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Pirate Radio: Mavericks on the High Seas · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hey, everybody. I don't know if you've heard, but we
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: have a book coming out finally, finally, after all these years.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: It's great, it's flun You're gonna love it. It's called
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Stuff You Should Know Colon an incomplete compendium of mostly
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: interesting things. Ye, and it's twenty six jam packed chapters
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: that we wrote with another guy named Knowls Parker, who's
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: amazing and is illustrated amazingly by our illustrator Carl Manardo.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: And it's just an all around joy to pick up
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: and read. Even though we haven't physically held in our
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: hands yet, it's like we have Chuck in our dreams
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: so far. I can't wait to actually see and hold
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: this thing and smell it. And so should you, so
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: pre order now. It means a lot to us. The
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: support is a very big deal, So pre order anywhere
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: books are sold. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: production of My Heart Radios How Stuff works, Hey, and
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: welcome to up up the volume. I'm Josh, there's Chuck.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: Jerry's out there somewhere raging against the machine. And this
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: is um bubble to say, it's just Stuff you should Know.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: I love it. When I sent you this, uh, this research.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: You are like, the first thing you said, let's pump
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: up the volume. Sure. Man, it's such a great movie.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: You know, it's funny is I didn't think about that
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: once until you said that, and I was like, oh yeah, yeah,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: it was all about piracy and radios. Yeah, I love
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: that movie. I just hadn't seen it, and I don't know,
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: I don't think probably since then. It has a really
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: has a good soundtrack, has bad Brains and Henry Rawlins
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: doing kick out the jams you see five songs. It
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: also has probably the best sound Garden song of all
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: time heretic. Yeah, well it's tough to call for me
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: is a sound Garden nut, but yeah, good song. It
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: is a good song. Which one is better than that?
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: I like a lot of sound Garden, so yeah, I
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: have probably twenty tied for songs. Okay, but is that
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: one of them? Yeah, it's up there. Oh thanks for that.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: I love it. It's great. I mean I love all
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: sound Garden songs. Yeah, I guess I do too, now
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: that I think about it, I think I could have
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: had something to do with Chris Cornell's voice to an extent.
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: Man r I P Yeah, for real. I used to
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: joke about the imagining the first time that he like
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: sung in the shower when he was thirteen or something.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: He was like, what, I'm like, Oh, I think I
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: know what I'm gonna do for a living. Yeah, exactly, shower.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: So we're talking about pump up the volume and Chris
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Cornell right now, because this episode is about pirate radio,
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: and specifically it's about the British pirate radio invasion of
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: the sixties that I had no idea about. I've never
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: seen that movie, um, Pirate Radio, but I intend to
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: now have you seen it? I haven't seen the movie,
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: but I was acquainted with the story somehow. I think
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: I might have seen a short documentary or or something
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: about the Caroline and uh, really really cool stuff it is,
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: which is why we're going to talk about it in
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: this episode. But um, I just found the whole thing.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: I don't know if mind blowing is the right word,
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: but certainly deeply interesting. And I think it's cool because
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: it's one of those like pieces to the jigsaw puzzle
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: of history, at least like rock history, that you didn't
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: even realize, like you didn't you didn't have you know,
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: And by you I mean me. Yeah, And Here's the
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: thing is, there were other pirate radio stations all around
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: the world, and there always have been since there's been
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: radio and restrictions on radio. But he and as long
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: as there's rock, Chuck, there always will be. That's true.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: But the the UK version was sort of the most
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: celebrated and the most famous. I think obviously why they
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: made a movie about it. And one of the reasons
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: is because the man whose thumb they were under was
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: the BBC, which is a big deal. It was a
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: big deal because here in the United States and I know,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: um ahoy to all of you listeners outside of the
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: United States who are you're like, well, yeah, we we
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: this is what it was like. Um, in the United States,
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: the radio spectrum has always been very free, or it
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: was intended to be very free, to where um, there
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: was a multiplicity of voices and you could say a
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: lot of stuff got a little stodgy, and it was
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: kind of stodgy from the outset. But for the most part,
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: it wasn't just one monolithic organization that controlled all of
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: the radio waves. That's just not how it's been in
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: the States and in places like the UK. That's how
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: it was basically, right out of the gate. They said, Um,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: you know, we this is a really valuable tool. You
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: can really shape people's minds with this. So we're going
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: to leave it specifically under government control. Like we'll provide
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: a bunch of different stuff. Not everything you want, um,
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: but a lot of stuff. Especially if you're a stodgy conservative,
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: old establishment type, you're gonna love what we're pumping out.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: But um, the point is it's too important to just
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: kind of let anybody come along as the money for
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: a radio license to just set up a radio station.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: That seems absurd. Only the the Looney colonies would do
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: something like that. Yeah, So the BBC had a very
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: vice like grip, like you were saying, for geez, about
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: forty something years and then you know, the sixties come along,
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: and like so many other things in America and the UK, uh,
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: kids that were born of these World War two I
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: guess you would call them baby boomers or booms or boomers.
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: The babies of those boomers where rock and roll kids.
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: You know, they grew up seeing Elvis and the Beatles
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: on television, and they were not square like their parents were,
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: and they had different ideas and their parents did. And
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: this was the case in England in the nineteen sixties
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: when the BBC was you know, rock and roll was
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: was a thing and they were like, we're not playing this,
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: this devil's music. They probably didn't say that that was
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: more American if you, but if you, it was certainly controversial.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: UM songs that seemed to us like I mean, like
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: you just hear him on an elevator today, like they
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: were highly controversial back then, you know, and like there
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: was genuinely nowhere on the radio in the UK for
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: you to reliably turn to to hear this stuff. You
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: have to go to like a club um to hear them,
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: and those were few and far between. And then if you,
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: um were lucky enough, you might be able to occasionally
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: dial in Radio Luxembourg, which played some of these like
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: pop hits, but they were also it was still largely
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: controlled by a few record labels, so it didn't just
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: they didn't go deep. It was still like whatever new
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: big band they were trying to promote, but it was
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: still way cooler than anything the BBC was promoting. The
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: problem is that the reception was certainly spotty. Have you
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: ever been to Luxembourg? I have not. I may have
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: passed through it not known it. They blinked, but I
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: don't believe I have. It's so under the radar. I
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: flew out of there once. That's the only thing I've
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: been to Luxembourg is flew home from Europe out of
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: Luxembobourg airport. So that's my only like, I don't know
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: anything about it as a place. It's it's interesting. It's
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: like the Delaware of Europe. It's right, it may or
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: may not exist. Yeah. So um, that was pretty much
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: the long and short of it. The BBC didn't really
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: didn't really care that the teenagers wanted more. They just
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: said no. They might have even said nine at this point,
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Yeah, And this is where
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: a gentleman comes in the picture that would really change everything.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: And his name is uh Ronan and I've heard Americans
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: pronounced it O'Reilly. It's spelled oh little accent capital r
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: A h I L l y. And I heard him
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: speak his name in court when they asked his surname.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: But he said it so quickly it sounded like a dolly.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: It sounded like a d So it may just be
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: like some weird like you know, Irish pronunciation or something
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: that I don't know about, but we're gonna say Riley.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: I mean that's how Yeah, that's how I heard it too. Um.
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: But yeah, so he sounded like Brad Pitt and snatched
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: sort of. I couldn't understand him. That's where there was
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: a d in there. But he was He was a
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: guy who uh figured out that their jurisdiction over the airwaves,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: the BBC and the UK government's jurisdiction stopped about five
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: kilometers off the coast three miles here in the States.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: And he said, and there were he didn't invent the
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: idea of planning a boat out there and broadcasting. Other
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: countries were doing this kind of thing and exploiting this
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: loophole already, but he said, this is this is something
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: we should do. The kids want their rock and roll,
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: they want their MTV. We don't know what that is yet,
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: and I'm gonna bring it to him. Yeah. So um,
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: he he actually took inspiration. Like you're saying, there was
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: some Scandinavian countries, specifically Sweden and Denmark that had been
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: home to pirate radio stations that were docked off of
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: their coast, and for very similar reasons too. There was
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: a state monopoly on radio broadcasting at the time, and
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: some people were like, uh no, that's I want to
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: broadcast what I want to broadcast. So they set up
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: those shops, I mean, all the way back in the fifties.
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: And I actually ran across one in the United States
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: to bring it on home that was operating in the
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: nineteen thirties three um, and it had a call sign
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: r x k R, and it was out of Panama,
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: even though it was off of the coast of Long Beach.
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: And I think, Chuck, I think, I think we either
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: talked about it in our Prohibition episode or we talked
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: about it in our Who Owns the Oceans episode, but
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: it was it was originally one of those floating speakeasy
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: casinos doctor National Waters. Then they started to broadcast radio
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: pirate radio is well for a little while, so it
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: had happened before. And there was actually because of the
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: success of the Scandinavian stations, there was kind of this
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: mad rush in the UK to be the first too,
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: to see I guess um and start broadcasting, and Ronan
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: O'Reilly beat them all with what came to be known
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: as Radio Caroline. Yeah, so he was sort of in
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: a tight race with another guy named Alan Crawford who
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: had a project called his was gonna be Radio Atlanta.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: I think it was called Project Atlanta. Nothing to do
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: with Atlanta, Georgia, Atlanta, Texas. From what I saw, really,
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: I figured it was just a riff on Atlantic As
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: in the ocean. No one of the one of the owners,
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: um was a from Dallas, I believe, is a radio
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: man from Texas, and for some reason he chose Atlanta
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: after Atlanta, Texas. I did another ones in Atlanta, Texas.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: I didn't neither. Neither did the people who live in Atlanta, Texas. So, um,
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: they're the Delaware of Texas. That's all right. So there
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: was I think o'reiley got about half a dozen investors.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: Because this is gonna call some money. Because you gotta
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: buy a ship. Um, it can't just be a little
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: dinghy or or a rowboat or anything like that. You
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: have to get it takes. It takes a shipload of equipment. Yeah,
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: it takes, and people to operate it and people to
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: stay on it and stuff like that in meeting rooms,
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: and so you gotta have a legit ship. So um
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: Crawford for Radio Atlanta got the MI Amigo and O'Riley
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: got a passenger ferry, a Danish ship called the Envy Frederica.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: They each renamed them Uh Atlanta and then Caroline, respectively,
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: apparently Caroline after Caroline Kennedy because he, as Laura Goes,
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: saw a picture. O'Riley saw a photo of Little Caroline
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: and Little John Jr. Dancing in the Oval Office and
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: he was inspired by that because he was like, this
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: is what we're trying to do, like sort of uh,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: you know, you're not allowed to dance in the Oval Office,
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: yet they're doing it, and we're not allowed to broadcast
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: rock and roll music because the government says so. So
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm gonna name after Caroline, very cute name.
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: It is very cute. Um. So that's the name that
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: he went with. And I'm glad that he was one
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: of the I'm glad he was the one who who
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: made it first because he was the one who was
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: doing it. I guess as as purely as you would
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: expect somebody to be doing with like a constant rotation
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: of DJ's operating twenty four hours a day, legitimately broadcasting
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: from the ship, and that was not Radio Atlanta's model.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: At all. They were compiling shows or day's worth of
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: shows in the studio back in London, recording them and
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: then sailing it out to the ship. It was really
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: it was also, I mean there was like banking concerns
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: that were invested in it was. It was ill legit
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: as far as pirate radio goes from the outset. So
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: I'm glad that they weren't the ones who made it
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: to market first. Yeah. So Radio Caroline. Their slogan was
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: your all day music station because of seven format, and
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: it was new and in and of itself, right, Yeah,
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: I mean as far I mean as far as playing music, absolutely,
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: and they just within a few months. I think they
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: launched in on Easter Sunday nineteen sixty four with the
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: Stones tune It's all over Now perfect. I saw not
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: fade Away. I saw it's all over Now. Actually I
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: saw in the Guardian and then one other source not
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: fade Away, and then I I also saw um all
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: over Now. But I saw both enough legit places that
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: I'm I honestly don't know. Yeah, I saw not fade
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: Away was the station's theme song, so who knows, And
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: then they got someone else to compose an original theme
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: song because I think they didn't want to keep playing that.
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: But at any rate, they launched and it didn't take
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: long until they had a larger audience than all of
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: the BBC stations combined. That's wonderful. And they quickly merged,
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: I think if it goes from Easter Sunday, they merged
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: in July, just a few months later with Radio Atlanta.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: I guess they figured they had uh, just more power together.
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: And then the Mi Amigo they became um the Carolina
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: North in the Caroline South, broadcasting from due different places. Yeah,
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: which covered almost all of the UK, but not all
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: of it. There was some southwestern parts that just didn't
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: didn't get it from either ship they had. They had
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: pretty good coverage of of the aisles for sure with
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: those two ships. And then eventually Radio Atlanta went under
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: as an organization and Radio Caroline was able to take
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: over both of those ships. So they had that they had,
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: I mean, for a pirate radio station, they they had
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: a lot of power behind them, for sure. Yeah, and
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: I don't I mean, we haven't said the obvious. They
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: were called pirate radio because they were operating on ships
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: in the ocean and flouting the law, So it was
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: sort of doing double duty there with the name. Yeah,
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: there's actually some really great pieces out they're on the
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: internet about this this era UM. And one of them
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: I saw was they said, like, from the moment they
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: started broadcasting, it was basically immediately called pirate radio. For
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: some reason, those two words together just seem they just
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: strike something in you, you know, Yeah, yeah, for sure.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: And there's there's lots of cool documentaries to UM in
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: addition to the narrative film, which obviously takes a lot
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: of liberties, and we'll talk a little bit about that,
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: but a lot of cool short documentaries and even longer documentaries.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: You wanna take an ad break, Yeah, true pirates. Right,
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: we'll be right back, everybody, all right, We're back, hopefully.
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: Those were the bosses ads you've ever heard. Yeah, I'm
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: sure they were very subversive and flouting h anti establishment exactly.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: So UM Radio carolines up and running. And when I
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: said earlier, Chuck that there was like a UM it
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: represents a piece of the puzzle of rock and roll history,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: even pop culture history that I didn't realize, what I
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: didn't know existed. But when I said that, I meant
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: this this specific group of pirate radio stations, but really
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: Radio Caroline, from what I can tell, had such a
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: pronounced effect on music that they they actually managed to
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: reshape it and rechange it because the BBC was basically saying,
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: we're only playing stagy stuff your parents like, like literally
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: square records. That's how square the music we're playing is. Um,
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: we there's no place for you bands to play the
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: music you want to play, so you have to make
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: your make music that we will play on BBC. And
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden, now there was this really potent
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: outlet that hadn't existed before. And those bands that had
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: started out kind of prim and BBC ready were now
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: able to start taking acid like on a daily basis
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: and really explore like their musical um abilities and try
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: new things. And they knew that there was a good
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: chance that it would get played on Radio Caroline or
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: some of the other pirate radio stations, and in that
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: it actually shaped psychedelia. It's shaped the psychedelic music scene,
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: um by just giving it a place to start. Yeah,
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: I mean they had to fill it. Says here about
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: songs each week because they were going seven that was
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: each DJ that had to Yeah, that's a lot of music,
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: and you know, you gotta you didn't want to just
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: play the same stuff over and over. They wanted to
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: follow and they could follow the American Top forty sort
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: of system where you you play the hits, and you
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: play the hits a little more, but then you also
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: try and break new music and this house stuff works.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: Article says that the Moody Blues we're a band that
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: kind of came directly out of pirate radio as far
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: as being broken on pirate radio, starting to do experimental
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: stuff and that wouldn't obviously get played on the BBC anywhere,
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: but having started out as playing music that would get
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: played on the BBC and then being allowed to kind
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: of alter what they wanted to be totally. And Um,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: one of the song I saw that's widely considered the
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: first pirate radio hit of um the Swinging sixties in
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: the UK because Tom Jones, it's not unusual. Good song. Now,
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: that is unusual as far as facts go. Uh you
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: think that makes the Carlton Dance one degree remove from
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: British sixties pirate radio. I would not have seen that
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: connection before. Yeah, And I mean you hear it's not
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: unusual it's a cool song and Tom Jones was a
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: cool dude. But it definitely it feels way more square
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: to my ears now than than early psychedelia for sure.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: I mean sure, the whole thing is from front to
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: back about smoking hash and how much Tom Jones loved
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: his hash. But it's still today it seems a little tame,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: for sure. Yeah, he was so great. He's Welsh, right,
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: I don't know, probably I think he's Welsh. Okay, we'll
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: go with that. So one of the big DJs, and
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: they had a you know, a whole rotation of DJs
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: that all loved what they did, and most of them
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: went on to be DJs for life. Some stayed with
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: Radio Caroline for life. Um. I guess that's the sort
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: of spoiler, is that they're still around today and you
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: can listen to them on the internet and on the radio,
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: even though they have a legal license now. But I
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: was listening to their their stream. Uh you can stream
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: sort of the classic version, which is music from back then,
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: and it's just fantastic. Uh, it's like a good WFMU playlist.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: If you ever remember, we were on FMU for a while.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: The classic New Jersey freeform radio station. That's so great.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: They clearly had some space to fill too. Yeah, so
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: I encourage you to go listen to to Radio Caroline
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: and check it out. But one of the more famous
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: DJ's to come out of that scene was Tony Blackburn.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: And he was a fan of Radio Luxembourg just as
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: a listener and saw an ad in the n M E.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: Uh New Musical Express still a great magazine. Sure, it's
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: been around since the fifties. I read, Oh, it's fantastic,
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: Uh that Melody Maker are two of the best. And
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: he basically applied to this for this job, got it
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: and uh became one of the more popular DJs on
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: on that ship. Yeah, he was one. Um, I mean
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: kind of going down through history. Pete Tong started out
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: on Pirate Radio. Uh. He's very well known DJ and
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: supposedly also UM. I think we mentioned him in the
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: Cockney rhyming slang episode where Everything's gone all wrong. It's
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: gone Pete Tong. Well, yeah, we definitely did, because we
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: talked about that. It's better than nothing, I think. Um.
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: And then there was another very famous DJ. Um his name, Yeah,
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: he's I'm the DJ, He's the rapper. Remember that they
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: had to explain it to everybody on one of their
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: so H. The guy I'm thinking of his DJ Andy
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Archer and Um. He is a very well known DJ,
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: has been for many many years. I think he started
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: out in the sixties. I don't know if he's on
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Caroline or Radio London one of the competitors, but he
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: UM is known to have coined the term an iraq
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: and in the UK I didn't know this, but antarak
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: is slang for like a super nerdy obsessive fan basically
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: um and the term was coined because Andy Archer UM
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: called some of the nerdy mail radio pirate radio fans
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: who were like so obsessed with the whole thing they
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: would actually hire boats to take them out to the
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: ships that were UM broadcasting. They would normally wear like
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: antaracts because of the weather. So in anarak apparently gets
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: its its origin from pirate radio too well. And that's
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: one of the cool things about the early days of
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: pirate radio is they didn't have ratings to depend on.
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: They got their feedback from uh kind of like us
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: from from hearing from people. We we get it via
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: email and stuff like that. But they got bags and
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: bags of mail just like us. Just like us, um,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: people would stop by their office, like you said, on
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: by boat, just specific us. That's happened to us before,
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: even though it's you know, not encouraged any longer, and
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: especially now during the lockdown there's no one here, um,
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: but people would show up. They would send them gifts.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: I think Blackburn was the one that said he would
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: tell listeners that when he got back to land and
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: he would drive away in his little sports car, that
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: he would give away just you know, records. He would
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: give away forty five's and this obsolete vinyl. And he
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: said it would take him an hour and a half
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: to get out of town just because he was mobbed
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: by kids on the street looking for looking for him,
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: looking to get a piece of him, looking to get
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: one of those records. It was like true true fandom. UM.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: I read uh, I read something about Tony Blackburn that
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: apparently he once did a live performance of Tie Yellow
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: Ribbon around the old Oak Tree um in a cage
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: full of lions with a lion t very psychedelic song.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: It is, isn't that weird? Yeah? Why, I don't know.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: I think that's just Tony Blackburn. That's the impression I
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: have Uh. Other DJ was an American named Mike Pasternak.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: His DJ name was Emperor Roscoe, and he still sort
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: of apparently wears this skull and crossbones baseball hat. And
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: I get a feeling all these people like this is
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: their cred. They still really hang their hat on this
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: experiences like these rock and roll mavericks from the sixties, Right,
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: That's the impression I have too. But the thing is is, like,
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: you know, I think most people assume that these ships
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: were just like party boats basically, and from what I
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: can tell, that's just not the case at all. That
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: they were largely staffed by professional acting DJs, even though
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: a lot of them were not professionals at all. Like
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: you said, it was a Blackburn that that had. He
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: answered an ad in the New musical Express Blackburn. Did
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: Pastor knack the American was he had a little bit
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: of experience with military radio on an aircraft carrier two years. Yeah,
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: and thought he brought sort of a polish that the
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: British guys didn't have. He said they didn't have the
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: technique yet. But um, yeah, by all accounts they were pros.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: They weren't like in the movie. I think they really
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: play it up as just sort of a big party barge, sure,
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: which I mean that's a movie kind of thing to do,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: for sure. And they were allowed apparently only two beers
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: a day, and uh, they could play cards, they could
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: watch TV, they could sunbathe, and I think Pastor Neck
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: said occasionally some some women would come aboard for a
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: cup of tea. So, uh, you know, well, I don't
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: know if that story is fully true, but I don't
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: do either. I think they actually did have tea with
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: some of the antarraxx that showed up probably so so. UM.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: So we've got Radio Caroline. It's operating, it's going pretty well. Um,
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: but there was an incident that went down, um, I
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: think in nineteen sixty six, maybe maybe sixty seven. Um,
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: which kind of us to show you, like, Radio Caroline
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: is this huge smash success and it's allowed to operate, um,
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: flouting the laws of the UK um for a few
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: years before the UK government finally said enough is enough
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: and um they passed something called the Marine Broadcasting Offenses Act,
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: And supposedly the thing that really prompted them to take
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: action was that there was a hostile physical takeover of
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: one of the pirate radio stations. Um. There was a
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: radio station called Radio City that had taken over a
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: set of abandoned sea forts that were jutting out of
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: the North Sea. And there was a disagreement between a
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: Radio Atlanta owner, the chairman of it, and the guy
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: who was running Radio City, REDG. Calvert, and the other guy,
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: Lord Smedley. UM shot REDG. Calvert with the shotgun when REDG.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: Calvert came to negotiate with him about getting a I
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: think a transmitter back or something like that. And the
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: fact that like these guys were now physically invading one
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: another's ships and we're shooting one another, um, really kind
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: of brought home that the you know, the fact that
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: everybody had been calling it pirate radio for a while
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: made it seem pirate, but not in the good kind
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: of pirate, you know what I mean, like the real
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: life kind of pirate thing all of a sudden, and
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: that forced the British government's hand. Yeah. I think what
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: I saw was that Smedley was trying to uh, trying
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: to get another merger going and just grow this empire
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: with Radio City, and offered up this transmitter to Calvert.
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: It didn't work. Calvert didn't want to pay him for it,
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: and so Smedley literally sent, like in the dead of night,
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: these guys to board the ship and get it back,
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: like true pirate style. And Calvert didn't take kindly to that,
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: so he threatened him went to his house and was
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: met with a shotgun. I saw that he was not
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: the type to threaten anybody, um, but that the Smedley's
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: house keeper tried to keep Calvert from entering I guess
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: his study or his office or something. They got into
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: a scuffle and um Smedley shot him with a shotgun
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: and fort manslaughter. He you know, apparently claimed self defense
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: because I don't know the laws were like back then.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: But the guy did come to his house and he
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: claimed he felt threatened. Yeah, and so he was ultimately acquitted.
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: But the large the larger impact that it had on
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: pirate radio in the UK is that Marine Broadcasting Offenses Act,
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: which um, you could get up to two years in
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: the pokey for that, not to mention all of the fines,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: and um. One of the things that they really kind
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: of passed this law on was not like, oh, these
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: guys are actually shooting each other and now we got
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: to do something. It was this idea that their broadcast
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: could interfere with marine distress signals, and that is an ongoing,
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: long standing establishment government opposition to pirate radio. That's typically
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: what they go to the public with, like, Hey, you
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: want to be out at sea trying to get help
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: and some kids are spinning the who and nobody can
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: hear you because your signals being infringed on. We don't
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: want that either. Let's all get rid of the pirate
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: radio stations. But that doesn't seem to be the real
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: reason why governments tend to oppose pirate radio. It's usually
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: that they're protecting the interests of the corporations who have
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: legitimate licenses and usually a lot more sway with the
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: government than some kids who got their hands on a
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: German merchant vessel and started broadcasting you know, sixties soul
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: from it. Yeah, and that's I mean, we'll get to
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: America today. But that's that's exactly how they frame it
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: today as well, is that you're going to get in
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: the way of legitimate signals in case of distress. Um,
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: because well, we won't go there yet, but uh O'Riley
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: keeps Radio Caroline going. His ship was seized by Dutch authorities,
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: but he got it back. Um, he kept it going.
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: There were some I think George Harrison gave them like
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: a substantial check to keep it going because he believed
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: in their mission in the seventies. And Tom Jones chipped
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: in a bunch of hash, of course he did, which
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: is more valuable than money, as we all know. Uh.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: But both of the boats, the Caroline North and the South,
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: had a couple of incidents. I think the mi Amigo
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: ran aground at one point and was repaired, and then
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: the original Caroline I think I did a fire break
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: out or did it sink? No, sorry, the so the
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: Miamigo sank the original Caroline. I don't know whatever happened
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: to it. I could not find it, but I know
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: for a fact that it wasn't that the original ferry,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: the the um M V Caroline that sank. It was
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: definitely the mi Amigo. Well, the mi Amigo must have
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: two then, because it ran aground and was fixed and
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: then it did it had a little bit of bad luck.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: What cracks me up in this entire story is that
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: there was a German vessel called the Miamigo my friend
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: in Spanish, it's a German merchant vessel. Don't understand. I
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: think the Caroline is as a museum now, so that
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: one did survive, right, No, the UM the Ross's Revenge,
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: so they came up with another German ship, the Ross
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: Revenge UM, to replace the Mia Amigo and that one eventually.
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: UM has been outfitted to be a museum, which I
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: can't tell. They have a website and it sounds like
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: the last update was from two thousand fourteen, and I
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: don't know if it's actually open or not. If it is,
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: they definitely need to update their website. But um that's
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: the plan at least. I don't know if like they
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: ran out of money or something like that. Yeah. I
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: think there's a couple of different museums, but I would
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: love to on our next UK trip go check these
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: places out. There be a lot of fun. Yeah. I
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: can't wait to get back to the UK and Australia too. Man. Yeah,
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: I think we hit even sort of loosely earmarked this
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: year next year for another international trip and uh, you know,
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: I don't think that's going to happen. That kind of
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: fell through. And also sorry everybody, I'm also excited to
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: get back to New Zealand too. Yeah, because I didn't.
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: We didn't get enough time there. Oh wait wait and Canada, Well,
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: we always love to get to go to Canada. That's easy.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: Should we take it that? Yeah, let's take a break,
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: all right, We'll go to Germany next time too. I'm
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: about to go to Germany. It's my homeland. Well that's
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: not true. We'll be right back, Chuck. By the way,
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: I said Germany was my homeland because I took German
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: in high school and college speak German and have been
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: to Germany and love it. I'm not German in any way.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: What what's your what's your ancestry? Uh, it's fully Like
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: I did the DNA test, it's it's fully like uk Irish,
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: sort of European. And then it said like one percent
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: East African or something like that. I got, um, like
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: two percent or point two percent. Yeah, it was like
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: no point zero or two percent Ashkenazi Jew and then
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: I got I got two percent something Neanderthal. This all
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: checks out, it does, it does for sure. So I'm
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: celebrating both of my heritages. Thank you. So I think
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: it's back at you. So. Um, the US, we've kind
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: of overlooked the United States, they didn't have nearly the
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: sort of I guess cultural revolution that the UK had
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: as far as pirate radio goes. Um, they've had a
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: few sort of operations here and there. The one that
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: you were talking about, Uh, there was this this preacher,
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: Reverend Carl McIntyre. He was a fundamentalist who I think
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: he broadcast from a ship for like ten hours until
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: there was a fire. He worked so hard on it
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: for months, months. He thought he was going to be
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: up and running in a few days, maybe a couple
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: of weeks. It ended up taking him months to get
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: this pirate radio ship ready, and he got it going
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: and they shut him down in ten hours. And we've
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: talked about him before actually in our fairness doctrine, the
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: reason that he was operating from a pirate radio stations.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: He went from being broadcast and like I think six
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: hundreds something radio stations across the South and the Midwest.
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: And he would preach like um, anti communism. He said
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: the Catholic Church was fascist. He said Billy Graham was
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: an appeaser. Um. He was a real firebrand and also
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: super political too. And because that fairnes doctrine said you
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: have to have equal airtime for opposing viewpoints. He didn't.
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: He didn't do that, so he kind of brought the
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: heat onto some of these stations that were worried about
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: losing their license. They started to drop him. So he
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: tried pirate radio for a minute, and it didn't pan
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: out very well for him. He tried for six minutes.
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: That's right. So, um, that's some fast math there. It's
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: pretty easy. Uh where you see pirate radio in the
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: United States, and it still continues today. In fact, uh,
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: there there was one study that said there are more
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: pirate radio station UH stations in New York on the
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: FM band than there were legit stations. Yeah, and that's
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: been going on for a while. I saw late eighties,
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: early nineties there was a big boom in pirate radio.
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: And like the epicenter seems to have been New York
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: because the Christians later I think so, or maybe they
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: wrote the movie because of the boom. I don't know. Well,
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: a lot of them are out of Brooklyn there, um
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: broadcast from rooftops. You know, you get a little equipment,
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: you get an ant in UH and and you're in business.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: And here's the deal with pirate radio in the United States.
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: And what's going on now, which is currently the FCC
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: has has popped up, of course, and they used to,
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: like the article said, play kind of whack a mole
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: trying to knock these things back as they came up.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: But I guess they thought it was such a problem,
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: especially in New York that the f c C has,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: and especially this current FCC has stood up and said, Nope,
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: not going to happen on our watch. Uh. And in
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: January of this year, the President signed the and I
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: love it when they come up with a an acronym
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: that actually worked for this one. They had to reverse
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: engineer this one, the Pirate Act preventing illegal Radio abuse
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: through enforcement but also abuses in there, like stop abusing
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: that radio center. Yeah, but you know they needed an
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: A for sure. I'm saying, like, hats off to that
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: for to them for that one. It couldn't be radio
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: amusement through Actually, at least they used all the letters
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: from all the words. I hate it when they just
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: slip a couple of words and they're like nobody's gonna notice,
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean? So, um, the problem with
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: the Pirate Act is this, it takes uh already existing
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: FCC laws that allow the SEC to kind of go
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: after pirate radio stations and find them. I saw, um,
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: you're looking at fines of something like ten thousand dollars
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: a day, typically with the maximum of about seventy five
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: dollars for a total fine for operating an illegal pirate station.
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: That's that's bad. I mean, most people who are operating
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: pirate stations do so as as we'll talk about in
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: a minute, because they don't have the money to to
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: run a legit station and pay all the fees and
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: all the application fees and the license fees and all
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: that stuff. So that is significant. What the Pirate Act does.
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: It takes all those existing laws and just says you're
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: that seventy five max fee, let's up that to two
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: million dollars. And the whole point of that is to
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: specifically intimidate people out of out of pirate radio, out
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: of broadcasting pirate radio. And that that's that's terrible, especially
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: coming from an FCC that's led by a former telecommunications
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: lobbyists and the guy who presided over the end of
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: net neutrality. That's a that's some sour grapes right there,
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: if you ask me. Yeah, and the whole deal with
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: pirate radio these days, especially out of New York is
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: They're not just like spinning tunes for fun. I'm sure
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: there are some that do that, but a lot of
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: it is, UM are people starting these very small, small
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: operations that maybe broadcast over their neighborhood because they are
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: an underserved community as far as radio programming goes. And
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: they will speak in their native language to people who
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: are listening in their native language, and they are getting
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: news out to people in their native language. And these
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: are communities that don't that aren't represented on the on
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: the the regular FM spectrum. And there's a big argument
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: to be made that this is a almost like a
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: public service in a way to these underserved communities. Absolutely is,
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: and that's what radio. That's what radio has been, this
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: has been intended for since the inception of it. At
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: least in the United States, it's a and in the
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: u k two it's meant to be a public service,
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: UM for for everybody. The thing is is in the
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: U S we've long valued a multiplicity of different voices,
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: of competing ideas and thoughts of different music. I mean,
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: even if you are talking about pirate radio stations, UM
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: that are just playing music. They're not doing, you know, anything,
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: there's no like, you know, community discussion or anything like that.
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: The music they're playing is probably stuff you're not gonna
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: hear anywhere else on the radio, and there's definitely something
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: that's lost when you know, more and more radio stations
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: become homogenized further and further, then all of a sudden,
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: it's kind of like the radio equivalent of UM that
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: strip mall that you could go to Topeka or Miami
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: or Seattle and find the exact same stuff in the
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: exact same stores with almost the exact same layout to
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: where it's all the same. That's what pirate radio represents,
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: or even if you take the pirate out of it,
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: that's what a multiplicity of different um community radio stations represents. Uh,
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: the lack of homogeneity that kind of sucks the life
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: out of everything that in and of itself makes them
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: valuable and that they shouldn't be aggressively pursued or chuck.
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: There's one other thing too. If you are going to
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: aggressively pursue this, then also make an avenue for legitimacy
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: rather than just try to stamp them out or else.
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: It really makes you question what the ultimate motive is. Yeah,
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: and here's the thing, Like, it would be very easy
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: to sit back and say, well, you've got the Internet,
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: you can have an Internet radio station, you can have
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: a podcast. It's more democratized than ever before to get
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: your voice out there, which is true in a way,
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: but that's also a very privileged thing to say when
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: you just assume that someone has the money to afford
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: the Internet. Let's go get a new iPhone. What's your problem? Yeah, exactly, Like,
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: just download the app. It's that easy. Um. Radio, I
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: don't understand how you're not kidding. Radio is free and
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: you can you can buy a radio. You probably have
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: a radio if you're one of these people in an
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: underserved community. But if you don't, you can get one
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: of the thrift at a thrift store for five dollars
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: that picks up the FM and a M spectrum and
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: you don't have to play pay monthly fees. You don't
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: have to pay internet fees. And it is a true
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: democratized voice for the people who can't afford to get
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: it otherwise. Right, So, like, I didn't know anything about
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: this as far as like the Pirate Act, I didn't
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: know that existed until we started researching this episode, but
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: it's very clear that this is ah, this is a
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: law that's creating outlaws where they shouldn't necessarily be outlaws.
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: There's no inherent problem with UM pirate radio like from
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: what I've read UM and granted it was on a
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: pirate radio organization's blog, Prometheus Radio Project, but they said
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: they're very you can find very few instances of pirate
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: radio stations actually interfering with other stuff, but you can
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: very easily find major corporate radio stations interfering with stuff
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: and very frequently saying there's a There was an instance
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: in the nineties where North Perry, Florida's airport had to
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: change frequencies because the commercial radio station that was interfering
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: with their frequency that they were using to communicate with airplanes.
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: They wouldn't change their their frequency UM, so the airport
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: had to UM. You don't find that with pirate radio stations,
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: And from what I saw, there's a lot of self
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: policing that goes on in the community because you don't
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: want to infringe on somebody else's broadcast, because that means
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: that their broadcast is gonna infringe on your broad Yeah,
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: you want your own digits, uh in America. Like we
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: said before, UM to reiterate their standing behind the same
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: thing the BBC did, which is it's it can interfere
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: with sharing a vital public safety information, and it's just
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: that's such hooey. Like if a someone dropped a dirty
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: bomb on New York City, they're sure the radio stations
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: might issue some sort of public safety alert. But I
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: guarantee you so would the pirate radio stations, and they
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: would do so in their language. That's true, that's right. Yeah,
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: Because there's a lot of a lot of evidence that
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: pirate radio stations serve immigrant communities because they have like
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: kind of this cultural tie to UM radio as a technology.
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: So when they come over here to the United States,
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: there they expect to get their information from radio. Yeah,
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: and they wouldn't like the Twin Towers fall. I guarantee
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: you pirate radio stations weren't like, we're just gonna keep
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: spinning the tunes, you know. I'm sure they did like
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: every other broadcast and TV show and radio show in
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: the world. I'm sure they cease their programming and started
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: handing out vital information. Oh yeah, for sure. I can't
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: prove it, but I can't imagine that they did otherwise. UM,
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: I like what you did there too? You UM Like,
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: they're like, well, what are you gonna do? I mean,
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: pirate radio interferes with stuff? You're like, Oh, yeah, what
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: are you gonna do? If there's a dirty bomb in
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: New York? You just threw it right back in the
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: FCC's face. I don't know what the thing is is
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: from from this, from what I've seen, small government conservatives
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: and libertarians should be all over that Pirate Act. They
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: should be very much up in arms about this and
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: about the way that the SEC targets small illegal radio
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: stations without offering like a legitimate path to legitimacy. And um,
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: I would like to see that that's right. And by
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: the way, I have in show correction. I think I
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: said that Preacher's boat caught fire. I don't think it
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: actually caught fire. I think it just started smoking because
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: the antenna feeder line interfered with another radio station, so
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: didn't actually catch fire. When he was because I thought
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: that the ironies of preaching fire and brimstone and it
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: actually catching fire was too great, right, God went be
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: quiet smoke, so um, if you are interested in pirate radio,
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: The Verge did a whole series on it, really interesting
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: in depth stuff, and uh, yeah you could also do.
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: I ran across one called the Lot. It's out of
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: I think Williamsburg and it's on a little lot in
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: a shipping container. Of course it is. It's like, um,
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: all DJ sets all the time, but it's not a
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: pretty great and they have a webcam of what you
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: can see out the window. It's just cute, nice and
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: it's just cozy in a way. Yeah, and again, go
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: check out and stream the radio Caroline classic version. Uh.
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: If you're into like just good playlist, it's it's one
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: of the best. I gotta check that out. I didn't
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: run across that, so thank you for that public service, chuck. Um,
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: you got anything else? Nope? Okay, Well that's it for
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: pirate radio for now. Uh and um that means it's
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: time for a listener mail. This is called hot off
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: the Presses. Just got this email and it was just
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: so heartwarming I had had to share it. Hey, guys
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: and Jerry, I love listening to the recent episode on soap.
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: I consider myself a bit of a soap nerd because
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: when I served at the Peace Corps as a Peace
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: Corps volunteer in Senegal for three years late two thousand's
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: I guess two thousand sixteen to two thousand nineteen, late teens.
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: My main activity was training women's groups on how to
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: start small businesses making and selling soap. We trained them
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: on how to make all kinds of our soap using
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: local ingredients shape, butter, honey, mint, herbs uh. Teaching these
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: women's groups about soap making is a the excellent way
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: to improve their household financial security for a few reasons. First,
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: you're always going to have a market for soap because
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: everyone needs it. Secondly, there are a few barriers to
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: entry to making soap. You don't need to be able
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: to read or have fancy equipment. If you can measure
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: poor and stir, then you can make it. And Thirdly,
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: because women in Senegal are responsible for so much of
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: the daily chores in their home, soap making requires only
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: a little bit of time since much of the process
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: is waiting for the soap to cure fully into a
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: hard bar And fourth making soap is a great way
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: to teach all the basics of starting a business. Marketing, accounting,
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: record keeping, calculating unit costs, profit margins, making creative packaging.
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: Once they master these skills, they can expand to other
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: business opportunities. And fifth, it smells really good. Yeah, she said.
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: Some of the re fondest memories are her service seeing
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: the satisfaction on their faces as the lion shape butter
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: mixture spent ages stirring by hand became real soap for
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: them to sell and market. Uh I trained over a
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: hundred and fifty members or of more than five women's
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: group on soap making, and all of the groups continue
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: to make soap and sell it for a profit today,
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: helping to make their households more financially secure. Tell me
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: they included a website. Uh no, because it's a bunch
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: of different groups, but it is. It was from the
• 48:15
  Speaker 1: Peace Corps. You obviously want to support them, and that
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: is from Grace e uh Nagel. Thanks a lot, Gracey Nagel. Um,
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: we appreciate that. That was that was great. It was
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: a great email. She sent pictures. We appreciate Um, I'll
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: have to check them out. Well, we appreciate you what
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: you did over there and sending goal to totally. If
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: you want to let us know about something great you
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: did in your life, like grace E did. You could
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: send us an email, wrap it up, spanking on the
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: bottom twice, and send it off to Stuff podcast at
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works from more podcasts
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: for my heart Radio. Because at the iHeart Radio app,
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: Apple podcasts are where every listening to your favorite shops