Oi mate, that’s my Egg Nog okay?

A Happy Boxing day to all! Here’s the audio of The imaginary Stations Winter Holiday Special which was broadcast via Shortwave Gold on Christmas Eve on those shortwaves. There’s a load of festive tunes throughout the hour plus “A holday Mix” from One Deck Pete at 40.38 minutes in. Here’s the tracklistings:

Forgotten employee – The Backroom Tapes
Snow Palms – Evening Rain Gardens (Excerpt)
Kohei Yoshi – Cold Ice Dub
Frost – Munch RIP (instrumental)
Bodyswitch – Gee Whiz it’s Christmas
Jacob Miller/Ray I – Deck The Halls
Kibble – Warm Fireplace (Excerpt)

 

 

Not the Twelfth Night

We went out for a Christmas Eve pint and saw the first dumped Christmas tree of the year at Blythe Hill Fields (where the recycle team usually pick the trees up in January) at 3pm today. Crazy stuff and it isn’t even Christmas Day yet. Those trees aren’t cheap!

Whilst we’re on the Christmas/Yule/Solstice tip, we would like to wish all our gardening and music friends and readers a Happy Holiday and may you all have a great 2024!

(Not) an imaginary fanzine

Better late than never but we must let you know about a great A5 fanzine from DJ Frederick called Tin Can Telephone which is available here if you’re in the US.

It’s a great fanzine if you love radio of a different kind. Issue number 8 features: Imaginary Stations, WKFC (audio here), Alan Maxwell’s KIPM (more here), an interview with Bob Catface from Radio Catface International (if you like downbeat and mellow his great shows are here) Pirate TV stations and Part 15 Legal Low Power AM Radio.

If you’re from out of the US and fancy a copy, an email to imaginarystations@gmail.com will be a good place to start. It’s a really good read and a fanzine worth tracking down.

Tune in here for more solstice vibes

If like us you can’t be at Stonehenge this Friday 22nd December for the Solstice sunrise, you can tune in via the services of youtube here while you sit at home having some toast and lime marmalade or a bowl of All Bran in your PJ’s. Tune in, drop out then drop off (for a bit of a kip).

On a shortwave Solstice Christmas tip

On Christmas Eve Sunday 24th December 2023 there’s an Imaginary Stations Winter Special going out to Europe via Shortwave Gold at 1000/1400 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and then at 2100 UTC on 3975 kHz. There are festive tunes a go-go and at 40 mins in there’ll be One Deck Pete with “A holiday mix”. Tune in with a Irish Coffee and get festive!

One tune that will be played is a cracking dubbed out version of Carla Thomas’ “Gee Whizz it’s Christmas” (above) by the one and only Bodyswitch out of Oakland, California, Great stuff indeed.

 

Then on early Christmas Day there’s a show from the Radio Thrift Shop archives called a Winter Holiday Special with DJ Frederick. Tune in at 0300 UTC on 9395 kHz via WRMI for the more eclectic side of yuletide/winter solstice programming featuring some eclectic holiday tunes and a very interesting mini-documentary called “In Search of The Shaggs” about the rock band formed in Fremont, New Hampshire in 1965. Tune in for something that little bit different for Christmas.

A tune for bin-night’s eve

 

Now here’s a tune that is getting under our skin. It’s from an artist called Paper Sailboat from Ottawa, Ontario and it’s called Numbers Stations. We can’t hear any recognisable number stations samples (but remember we are getting a bit mutton jeff in our old age) and this one really get under your skin, it’s nearly 6 minutes long but you wouldn’t think so. One for turning up loud knowing that the binmen will be here at the crack of dawn.

Gone are the days when the binmen in Coventry would knock your front door on Christmas Eve holding a bin bag saying “Merry Christmas from the Coventry Binmen”. It was like an adult version of trick or treating where if you didn’t comply, your bins wouldn’t be emptied for a couple of weeks, allegedlly. It’s a whole different world now…

Cheers to the good Doctor

If you want to hear a great Monday morning radio show which plays all sorts from Jazz, Funk, Dub and Downbeat you should tune into The Rhythm Doctor’s Waiting Room on a Monday morning from 9-11am (UK Time) on IDA Radio, Tallinn.

Cheers to The Rhythm Doc for airing a mix this morning from Weed’s own One Deck Pete called Dub in the waiting room. At 46.28 Minutes in on the show below is the mix and here’s the tracklistings:
Patrick Andy – Please Don’t Go/Version
U Brown – Black Star Liner
Augustus Pablo – Dub in Moonlight City
Wayne Wade – Man of the Living (Version)
King Tubby – Play Fool get wise (Version)
Dillinger – Bongoman
Jackie Mittoo – Congo Man
Prince Buster –Taxation

Tune in and dub out!

Festive tune of the week

This excellent tune was found when compiling a shortwave mix, a great spoof of The Normal on a festive tip. We hope even Daniel Miller would have a chuckle at it while he’s listening to it around the open fire.

Keep this frequency clear

It was very sad to hear about Benjamin Zephaniah who passed away this morning. Thanks to Gerry Hectic for letting us know about this great tune. RIP Benjamin Zephaniah.