“You Really Got Me” — The Kinks
Imagine being a British teenager in the summer of 1964. “You Really Got Me” comes on Radio Caroline one night and BAM!…your world changes….
Back in 1964 the BBC played pop music only sporadically, even then they only dipped their toes in the water at the more genteel…and dare I say whiter…end of the market.
1964’s biggest-selling acts in the UK included Jim Reeves, Roy Orbison and Cilla Black…great artists all, but they were unlikely to get angry letters written to the BBC’s Director-General or awkward questions asked in Parliament.
No wonder young people listened to what was called pirate radio at the time…so called because those buccaneering pop music radio stations broadcast from boats moored just outside UK territorial waters to get round UK laws which only licensed a small number of approved broadcasters.
Radio Caroline and Radio London were popular, as was Radio Luxembourg (not technically a pirate station as it was based in a physical building in Luxembourg which, by complete coincidence I’m sure, just happened to have an astonishingly powerful transmitter, able to reach most of the UK…).
Pirate radio was all about pop music, all the time. And the pirate stations could play pretty much what they liked as they were beholden to no-one.
