Category Archives: imaginary stations

A life on the ocean (air)wave(s)

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This weekend, a show called Great Lakes Pirate Radio Ships from the Imaginary Stations crew was broadcast to the far flung reaches of Europe via those old shortwaves. It was a programme that celebrated the spirit and sound of those offshore stations of old. Here it is in its full glory below.

At 33.27 there’s a mix from One Deck Pete called “Have you ever been to Windermere?”. The tracklistings are:
Imandra Lake – VööImandra
Lake Radio – Culture Veins
Zap Pow – River Stone (Lee Perry Prod.)
Morschen43 – MV Ross Revenge For Ever!
The Cats – Swan Lake

And as the song below goes from Morschen43:
“To you, web radio director, presenter of radio show,
And for all music programmers!
Real people!, real music!
Said their radio slogan”

By the way there’s a great archive of the pirate radio ships here.

Hang on mate, the place is electrified

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Thanks to Gerry Hectic for sending us this very grim public information film from 1989. There’s two deaths within a minute, this is heavy going stuff. They don’t make them like they used to. After watching this, we are going to stay put if we see any footballs in power stations.

While we’re onto electricity and safety, here’s a track from Madtone Safety Council Vs Tommy McCook called Fix things properly, a 1970’s public information film/reggae mash up.

Who’s been on me harp (without asking)?

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Big shout to Fenny for playing this on last week’s On the Wire. It’s a wonderful bit of music from Cerys Hafana called Helynt Ryfeddol which features a triple harp. It’s a tune that reveals itself with every listen and one that will fit in just fine on the next instalment of HARP from Imaginary stations.

A couple for a sunday

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Here’s something a little out there: a dubbed-out, globe-spanning tune from Free Soul School with Red Dragon. Ideal for those grey Sunday mornings when you’re not quite sure if the garden is calling or if the weather has other plans (clearing out the shed, perhaps?)

And a nice piece from Scientist & Dubiterian called Jah Light Dub from an LP called A Tribute to Augustus Pablo. Lovely stuff!

We have (an Egyptian) lift off

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It’s been just 8 days since we received some egyptian/walking onion bulblets and as soon as we got them, we put them in a pot as directed and stuck it on the packed kitchen windowsill. We ordered our bulblets from Real Seeds, and although we only paid for one, they kindly included a few extras—just in case. We noticed yesterday two had germinated and there may even be more to come! Great value by the way as they cost £3.29 for one. We’ll keep you posted.

And here’s a realy wonderful track to accompany those onions bulblets.

We’ve got your number

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Cheers to our good music/gardening/radio friend Justin Patrick Moore for sending over this musical recommendation in an ambient downbeat style called The haunted testcard tapes by Alpha Seven. Haunted Testcard is a lovely bit of electronica and a great one to drift off to. By the way the cover of the LP is great too!

There’s another testcard connection as Pete Roberts of Alpha Seven was also a member of Testcard F, remember them?

 

The next we’ve chosen (above) is a numbers stations related tune and you know we love one of them here. There’s quite a few on Bandcamp if you tap in “Numbers Stations” under the search. Some are of an industrial or harsh experimental nature which all have their place but it is nice to hear something in a more chilled out style. The track even has some morse in there as well. Double radio-related bonus. Cheers for the musical tip Justin.

And by the way if you want to get into a saturday spy mode, pretend you are secret agent 001 and fancy listening to some numbers stations have a look here and see if there’s a transmission coming up.

Don’t worry you don’t need a shortwave radio hidden in a bar of soap or disguised as a loaf of Hovis to listen in, just click the link ( in blue under “Next station in so and so minutes”) and it will bring you to a online SDR (software defined radio) all ready tuned in and ready to decode. Make sure you have a biro and a rough book at the ready.

Rose thorns as gramophone needles. Isn’t it?

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Thanks a million to the one and only Rhythm Doctor for playing One Deck Pete’s “Put a sock in it” mix (originally for Imaginary Station’s KTAB) 11.30 mins in on his “Mojo” It’s a mix up of some fine funk, jazzy stuff, latin, soul, ska and whathaveyou. More on the show here.

Tracklistings:
Jimmy James – Come to me Softly
Off a Jamaican 7″ single on WIRL from 1962 from the man Jimmy James as in Jimmy James and the Vagabonds “I’ll go where the music takes me” fame.

Kouta Katsutaro – Asu ha otachika
Off the wonderful set simply entitled “Kouta Katsutaro” on Death Is Not The End’s Bandcamp (here).

King Stitt/Tommy Mc Cook – Sauvitt
As sampled by One Deck & Popular on “Son of Stitt” (here) and a version of Mongo Santamaria‘s Suavito (here).

Alick Nkhata – Kalindawalo Ni Mfumu
This track is something else! A sort of Rock n Roll stomper, with some lovely harmonies and some horns courtesy of a Coventry Salvation Army brass band sound-alike and someone tinkling those ivories very skillfuly towards the end. It don’t get much better than this. On an LP called Radio Lusaka off the mighty Mississippi Records Bandcamp here.

Marty Robinson – Follow you
From a very battered Coxsone Dodd white 7″ blank and later released on his Port-O-Jam label. M (Martell/Marty) Robinson may have lived in the Coventry/Birmingham area for a bit too. More about the artist here.

Sitting here watching crows like themselves

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Early this morning we popped down B&Q in Bell Green for some liquid fertiliser as we’re not producing enough comfrey leaves to make the liquid feed we’re used to putting on our garden (Above: crow waiting for bus home like us at 8.30 am).

Something we should look into is the NPK content that comes on the side of the bottle denoting how much Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus (P), and K for Potassium (or Potash) is in the liquid. As we’ve always used home-made comfrey liquid and mixed in compost on the beds, that’s something we’ve got to research about more.

Back home we spent a good hour or so feeding the back garden including the giant sunflower which is reaching skywards. We’ve 3 sunflowers, this 8ft monster and another 2 that are about 5 foot. It must be all about where they’re placed and how much sun they get. We love the sunflowers as the tops do follow the sun about during the day.

And this week we were told about this video, 10 vegetables/fruit that we don’t bother with anymore. We’re talking skirret, alexanders, good King Henry, medlar, chickweed, scorzonera, welsh onions, lovage, tansy (“The punk rock herb…” “…that demands respect and attention” as the bloke describes it, we love that!) and turnip greens. We wonder as food fashions come and go, will any of these “old time something come back again” as the song goes?

 

And two tunes about flying winged things:
The first a nice dub number from Derajah meets The 18th Parallel called Dub Crow.

 

The next is an a excellent tune released by the wonderful Sublime Frequencies out of Seattle, Washington, it’s by Chhoun Vanna and called To Tea Yum Chlong (Birds Are Singing But My Lover Won’t Return). At 2.45, it just ain’t long enough.

“The birds are chirping, to and fro
My love, have you forgotten me?
As water can’t cut through the sand
I can’t cut you from my memories
The bridge (between you and I) has broken
The pathway is gone, and the water is so very deep
How am I to find you on the other side, so far away?”
Thanks to fleurmach.com for the lyrics.