Sealand

Criminal

Vox Media Podcast Network

True Crime, Society & Culture, Documentary

4.7 • 38.4K Ratings

🗓️ 27 August 2021

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Today's episode begins with rock & roll and ends with royalty. When bands like the Rolling Stones and the Beatles were becoming popular, they weren't played much on the radio in England. The BBC controlled the airwaves at the time, and some listeners described its music offerings as "square." So aspiring DJs packed up their record collections, got in boats, and sailed past the territorial limits of the UK, where they set up pirate radio stations in the sea—sometimes on abandoned WWII sea forts. One fort was taken over by a man named Roy Bates. When his pirate radio station didn’t work out, he refused to give up the fort. He raised a flag on it and announced that he and his family would be forming their own nation. A spokesperson from Britain's Ministry of Defence said: "This is ludicrous.” Michael Bates’ book is Principality of Sealand: Holding the Fort, and Dylan Taylor-Lehman’s book is Sealand: The True Story of the World’s Most Stubborn Micronation and Its Eccentric Royal Family. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for this show comes from Krakan.
0:03.0	Krypto is like the financial system, but different.
0:07.0	It doesn't care where you come from, what you look like, your credit score,
0:11.0	or your outrageous food delivery habits.
0:13.7	crypto is finance for everyone everywhere all the time.
0:18.4	Krakhan, see what crypto can be.
0:21.3	Don't invest unless you're prepared to lose all the money you invest.
0:25.0	This is a high risk investment and you should not expect to be protected if something goes wrong.
0:30.0	I was at boarding school and I recall that the only pop music you could get on the radio was from the BBC,
0:38.0	British Broadcasting Corporation and that was only for an hour every Sunday where they played the top 20.
0:45.0	There was just no music for the kids.
0:48.0	Michael Bates grew up in England in the 1960s.
0:52.0	He was 11 in 1964
0:54.0	when the Beatles
0:55.0	first performed in the United States
0:57.0	and the Rolling Stones released their first album.
1:00.0	But that wasn't what the BBC was playing.
1:03.0	It was all very straight lace, classical music.
1:08.0	The BBC had its own orchestras.
1:10.0	And if the Beatles, for instance, had a number one record out, apart from hearing it for that one hour on a Sunday,
1:17.0	you wouldn't hear it unless it was played by the BBC Light Orchestra.
1:20.0	And they held the only licensed radio stations in the UK.
	...

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