Roman Kemp shares real reason he quit Capital radio after 10 years

DJ Roman Kemp has revealed the real reason he quit his role on Capital Radio after 10 years on air.

Roman, the son of musician Martin Kemp, originally joined the station back in 2014, later taking over the weekday breakfast slot in 2017 alongside Sian Welby and Chris Stark. His departure was announced back in October 2023 and his final show was broadcast on 28 March 2024.

Reflecting on his time on-air, the 31-year-old explained that leaving the role has had a major impact on his life (via OK!).

"In a way, you get your life back. I went through a period of spinning too many plates and I think you come to a point where you want to know if your work is controlling you too much," he said, adding that having such a demanding job was causing him a lot of stress.

"My work was controlling my happiness. I had no time to work out what made me happy. I was working constantly."

Roman has since been enjoying discovering the world outside of work, adding to The Sun: "It feels like I now have a world I never knew existed. It was so much fun, but you are in your own bubble."

Roman had previously revealed that his decision to leave Capital was in part due to 'reliving' the death of his friend and producer Joe Lyons back in 2020.

Roman had worked with the presenter on the weekday show and was in the middle of a broadcast in August 2020 when he learned that his friend had died by suicide.

(Jim Dyson/Redferns)

"I went through such a horrible moment in that room, in that studio," he told the BBC.

"Four years on and I've been living that same day over and over again, without the awful event.

"For me, I'm quite ready to go, 'OK, close that door now, don't keep going back living that horrible day over again'," he added, stressing that it was important for him to 'close this chapter' of his life.

"Imagine a tragedy happened in your house, you're going to want to move."

Kemp left Capital earlier this year. (Tristan Fewings/Getty Images)

However, Roman won't have too much spare time on his hands as he has recently enjoyed several presenting jobs for BBC and ITV, most recently co-hosting the BRIT Awards alongside Maya Jama and Clara Amfo. He is also the host of BBC show The Finish Line alongside Sarah Greene.

He made sure to leave Capital with a bang, revealing he deleted the group WhatsApp upon his departure.

"When I was at Capital, I was in control of the WhatsApp group. The day that I left, I was like, 'I am refusing to be ejected from this group'," he added.

"Instead, at 10.01am, when everyone was going, 'Well done', I secretly deleted the entire group. I blew up the WhatsApp group. I wasn't having it. I opened that group ten years ago . . . I was going to be the one to close it."