Favourite Radio Stations past and present.

['LIVEWIRE?']

All of us now getting on in years will no doubt have listened to 208, AFN, etc., in our youth, but, IMHO, one of the best stations available between 1964 & 1967 was 'Wonderful Radio London', which brought American style top 40 radio to these shores for the first time. To me they were always slick, professional, and in tune with the times, and, if I may say so on here, Radio 1, when it started, was a pale imitation of 'Big L', hampered as it was by Needle Time restrictions and BBC cost-cutting, both of which restricted what could be done on 247 metres. Which of the 'pirate' stations were other members favourites, I wonder.

[martin.m]

In North East England we had the pirate station Radio 270 until they stopped broadcasting after the ban in August 1967. As a teenager the commercials and promos never bothered me, some of them were quite entertaining.

[hannahs radios]

My favourites were Luxembourg the great 208, then BBC Radio 1 (despite poor reception after dark), Atlantic 252 was another favourite station. When all those went or changed programme style I listened to Gold, now nothing really. Hearts not too bad 'but that's it now.

['LIVEWIRE?']

We could, and I often did, listen to 270 down here in the South Midlands, too. IIRC 270 was owned &/or managed by one Wilf Proudfoot, who later became an MP. (Odd, the different things that are retained in the mind!)

[raditechman]

I listened sometimes to Radio 390 which was on air during the 1960's pirate era.
Broadcast from an old fort and gave a good signal in London area.

John

['LIVEWIRE?']

Likewise. 390 Broadcast from Red Sands Fort, which is still there, and in a recent documentary about the Thames Estuary Forts, I'm sure there was still an aerial mast on one of the towers, possibly left from the Radio 390 days, though I don't know when the footage showing this was filmed. Coincidentally maybe, but 774kHz (388M) has in later years been allocated to, and used by modern day Commercial Radio Stations. One, much missed , was Severn Sound, which used to operate out of Gloucester

[bluepilot]

In it's day my favourite was "Big L". Somehow the jingles seemed to add to the experience rather than being annoying. Remember the "I dig Big L 66" stickers? Sadly in 67 it was all over. After that the only choice was Radio Noordzee which wasn't bad until the government jammed it.

Actually I think Caroline kept going for a while. I remember in the 70s (?) some station promoted "Loving Awareness". Was that Caroline? It was never made clear what Loving Awareness was. The main positive point was that they played loads of tracks back to back with no interruptions. Quick jingle about Loving Awareness and then another half an hour of non-stop music.

I could never stand Luxembourg with its never-ending adverts for products for teenagers with spotty faces.

[Station X]

If we're talking pirates, Radio North Sea International and Laser 558.

[Panrock]

Favourite in my teens: Radio 390.

Favourite today: Jones College Radio.

Both easy listening.

Steve

['LIVEWIRE?']

Stuart, you're right in thinking that Radio Caroline at one point promoted LA (Loving Awareness) and played mainly album tracks. IIRC, their ship at the time was the 'Ross Revenge', which they still own. It's moored in the Blackwater River -their website will have more details. Caroline, the first of the UK pirates of course, has been broadcasting, with interruptions, since Good Friday 1964, almost 56 years. A supplementary question, what was the first 'pirate' radio station? My bet would be either Radio Nord (off the Danish Coast?), or was it Radio Sud?

[Nymrod121]

R.N.I. was my favourite ... kept me company whilst revising for my 'O' levels:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1heA...w?usp=drivesdk

[CambridgeWorks]

Radio Albatross was a venture started by one Robert Tidswell from Gosberton, near Spalding. My boss bought some shares, but it never really got going, certainly not on a boat. He was rather alarmed when Robert told him of a plan for a huge mast on a small boat. Whether any boat was bought, I don't know. Robert always had grand ideas and was a very likeable person, later becoming G8KGR. He passed away maybe 15 years ago?
Just before I got my licence, my dad bought from Robert an excellently made hf 80M to 10M am/cw tx. 813 pa, pair of 811 modulators. This was originally built by an amateur down South, who I can't recall his callsign.
The reason for this post is that Robert had used this tx in the village for pirate radio test purposes on AM as part of his experimental work for pirate radio. He had made an rf coupler unit for interfacing between the co-ax output of the tx and the Live and Neutral of the mains!!! He told me it was amazing just how many people it reached in the village, even though they were all complaints. He was happy it worked.
The coupler was included with my tx, but was never used!
Rob

[m0cemdave]

I'm sure the "Loving Awareness" period was pre Ross Revenge, when they were still using the old Mi Amigo. Tony Allan was an exceptionally good broadcaster.

My favourite radio station was an incarnation of Caroline called "Radio Seagull", which ran in the evenings for about 6 months or a year in around 1973/74. A shipload of stoned hippies playing whatever music they felt like. Classical pieces, American rock, obscure continental prog and everything in between, interspersed with occasional poetry readings and , er "deep and meaningful" comments. And who can forget the occasional playing of "a request for Mary Warner" when supplies were running low?

I was also a regular listener to RNI and was very fond of their pan-European approach. "Music for a young Europe" was their strap-line and they played a lot of continental music that was never heard on British radio.

[Hybrid tellies]

In my younger days living in the far south and west of Cornwall there were no Pirate stations. So it was a choice of three stations and I wish I could go back in time to listen to them again.

BBC Radio 2 on 1500m with it wonderful mix of music, news, sport, shipping forecasts with gale warnings that would be broadcast as required throughout the day. Some great presenters including Ray Moor and Terry Wogan.

BBC Radio 4 West on 285m. Some very interesting programmes as there is today but with the regional opt outs for news and weather from Bristol.

Radio Luxembourg on 208m. During the evenings this was our go to station for the latest pop music hits. We loved the different style of presentation to that of the BBC and yes this includes the adverts which for us was quite a novelty to hear on the radio.

[G6Tanuki]

In the 80s one of my favourites was Laser 558: in those days I was spending a lot of time driving round the South of England and Laser was my go-to entertainment in the car or when - as seemed to happen rather frequently - I had to spend a morning at some obscure hilltop-site waiting for the keyholder to finally arrive and let me in.

Also in the late-80s - at least in cities like London, Oxford, Bristol and the Medway towns - there were plenty of FM pirate stations pumping out happy-hardcore/acid-house/rave, which was something you never got to hear on any of the legal music-stations.

[hannahs radios]

I forgot all about the great Laser 558 I loved that one Atlantic 252 were almost the same style at least in the beginning. I remember that on one of my radios there was an annoying beacon which interfered with laser this was the first time I was aware of IF break thru problems I realised the beacon was not really there because it wasn't audible on other sets I owned. Puts me in mind of listening to radio one in my brother in laws car and hearing morse code very faintly in the background

[Nickthedentist]

Originally Posted by G6Tanuki

Also in the late-80s - at least in cities like London, Oxford, Bristol and the Medway towns - there were plenty of FM pirate stations pumping out happy-hardcore/acid-house/rave, which was something you never got to hear on any of the legal music-stations.

Yes.

I lived in SW London until the mid-1990s, and always had my old Rogers tuner in the workshop tuned to stations like Fantasy, Medina, Powerjam, Lightning etc.

They were all on FM, usually mono without RDS, often accompanied by a lot of mains hum, but sometimes sounding as good as the big boys with slick presentation, very professionally-done ads, and music that was light years ahead of what was on Radio 1 etc.

I went to university in Birmingham in 1993, and was astounded to find the airwaves dead in comparison, with not a single pirate station on FM as far as I could hear. BRMB and Radio WM weren't quite the same!

There was one audible in Oxford about 5 years ago ("UK's Finest") which had scrolling RDS with a phone number for text "shouts" and adverts for raves, but it didn't last long. It seemed to come from the Thame area.

My sets are all tuned to BBC Radio 3 or 4 these days.

[Beardyman]

I remember listening to Radio Luxembourg into the wee small hours as a lad (11-12 years old) on a little two valve regenerative I'd built from a book in the local library, it ran off a 45V & 1.5V battery (this must have been around 1970-72 when you could still buy them), a pair of high impedance (heavy!!) headphones from the local army surplus shop & a long wire antenna strung out the bedroom window to the washing line! When I went to buy the parts the shop owner said "Oh, another follower of Mr. King I see!" then proceeded to point out all the mistakes in the schematic & what to do to make it work, the shop was called Barkers (Portsmouth) now long gone sadly. Luxembourg would fade in & out which I thought was something to do with my radio or atmospherics. Still got that radio somewhere. Happy days indeed.

[Richard_FM]

Ethnic radio stations were an interesting part of the 1980s pirate scene.

London Greek Radio was an example, which was once raided while on air & led to a shouting match betwwen the police & a DJ who sounded like Harry Enfield's Stavros, or so I've been told.

[crackle]

I remember listening to Luxembourg under the bed covers, with that annoying fading and phasing of the sound.
What a joy when the UK Pirate stations started with their local powerful transmitters with no fading, both day and night. I remember mostly listening to Big L and RNI, and of course BBC R2/R1 for the Sunday run down of the top 20.

MIke