DJ Prendeville slams 'online bullying' by Keith Barry
Cork 'shock jock' DJ Neil Prendeville has hit back at claims that he 'snubbed' Keith Barry in retracting an invitation to appear on his show - and has accused the well-known mentalist of 'online bullying'.
It's the latest broadside in a war of words which erupted between the two last Friday when Prendeville refused to interview Barry on his Red FM show after learning he had also been on a rival station shortly beforehand.
Barry, in Cork to promote his Brain Hacker show in the city in May, appeared on 96fm's Opinion Line on Friday morning between 9am and 10am (for those not familiar with the Cork radio landscape, 98fm is the station that was home to Prendeville for many years before he was poached by Red FM recently).
The main man @Keithpbarry hacked us senseless on @OpinionLine96 today! A great guy and a class act. Thanks Keith! pic.twitter.com/U7UYgr67w8
— PJ Coogan (@pjcoogan) April 11, 2014
Barry was then booked to appear on Prendeville's show - only, as he claims, to have been turned away at reception.
Had a blast on @Corks96FM this morning.was supposed to be on @CorksRedFM but they rudely cancelled as Neil acting like a premadonna!
— Keith Barry (@KeithpBarry) April 11, 2014
"Having been a professional entertainer for 15 years I have never met such unprofessionalism," Barry wrote on his Facebook page later.
"Neil Prendeville, new to the station refused to have me on because I had just been on 96.
" I thought it was a wind-up at first as they had asked for no exclusivity and actually asked me 2 days prior to develop new material to perform on his fellow DJ KC which took me hours to do.
"These are hours I could have spent doing other things."
However this morning Prendeville addressed the issue on his show, describing Barry's Facebook comments and tweets to his over 50,000 followers as "online bullying".
"To threaten someone with Twitter, or to engage in Twitter or Facebook attacks - this is bullying, lads," he said on air.
"This is bullying, pure and simple."
He went on to add that Barry's encouragement of his followers to boycott the show was "wrong".
"Never mind about me," he added. "Take me out of the frame."
"It jeopardises innocent people and jeopardises their jobs."
Listen to Neil Prendeville's full on-air statement this morning
Red FM also published a blog post online which gave details at odds with Barry's version of events.
"(Prendeville's) show was contacted by Keith Barry’s management a number of weeks ago to come on the show," according to the article.
"Neil says at no stage was it mentioned that he would be doing the same format, on the same morning on 96FM and had he known that he would have urged Keith to pick one radio station on that morning and re-schedule the other for another day.
"His PR firm was contacted and his appearance was cancelled."
According to the Prendeville camp, Barry then arrived at the studios and "demanded to be taken on air".
Keith Barry has yet to respond to Prendeville's comments - but this one could run and run.
