Steve Lamacq to step back from BBC Radio 6 Music show | BBC

Steve Lamacq, the BBC Radio 6 Music DJ, is to step back from presenting his drive-time show full-time after 18 years.

Addressing listeners on Friday, the broadcaster said he was “a bit knackered” from hosting the teatime show five days a week since 2005.

Lamacq, 58, is scheduled to take a break from October, before returning with a new teatime show on Mondays from January. Huw Stephens, who regularly deputises for Radio 6 DJs including Lamacq, will take over the slot from Tuesdays to Fridays.

Lamacq said: “The obsessive way I do this job hasn’t really left enough time [for my family].

“On top of that, I’m going to be 59 next month and there are some other things which I’d quite like to do while I can.”

Lamacq has been a contributor to BBC Radio since the early 1990s, having been a journalist at the music magazine NME.

He co-presented The Evening Session on Radio 1 with Jo Whiley from 1993-97, before moving to 6 Music.

After the semi-retirement from his staple slot, Lamacq said he wanted to “give something back and try and find a more practical way of supporting the live music circuit, which I owe so much to”.

“It will be a wrench to leave this slot full-time,” he added. “But after 36 years in radio and journalism chasing around after new bands, I’m a bit knackered.

“The family at this point comes first because they’ve been there for me – and now I want to be there for them.”

Lamacq is married to a psychologist, Dr Jen Wills, with whom he has a young daughter.

He was described as a “legend” by the head of 6 Music, Samantha Moy.

“He is one of our finest,” she said. “While we were tucked up in bed, he was at a gig, watching someone unheard or unsigned, that he’ll play on the radio, who might then become your new obsession.”

Stephens will broadcast from Cardiff, where he is a regular presenter for BBC Radio Wales, as part of the corporation’s plans to shift more of its operation outside London.