Skybird on repeat

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Due to poor reception over the whole of Europe the other week, Free Radio Skybird is rebroadcasting their October edition tomorrow at 1100 UTC (12 noon UK).

Tune in using your shortwave set on 7440khz in the 41 metre band, via the SDR on Channel 292 or failing that, have a listen from locations around Germany using the SDR site here. There’s a mix from Weeds’ One Deck Pete featuring a new track from Madtone an old feature about Numbers Stations and a Delia Derbyshire Radiophonic Laboratory special.

Fingers crossed for good propagation!

#shortwavesnotdead #freeradioskybird #madtone #deliaderbyshire

We don’t want no more co-channel interference

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Here’s the studio recording of One Deck Pete’s “Sunspot minimum but the music’s maximum mix” which was transmitted on Free Radio Skybird on the 5th October 2019. (No recording off the airwaves this time due to poor quality signal and co-channel interference.)

Tracklistings:
Froth Whitlam – “Sheeba”
Dasya – “Tango on the Street”
Andre J Kwenda – “Umbali”
Madtone – “Diamond in the sky” first worldwide play on shortwave radio.

And if you’re longing to hear a bit of distorted audio here’s what Madtone’s “Diamond in the sky” sounded like recorded off an online SDR in Carlow, Ireland. Additional percussion thanks to co-channel interference from Radio China International and fades and noise courtesy of the E and F layers of the Ionosphere.

Genuine Thursday night tune

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As heard on last week’s excellent On The Wire show on BBC Radio Lancashire. Lloyd Ruddock with the excellent Roy Cousins produced “Genuine Way” with the lovely flip, Ungena, a dub by his brother the late great King Tubby. Cheers Stevie B for letting us know about this one and for Fenny for telling us about finding a genuine stone-age axe head! Here it is in all it’s glory on the On The Wire website! It’ll be passed onto a museum for safe keeping but what a find!

Saturday night’s radio today

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https://soundcloud.com/djfrederick/free-radio-skybird-5-october-2019

Here’s an advance on  Free Radio Skybird‘s Saturday 5th October at 2200 UTC/ 2300 UK transmission on 6070 khz on shortwave if you want to hear it now and without the sounds of the ionosphere.

This month’s programme features One Deck Pete’s “Sunspot Minimum but the Music’s maximum” mix at 11.22 in, at 22.01 Justin Patrick Moore’s Radiophonic Laboratory which is an excellent special on Delia Derbyshire (cheers also to Justin to pointing us to this great Delia Derbyshire resource here), a rerun of a Numbers Stations special at 34.47 featuring Akin Fernandez and Simon Mason and at 42.35 One Deck Pete again with the Skybird Mailbag. 

“Solar minimum but the music’s maximum” mix has tunes from: Froth Whitlam, Dasya, Andre J Kwenda and a worldwide exclusive from Madtone with Diamond in the sky.

Big thanks to DJ Frederick for getting us involved in the Skybird project and a big shout to everyone else involved (Justin & Steve). Tune in and drop out (now or later)! #Shortwavesnotdead #Freeradioskybird

Another page in your (gardening) diary

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This afternoon we put in another couple of rows of onions and garlic which we got from Shannon’s the other week so they can happily overwinter (or they’ll only sit in our seed tin until next spring). In the bed (above) where once stood a greenhouse many moons ago and where now the Thompson & Morgan trial sunflower and tomatoes are still hanging on, we put in one row each of Autumn Champion (white) and Electric Red onions.

And near to the house we put in an extra row of Marco garlic that’ll get a good bit of the sun because of the position of the bed. To the left of the picture can just be seen the newly bit of lawn we sowed around the August Bank Holiday. A few weeks previously we took up all of the 1970’s crazy paving that was doing nothing but attracting weeds in between its cracks. With all this late gardening action we can’t wait to see the results next year. Roll on next spring!

Saturday night (in a shortwave) style

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On Saturday 5th October at 2200 UTC/ 2300 UK there’s a new transmission from DJ Frederick’s Free Radio Skybird on 6070 khz on shortwave. The later time which will help propagation hopefully is broadcast by Channel 292 and if you haven’t a shortwave set can also be heard on the SDR link on their site here.

This month’s programme will feature: Justin Patrick Moore’s Radiophonic Laboratory, Steve with Mini-indie radio and our very own One Deck Pete presenting the Skybird Mailbag. They will also play his “Solar minimum but the music’s maximum” mix that has tunes from: Froth Whitlam, Dasya, Andre J Kwenda and a worldwide exclusive from Madtone.

The programme will be available on DJ Frederick’s Soundcloud page the day before, if you want to hear the show in quality stereo. We here prefer it intermingled with the sounds of the ionosphere. Tune in and turn on whichever way you fancy!

Also this weekend coming sees the re-transmission of Free Radio Skybird’s Remixed show on Sunday 29th September at 0800 UTC (0900 UK) on 7440 khz which will feature One Deck Pete’s “Sounds of the shortwave” mix.

#shortwavesnotdead #freeradioskybird #madtone

And the final result just in…

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Okay, so something got to it before we did (pesky squirrels!) and it is looking a bit bruised but the excellent beefsteak Thompson & Morgan trial tomato is a winner. This specimen is next to a 50 pence piece and weighs 500 grams, that’s half a kilogram! You would be mad not to try these next year. The plant required minimum fuss, some support, regular water and a weekly comfrey feed. What a tom!

Do(ing) it properly

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And as we said in the last missive, we’re going to post up stuff to remind ourselves where and when we’ve put plants & seeds in as it’s handy for us to know that sort of thing (as we usually forget!)

When the sun was out yesterday a couple of cloves of the garlic (Marco) we got at Shannon’s were popped into the South Suburban planter we found in a skip which has a couple of Egyptian onions seedlings in there already.

The onions sets we got too were put in today (when it didn’t rain) by the silver birch and the lone lettuce from the Thomson and Morgan seed trials. On the left is the Autumn Champion and Electric Red on the right. Apart from putting those in, it was just a little bit of tipping around and the odd bit of weeding. At least we know where we’ve put stuff now!

By the way, Happy Autumn Equiknoxx to all for tomorrow!

Plant variety of the week

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We’re not massive Hydrangea fans here at Weeds even though we’ve got one but we do love any plant variety called Red Reggae. This is from a new range of plants in the marketplace especially for music fans of all genres called “Music Collection”. We’re now eagerly awaiting the Buddleia “Intelligent drum and bass”, Daffodil “Dead bonkers gabba” and Rudbeckia “Not so soppy cuddlecore“. We’ll keep you informed!