It hardly seems like 40 years since I was writing to Tony Benn as the Postmaster
General to beg him to save
General to beg him to saveto save the pirate radio
stations that had sprung up
across the North Sea - either
on board ships or perched on top of old World
War II forts stuck on mud
banks off the coast of Essex.
The real problem was that the BBC Light Programme of the 1960s wasn't playing the music that teenagers wanted to listen to. Although there was Radio Luxembourg it was hard to pick up on the transistor portable radios that had just come into vogue, and the big family radiograms were tuned invariably to the Home Service or the joys of Housewife's Choice and Worker's Playtime. There were no real 'disc jockeys' and the playlist was heavily restricted and censored. So, the pirates were closed down (they interfered with emergency and shipping wavelengths in those pre FM/VHF/Digital days of very restricted broadcasting opportunities) and Radios 1, 2, 3 and 4 were created. A very British solution - commercial radio has never really caught on, but listening figures for the BBC seem to ever increase.
stations that had sprung up
across the North Sea - either
on board ships or perched on top of old WorldWar II forts stuck on mud
banks off the coast of Essex.
The real problem was that the BBC Light Programme of the 1960s wasn't playing the music that teenagers wanted to listen to. Although there was Radio Luxembourg it was hard to pick up on the transistor portable radios that had just come into vogue, and the big family radiograms were tuned invariably to the Home Service or the joys of Housewife's Choice and Worker's Playtime. There were no real 'disc jockeys' and the playlist was heavily restricted and censored. So, the pirates were closed down (they interfered with emergency and shipping wavelengths in those pre FM/VHF/Digital days of very restricted broadcasting opportunities) and Radios 1, 2, 3 and 4 were created. A very British solution - commercial radio has never really caught on, but listening figures for the BBC seem to ever increase.
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