Listen to a radio documentary that the author made over 35 years ago...

Above: The original ad for On The Run in Script Magazine, courtesy of Peter Carbines. Click here to see a large version of this image

It was an odd, relatively short period in British broadcasting history - between the closing of most of the off-shore stations on August 14, 1967, and the opening of Britain’s first commercial radio stations, LBC, on October 8, 1973, and Capital Radio a week later.

During that period, the “fight for free radio” was at its height. Land-based pirate radio flourished, and especially so in London. From Radio Free London and Radio Freedom on 255metres, to the Radio Free Helen network on 197 metres; from Radio Jackie to the London Transmitter of Independent Radio; numerous music stations attempted to make short weekend broadcasts before being apprehended by the authorities in the form of the Post Office, then in charge of dealing with such things as offenders against the Wireless Telegraphy Act 1949. Sometimes stations were raided in under half an hour, resulting in all kinds of tricks on the part of the broadcasters to avoid capture.

Enlargement of the inset text show in the ad above.

The story is told in this London Underground/Pyramedia Productions radio documentary, originally made available by Script magazine in 1973. Including a mass of off-air actuality and interviews with staff of stations such as Radio Free London, Radio Jackie and Radio Kaleidoscope, On The Run tells the story of London’s clandestine radio stations as they approached a turning point - facing the start of legal commercial radio.

Land-based pirates of course continued right up to the present day, but the 1971-73 period was certainly a classic era for underground broadcasting in the UK.

The programme runs for just under one and a half hours and is available here, or as a Podcast.

Above: The original cassette inlay

• Originally recorded on 2-track reel-to-reel tape and mixed to mono, the original master was sent via the magazine for duplication - and never returned. Although the 2-track masters still exist, the original mix was lost - until now. Transdiffusion reader Andrew Barker kindly supplied a copy of the original Script Magazine version, which has been transferred to digital and cleaned up. While it has some minor technical issues (it’s a 35-year-old high-speed-duplicated cassette after all), it has stood the test of time.

Enlarged version of the inset image in the ad shown at the top of the page.