Taped off the air.
Every recorded show now goes on the Tape Shelf the morning after: full length on YouTube, with the night's running order written out. Trevor's Late Night Session is the first shelf.
Nobody heard a pirate show twice unless somebody taped it. A C90 in the deck, a finger over the pause button, a J-card filled in with whatever pen was nearest, and the tape went round the estate until the label wore off. Half of what we know about those stations, we know because someone pressed record.
So we tape our own now. Recorded shows go on the Tape Shelf the morning after, full length, on the station's YouTube channel. Each tape has its own page: the date, the presenter, how long it ran, and the night's running order written out by hand, so you can find the record you heard at three in the morning and go back to it.
The first shelf is The Late Night Session - roots reggae and dub with Trevor "DubPlate" Williams, weeknights from midnight to five. Eight tapes are on it already, and a new one turns up each morning after he's been on. More shows get their shelves as they start recording.
No two tapes look the same, because no two tapes ever did: every cassette, box spine and sheet of paper on the shelf is its own, and stays that way. To hear about new tapes as they arrive, subscribe on YouTube or follow the Tape Shelf by RSS.
- The Engineer