This story originally appeared in XXL magazine in 1998.

COMMERCIAL FREE UNCENSORED RAP RADIO

As you drive east on California's Interstate 80 winding through the working class town of Vallejo, thirty-three miles northeast of San Francisco you'll notice how the signals to the more adventurous radio stations, usually located to the left of the FM dial, gradually fade away into noisy static. At this point the choices for some rap on the radio are pretty much limited to the two San Francisco high-wattage, commercial urban outlets, KMEL FM and WILD 94.9, unless that is you get lucky and happen to stumble upon the infrequent broadcasts of Vallejo's low-powered 91.3FM all rap radio station D'z Nutts. Broadcasting mostly evenings out of the bedroom of 19 year old "Mac Ran" (note: that many of the "pirates" interviewed for this story asked not to be identified by their legal names) in the East Vallejo home he shares with his mom and 16 year old sister, D'z Nutts is an illegal, low-powered, 15 watt pirate radio station that the Diablo Valley Community college student and his three high school buddies (19 year old Young J and 18 year olds Rick D'z & Weev Dogg) set up in January 1997 after their high school electronics teacher showed them just how easy it all was.

"Our teacher at Hogan High gave us our first equipment and then we bought our own equipment over the Internet for about $300 to get on the air," explained Mac Ran one recent broadcast evening from his blunt-smoke clouded, cramped bedroom/pirate radio studio. Besides the simple radio equipment, including the station's very compact transmitter which is about the size of a small brick, the crowded bedroom is packed with stacks of rap records, cassettes & CDs, and a drum kit that Mac Ran neglects now that he's gotten hooked on radio. "I wanted to be a drummer but when I saw Pump Up The Volume (the 1990 Christian Slater flick about a pirate radio high schooler) I really wanted to do radio," confides Mac Ran propped on the edge of his narrow single bed beneath walls that are plastered with posters of E40, N2Deep, B-Legit, and other heroes of his. Some nights up to a dozen people crowd into this small room but tonight it's just Mac Ran, Rick D'z and Weev Dog who's currently at the controls. Within a minute of Rick D'z segueing into hometown star E40's album track "Outsmart The Po Po's" the pager/voice mail starts to fill up with enthusiastic feedback. "We get about a hundred messages a night from people telling us they want to hear local rap, not that same ol' Top 40 shit on KMEL," shouted Rick D'z, lifting one ear of his headphones, as he cued up a CD track from Mac Dre; another Vallejo rap legend. "And everyone will tell you that they want to hear the music the way it was recorded, with the curse words."

Although D'z Nutts is a low wattage station run by inexperienced teens it has become the talk of the town in Vallejo with locals, who pick up the five to ten mile radius signal, referring to it as "our station" because of its unique and undying loyalty to the thriving local rap scene. "We just did up some fliers and handed them out at school when we first went on the air," said Weev Dogg. "But then word spread fast coz people started calling their friends and telling them to tune in to hear all this Bay Area and Vallejo rap shit. When people call they tell us that they tape all our broadcasts," he said. Even hometown rap stars such as The Click's D-Shot and N2Deep heard about the station and were so impressed that they stopped by the tiny bedroom studio. "Most people don't even think of us as a pirate radio though," noted Mac Ran. "They just think of us as the Vallejo radio station." Sometimes Mac Ran will wake up on his bed at three in the morning in "the station" to find everyone gone home and the transmitter still on playing a CD on "repeat" mode. Then he turns off the transmitter and the lights and goes back to sleep to be up early for school the next day.

THE PIRATE RADIO REVOLUTION

D'z Nutts is just one of approximately 500 to 1000 illegal pirate radio stations currently broadcasting across the US, most of which have sprung up in the past five years. Although pirate radio dates back many years with such stations as Black Liberation Radio, which began broadcasting out of an Illinois housing project in 1987, the current proliferation of stations began in 1993 when Stephen Dunifer, a 46 year old political activist and radio engineer by profession, began his original transmissions of Free Radio Berkeley. At this stage Dunifer would hike into the Berkeley hills once a week and broadcast his station on a tiny transmitter with a battery and a tape deck all stuffed into his backpack. By 1995 Free Radio Berkeley had become a fully fledged 24/7 radio station operating out of a fixed [secret] location with a staff of 40 volunteers programming everything from punk rock and hip hop music shows to bicycle traffic updates and "Cop Watch" reports.

In the past three years Dunifer has become the chief spokesperson and leader of the ever escalating pirate radio revolution due to both his outspoken support of micro-powered radio stations [he gives classes on how to assemble the inexpensive pirate radio kits that he sells] and for his much publicized fight with the FCC [Federal Communications Commission]. This heated ongoing battle with the government agency has included him being slapped with a $20,000 fine [later reduced to $10,000] and being dragged through the courts to [unsuccessfully] make him cease broadcasting. On January 20th, 1995 Dunifer's lawyer, with help from members of the National Lawyers Guild's Committee on Democratic Communications, beat the FCC in federal court. These attorneys fought the FCC on the grounds that the FCC regulations, which preclude unlicensed stations under 100 watts of power from broadcasting, are unconstitutional. On two separate occasions US District Judge Claudia Wilken refused to issue injunctions that would force Dunifer's station off the air; most recently on November 12th, 1997. The resulting stalemate of this legal action has opened the floodgates to hundreds of more pirate radio stations popping up across the country, many of them built with do-it-yourself micro-powered radio kits purchased via the Internet from Dunifer himself or fellow pirate revolutionary L.D. Brewer in Florida. (see "how to" box below for details).

"THE FREE SPEECH MOVEMENT OF THE NINETIES"

However Dunifer is quick to reject the term "pirate" in favor of "micro-powered." "The FCC tries to portray us as pirates - people sneaking around - but what we're really participating in is what we consider to be a protected First Amendment activity; free speech. Free radio is the free speech movement of the nineties," said the soft-spoken, graying long haired, longtime activist. "We're not outlaws but civil rights activists and this whole free radio movement is about free speech for all but right now the FCC excludes all but the wealthy from having a voice on the airwaves." Dunifer is referring to the fact, according to FCC regulations, that it costs at least $100,000 (a modest estimation for even a small radio market) to set up a legit radio station versus a mere few hundred dollars to set up an unlicensed pirate radio station. Furthermore the FCC's 1996 Telecommunications Act, the deregulatory federal law that changed the rules of how many radio stations one company could own in a marketplace, resulted in the price of commercial radio stations skyrocketing. In less than two years a staggering 4,000 of the 11,000 stations in the US have been bought and sold at high profits; generally to bigger and more impersonal national conglomerates, which could afford the inflated prices. All of this wholesale consolidation signals the end of the traditional locally owned and operated radio station that can afford to cater to the specific needs of its local audience. In its place are today's overpriced commercial radio stations that are conservatively formatted by program directors or [more usually] out-of-town radio consultants who dare not veer far from the carefully researched fail-safe generic playlist that might result in a loss of "Arbitron" or "Arbitrend" ratings - the radio industry's yardstick by which the advertising revenue that a station can generate is determined. Another important result of the Telecommunications Act is that now one company can own up to five FM radio stations in the one market, essentially becoming a monopoly in a certain demographic if they wish, as in the case of Chancellor Media which in the Bay Area owns both KMEL and WILD 94.9FM which merely pose as "competitors."

REACTIONARY RADIO

The recent explosion of community-based pirate radio stations is a direct reaction to this homogenizing of the airwaves. And while seemingly disparate pirate stations such as talk-formatted Radio Free Tallahassee, rap-radio D'z Nutts, leftist Chicano Radio Clandestino in Los Angeles, or anarchist talk'n'music Steal This Radio in a Lower East Side New York City squat, may all vary in format their one common theme is that each is responsive to the needs of its respective community. "There's all types of little stations out there filling a need," said Dunifer, "There's religious stations, right-wing stations, left-wing stations, farming news stations. There's even a little station up in Washington State that broadcasts the local high school football games because that's what the people of that town want to hear. In fact we're getting increasing orders (for pirate radio kits) from high school teachers and students across the country." In many cases, as with Berkeley High School, CA the school district itself funded the pirate radio station.

In sharp contrast to these community-sensitive, low-powered stations, commercial radio appears like a MacDonald's fast food joint with a radio station in say Chicago presenting the exact same menu/playlist as one in Houston or any other town USA. "Commodifiying the music, as these big business stations do, is merely killing its development and all these commercial stations who claim that they're playing more hip hop are in actuality playing fewer records but the same ones over and over. Ultimately these big stations are slowly killing hip hop music," said Boots of hip hop group The Coup. For the past three years the rapper and political activist, who is a key member of The Young Comrades [a young people of color anti-capitalist organization whose agenda includes fighting California's Three Strikes Law] has been involved in pirate radio. "Pirate radio is one of the most important links in keeping hip hop alive," he said. To date Boots has done shows on both North Oakland's black owned and operated Life Radio and on the nearby Free Radio Berkeley. At Free Radio Berkeley he met Stephen Dunifer who inspired him to write the song "How To Make A Pirate Radio Station." The idea came about after the two radicals from different generations started talking about "The Drinking Gourd" - the popular old slave song in which ways to find an escape route north were cleverly hidden in the lyrics. The new how-to rap, which appears on The Coup's new CD "Steal This Album" (Polemic/Dogday), is written in that same revolutionary spirit.

BLACK LIBERATION RADIO

Boots and Dunifer are both quick to give major respect to the pioneering black pirate radio broadcasters that paved the way for today's intensive movement; in particular to Mbanna Kantako, the legally blind resident of the John Hay Homes housing project in Springfield, IL who started broadcasting Black Liberation Radio back in November, 1987. Interestingly this tiny one-watt radio station was totally ignored by the local authorities until it began exposing police brutality against black city residents. Almost immediately Kantako received a $750 fine, was intimidated by the police in seeming direct retaliation, and got an FCC "cease and desist" order which he ignored. "I strongly encourage other inner urban dwellers take the example of Black Liberation Radio and start setting up radio stations. The white men at the FCC would have even more trouble trying to shut down stations in city housing projects," said Dunifer.

But that's not to say that the FCC are wimps. In the past few years they have been actively cracking down on pirates across the country by raiding their stations or homes and/or pressing civil and criminal charges against them. For instance last November the Florida FCC busted three pirate stations all in one day. At 6:30AM a multi-jurisdictional task force, with automatic weapons drawn, came crashing through the door of the home/station of The Party Pirate Doug Brewer and his wife, confiscating all of his equipment. Later that day, they busted both Kelly Kombat of Tampa punk rock station 87X and Lonnie Kobres of Lutz Community Radio and later Patriot Radio who got convicted of multi counts of illegal broadcasting. His sentence is still pending but he could spend up to 28 years in jail.

A few months ago Vallejo CA's D'z Nutts got paid a visit by the FCC. "I looked out the window and saw it was the FCC so I didn't answer the door. I know my rights," said Mac Ran. The two FCC agents left after posting a warning on the front door, telling the pirates to immediately cease broadcasting or they'd be fined since their signal, based on a complaint from the Federal Aviation Administration, was interfering with the nearby Napa airport. Initially a little shaken Mac Ran took the station off the air for a few weeks, during which time he redirected the station's antenna. "Now we only broadcast occasionally, at least until we find a new location," said the teen pirate.

THE FCC & THE FUTURE OF PIRATE RADIO

The FCC's recently appointed new chairman William Kennard cites aviation interference as one of the major problems with pirate radio broadcasts. However Kennard, the Commission's first black chairman, does appear to be sensitive to minority ownership. "I am distressed because as a result of this consolidation there are fewer opportunities for new entrants to get into this industry, small businesses and minorities in particular," he said. However Dunifer isn't buying. "When he talks about minority broadcasting I don't think he's talking about radio in the hood but rather capitalists of color. And there's a huge difference between that type of broadcasting and a black or Latino cultural community radio station," he said. Boots is also skeptical of the Government's idea of "minority" radio. "No one can give you your liberation. You have to fight for it yourself and pirate radio is the perfect way to do it," he said.

"HOW TO MAKE A PIRATE RADIO STATION"

"It's so much easier and cheaper than most people imagine to make your own pirate radio station," said Boots of The Coup. To prove this argument the rapper, activist, and radio pirate has just recorded the song "How To Make A Pirate Radio Station" which is featured on The Coup's brand new CD, Steal This Album. The average set up cost is about $300 to $700 (excluding such consumer audio gear as turntables, microphone, CD & cassette players, mixer & speakers). Equipment can be purchased from L.D. Brewer (www.ldbrewer.com) or Free Radio Berkeley which offers a mail-order "on air quick" package that includes a 20 Watt transmitter in kit form, power supply which power's the transmitter, (you need a power supply of 12 volts) an antenna (recommended type is the Comet antenna), and cables to hook it all together.

For more information on this either call (510) 464-3041, or visit the web site www.freeradio.org where the Free Radio Berkeley can be heard in real audio 24/7, or write FRB, 1442A Walnut Street, #406, Berkeley, CA 94709. Also recommended reading is the book Seizing The Airwaves: A Free Radio Handbook (AK Press, 1998), edited by Ron Sakolsky & Stephen Dunifer, which offers invaluable insights into the whole "micro-powered radio movement."

The Author's Pirate Radio History

Billy Jam, who has worked at over a dozen radio stations (commercial, college, and community) since 1984, received his first warning for playing curses in 1990 when the management at KALX Berekely suspended him for playing an unedited version of Ice Cube's "AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted." Two years later, after taking his show Hip Hop Slam across town to radio station KUSF, San Francisco he also got suspended [twice] for broadcasting curse words. In late 1994, after playing a pre-release copy of Public Enemy's album Muse Sick-N-Hour Mess Age in its original uncensored form, it was "three strikes and you're out" time for Jam. Within a week of getting kicked off KUSF he learnt of Stephen Dunifer who was still in the formative days of broadcasting his micro powered station out of the Berkeley hills. With Free Radio Berkeley's "no censorship" policy the station offered the perfect new home for Hip Hop Slam. Since '94, Hip Hop Slam has been broadcast on Free Radio Berkeley and various other US pirate radio stations including Free Radio Seattle and New York City's Steal This Radio. "Hip hop music should be played the way it was recorded. A 'Radio Version' of a rap song is no different than say putting masking tape over a Van Gough painting. It distorts the art form and it's wrong," commented Jam.