At home with... Ray Foley

One of the new breed of relatively young national radio DJs, 27-year-old Ray Foley has seen his profile rise considerably since he took over Today FM’s lunchtime slot. Previously, he hosted the station’s popular night-time show, The Blast, and prior to that he learned his microphone chops on a variety of local Dublin stations.

Originally from Ballina, County Mayo, he came to Dublin less than a decade ago with the intention of completing a journalism degree in DIT. However, he soon found himself bitten by the broadcasting bug. “I got interested in the pirate radio scene, which meant my degree dragged on longer than I’d planned,” he laughs. “After I finished college, I ended up doing a lot of work-experience in various stations. I got a gig as newsreader on 98FM and then I was with Spin for two years before I got the night-time show on Today FM. About a year ago, I was offered the lunchtime show, which I think has been going quite well so far.”
Foley is way too modest in describing the show as merely, “going quite well” as he’s been nominated for a Meteor Award in the Best National Radio DJ category.
“It’s nice to be nominated but I’m not getting my hopes up too much,” he says. “I’m up against some of my own colleagues like Dempsey, Darcy and Dunne so I’ve some tough competition to contend with (laughs).”
Home for Foley is a semi-detached house in Artane, in north Dublin, which he shares with his wife, RTÉ reporter Kate Carolan (not forgetting Izzy, the fox-hound rescued from an animal shelter).
“We moved here about two or three years ago though we only got married last July,” he says. “Before that we were living in town, in a one-bedroom apartment off the South Circular Road. We were kind of reluctant to move out further. I know I bitched and moaned about it for a while but as soon as we moved, it worked out great. It’s not as far out as I thought it would be anyway – when there’s no traffic the bus gets into town in 15 minutes.”
The house, which originally belonged to Kate’s grandparents, needed some updating; they’ve already extended the kitchen as well as landscaping the garden and adding a deck.
“With an older house there’s always work to be done,” Foley proffers. “I was up in the attic recently and found a hole in the roof-felt where the water was dripping into our spare room. The bathroom is badly in need of a makeover too, so that’s probably our next project.”
Not surprisingly, music forms a central part of the Foley household and the signs of his chosen profession are everywhere. The box room has been converted into a “music room” where – with a little help from IKEA – he keeps his vast collection of CDs. He’s built a mini-studio which he plans to use for putting together various bits for the show.
“I’ve loads and loads of music,” he enthuses. “I’m mad for the whole random thing on the iPod and I’ve something like 27,000 songs digitally ripped. It’s great for picking music for the show. We have a reasonable amount of freedom to explore our own musical tastes but of course I have to understand that Today FM is a formatted station.”
Foley’s music tastes range far and wide and he admits to being “easy going” when it comes to his choice of listening.
“As soon as I get sick of a CD I move onto something else,” he says. “But one album I’m always playing is The Fratellis’ Costello Music especially when I want to be put in a good mood Will Smith’s Greatest Hits is another big favourite and I listen to a lot of radio. In fact I’ve three internet radios around the house – I love listening to Jonathan Ross [BBC Radio 2] on a Saturday morning.”
Movies are another passion for Foley and he has a large DVD collection to call on, as he explains. “I watch movies all the time and my pride and joy is my big screen TV though it’s not as big as I thought it was when I bought it first. The most recent thing I watched was Brave One with Jodie Foster which I found a little disappointing and I’ve just sat through the third Pirates Of The Caribbean which infuriated me.I like my TV box-sets too – Seinfeld, The West Wing and of course The Sopranos and I’m a big fan of Playstation and the Xbox 360.”
Despite his job in the media spotlight Foley says his social life is fairly tame by some standards.
“Lately, we’ve found we’re staying in a lot,” he says. “I’ve never really worked a proper day-job before so having to get out of bed at 7.30am can be crippling to your social life. Even having a few drinks on a school night can be a no-no. When the weekend comes around we’re a bit knackered and we just prefer to take it easy. We’ve recliner couches so that helps (laughs)”
“If we go out, it might be down to the local for a couple of drinks or we’d eat in town, somewhere like Café Bar Deli in George’s Street. But with the new kitchen, we’re going a bit mad on cooking at home so we’re probably eating-in more often these days.”

The Ray Foley Show is on weekdays on Today FM from midday-2.30pm