Selling the Sixties - The Pirates and Pop Music Radio (Hardcover, Second and Seco)

Was it a non-stop psychedelic party or was there more to pirate radio in the sixties than hedonism and hip radicalism? "Selling the Sixties" examines the development of offshore pirate radio in Britain, challenging the myths surrounding its maverick "Kings Road" image and separating popularist consumerism from the economic and political machinations which were the flipside of the pirate phenomenon. Robert Chapman analyses pirate radio and its legacy in the shape of two contrasting models of unauthorised pop radio: Radio Caroline and London. He situates these influential stations in their social and cultural contexts, and frames them in an examination of the growth of European and American commercial radio. Chapman also examines the boom in pirate stations in the wake of the BBC's reluctance to respond to consumer demand and its eventual adoption and assimilation of aspects of unoffical pop radio into its own pop service - Radio One. This study of the place of unauthorized braodcasting in sixties subculture brings to light previously unseen evidence from the pirates' archives and makes use of interviews with those directly involved. This book should be of interest to students of med