Lisa Stansfield

Lisa’s voice was and is truly wonderful and I knew she was local to Manchester so I was delighted to be able to play it on the show.

After winning the Licence to set up SUNSET RADIO in Manchester, I contacted YELLOW 2 studios in Stockport to get our jingle package done. We agreed on the strap line and we had to find a vocalist. It had to be LISA STANSFIELD. I got in touch with her record company who asked Lisa if she would do it. The message came back a few weeks later and it was no.

I was devastated but accepted that that was it.

A couple of weeks later I was at YELLOW 2 studios working on the music. Suddenly, in walks the secretary from the studio round the corner wanting to borrow a roll of fax paper. After a couple of minutes, she said, “You’ll never guess who is in our studio? No we all said in unison.”Well LISA STANSFIELD is in our studio”.

I could not believe it, this was my chance. I wasn’t sure what I was going to say to her but I went over to the other studio and there was LISA, sitting on the couch drinking a cup of tea. I introduced myself and asked her why she had refused to do our jingle package. She said that she had been told that it was a pirate radio station, and she had been advised not to do it.

When I told her it was a legal station and we were going to play SOUL MUSIC on the airwaves of MANCHESTER, she said she would be delighted to sing our jingles. Six weeks later LISA arrived at YELLOW 2 to record the SUNSET jingles. I had been looking forward to this day for months.

Unfortunately, a couple of days before she was due in I came down with Chicken Pox and was not able to attend the recording session.

We did end up with what many believed was the best jingle package ever recorded in this country. Our strap line was ‘KEEPING THE DREAM ALIVE’. Listen to one of the Sunset Jingles HERE.

In the week that SUNSET went on the air, October 1989, LISA STANSFIELD had her first hit in the UK and she was riding high in the charts with the single ‘ALL AROUND THE WORLD’. We were all delighted that LISA’S voice was played all day on SUNSET on our jingle package.

It really could not have been any better had we planned it ourselves.

Some weeks after launching SUNSET, I contacted LISA’S record company to see if she would be available to come in for a live interview with me. The message came back, YES!

We had a LISA STANSFIELD DAY, playing her music all day and she came in and spent a full hour with me. It was a wonderful day and a wonderful interview. It was certainly a day that I would never forget

MIKE SHAFT
Bolton England

Chart Graphic & new Lisa/Mike Shaft photo added January 2015