So Garry Stevens knows (or is that nose in his spell checker) just what Malcolm's Radio Caroline should play and it's not what they are playing right now!! Well being a licensed station they have to stay along the lines of playing album music that's their remit. Well to brighten things up and bring the quality up to Garry's demanding albeit unclear expectations I think I may have found the perfect compromise.

Just asking for a friend, but were the real radio pirates those who came around in the mid 1990's and onwards? Prior to that the offshore and unlicensed land based stations in the UK, Holland etc, went out of their way to explain that they were free radio stations, many of whom said they would happily be licensed if they could just continue to do their thing (well words to that effect). 

Plenty of time was spent by offshore stations explaining that by being in international waters they could not be pirates as they were outside of any governmental jurisdiction. The bigger land-based stations lobbied for a license (Radio Jackie & Radio Sovereign initially come to mind, there were others) and many of the rest were just part time weekend hobbies run by very naughty boys. 

Anyway this is an interesting video about some who happily knew they were pirates, loved every minute of it and were living in the moment. Ringway Manchester is a fine Youtube channel and hopefully more will follow on this era when Pirate Radio really did test boundaries (pun intended). For the old fart anoraks, don't forget that these were all drug pushing gangsters who stole your legacy, oops sorry who stole your transmitters and headlines.  

Just to show that I am not completely devoid of some happy memories from the past here's some fine tunes from August 1967. Being the youngest sibling (& still in short trousers all year round) my older family members ensured I was a fan of The Doors before most folk this side of the Atlantic had even heard of them. Anyway do me a favour, don't tell the two dull forums about this video, it mentions a radio station that was much, much better than Radio Carol Smiley.