Gift Grub

Gift Grub is a series of short comic pieces broadcast on weekdays on The Ian Dempsey Breakfast Show on the Irish commercial radio station Today FM, having been broadcast since May 8, 1999.

"Gift Grub" originally aired on Today FM's predecessor, Radio Ireland as a three-weekly, two minute sketch series called "Starship Compromise", a parody of Star Trek featuring Gerry Adams as a starship captain accompanied by his faithful officer, Martin McGuinness with the two scouring the galaxy, seeking compromise with alien beings.

In 1998, Ian Dempsey who had left RTÉ joined the newly renamed Today FM which had replaced Radio Ireland. A year later, in March 1999, Paul McLoone, a producer who had moved to Dublin around that time from his native Derry in Northern Ireland joined Today FM and subsequently became a producer for the Ian Dempsey Breakfast Show.

McLoone later came up with the concept of "Gift Grub" and was also responsible for co-creating Gift Grub alongside Irish comedian with "Gift Grub" becoming a huge success and helping Today FM gain a stronghold among the listeners in the Republic of Ireland with the first ever Gift Grub sketch airing on May 8, 1999. Seven months later, in November 1999 the Northern Irish pop-punk/New Wave band, The Undertones reformed and following the refusal of original singer Feargal Sharkey to rejoin the band, McLoone became the band's current frontman/lead vocalist with the band to this day regularly touring and performing various gigs all over the world.

For the next five years, McLoone and Rosenstock worked alongside each other with the two participating in various sketches either together or separately with four volumes of Gift Grub being released on CD. In 2004, McLoone resigned as a producer from the Breakfast Show and left Today FM altogether, spending the next two years, freelancing with McLoone even working for a time with the Irish national broadcaster, RTÉ. McLoone later returned to Today FM in 2006 to help produce Tom Dunne's show, "Pet Sounds".

Following Dunne's own resignation from Today FM and joining of Newstalk which occurred two years later in August 2008, McLoone later approached the Today FM staff, asking to be given the opportunity to take over the slot albeit temporarily. The main Today FM staff subsequently agreed, resulting in McLoone stepping down from his role as producer and becoming an official radio presenter instead. Although the role itself was at first originally intended to last for only three months until a new replacement could be found, McLoone later permanently replaced Dunne altogether due to the increasing popularity now associated with him. As such, McLoone eventually made his official on-air debut during September 2008 and he also received his own radio show, "The Paul McLoone Show" which airs from Monday to Thursday and which also at first aired from 7pm to 10pm followed by Ray Foley and later K.C. and then from 7pm to midnight before being given its current timeslot of 9pm to midnight with McLoone's show airing straight after Colm O'Sullivan and later Fergal D'arcy who replaced O'Sullivan due to O'Sullivan retiring after twenty years of being a radio presenter and having become the new Program Director for Today FM.

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