So I spent the day mainly working on Hethersett Herald and wondering how anyone can pay Zoe Ball over £1 million for what she does on Radio Two and in other spheres. No wonder people complain about the cost of the television licence.
But it did start me thinking about pop/rock music and the "Good Old Days." So I spent the evening dotting around on You Tube and seeing where my fancy took me. It didn't go too far. For some reason I honed in on Suite London by the Peddlers. That morphed into two songs written by the Peddlers' Roy Phillips - Girlie and Birth. Phillips is now 79 years of age, lives in New Zealand and is still writing and performing music. If you don't know these songs check them out.
For some unknown reason that took me to a load of documentaries on the Pop Pirates and in particular Radio Caroline - always my favourite. In 1965 I was 13 years of age and the pirates meant a lot to me. During the day (when not at school obviously) I would listen to Caroline on my trannie (transistor radio) and at night it would be Radio Luxemburg with Kid Jensen and Baby Bob Stewart. Caroline had Simon Dee, Doug Kerr and Tony Blackburn. I went out in the early 1970s for a short time with a girl who was obsessed with Tony Blackburn and thought he was an excellent singer. She had an LP of his which she played a lot. Not surprisingly the relationship didn't last!
The pirates were essential listening for young people. They were popular, vibrant, fun and anarchic and it was just so romantic dreaming of being a DJ on the ocean waves with your own programme and nothing to do all day apart from eat, drink, play music and sleep. Of course the reality was probably different and featured words like boredom and sea-sickness. Still the idea is usually much more fun than the reality.
I have written plenty over the years about the Pirates and even got to know a bona fide Caroline DJ when I worked as a reporter on the Beccles and Bungay Journal newspaper on Suffolk. Ric Turton was one of the freelance photographers we employed. He was also a coach driver. Rick had been on Radio Caroline in its very early days and went on to manage Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits. As a DJ he went under the name of Ric Jonns or Richard the Third.
Thankfully I decided to tape interviews with Ric and, although the tapes are long lost, I took the trouble of transcribing them and many years later sent that transcript off to a pirate radio website who printed it in full and I received a thank you from Tony Prince who himself was a DJ on both Caroline and Luxemburg and who has put together an excellent history of the pirates which is readily available on You Tube.
That interview is still on the pirate radio site at http://www.offshoreradio.co.uk/odds33.htm
There's also more biographical details of Rick at:
http://www.offshoreradio.co.uk/djsj2k.htm#jonns
The Pirates shook up the establishment, had the boring old BBC hopping up and down and caused consternation in Parliament. They didn't last all that long but they led to the BBC having to acknowledge pop music as an art form and also led directly or indirectly to the launch of Radio One. Ironically there is still a Radio Caroline broadcasting album tracks on DAB Radio.
Many of the pirate DJs have passed on but Tony Blackburn and Johnny Walker still regularly turn up on Radio Two and Walker's Sound of the 70s show on Sunday afternoons is still the highlight of my listening week.
Somebody left a message on one of the pirate radio sites about how lucky he felt to have grown up with the pirates and what amounted to the birth of rock music. I echo those sentiments. Those were times of musical wonder when the whole history of pop/rock music was unfolding before our eyes (and ears of course). Those days will never return - the days of music innocence and wonder.
More music memories in coming blogs.