A few weeks back, Hamish Blake and Andy Lee announced via Instagram that they would be returning to drive time radio. Today, it has come to light that the pair are making a lot of money for their trouble.
How much money are they making? Let’s just say that it’s a great deal. It’s the kind of money that, if someone wrote it down on a piece of paper and slid it across the table to you as a suggested salary, you’d probably slap them in the face.
Okay, fine, if you must know, it’s $4 million each, per year, which makes the pair the highest paid FM radio announcers in Australia.
The Daily Telegraph report that Southern Cross Austereo has been struggling since Kyle Sandilands and Jackie ‘O’ Henderson left 2DayFM, after pay negotiations fell apart.
At the time, Kyle and Jackie O were asking for $2 million each per year to stick around – half of what Hamish and Andy will now earn. This could well be a sign of desperation on Southern Cross Austereo’s part to claw back some of its ratings.
The move has already met with criticism. The Daily Telegraph spoke to a “well-placed industry source” – gotta love those – who called the choice to pay Hamish and Andy so much after ditching Kyle and Jackie O “an unbelievably bad piece of decision making.”
“We’re so stoked to be jumping into the drive slot,” the pair themselves said in a recent statement. “It’s something we’ve always wanted to do. Ever since that time we did it for five years. It’s going to be so much fun.”
Hamish and Andy will take over the national drive time slot in July of next year. A presumably very sad Jules Lund will host the show until then.
Photo: Scott Barbour via Getty Images
