by DeVon Harris
The escape route ran along the top of the connected rowhouses lining Baltimore Avenue. The plan was for any DJ or station staffer to climb into the attic and exit a hatch door that lead to the roof and then head westward across six roofs to a light green house, go down the rear stairway and knock on the door. The tenants of that house had an understanding with the heads of our station to let us in, and then out the front door, if we came knocking.
The year was 1997 and this was the escape plan we practiced at WPPR, West Philadelphia Pirate Radio, in case the FCC ever came knocking. We operated out of a nondescript house on the 4900 block of Baltimore Ave. A few local hippies ‘squatted’ in the abandoned house and somehow got the electricity turned on and turned it into not only a home, but a low-wattage radio station that broadcasted throughout a radius of about 20 miles. All of this was of course unsanctioned by the FCC, the Federal Communications Commission.
The leaders of WPPR, Pete Tridish (pronounced “petri dish”) and Bertha Venus, had notoriety from their appearances on CNN, NBC, etc. as voices for our rights to free speech and liberation of the airwaves as the property of Americans who should be able to communicate on them freely. It was a menagerie of wildly different perspectives speaking and playing music from the heart and exercising free speech. There were 35 DJs with shows like “Incarceration Nation,” directed at the “1.6 million legal slaves.” There was the Condom Lady who spoke about safe sex and drug use, Jah-Sun discussing revolutionary indigenous peoples around the world, and DJ Damage – a handsome local college kid who provided the latest college hip-hop & commentary.
WPPR doesn’t exist anymore. Almost no stations like it are around anymore. The Internet has made local – or global – distribution far more accessible and communities can go to blogs or online radio for localized content. In fact, a lot of former micro-broadcasters, like the popular East Village Radio, don’t even broadcast radio signal anymore and live only on the web. It’s clearly not as romantic as ‘the good old days’ and often marginalizes the elderly or those that can’t afford or don’t use the Internet.
So where is the romance? In the early 1900s ham radio hobbyists hacked sophisticated (at the time) equipment to broadcast live to miniscule audiences. In the 60s and 70s, groups of individuals united under shared interests to build larger setups (in the UK they often existed in offshore ships) and at WPPR we broadcasted from a ramshackle house. Now, kids can use Ustream or YouTube at a moment’s notice.
Technology, fortunately, allows us to communicate to a larger audience, asynchronously, with less personal infrastructure. But there’s something to be said for the passion needed to lug turntables to a ‘squat’ weekly or actually physically going somewhere and interacting with all types of people you’d never meet yourself. There’s a sense of mystery and thrill in serendipitously scanning your radio dial and discovering a 60-year old woman comparing condom flavors or other wild stuff you’d never expect.
Truth be told, I wish kids today could have that experience we had. We’re certainly at the end of one era, and I can’t wait to see what is dreamt up to allow the romance to live on.
DeVon Harris (aka Devo Springsteen) is a Grammy-winning producer, songwriter, entrepreneur, and regular SoundCtrl contributor. DeVon is also a former consultant and founder of interactive video company, Ochre. You can follow him on Twitter @springsteezy
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