Free Radio Forum: Re: Laser 558

I’m finding the reminiscences here really interesting, even if they do make me feel old!

I discovered Radios Caroline, London and 390 at Christmas 1966 when I received a Mitsubishi transistor radio as a present. Radio London was my favourite. Although the offshore stations are often referred to as “pop pirates”, they knew their audience and would also play music for ‘housewives’ (although I’m sure that description is discredited now.) If Radio London played something really egregious, an Englebert Humperdink record for example, I would turn my tuning control a quarter turn to the left and hear Caroline, probably playing something magical like Matthew & Son. I’d stay with Caroline until they Humperdinked (Humperdunk?) me, then it would be back to Big L. I freely admit that I cried at 3.00pm on 14th August 1967, so great was the feeling of loss. Like losing a dear friend.

So, to Laser 558. A magazine, I think it was called Radio Now, run by the late Howard Rose/Jay Jackson/Crispian St John/Chris McCarthy (the rogue had many names) mentioned a “Laser 730” due on air “soon” and using a balloon to hold the antenna aloft. I tuned around that part of the dial regularly and, one day while in my car, I was rewarded by the balloon tests on 729kHz with continuous Beatles music, some in German. I was absolutely thrilled. The signal was good but with some adjacent channel interference from BBC Radio 4 on 720kHz. I was always glad to know that Caroline was on air, but wasn’t so keen on the format at the time, so the advent of Laser was wonderful.

When the Communicator lost the balloon, on at least two occasions, tests continued on 729 but were very weak with an antenna strung between the ship’s short masts. Then one day the presenter, either Blake Williams or Johnny Lewis if memory serves, said they were going off air for engineering work but would be back “in about two weeks, possibly not on 729”.

Some time later a friend called me to say there was a very strong signal playing continuous music on 558kHz. I checked. Yes! It was pounding in on every radio in my home in south Bucks, even on a 1933 Philips 634A exactly like this:

https://www.vintageradio.nl/radio%27s/philips_634a_engels.htm

The 634A only had a couple of feet of wire for an aerial, but the 558 signal was massive. I remember on one occasion the music stopped and an audio sweep and step signal generator was put to air. Oh the joy, the sheer unbridled joy!

I was working at LBC/IRN in London at the time and laser and Caroline were both carried on the ‘ring main’, the audio feed that was available on all desks and work stations. There was one engineer, a chap from Northern Ireland who loathed Laser with a passion because it interfered with his reception of RTE on, I think, 567kHz. Many Irish people in the UK complained, and eventually Laser reduced their bandwidth. When they first came on air the quality was superb, but after the bandwidth reduction it never sounded as good.

The first presenter I head was Rick Harris, and I can’t put into words the excitement of having a real offshore station back. I was 32 at the time and I sobbed like a child! I had a private pilot’s licence and used to take people out to see the two radio ships. One was the hypnotist Paul McKenna, who was working in radio at the time. To this day he doesn’t know that he nearly died at my hands when I got lost over a very rough North Sea!

When Caroline started transmitting on 576kHz it was like going back to the sixties as I could oscillate (pun intended) betwixt Laser and Caroline with a quarter turn of the dial.

The other thrill was RNI coming on air in 1970. In my mind’s eye I can still see the article in Disc and Music Echo with the headline: “Pirate radio is back and it’s a North Sea Gas.” And it was. Oh it was.

Previous Message

I was 21 in 1984. I had recently returned to the UK at the start of the year and was aware Radio Caroline had returned. I was in Ibiza for most of 83 and had read reports in the English newspapers that Caroline had returned (these newspapers were received a day after publication) I spent every night after finishing work to try to pick them up, finally hearing the closedown one early morning in September.
When I returned and was in the south east I could listen to Caroline's superb signal where I lived and worked. This was all over the place but mainly East Anglia, and East Midlands down to East London. It was quite popular in East Anglia but as you reached into East London not so much.
In February I picked up Beatles music and a few programmes by Blake Williams and Johnny Lewis and together on 729khz. I still have the recordings in the loft, but these can be found on the internet too.
They said they would be back. In early May I heard a terrific signal on 558 with more popular music than Caroline were playing. I started tuning the companies vans and vehicles. Feed back from my colleagues was good, but they said there's no DJ. After a little over two weeks I got picked up by my colleague (I didn't drive at the time) and my colleague Rick Hendy said your station started talking today and the DJs called Rick too.
The station was very popular in my company and I started hearing it in the bakers, chip shops, taxis too. I lived in the Cambridge area
I returned home to East London/Essex border for a few weeks in the summer and literally the station could be heard in shops, cars and in the park it was that popular.
When I did start driving we didn't have presets in some of the vehicles and when Caroline moved to 576 and had changed to a more popular format all you did was tune slightly once a song you didn't like to either 576 or 558. I listened to both but the stand out presenters I recall going to were David Lee Stone and Charlie Wolf and Johnny Lewis and Jay Jackson on Caroline. 84 and 85 was an offshore radio fans dream as you could also listen to Monique and it brought back memories of listening to Radio Mi Amigo for this non Dutch speaker.
For someone who only got into offshore radio in late 74 it was great to have this as I had only ever heard Caroline and Mi Amigo the stations of the 60s and early 70s were just history books to me sadly, so therefore I loved it.

Previous Message

I was 16 and was really into Caroline at the time, the signal on 963khz was the loudest thing on the dial, but I was only 15 miles from the ship as the crow flies.

I heard the tests on 729 khz from laser and got quite exited about a new English pirate station to listen to, I hated Radio 1, before Caroline returned I would listen to Capital.

Then one day in early may I heard loud music on 558khz, I knew it was from the communicator but to the best of my knowledge there were no announcements until the transmissions started on the 24th.

I personally hated the American accents and stayed listening to Caroline, but Laser was on everywhere in my area, what else was there to listen to apart from Orwell, Essex Radio or Radio 1 all were much weaker and suffered terrible interference at night here in Colchester.

Our local chip shop switched from Luxemburg to Laser and if you took a taxi anywhere it would either have Caroline or Laser on.

It seemed longer but 6 weeks after Laser 558 launched Caroline started testing on 594khz and later 576. Signal was strong like Laser but mod was slightly quieter and suffered from interference from German stations after dark. But it was good to switch between the 2 stations when a song came on you didnt like.

I dont know what the audience was like before its demise, I noticed lots more radios tuned to Caroline in 1985 as they had introduced a new daytime format, plus Laser had a lot of downtime which must have been an advantage to Caroline.

Caroline 558 was great in my opinion, I dont think Laser hot hits had half the oomph that the original laser had, but it was off air more than it was on, so difficult to say how things would have panned out.

Best DJ on 558 was Charlie Wolf, I loved it when he was on breakfast on Atlantic 252.