BY JOHN MUSGRAVE
Today marks the annual anniversary of the death of pirate radio back in 1967. Every year a dwindling band of ageing rockers and ravers mark the passing of the Marine Etc Broadcasting Offences Act; Harold Wilson’s infamous law that sank rock and roll radio. For three glorious years we’d listened to pop music from the high seas.
Radio Caroline began broadcasting at Easter 1964 from the mv Fredericia anchored off Felixstowe. Soon, other stations joined her. Anchored outside territorial waters, Radio England, Radio London and the rest claimed to break no British law. Other stations like Radio City and Radio 390 set up on disused wartime gun forts in the Thames – again just outside the three mile limit. A second Caroline ship took up position off the Isle of Man broadcasting from the mv Mi Amigo. To this day the odds the pirates went through to bring pop music to air defy rational explanation.
Hardened sailors, perspicacious wireless engineers and teenage disc jockeys braved storm force gales, snapped anchor chains and faced routine harassment. Many of them had never been to sea before. As well as sea sickness, our heroes risked life and limb on those heaving ships.
Hard to imagine now but before the pirates pop radio was non-existent – the Beeb played a few hours a week. In marked contrast the United States had radio stations playing every conceivable type of music round the clock – all paid for by advertising.
The establishment completely failed to understand this visceral sixties cry for freedom. What it couldn’t cope with was out-of-control youngsters playing and saying whatever they wanted. Here was free speech complete with love laments, political protests and hymns to liberty. We surfed a youthful dynamism born out of a grey post-war landscape. One minute we were playing on a bombed out street, the next listening to Kathy Kirby on a transistor radio. The first time I ever danced with a girl – Vicky – was on a construction site. She was teaching me and my gang the Twist. Chubby Checker recorded the song for Parkway Records in Philadelphia but we heard it playing on a ship anchored three miles off Scarborough.
That August a palpable fury swept Britain. As closure loomed, teenagers rioted in London, rock stars like Lulu broadcast tearful farewells from the ships and schoolboys rigged up rooftop transmitters. Rain swept much of the country that day. The weather was so atrocious that relief crews were unable to get out to Oceaan Seven – home of Radio 270. As a tearful 11 year old that night I listened to the last programme on my steam radio. I kept the sound turned right down for fear of a recalcitrant parent sweeping in and turning it off.
270 went off the air at midnight. I was devastated.
Wilson’s MEBO act made it an offence to advertise on the stations. This effectively cut the financial feed lines. Labour’s back door approach holds a warning for all modern day defenders of free speech. If outright cancelling is too difficult for them then attack the target financially.
Some disc jockeys like the superb Vince Allen on Radio 270 disappeared never to be heard of again. Others like Johnnie Walker and Tony Blackburn became household names.
What of us the fans? Almost an entire generation was distraught. In an era with a marked generation gap pirate radio was like having a personal friend whispering in your ear. The crushing of free radio inspired many of us to mistrust authority. Looking at the social media landscape nowadays it is plain to see the same phenomenon is at it again. Free speech is the most fundamental of our freedoms. It demands ceaseless vigilance. Rock and roll remains the language of protest. As an old pirate jingle urges: ‘Play More Music Now….’
John Musgrave’s novel ‘Radio A-Go-Go’ is available on Amazon