live Aid in 1985.

Born Richard Anthony Crispian Francis Prew Hope-Weston in Eynsham, Oxfordshire, on 11 July 1940, his grandmother owned a travelling repertory theatre company, his father was an electronics engineer, and his mother a former singer and dancer.

Expelled from school at 15 for truancy, Vance got his first job as trainee manager at the Hyde Park Hotel in London. He joined the merchant navy in 1956, aged 16, as a cabin boy. While docked in New York City listening to U.S. radio, Vance was inspired to begin toying with becoming a disc jockey. Like a number of his contemporaries, while growing up in the 1950s, he listened to British broadcasting, but he fell in love with the brash sound and format of American commercial radio.

When Vance returned to the UK, he worked as a mechanic for a jukebox company so that he could hear music for free. Unable to find an opening in British radio, he enrolled at a Northern Irish college, where he also became a part-time actor and stagehand. He joined the Ulster Bridge Repertory Company, run by the actor James Ellis, as a stage manager.

In 1964, Vance moved to Vancouver, Washington, in pursuit of his first wife, Fern. He was hired by KOL Seattle as its prime drive-time jock. The programme was originally intended for another presenter who pulled out of the deal at the last moment. The station had invested heavily with the jingle package and pre-launch publicity that it had developed for the original "Tommy Vance". Vance recalled: "The station asked if I would take the name as they had already made the jingles for him. I said, for that kind of money you can call me what you like mate!".

He got into a pay dispute with KOL and quit and went on to voice his displeasure on rival KJR where he co-hosted for a few days with KJR's prime time jock Pat O'Day.

From there Vance moved to Los Angeles, where he was offered a show by programming consultant Bill Drake on KHJ radio (aka Boss Radio), holding the evening 9-midnight airshift at KHJ for a few months in late 1965.

KHJ was one of the most successful and influential Top 40 stations of the era and California in 1965 was a great place to be. However, the United States also was then involved in the Vietnam War. When Tommy received draft papers for the U.S. Army, he decided it was time to return to the UK. For the next several months Vance filed occasional phone-in reports for KHJ covering the British music scene.