Review: Seizing the Airwaves
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Seizing the Airwaves: A Free Radio Handbook Publisher: AK Press If ever there was a manifesto written for pirate radio, Seizing the Airwaves is it. Too bad it's written primarily from the left, though. Even so, if you want to know why the low power radio movement's taking off in the United States, this is a text to read. Dunifer's constantly referred to as the "Johnny Appleseed" of the free radio movement; his cheap and easy-to-construct transmitter kits coupled with his fervor for direct action through the founding of Free Radio Berkeley have made him a father figure to many pirates. Sakolsky is one of a handful of academics who've specialized in counter-culture media, and radio in particular; during his tenure at the University of Illinois, he's taken an active role in Springfield's Black Liberation Radio (now named Human Rights Radio) - whose founder, Mbanna Kantako, is regarded by those in the know as the first person to found the first true free radio stations in the U.S.
Organized into three parts, Seizing the Airwaves first begins with a philosophical arguments against current mainstream media and for free radio. There's too many contributors to list for each section, but outside of Sakolsky's air of authority in the matter, there is also Robert McChesney - another scholar who's written extensively on the subject, who dissects how capitalist-based economics and the government's fostering of this economic system have perpetuated the problems with free and true information exchange in today's broadcast world. And Lee Ballinger, who edits the anti-trendsetter zine Rock & Rap Confidential, tells the tale of commercial radio's decline from inside the beast of the corporate entertainment industry. Next up are the tales from the front lines: Kantako and Dunifer notwithstanding, there's also perspectives from the likes of Lorenzo Komboa Ervin, founder of Chattanooga, Tennessee's own Black Liberation Radio; DJ Tashtego, squatter-turned broadcaster when he began Steal This Radio on Manhattan's Lower East Side, Geov Parrish (Seattle Liberation Radio), and Louis Hiken, one of the lawyers handling Dunifer's legal defense. All explain why they got involved in the movement and what the movement's goals should be. Finally, there's a short primer in how to set up your own station, written by Dunifer himself. Included, too, is the helpful "When the FCC Knocks On Your Door," a Q-and-A-style primer of a pirate's legal rights. While they're good places to start, consider it the bare-bones minimum information you need before "flipping the switch." While a lot of the justification for the free radio movement espoused in Seizing the Airwaves needs the reader to approach it with a generally healthy dislike for capitalism and a decent desire for left-leaning politics, don't let the perspective scare you off. Remember, every movement starts with a committed few, and this is where those few came from. Even though their fixations on boiling the movement down to the haves and have-nots may not be easy for everyone to swallow, their contributions to the movement and the arguments used to win over supporters reflects the kind of landscape the radio spectrum in the United States is turning into with a canny surrealism - like it or not. |
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