Weekend Pirate Loggings: 12/5-7/15

I want to work on the basement, but there's been so much activity this morning that I wanted to at least get some loggings listed.

WABC relay: 6955, 12/5, 0310+ Nice signal & audio with some oldies, old ads + I think some fake ones worked in, and DJ patter from, I think, the '70s. Timechecks were about two minutes off. I'm not sure when this recording was from, but it's a nice example of what pop radio used to sound like--very different from today's automated stations.


THX1138: 6925, 12/5, 1337-1730* Very nice signal & audio with mostly '70s rock and pop: "Green-Eyed Lady," "One Night in Bankok," "Breakfast in America," "Jessie's Girl," etc. Standard ID, said 25 watts & off at 1730.

Undercover Radio: 6950, 12/5, 1643-1652* Test broadcast "from the middle of nowhere" undercoverradio /at/ gmail.com announced. A couple of songs by Boston. Pretty good signal

Unid: 6950, 12/5, *1658+ Big dead carrier on a few times around 1655+, then on at 1658 with music. Low levels on the audio, then transmitter off & on some more. KC & the Sunshine Gang "Shake Your Booty" at 1704, then "That's the Way I Like It." Audio got much stronger during the 2nd song

Old-Time Radio unid: 6770, 12/5, 1800+ An episode of Ft. Laramie where Lee Quince works with a Cheyenne warrior to take a physically abused boy to the fort. Frontier Gentlemen, with promo for The World Tonight on CBS Radio. Lone Ranger episode with digital glitches. Everyone sounds like Max Headroom. Pretty fun

Shortwave Ghost: 6873, 12/5, 2006+ Rock song with flute, Hendrix "All Along the Watchtower." Solid signal

unid: 6930U, 12/6, 0003-0005* Fair signal in terms of strength, but no interference & no fading, so nice copy. I thought the song was an older crooner duet from the '40s or '50s, but, nope, on the HF Underground, refmo IDed the song as "Lady is a Tramp" by Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga.

Tuesday pirate loggings: 12/1-2/15

I've heard a decent number of stations recently, but just haven't had the time to post lately. But today's been really active, so it's time to start. What a Tuesday night!

THX1138: 6925, 12/1, Beautiful signal with a variety of mostly '70s rock: Heart "Barracuda,"a remix of AC/DC "Back in Black," Don McClean "American Pie." Nice IDs, announced 25W @QRT. That's a great-sounding 25 watts!

Liquid Radio: 6925.1, 12/1, Pretty good signal with dance music, but absolutely hammered by pescadors

Timberwolf Radio: 6940U, 12/2, 0004+ Bluegrass, country, & maybe rockabilly songs? Heard an announcement a few minutes ago, but could only make out a few words. Weak but improving. Wolf howling at end of show was much stronger than anything else

The Crystal Ship: 3431, 12/1, 2355+ Fair/weak, wanted to hang here longer, but I bounced up to listen to Timberwolf Radio

Unid: 6925U, 12/2, 0055* Gobbling Turkey sound effects repeated a few times, like an interval signal. Thought a late Thanksgiving show might be coming on, but nothing else materialized. VG signal, though

Weekend Pirate Loggings: 11/6-11/8/15

Last night, I was out to see a football game--the real football night in America, high school football on a Friday night. That ate up almost the entire evening, but I did manage to hear one of the first broadcasts from WJD. It's interesting that the broadcast that I heard wasn't logged on HF Underground. That must be about one of about 1% of the pirate shows that's not logged there. I need to start posting more of my loggings there, but I've been trying to keep my head above water with the projects that I'm working on. Speaking of which, I've now finished the Philco 87 cabinet and I'm just waiting for some grille cloth to arrive so that I can put some of it back together.

WJD: 6940U, 11/6, [need to check the time] Recent rap/hip hop music with overdriven audio. At end, two female computer-voice IDs. Excellent signal.

Rave on Radio: 6925U, 11/7, 2256+ Playing a lot of music by the Grateful Dead, including "Truckin'." A few clear IDs.

BBC Pirate Radio: 6850, 11/7, 2310+ Huge signal with BBC relay, clear in-program BBC IDs. Too much going on for me to catch everything.

WJD: 6919, 11/7, 2310+ Dance music, then apparent old-time radio show or clip with mention of Orson Wells. According to Skipmunk on HFU, this is WJD

unid: 6880, 11/7, 2310+ Can hear some music here, but this one's a bit weaker than 6919, so I set the recorder running there instead. After I got the ID on WJD, I tuned back to this one, and it was gone. After seeing that WMID was active on 6880 on 11/8, I wonder if this was WMID?

Old-Time Radio unid: 6770, 11/8, 2238+ Excellent signal with Tales of the Texas Rangers "Blood Harvest" episode from January 21, 1951

Captain Morgan: 6925, 11/8, 2310-2311* Caught the end of the show with an older-style Captain Morgan "Pirate Zone" recorded ID & "Twilight Zone" theme. Excellent signal. Nice to hear CM again!

Europirate Loggings via Twente

?: 1636, 11/7, 2015+ Huge signal with lots of old country music + a '60s ska song, Eagles "Hotel California,"  and some schlager. After a long set of music, surprised to hear a woman announcer with a lot of echo on her voice. I've heard about a few female Dutch MW pirates, but this is the first one that I've heard. Very wide signal, probably at least 15 kHz wide.

Pirate Logs + Europirate Logs via Twente: 11/2-11/3/15

Not much to report locally because conditions weren't too great, but I also logged a few stations via the Twente web receiver, so altogether, I have a bit to report.

unid: 6945, 11/3, 0030-0032* Faint signal with light music. I don't think it was a Europirate, but it had that sort of trans-continental sound to it. I don't think it was a pescador because the signal was in AM.

The Crystal Ship: 6850.5, 11/3, 0035+ Another faint signal tonight. I recorded it, but for the time that I was listening, I could hear but not copy most of the audio.

A few logs via the Twente web receiver:

Unid: 1640, 11/2, 1930+ Dutch light pop and schlager. One song sounded like the Dutch equivalent of Roger Whittaker. “The Green, Green Grass of Home” This type of music for about 30 min., then Toto “Africa,” older yodeling song. Male DJ talking a lot at 2000 UTC, but I can’t understand it. ID sounded kind of like “Radio Pironia” Gave out a phone number

6290, 11/2, 1534+ Commercial radio or TV ad, announcement for Annie Schilder, I think, so I guess the next song was her singing in a country duet. A few more light pop duets. Sounds like these are all segments of Annie Schilder/BZN songs clipped from German or Dutch commercial stations. Maybe something to entertain Dr. Tim this morning?

Unid: 6395, 11/2, 1618-1644* Good signal, Dutch country, polkas, a techno dance song. 20+ min, no IDs

Halloween Weekend Loggings: 10/30-11/1/15

I was away on Thursday night (made it back in time for all of the activity to be gone), then last night, I committed radio-listening sacrilege and went to the local football rivalry football game and missed almost everything. Again, I came home to almost nothing left on. But despite my extreme negligence, I did hear a couple of things:

The Ghost SW: 6873, 10/30, ca. 2200-2300 Excellent signal with Halloween music.

unid: 6925U, 10/31, 0215+

Radio Ronin SW: 6924, 10/31, 0255 ID per HFU. Just the carrier here for a few min.

unid: 6925U, 10/31, 1240 Heard some older cartoony music for less than a minute before being wiped out by dishwasher noise. Good signal

Wolverine Radio: 6955U, 11/1, 0005+ Huge signal. We had company, so I recorded the show & plan to listen to it later on. A couple of nice-quality SSTV images at the end.

X-FM: 6975, 11/1, ca. 0130-0305 Redhat with fantastic signal here. I listened on both the R8 and the Philco 44, depending on where I was in the house. Taking requests and reports both via e-mail and by telephone, which reminds me of the old call-in shows from the pirates of the early '80s. Doors "Riders on the Storm," Marilyn Manson "Tainted Love," Black Sabbath "War Pigs" and much, much more. I think Redhat said that he received 83 e-mails and 44 postings on HF Underground for the broadcast!

Radio True North: 6955, 11/1, 0305+ Was listening here for a bit & heard a clear ID. Signal decent, but not nearly as strong as X-FM and Pee Wee, so I've been bouncing around across a few stations

Pee Wee Radio: 6950U, 11/1, 0325-0330* Jim Croce "Operator" excellent signal, no voice IDs, but Morse code at end. IDs by HFU

Classic Pirate Radio Relay Service: 6955U, 11/1, 1332-1334* Caught CPRRS theme music, IDs, and e-mail address. Excellent signal and audio. According to HFU, the station had just relayed an old show from the Voice of Laryngitis.

unid: 6924.9, 11/1, 2146+ Off and on the air with AC/DC "Hells Bells" The Who "Baba O'Reilly" "My Generation" Excellent signal & audio when all's working properly

Rave on Radio: 6925U,  11/1, 2313+ Radio broadcast segments from "Night of the Living Dead." Pretty good signal, some QRM from pescadors, but not too bad. IDs, announcing Halloween 2015 show. Rolling Stones "Sympathy for the Devil" Talking Heads "Psycho Killer." Around 2330, someone testing & asking "How copy?" overtop. Testing station had a VG signal, but the pescador QRM started getting really bad. I gave up on the signal & stopped recording, but then had really nice copy on the signoff announcement, with shoutouts to me (thanks!), Chris Smolinski, RAFman, & a few other people that I missed  

Mid-week, Pre-Halloween Pirate Loggings: 10/27/15

WREC: 6873, 10/27, 2253+ Halloween show with PJ Sparx. Excellent signal. Offering special QSL, “AC/DC “Hells Bells,” Ozzy Osbourne, standup comedy (maybe Cheech Marin?) about why there aren’t any black or Hispanic ghosts, etc. “You’re listening to the Halloween special from Radio Free East Coast” over Munsters theme, Ramones “Pet Cemetery” live, The Titanics “Stayin’ on the Right Side of Satan,” Misfits “Ghouls Night Out” “It’s me Beelzebub on the radio” Ad for “A Nightmare on Sesame Street,” CCR “Bad Moon Rising” Ad  for “The Texas Chainletter Massacre” from RNCI, Story: “do you ever think of the undead?”

The Crystal Ship: 6850.5, 10/28, ca. 0005-0050* Another excellent signal.  “let the darkness take you away” ID; quotes from Mr. Grady (from The Shining), The Decemberists “The Rake Song,” clip from what might be “An American Werewolf in London,” Bob Seger “Werewolves of London,” radio emergency clip from “Night of the Living Dead,” BOC “Joan Crawford,” “The Raven” reading—kind of hard to copy with the echo, Arthur Brown “Fire” Juliana Montana with the gmail address, EBS announcement into educational bit from the ‘50s about nuclear fallout, nuclear attack messages, nuclear attack sirens, & gone.

unid: 6945L, 10/28, 0105+ Weak. Piano music: some jazzy, some sounding like at a recital. Now an EZL song with lots of flute solos. Some of the posters on HFU think this might be a pescador who's been inspired to pirate, and that definitely seems like a possibility here.

Europirate Loggings via Twente: 10/27/15

These were heard via the University of Twente webreceiver today:

Unid: 1620, 10/27, 1812-1817* Johnny Cash "I Walk the Line" & more old country music. Off without any talk

1630, 10/27, 1822- Very weak with some music and talk. Lots of reverb on the male announcer


1650, 10/27, 1835+ Very weak, not sure if any audio is here or if someone was testing an antenna or transmitter. Same thing on 1655 at the same time

1670, 10/27, 1830 Very weak with a male announcer. Gone in a few min

Unid: 6285, 10/27, 1440-1445* Dutch country music, polkas, schlager. Off with no talk of any type

6309.8, 10/27, 1400+ Light instrumental jazz, much like what would be played in a dentist’s office or on the telephone when you’re put on hold. Weak; heard as early as 1300, but audio was hard to detect at that time. Signed off by 1430