1976 article about Italian radical radio station Radio Citta Futura (Radio Future City) from Red Weekly, paper of the International Marxist Group in the UK. The Rome-based station began broadcasting regularly in that year and played a role in the tumultuous events of that period. It was temporarily closed down by the state while covering the riotous demonstrations of the Movement of '77, as was the another Rome based station, Radio Onda Rossa. In 1979 five women involved with the station's feminist programme Radio Donna were shot and seriously injured in a fascist attack on the station.
The scan of the article is incomplete but there's some interesting information including the daily schedule for the station. This includes 'The Night of the Comrades' a late night programme where 'each worker on the station in rotation can broadcast what he/she wants' ('the freakier part of the station') and 'Programme for night workers' based on taped interviews. As mentioned in the article the proliferation of 'Free Radio' followed a court decision in 1975 that ended the state's monopoly on broadcasting - leading to the legal creation of commercial stations as well as political projects like this one. The interviewee - Sandro Silvestri - estimates that at this time there were 800 new radio stations 'in the whole of Italy and there are 52 in Rome alone... at least 120 stations are openly declared to be left wing stations, calling themselves "democratic" radio'.
On Redcross Way SE1 (near to London Bridge station), the site of a paupers' graveyard was discovered during construction of the Jubilee line on the London underground in the 1990s. Crossbones has become a remarkable unofficial shrine where people gather on the 23rd of every month to remember the outcast dead buried there, and also their more recently departed loved ones.
Going past last week I noticed a notice in memory of Jason Fisher (1979-2011), aka Angryness and Brimstone - evidently a pirate radio stalwart from South London and Kent. The notice also says 'Pirate Radio is Good for Your Mind'.
'Brimstone' was particularly associated with Essence FM, broadcasting in Kent from the early noughties (FM 105.1 - 105.0, 2000-2007). According to farstep in a discussion at Radionecks, Essence 'used to broadcast from Thanet (usually from tower block flats in Margate or Ramsgate) used to be a great little station playing UKG, DnB, Happy Hardcore, House etc. ... anyway was nice to hear it when it was about and to date its been the only one that was audible in Thanet/Kent which is a bit sad to say the least as we need something on round here. There was briefly Sweet FM which went on for one night from a farm in Ramsgate but sounds to me they got dobbed up and never returned. Friend of mine did a set on Rival FM but I dont think that lasted long either so Essence was really the only driving force around these parts'
This prompted an interesting reply: 'Hi everyone, I'm "Brimstone's" dad. First of all I like to say how much I and family and friends miss him. I believe he started Essence FM in around 2000 with Frantic and Mr Woo was also involved and this went on till about 2005. He built rigs at one time then did repairs then designed and built link boxes and audio limiters of high quality. He left radio behind and then he was into computers and built his own website. He was quite well known in the pirate world around London, Essex and Kent. He did pirate radio proud. He was a genius... I am writing a book on his life and collecting any info about his radio days if anyone feels they have a story please let me know'.
A Radiocommunications Agency press release (31 January 2003) descirbes Fisher's arrest at the top of an aerial:
'Two pirate operators were convicted at Camberwell Magistrates Court on 27th January 2003 for offences under the Wireless Telegraphy Act 1949. Jason Fisher of Priestwood House, Drummond Road, Rotherhithe, London, SE16 and Michael Pruce of Philip Walk, Peckham, London, SE15, both 23, were each given 18 months conditional discharges and ordered to pay £150 costs after being found guilty of participating in the running of a pirate radio station calling itself Essence FM.
28 September last, the two defendants were caught at the top of a 180ft-cell phone aerial with tools and radio transmitting apparatus. When questioned they stated they were enjoying the aerial views. However, they subsequently admitted the offences when interviewed. The court ordered the seized equipment be forfeited'.
Last week I had the opportunity to visit a rarely opened archive in South London. The basement of New Cross Learning (the volunteer-run library/community space in New Cross Road) holds the collection of the Lewisham Local History Society, an eclectic assortment of specifically local artifacts and general 'old things' assembled over the years with an aim of one day forming the basis of a museum collection.
Naturally I was intrigued by some of the musical items, including this metal sign for the old 'Music for Pleasure' label. I spent some of my teenage wages from working in the library and Debenhams (like someone in a Belle & Sebastian song) on these budget LPs, often consisting of early material or live recordings from well known bands. My favourite was 'Relics', a fantastic compilation of Syd Barrett era Pink Floyd.
The archive also include various bits of semi-obsolete technology stacked up on the shelves. Here's an Alba gramophone:
Most evocative for me was this Regentone valve radio, made in Romford at some point in the early 1950s. I remember as a child going to visit an elderly relative in the Forest of Dean and they had something similar.
I recall that I was fascinated by the dial with its list of exotic sounding places and stations. Looking at it now as an adult it still seems to embody a kind of utopian internationalist dream of the radio, the possibility of sitting in a room somewhere in post-war England and listening in to Marseilles, Bologna, Berlin or the USSR.
Interesting short article on mid-1980s London pirate radio and hip-hop:
Soul pirate on the air waves
By Jaswinder Bancil (South London Press, 13 July 1984)
"Steve Devonne is, by his own admission, one of the major figures in London's hip-hop scene. As a regualr broadcaster on the soul pirate station Invicta, Steve was among the first to introduce scratch and mix sounds over the air waves in the capital.Most of the exposure given to this type of record has largely been confimed to clubs.
But hip-hop is not the only sound the 26-year-old DJ plays. His slot at the Maze club in Soho every Friday night is strictly soul. He explained, 'I'm still a soul and funk man, but I also believe I have a wide enough perspective to cover hip-hop. Already established soul artists like Herbie Hancock and Shannon are showing obvious hip-hop influences on their records. It's going to continue to have an effect on mainstream music'.
Born in Lambeth, but raised in Wandsworth, Steve has been a DJ for nearly ten years. He became involved in pirate radio because 'I was interested in broadcasting black music to London without having having to go through official channels'.
While Invicta is temporarily off the air, Steve will be broadcasting for rival station JFM (102.8 metres FM).
To date pirate stations have been the most abundant source of black music in the city. Having cottoned on to the popularity of these illegal stations among young people, the BBC have recently begun to feature more soul and reggae. But hip-hop remains largely ignored, despite its massive appeal.
Steve admitted, 'I'm one of the few people who have picked up on hip-hop. It is something that goes beyond the music - style, dress, language all count. Hip-hop goes back as far as James Brown in my opinion. It's attitude, a way of life'.
Radio Invicta was a pirate radio station that broadcast in London from 1970 to 1984, usually on VHF on 92.4 MHz. It slogan was "Soul over London" and it featured soul and disco. It started broadcasting from a bedroom in Mithcam, but is credited with being one of the first pirate stations to use the tops of tower blocks (more here, including some recordings of old shows)
Here's some clops of Steve Devonne and others on Invicta from 1980:
In April 1974, left leaning military officers overthrew the Portuguese dictatorship and ended its colonial wars in Africa. For the next two years Portugal was in turmoil, with workers taking over workplaces and many hoping to push the revolution further. The radio stations were one of the key sites of struggle, in particular Rádio Renascença.
The Revolution Started with a Song by John Hoyland (Street Life, November 1 1975):
'3 am, April 25 1974. By prior arrangement with the rebel Armed Forces Movement (AFM), a DJ on Lisbon's Radio Renascenca plays 'Grandola, Vila Morena', a popular song of the day whose possible subversive meaning had escaped the censor's ears. The song is a signal for a military uprising that, with scarcely any opposition, overthrows the Caetano Government, and brings to an end 50 years of fascism in Portugal. The next day, the people pour into the streets, and give the soldiers red carnations. The soldiers stick the flowers in their guns...'
Tuesday August 26 1975
A visit to Radio Renascenca (RR), the radio station that the workers took over from its owners, the Catholic Church. As well as broadcasting news of workers' struggles and discussions with workers and peasants, it plays a lot of good music — including the best rock music in Lisbon — and has an hour a day in Spanish, beamed across Portugal towards Spain. A couple of the workers describe the history of their struggle to take over the radio station from their bosses — how the AFM sent a unit of COPCON [a military organisation] to hand RR back to the Church, and how the occupying workers broadcast a call to the people of Lisbon to help them — with the result that thousands of workers gathered outside the building to defend it, the COPCON soldiers refused to obey their orders, and in the end the AFM was forced to ratify the occupation.
The workers — both young guys, one of them with extremely long hair — go on to say that they are currently linking up with all the Lisbon Workers' Commissions, with the idea of forming a city-wide co-operative that would control the radio-station, and also finance it. "Then we won't have to take any more advertisements, not even from the nationalised industries." (At the moment a radio talk on the concept of Popular Power and the Class Struggle is liable to be disconcertingly interrupted by a bleep and a jingle for Seven-Up.) Before the April 25 coup, Radio Renascenca was on the air six hours a day, whereas now it's 24 hours a day. "We're the same number of workers, so we've multiplied our work-load by four. But you have to. The situation changes here so fast, each hour in Portugal is like a day. Since the coup, we feel as if we've lived through about 30 years . . ." In spite of this, they seem very sprightly and determined people. But they aren't particularly optimistic: "Lisbon is a red island in a sea of reaction. We don't think the conditions for revolution exist in Portugal yet. Nor is there a party that could carry it through. In our view, the parties here' are still too concerned about their own power, and not concerned enough about the needs of the workers'.'
'The radio station had been owned by the Catholic Church. Gradually, during May, the workers concerned had taken it over, disliking the line being pushed. Their communique of June 6 outlined what was at stake: "The complete history of our struggles at RR would bring together arguments and documents which a simple communique' cannot hope to do. When our story is written many positions will become clearer, as will the ways in which they relate to the overall politics of the country. The Portuguese people will then be able to judge the counter-revolutionary politics of the bosses, the immoralities of all sorts committed in the name of the Church, and the many betrayals carried out by capitalist lackeys in our midst. In their latest delirium the Management Committee (i.e. the Church) completely distorted our struggle and attacked the MFA. Of 127 lines, 73 were devoted to denouncing the government...
When they speak of the violent occupation of the radio station they forget to mention that the only violence was when Maximo Marques (a member of the Management Committee) attacked one of our comrades, who didn't respond to the provocation... The management argue that we are a minority of 20, whereas 30 would be more correct. Radio Renascenca is a private company owning a radio station, a printing press, a record shop, two cinemas, buildings and office blocks, etc. In the station we are about 60 workers. The management say we are trying to silence the Church's mouthpiece, and prevent it from reaching a large section of the population. If by this they mean we are trying to silence fascist voices, they are right. Words like truth, justice and liberty lose all meaning when they come from the RR administration. We remember the time when the priests managed the station and censored encyclicals, Vatican texts and even the Bible (!!) We propose that the management show their concern for liberty by supporting the current liberation of RR, now in the service of the workers and controlled by the workers. The workers of RR, June 6, 1975".
The struggle at Radio Renascenca was widely supported. The options were fairly clear: to side with the Workers' Committee or with the Church. Vasco Goncalves and other members of the Revolutionary Council decided to hand the station back to the Church. The decision was bitterly opposed by some 100,000 workers. A demonstration was held on June 18 at which Lisnave and TAP workers stood outside the gates and warned that RR would only be returned to the Church 'over their dead bodies'. 400 Catholic counter-demonstrators had to seek refuge in the house of the local Patriarcado. The determination of the workers caused the Revolutionary Council promptly to reverse steam. It found a way out: to decree the nationalisation of all newspapers, radio stations and television networks'.
In November 1975 the station's radio transmitters were blown up, effectively closing the station down before it was handed back to the Church in December.
The state and media's targeting of social media following last week's riots in England started out as an absurdity, with twitter, facebook and blackberry messaging variously blamed for the ability of rioters to seemingly outwit the police. Now it has begun to take a tragic turn with the jailing for four years of two young men for posting up facebook events for riots that never even happened. They were prosecuted under sections 44 and 46 of the Serious Crime Act for 'intentionally encouraging another to assist the commission of an indictable offence'.
Doubtless people did use their smartphones and their laptops to keep track with what was going on, arrange to meet up and spread information both true and false. But of course as many people have pointed out, riots have been happening for hundreds of years without the aid of these devices as insurgents have always found ways to communicate with each other. In the past , riotous demonstrations were sometimes publicised by chalked messages - see example from Deptford in 1932 .
Thirty years ago there was a suggetion that Citizen's Band (CB) radio was being used by rioters. In the aftermath of the rioting in Moss Side, Manchester in July 1981 Chief Constable James Anderton blamed the events on a conspiracy: 'It was well-coordinated. We believe a kind of military strategy was used with look-outs, people taking up observations, and vehicles being used by spotters. We also know that CB radio was used to pass messages'(Times July 10 1981).
CB radio enabled personal two way communication between users years before the mobile phone. By 1981 at least 300,000 people were believed to be using it in the UK, but it was illegal to do so amidst claims that it could interfere with emergency services communications (Times 27 February 1981). To demonstrate how law abiding they were, some CB users campaigning for legaliszation offered to help Manchester police by jamming rioters' messages (Times 11 July 1981), though their offer was rejected. Later that year, the Government did allow some FM frequencies to be dedicated to CB users, effecitively legalising it - though it remained illegal on AM.
In real terms, CB radio was marginal in the 1981 riots but its advent did signal that the state's monopoly on this kind of communication was coming to an end. The police still do have a tactical advantage in communications, particularly through its network of CCTV, helicopter and satellite imagery. But the means of mass communication are no longer solely in its control. We can expect to see a concerted attempt to reverse this in coming months, with arguments being made to close down communications in 'emergency' situations.
This will have implications for people trying to organise parties and all kinds of social events, not just demonstrations and riots. Last week a 20 year old from Essex was charged with "encouraging or assisting in the commission of an offence" under the 2007 Serious Crime Act. His alleged crime was publicising a mass water fight on Blackberry and Facebook.
For centuries, Somalis used poetry and songs to pass protest messages to powerful rulers they were too afraid to confront directly. Now, some young Somalis are using rap to speak out against Islamists who they say are using religion to wage war in their country. The 11-member Waayaha Cusub band, currently in exile in neighbouring Kenya, wants its rap lyrics to encourage fellow Somalis to stand up to Islamist rebels known as al Shabaab.
They have handed out at least 7,000 free copies of their newly-released album titled "No To Al Shabaab" to residents in Nairobi's Eastleigh neighbourhood, home to many Somali migrants. "We will wipe out the fear of our people that no one can speak out against al Shabaab. We will show our people that we can challenge them," said Shine Abdullahi, the group's founder... "They are unkind, teach terrorism, and worthless lessons, they blindfold, and cause pain, inject drugs, that lead to actions, force them to kill their fathers and relatives," one of the group's raps goes.
The group's only female member, Falis Abdi Mohamud, is a rebel in her own right. In one video, the 23-year-old is not covering her head as most Somali women do, and is wearing tight jeans. "They criticise me and say 'she is not Muslim because of wearing a trouser'. I am Muslim," she said. "I want to reach my people. I will not stop my mission because of fear or other people's desires. History will tell who is right and wrong."
Mohamud was born in the southern town of Kismayu that is now an al Shabaab stronghold. The insurgents have banned music in areas that they control and allow only Arabic Koranic chanting. Waayaha Cusub toured the semi-autonomous northern region of Puntland in July but Mohamud hopes to perform in her hometown one day. "The trip to Somalia was great. That is when I realised people like our music, and it really gave us confidence not to stop our campaign because a few people who dislike us." The group's youngest member is 15-year-old Suleqa Mohamed, who is a student at an Eastleigh school.
Most of them want to return to Somalia and live off their music when peace returns but currently survive on sponsorships by businessmen and Somalis in the diaspora. Their songs have angered some people. Even in the relative stability and security of Kenya they have been attacked. Gunmen shot and wounded Abdullahi in 2007. He believes the attack was because the group released a series of songs criticising Ethiopia's incursion into Somalia and suicide bombings by the insurgents. Even mobile phone text message threats from al Shabaab sympathisers in Kenya and Somalia have failed to intimidate Abdullahi.
He says he will never be cowered by what he calls "religious warlords" who present an awful image of Islam to the world. "The attack was aimed at silencing the group, but that did not work," he said, showing scars on his stomach from a bullet and the surgery that followed. "We will not allow anyone to silence us. They misread our religion and kill people. They are cursed," he said...
(Here's one of their tracks - this one is not really hip hop, but a great slice of hypnotic dance music . There's lots more stuff at their youtube channel)
'Gangsta rappers have been known to boast about how mean their hometown streets are, but none of them comes from a more violent ‘hood than K'naan. Born Keinan Abdi Warsame in 1978, K’naan grew up in Mogadishu, Somalia, amid one the most brutal civil wars in history.When he was 13, K’naan and his family fled Somalia and took refuge in New York and finally Toronto, where they still live. Coming from a family of performers and poets, K’naan naturally gravitated toward the arts to make sense of his new home and to process the trauma that nearly overwhelmed him in Africa (three of his friends were killed in the conflict). A poet, spoken-word artist and rapper, he has spoken out about his home country’s plight at the United Nations and recorded two albums, the latest of which is “Troubadour” (A&M), released last year. The album blurs the boundaries between spoken word and hip-hop, and incorporates everything from heavy metal to reggae.
Q: What were your memories of growing up in Mogadishu? What about the music there? Did it have an impact on you as a child? A: I grew up in the Mogadishu of dreams. During an idyllic and optimistic time, and music [was] almost its Siamese soundtrack. I remember realizing very early how music could so seamlessly go from being fun in one moment, to deadly serious in the other. A song would play in the record player at home, and you could sing along loudly and then another would come, and mom would turn it down swiftly, as the song might be considered what they called "anti" - usually music with subliminal poetic messages against the government' (full interview here)
'Radio stations broadcasting out of Somalia face a dilemma this month after a powerful Islamist militant group ordered them to stop playing music. Saying that the playing of music was un-Islamic, Hizbul-Islam announced on Saturday that stations had 10 days to take it off air. The punishment for failing to comply was not specified but 11 radio stations based in the capital, Mogadishu, are thought to be directly affected. If they drop music, they stand to lose listeners. If they ignore the warning, they face the wrath of the militants.
Music-lovers in the war-torn country are indignant at the idea they will not be able to tune into their favourite pop, which is largely recorded abroad, in North America and the UK. However, there appear to be limits to Hizbul-Islam's ability to make good on any threat. Somali pop music, ranging from the plaintive songs of Abdi Shirre Jama (aka Jooqle) to the hip hop and rap of K'Naan, is widely on sale in Mogadishu.
It can be heard playing in the tea shops of the government-controlled area, which amounts to about a third of the capital, says local BBC reporter Mohammed Olad Hassan. Somalis have to be more discreet about music in non-government areas. Al-Shabab, the country's other big militant group, are known for their own strict interpretation of Islam, frowning on music and cinema.
"You can see drivers on passenger buses playing music inside the government-controlled area, then turning it off when they cross into non-government territory," our reporter says. Pop music is genuinely popular in Mogadishu and many people resent being "bullied" into what they can hear on the radio, he adds. Hizbul-Islam would have all music, right down to the jingles, taken off air, he says. "Deny a Somali his music and his poetry, and you deny him his voice," says Christophe Farah, a journalist of Somali descent in London...'
'Roars, growls and galloping hooves replaced music Tuesday on some of Mogadishu's radio stations in a protest of a ban on music imposed by Islamic extremists. Radio Shabelle, along with the stations Tusmo and Hornafrik, were responding to threats from Muslim militant groups that believe music is un-Islamic and want it prohibited. Mogadishu's 14 private radio stations stopped playing music Tuesday after Hizbul al-Islam, an Islamic extremist group, issued a 10-day ultimatum. The threat was backed by the main militant group al-Shabaab, which has been linked to al Qaeda. A statement from the National Union of Somali Journalists said several stations received calls, warning them that there would be consequences if they failed to comply with the ban within 10 days.
But the three stations decided to broadcast the noises instead of music. Radio Shabelle announcers could be heard speaking on air, backed by the sounds of hooves, ocean waves, gunfire - even the roars and growls of big cats'.
London Pirate Frequencies is a nice short film presented by Matt Mason, tracing the story of free radio from the 1950s/60s forts in the Thames Estuary through to London tower blocks today. Current stations featured include Kool FM, Rinse FM and Flex FM.
I like Mason's comment about the contradiction between pirate radio's audibility and its invisibility: 'the thing about pirate radio in London is it's kind of everywhere, it's hidden in plain sight. If you turn on the radio, you tune the dial left to right you'll find a station but if you look around you you're not going to see them and they're literally all over the place. They're in residential neighbourhoods, in big tower blocks... there are pirates transmitting, about 80 stations across the city still exist today'.
There's a bit of a debate about whether the internet is killing off free radio on FM. It's true that anybody can now stream music via the internet without taking risks climbing up tower blocks and breaking the law. Most of the established pirates now also broadcast online and reach people all over the world - perhaps in the future they'll just be token FM broadcasts to give a sense of realness/London grounding to the deterritorialized online operation.
What I would miss about the loss of FM is the sheer randomness of coming across an unexpected signal while scanning the frequencies. Also radio is in some ways harder to censor than the internet. Repressive governments, like in China, can block access to websites but anybody with a radio can pick up a signal without the police or anybody else knowing they're listening to it.
A short lived episode in the history of pirate radio was Radio Sutch, initiated by English rock'n'roller Screaming Lord Sutch (1940-1999) in 1964.
After a couple of weeks broadcasting from a fishing trawler, Sutch and his co-conspirators squatted a disused anti-aircraft defence fort in the Thames Estuary. According to his biographer, 'Radio Sutch launched from the Shivering Sands for on 27 May... Those who listened to the station recall that Sutch would play his own records and read horror stories on air late at night... "We broadcast Lady Chatterley's Lover and Fanny Hill to break up the nights" said Stuch "We used to play a lot of Max Miller albums, which at the time were banned from the BBC, just because he was a bit saucy".' To pay for it Sutch sold late night air time to American evangelists who broadcast taped Bible classes in the early hours.
Sutch sold the station to Reg Calvert in September 1964, who took it over and renamed it Radio City. Calvert was to be shot dead two years later in a row over ownership of a transmitter (there's much more about all this at Offshore Echoes) . Sutch went on to become a political prankster, standing as a joke candidate in elections for his Official Monster Raving Loony Party.
Source: The Man who was Screaming Lord Sutch by Graham Sharpe (Aurum Press, London, 2005).
Next up on the Dancing Questionnaire, is Smith3000 of Expletive Undeleted blog and much more besides - 'did fanzines as a kid, promoted bands like the Membranes and Bogshed in Scunthorpe, first DJed in Darlington in 1984, moved to Leeds, was a founder member of techno collective Microdot, DJed on Leeds pirate Dream FM for five years, freelanced for NME, Mixmag and iD, started after-hours Ministry of Shite parties, moved to Manchester. Now write a blog and occassionally DJ at our 'early doors easy listening and bossa nova' do Easy Tiger with the lovely Jeanie'.
1. Can you remember your first experience of dancing?
My parents used to buy a bit of chart music and I remember us all doing some awful synchronised hands-on-hips dance to Mud’s Tiger Feet in the front room, over and over and over again. Wikipedia tells me this would have been 1974, so I will have been nine. I got a rush.
2. What's the most interesting/significant thing that has happened to you while out dancing?
I met my girlfriend when I was DJing early doors in a bar in Manchester a few years ago and persuaded her to stay out later than she planned so we could go to a club where a mate was playing. It was on the dancefloor there that I began to really understand exactly how fantastic she was. We’re still together.
3. You. Dancing. The best of times…
A lot of is to do with women and drink and drugs. If I’m dancing, I’m probably in a pretty contented state of mind anyway. But I have two happy moments that immediately spring to mind: Glastonbury’s experimental music field, sometime in the early 90s. Underworld played through Pink Floyd’s quadraphonic soundsystem for like 12 hours or something and me and my then girlfriend were tripping and dancing and acting daft pretty much the whole time.
One new year’s eve at the Band on the Wall in Manchester, at a gig by A Certain Ratio and Fila Brazillia, drunk but completely synchronised with an equally drunk then girlfriend. We tripped the light fantastic. It felt like a scene from a musical. And I also have very happy memories of making shapes at a birthday party for Bob Marley in Jamaica, at Bora Bora on the Playa den Bossa in Ibiza, on a podium at la Terrazza in Barcelona, the Mardi Gras in Kings Cross in Sydney and at Robodisco at Planet K in Manchester. When it got to 6am and the light started to come in through the glass roof during Back to Basics residency at the Pleasure Rooms always felt very special. Maybe it was just the drugs. And the night that I met my lady, of course. I could go on all night here.
Back to Basics, Leeds - detourning Jamie Reid's God Save the Queen détournement
4. You. Dancing. The worst of times... I had a bit of a funny turn at the Big Chill a few years ago where I inadvertently did too much MDMA and got some intense visual hallucinations (every surface of everything had like a layer of cling film hovering about a centimetre above it) which was kind of okay - but eventually I became utterly disorientated and incoherent and would have been up shit creek if I’d not had a mate with me. I also ending up puking so hard I did something to my diaphragm (which hurt for weeks afterwards). I had to go for a lie down.
5. Can you give a quick tour of the different dancing scenes/times/places you've frequented? I always used to dance at punk and indie gigs but as far as clubbing goes, I went to places like the Limit and the Top Rank in Sheffield, Spiders in Hull and the Ad-Lib in Nottingham.The club where I was first a regular was the Baths Hall in Scunthorpe in the early Eighties, where they stuck a dancefloor over the pool in winter and Steve Bird used to play punk, indie, alternative stuff and a little bit of reggae. Big tunes (for me at least) were stuff like Puppet Life by Punilux, Where Were You by the Mekons, Walls of Jericho and Nag Nag Nag by the Cabs, Follow The Leaders by Killing Joke and anything by the Stranglers. It was fucking brilliant. John Peel always used to say that the Baths was his favourite gig. We believed him.
I lived in Leeds during the late Eighties / Nineties and haunted places like the Well Funked Society at the Phono, Dig at the Gallery, Joy at the Warehouse, Kaos at Ricky’s, the Dream all-nighters at the Trades in Leeds, Back to Basics at the Music Factory, and Hard Times in Huddersfield, plus odd dances at the West Indian Centre and blues like Les’s and 45s in Chapletown.
In Manchester, Mr Scruff’s Keep it Unreal things is always good, as was the Robodisco and Electrik Chair and anything that Chris Jam or Rob Bright are DJing at.
7. You're on your death bed. What piece of music would make your leap up for one final dance? If I’ve got the energy, Le Freak by Chic. If not, Sweet Love by Anita Baker for one last erection section, propped up by my long-suffering missus.
Justine Picardie’s If the Spirit Moves You (2001) is a book about bereavement, specifically the author’s struggle to come to terms with the death of her sister, Ruth, in 1997. Like many in her position, Justine longs for a sign that the departed is still somehow present – a longing that takes her on a journey through the realms of contemporary spiritualism.
It is a moving book in its own terms, but it also caused me to reflect on the relationship between death and silence, life and sound.
Picardie writes that “When someone dies, they do not always disappear out of your life. You have a relationship with them: a relationship that changes, that begins to accommodate their silence”. This silence of the grave is at the heart of bereavement, the recognition not only that the dead are no longer physically present but that we can no longer hear their voice. Death cuts short the song and dance of our lives – Victor Jara’s widow (Joan Jara) called her biography of the Chilean folk singer, murdered by the military in 1973, ‘Victor- an Unfinished Song’.
So it is not surprising that the search for evidence of life after death has so often focused on the will to hear voices from beyond the grave, a pursuit that has gone hand in hand with the development of recording technology. Oliver Lodge, an early 20th century scientist (he invented the spark plug) and Psychic researcher, wrote that 'the dead live in etheric wavelengths which operate at much higher frequencies than ours'. No less than Thomas Edison, the inventor of the phonograph, talked of inventing a machine to record the voices of the dead ‘if we can evolve an instrument so delicate as to be affected or moved or manipulated by our personality as it survives in the next life, such an instrument when made available ought to record something’.
Then there was the Russian Dr Konstantin Raudive who believed he could record the voices of the dead ‘by attaching a micro-phone to a detuned radio’ or by leaving a tape recorder running in an empty room. In her quest, Justine Picardie meets current day enthusiasts for EVP (Electronic Voice Phenomena) such as Judith Chisholm and Dale Palmer. The latter has moved on to digital approaches, through projects like the Global Association of Instrumental Transcommunication and the Noetics Institute, hoping to develop software to make the voices of the dead audible. Inevitably, computers are the new frontline for those hoping to communicate with other realms – some have claimed that spirits have subtly left messages on PC screens.
Ulimately Picardie comes to the conclusion that it's all just apophenia - seeing patterns and meaning where none exist. But as her friend David Toop says to her at one point ‘Well, of course I don’t believe in it, but that’s not the point – what’s interesting is that these voices have significance to people who are looking for somehting’.
Radio Peter
The book put me in mind of an event I attended back in 2002 organised by the International Necronautical Society. The Second First Committee Hearings: Transmission, Death, Technology were held at the Cubitt Gallery in Islington and featured a talk by John Cussans on EVP which included reference to supposed radio stations broadcasting from the other side, set up by dead spiritualists:
'Friedrich Jurgensen... was a Swedish film producer I think, also an ornithologist, and I think as far as I can tell Jurgensen's was some of the first work in the nineteen-sixties... in fact it was using magnetic tape, and picking up on the white noise on magnetic tapes. Jurgensen had been taping bird calls, as an ornithologist will, and when he got the tapes home and listened to them he heard these voices in the white noise between... he thought he heard, well he picked up, he tuned into these voices, and eventually found, you know, decoded them, and interestingly enough also it was his mother that was speaking to Jurgensen, calling his name. And Jurgensen wrote a book... Radio Contact with the Dead in 1967. And that was the first work on EVP.
...EVP is Electric Voice Phenomena. The other technological term is ITC: Instrumental Transcommunication. And, yes, Raudive read Jurgensen's book, and that's what inspired him to do more and more research into the field. And it was Raudive who first encountered something called Radio Peter, which is the first documented claim that there are actually sending stations, radiotechnology, on the other side; that the people who are involved in ITC research, when they die they all meet up on the other side... ...and set up radio stations on the other side. And Radio Peter is that radio station'.
Raudive wrote that 'The astonishing conception that "other-worldly" transmitting stations exist emerges quite clearly from many of the voices' statements. Information received indicates that there are various groups of voice-entities who operate their own stations' (quoted in Haunted media: electronic presence from telegraphy to television by Jeffrey Sconce, 2000). In addition to Radio Peter, Raudive claimed to be in contact with another station called Studio Kelpe.
If only it were true, we could have some great listening when the present generation of London pirate radio operators pass on - 'big shout going out to the afterlife massive, hold tight the recently departed crew'.
I noticed that on Galaxy FM (99.5) at the weekend they were broadcasting appeals for people to donate food, clothes and other stuff to people who lost their homes and belongings in last week's fire in Peckham.
Five local 'pirate' radio stations (or as they prefer to call themselves, community radio stations) jointly broadcast the appeal. They invited people to drop off donations at Uppercuts Barber Shop on Nunhead Green, Maestro Records in Rye Lane and the Real McCoy clothing shop in Brixton - evidently many responded. This was part of an impressive display of community mutual aid which saw local people, and indeed council workers volunteering their time, coming together to respond to the fire. The local press have picked up on the story this week. The South London Press had the headline 'pirates to the rescue', while the Southwark News has the full story, in terms of actually giving credit to the stations involved - Lightning, Galaxy, Vibes, Genesis and Ontop FM.
Anyway makes a change from they usual Ofcom-led nonsense media tales of criminal radio operators disrupting the airwaves.
'A man has been banned from every roof top in London after pleading guilty to installing illegal pirate radio equipment on a tower block in Camden. Working with Camden Council and the police, Ofcom successfully prosecuted Kieran O’Sullivan who received an antisocial behaviour order (ASBO). O’Sullivan also received a suspended 18 week custodial sentence, a three month curfew, a £1,200 fine and had his radio equipment seized. This followed complaints from residents about pirate radio equipment being fixed to roof tops on the Chalcots estate in Belsize' (24dash.com, 28 September 2009).
Yesterday's Telegraph reports that a Manga introduction to Marx's Capital has recently been published in Japan - cover below (for more about this publication see this).Something that has been around for while is Jesse Drew's Manifestoon, an animation of the Communist Manifesto, a subversive detournement of Disney and other cartoons. According to Drew: 'Manifestoon is an homage to the latent subversiveness of cartoons. Though American cartoons are usually thought of as conveying consumerist and individualistic ideologies, as an avid fan of cartoons as a child, these ideas were secondary to a more important lesson--that of the "trickster" nature of many cartoon characters as they mocked, outwitted, and ultimately defeated their stronger, more powerful adversaries. In the classic cartoon, brute strength and heavy artillery are no match for wit and humor, and justice always prevails. For me, it was a natural process to link my own childhood concept of subversion with an established, more articulate version of subversiveness'.
The Dark Side of the Club is an exhibition of clubbing and music photographs by Jamie Simonds now showing at the Gowlett pub in Peckham. There's some great shots, I particularly liked this one of a pirate radio operator (Kool FM I think) in action on an Aldgate rooftop.
.... the Winter Haven Police Department arrested Anthony Davis after searching his Lee Avenue in Winter Haven. Detectives found audio mixers and DJ equipment and a 100 watt transmitter that they say Davis was using to broadcast his reggae music style radio station on 87.9 FM. Complaints about his station came from a local Orlando TV station, Channel 6 which uses the freqency for their TV audio. Davis called his station format "One Love Radio". A third degree felony charge of unlawful transmission of radio frequency was filed against Davis who told detectives he worked as a security guard in Haines City.
RAM-FM, an English-language radio station broadcasting from a Jerusalem studio, was shut down by police on Monday for transmitting without a proper permit. The West Bank station broadcasts Western music in an attempt to bring Israelis and Palestinians closer together. The station's headquarters are located in the West Bank city of Ramallah, where it broadcasts on 93.6 FM.... The station's headquarters are located in the West Bank city of Ramallah, where it broadcasts on 93.6 FM...The station attracts a diverse audience of tens of thousands, from Israeli soldiers and Palestinian students to West Bank villagers, English speaking immigrants, migrant workers and foreign diplomats. It is one of the numerous pirate radio stations broadcasting throughout Israel, which are often blamed for dangerous disruptions in airport air traffic communications and interference in regular radio broadcasts. (see also this)
'Within the first year after the initial broadcast of Free Radio Berkeley [in 1993], it became clear that the Free Radio Movement was part of a much larger global endeavor. Community radio is rooted in the struggles of people for a just and humane existence. Whether it was: Bolivian tin miners establishing radio stations in the late 1940’s as part of a campaign to improve working conditions; Radio Rebelde’s role in the Cuban Revolution; Czech citizens creating clandestine radio stations after the crushing of the Prague Spring in 1968 by the USSR; or the supportive role of community radio in the recent uprising by indigenous people in Bolivia to reclaim their natural resources – community radio has always been a tool of expression and organization... After the first coup against Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide, Free Radio Berkeley supplied transmitters to peasant organizations fighting against the coup. Transmitters also went to both the Chiapas jungle and the urban streets of Mexico City... Embracing Free Radio as a form of media expression that is genuine and real is the first step on the road to liberation from the society of the spectacle. Only by coming together as communities can people begin to: form the relationships that really matter, tell the stories which impart a collective identity, history and purpose; dance, sing and celebrate life together; and forge new bonds of commitment and support. Free Radio is the Peoples Drum'.
I've been spending a lot of time this weekend hanging round in a car. What has made it all bearable is the radio. Despite having weeks worth of music on my pc, and more music at my disposal than I will ever have time to listen to, radio still offers something else - the unknown and unexpected. Of course this is not true of most stations, but in London at least the airwaves are still crowded with pirates and sometimes community stations with short term broadcasting licences.
So on Force FM (106.5) I listened to DJs Ade and Frisk discussing the relative merits of nu garage, Bumpy 4/4, old skool garage, Bassline and UK funky. They were definitely most in favour of the first two, but the whole thing reminded me of the role of pirates as hothouses for the proliferation of micro-genres and mutations of the 'nuum. More importantly the music was good, Todd Edwards 'When angels sing' a standout track. On Rinse FM there was the inevitable God Made me Phunky, a UK funky take on an old house track that was itself inspired by a 1975 Headhunters track - from the first wave of funk... making me think about the shifting fortunes of the term funk in music - something that for a long time has conjured up a sense of retro-fixated scenes like acid jazz but now reclaimed for the latest twist in urban music... And so on.
Radio has always been important to me. When I was at primary school we used to gather round a small transistor in the lunch break and listen to the chart rundown, in the days of T.Rex and The Sweet. As a teenager I genuinely listened under the covers to the John Peel show, my mind being blown by punk - I can vividly remember hearing Stiff Little Fingers 'Suspect Device' for the first time in my bed. Years later I first heard jungle on a summers day in Brockwell Park (Brixton), lying on the grass and twiddling the dial.
Today all kinds of music are more easily accessible than ever, but there are also mechanisms to keep the unexpected at bay, like lastfm and Itunes Genius- 'if you like this here some more of the same'. Most radio stations, from Kiss to Xfm, are programmed on the same basis of giving their 'core demographic' what they expect to hear. But on the edges of the dial there are still surprizes to be found.
Woofah issue three has been out for a month now, but it's taken me a while to get round to reviewing it. If you haven’t seen previous issues, it’s a lovingly produced glossy A5 zine, aiming to cover reggae, grime and dubstep. As well as taking seriously musics that are under-represented in print (in my view), the contributors also have a strong sense of the way music emerges from connections between people in specific places and scenes, from their life journeys through these times and spaces, and from the sonic dialogue that is opened up when sounds created in a particular zone are transplanted somewhere else.
In the latter respect, I was fascinated to read the interview with The Bomb Squad (legendary producers of Public Enemy, among others). In the latest twist in the Black Atlantic dialogue, these African Americans have been seriously checking out dubstep made by people in England many of whom in turn would have grown under the influence of their groundbreaking hip hip productions. It’s all about the bass – ‘It’s dark, it’s heavy. At the same time its rebellious’ (Hank Shocklee).
Elsewhere an article on the history of UK Dub follows a route from Jah Shaka’s Dub Club at the Rocket on London’s Holloway Road through to Aba Shanti’s University of Dub at Brixton Recreation Centre, while Soulja of FWD recalls London and Essex hardcore and garage nights at places like Telepathy in Stratford, the Berwick Manor Club and Grays (Grays Inn Road) on her journey through to becoming dubstep promoter and working with Rinse FM – nearly 14 years on air as a London pirate despite crackdowns including an ASBO that banned one of the people involved from going above the 3rd floor of any building!
Something that has been around for while is 
