Andrea Langlois et al - Islands of Resistance - Pirate Radio in Canada

126 • islands of resistance
a “help my friend out” type thing, but then led to me becoming interested
in radio and going on to host and create content for community
and pirate radio. 13
TAR Continues to Grow
The second TAR pirate radio music festival took place in November
2007. We held it at the same location, and this time we had an antenna
technician climb onboard. This was fabulous as she was able to finetune
the antenna so that our range improved dramatically. This was
combined with the fact that we had a friend grab his climbing gear,
scale the roof and install the antenna at the peak. The difference of
another 15-20 feet was significant and meant that the reception across
the city of Victoria was much more solid. Often it is the placement of
your antenna — rather then the wattage of your transmitter — that
is of prime importance in terms of securing a solid range. Antennas
work via line of sight, so the higher you can get them without buildings
in the way, the better.
This time, we had 14 bands play live. (The genres included traditional,
folk, alt-country, roots, jazz, spoken word, punk, hip hop/beat
box and rock/experimental). Most of these bands would never get the
chance to perform live on radio, and many were motivated to take part
for political reasons. We used the same forms of publicity to spread the
word. We once again had support from CFUV; so much so that they
now requested the audio recordings from the festival to rebroadcast
on the station at a later date. These audio files have been made available
through websites and it means that the bands that play get radio
exposure on TAR and beyond.
Despite this more mainstream recognition, it is the countercultural
community that emerges with every festival that is treasured. Musicians
meet across genres and develop new connections. There is a
commonality of spirit in the clandestine locations where pirates hide
out for the day. One of the performers, TemPest, stated, “Alternative
media is rad and necessary, you hear things from local folk who otherwise
don’t have the opportunity to get radio play. [The experience
gave me] encouragement and inspiration for sure, I loved being able to
meet some local musicians I admired. Loved the random secret location
bits!” 14
Again, the eight-hour pirate radio festival was interspersed with