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Well here we are again with the 2024 / 2025 Interference update on the London FM wavebands. As usual we need to delve into community radio and stations on DAB as ex FM pirates move away from their traditional FM broadcasting.
REBEL RADIO
Rebel radio was held 1 June to 30 June 2025 at the Barbican in conjunction with Reprezent Radio which also broadcast live. Also Rinse FM were also involved which also included a party. A chance for Rinse to rediscover their past as old DJs and current DJs mixed.
It was described as “Experience the sound of resistance and reinvention across this month-long celebration of pirate radio and its lasting impact on music, culture and community.
Pirate radio was a movement. A rebellious force that gave Black British music and underground sounds a platform when mainstream stations wouldn’t. It shaped UK culture then, and its influence continues today.
Discover the radical influence of pirate radio across June through our programme of live radio broadcasts, a Rinse FM party, Sunday Selecta listening sessions, talks, workshops, film screenings, a 6-part podcast series and more.”
Needless to say, this was totally focused on London Urban stations and ignored the full history of the UKs pirate radio genre. This involved curated talks exploring pirate radio influence on UK culture and music (note black influence only we’ll ignore the rest) there were also six podcasts which started with Radio Invicta “soul over London” by DJ and radio producer Tayo Popoola.
In addition, there is a section of six podcasts on the site https://www.barbican.org.uk/read-watch-listen/rebel-radio-gaps-in-the-dial-podcastby from his personal perspective. Which you can hear going to Starting with Radio Invicta in 1977/78 period when they started regular Sunday broadcasts in September 77 and interviewed Tony Morson (Tony Johns). Ignoring when the station started in the early 70s on around 88 MHz late nights 11.30 to 00.30 hours. Later due to raids they switched to Bank Holidays with higher power 100 watts from 10am to 6pm and then a 2-hour slot from 10pmor so and the rest is history.
BITS AND PIECES 2025
It is worth mentioning that Station FM were 35 years old in 2025 and with apparently new management. It is possibly London’s longest running FM pirate station.
Starpoint Radio – celebrated 40 years with a party on December 18th 2025 in Putney at the Soul Fez nightclub. The station was south London based and was set up by Carl Barringon -Webster. These days it broadcasts on DAB+ in Birmingham, Brighton & Hove and Portsmouth. Plus the usual apps etc and Tune In. The station is currently funded by subscription, advertising and hosting events. They are now running a lottery the 250 Club from 1st December they need 250 subs at £5 per month and each month one lucky winner wins £250 the rest of the monies (£1,000) to be used to fund the station. As well as Carl two of the original DJs are on air.
Starpoint was on Fm from 1985 to 1988 and tried RSL broadcasting from 1991 and eventually joined forces with another group and went into satellite radio. In 20025 the groups separated and illegal relays were noted for a while a few years ago.
Rumour has it that LSR set up by an ex Select DJ. This station appears to move sites
Underground Bass – subject to off-air periods on FM.
BITS AND PIECES 2025 Continued...
In April JET reported both Vision and Divine 98.3 had died a death but that WKEnd returned on 106.5 with a good signal in West London but JET thought that they were switching sites a lot. Umat on 102.8 had an improved signal and had lots of ads for businesses in NE London. Vibes were still okay and that Venture had had a forced slight change of frequency to 99.6 as community station Croydon FM had been allocated a second frequency of 99.4 from the Whitgift Centre with 100 watts. 97.8 is apparently 530 watts.
Unqiue 101.2 was described as variable as it had disappeared a few times. Also that RJR 98.3 had received a big raid and then returned.
Subjam 104.7 has now gone onto DAB across Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire with 64 kbps. 104.7 had been strong around Wood Green. Meanwhile Karisma 87.8 had been blanked out by Ramadan Radio in Hounslow during Ramadan of course.
Wk-END 92.8 to Surrey and West London (in parallel with 106.5) got raided in April and we think it got done twice but 106.5 was unaffected. Low power Crystal Studios had dropped much of his weekday broadcasts but is still on at weekends Fri/Sat/Sun and the occasional weekday such as on the 18th May from 9am to 1pm. The signal in Feltham has got a lot weaker these days.
JET gets both Ontop 95.5 from SE London and also Roots 95.4 from the opposite direction by swinging his aerial around.
The Sould of London 97.1 is a reminder of Radio Invicta 7 days a week. This too can move around and tends to have low mod low mod presumably to not annoy LBC! London’s Wax 102.4 had a few raids we think cross January to March and it seems to be on 102.4 these days not 102.45. Listening on DX London it seems to be of far better audio quality these days not over-deviated and distorted. They seem to have a strong rival with 94.6 Underground Bass which describes itself as London’s No. 1 DNB station!
Devastation was heard at my home locale in 2025 with a strong signal on 108.0 MHz . JET reported there used to be a North London station of the same name on the same channel which caused issues to Radio Jackie on 107.8. We wondered if there was any connection between the two Devastations? The station we think locally started on a lower power down south but upped this. Noted for a fair while but presumably lost the rig in a raid and all went silent. Gigs were noted across the southeast including Haywards Heath, Tunbridge / Tunbridge Wells area and the Medway towns. We think on hi power having a decent service area. Now we heard from someone who df'd the station on a few occassios and told us approximately where the site/s were which we will not publish (see note below). The antennae was described as well hidden from public view. Whoever was behind this knew exactly what they were doing!
2025 Live Fm 87.5 tends to have enforced breaks along with Live FM. Live is normally a decent signal at 15 dB or so but after some raids they come back on low power. Weekend 106,5, S Dance and Power have also had some breaks in August, September and October
Cyndicut was established in 1989 and the main stomping ground Essex/ North Kent and into parts of NE/E London and like many pirates is now on DAB. Used to be on 90.6 and picked up down south at our locale.
Live FM 87.5 tends to have enforced breaks along with Live FM. Live is normally a decent signal at 15 dB or so but after some raids they come back on low power. Weekend 106,5, S Dance and Power have also had some breaks in August, September and October
2026 Comments
In March JET pointed out that WK-End seem to have given upon 92.8 but 106.5 is a decent power with an improved signal into NW London and UK Live back onto higher power. 88.4 Vision have not been so strong recently. Conversely, Turkish station Umat is really strong locally to them and another Turkish merchant KLAS appeared across last November/|December on 1042. They have a very good website. JET also logs Nomad 92.2 which is a legal Somali community station from Hammersmith King Street with a reported power of 200 watts.
Meanwhile there is another oldies station on 104.5 the Music Machine. Noted on the afternoon of 22nd January and switched to relaying Caroline Flashback
FIELD TRIPS
Now sadly for me life has changed so no more monitoring trips to Epsom or Biggin Hill as well as the Reigate/Redhill/Merstham area. It was always worth doing a stop or two en-route to more distant locales to do a quick scan and see if anything interesting was on. Other places East Grinstead (good altitude) and even our local Leisure Centre car park.
Monitoring would consist of a quick scan up and down the FM band logging all the frequencies that were on and noting those of intertest and then staying tuned to those. RDS info would be logged, audio quality and any relevant news/info which could be extracted from the broadcast. In a car park I would try and move to a different vacant slot so the car and its aerial were pointed in a different way. It made a difference. Parking in a street I would avoid main roads and being near a school so I didn’t look like I was doing anything dodgy. And again coming back try a spot on the other side of the road to change the aerial orientation.
When I had a working Grundig Satellite 500 I would do weekend and weekday evening loggings across a 12-13 week period and scan the bands in my car from outside the house. My locale was very good at this. Sadly the Tescun is greatly inferior receiver to the Grundig.
Biggin Hill would bring in some interesting stations from Essex. The only time I caught Vigorous. On the drive up there would bring in North London stations well
The last field trips were up in Roehampton and Tooting from hospital car parks. Roehampton was fine I could see the planes coming into Heathrow and listen in. Plenty of space in that car park. Going to Tooting was a tad more difficult, a very busy car park hard to find a space at all.
These days as we have said before down south the London pirates don’t propagate so well beyond the South Downs due to transmitter site restrictions (increased security on Tower Blocks etc.). As my regular monitoring trips have regrettably ceased I have discovered DX London although now you have to sign up to their forum to use. This is a south London based monitoring station
Usual thanks to JET for their input and also to south.dxlondon.com. Life would be difficult without them,
Meanwhile here is a list of London Community stations a number being former pirates (*). I am unsure about Rainbow FMs former status.
89.6 Westside Southall 92.0 Nagrecha, which replaced Nu Sound (Newham 30 watts) 92.2 Nomad Hammersmith (30 watts) , 92.4 Rainbow 60 watts Crystal Palace, 94.0 Revive Forest Gate, 94.4 Select* Dulwich 96.5 Maritime Greenwich, Croydon 97.8 and 99.4 Croydon, Flex* 101.4 Wandsworth 104.4 Resonance 101.4 Guys Hospital Rinse* 107.3 Lewisham, Reprezent
As we have said before legalising all these community stations has little real impact on the numbers game and can be counterproductive as not all staff join (Flex for example) or become disillusioned and go back to their pirate ways (Rinse and Flex being two examples).
CROYDON RAIDS IN 2025
It is getting increasingly hard to get print news articles about pirate radio either in print or on the net but we got this from London News South who got the data from Freedom of Information (FOI) requests by the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) which revealed a rise in pirate radio masts uncovered across Croydon in 2025. It was reported that Croydon Council collaborated with Ofcom, the police, and other partners to remove illegal broadcast masts across the borough in 2025. These sites have been publicly stated on mY London and were listed as:
283–321 Church Road, Upper Norwood – removed on Wednesday 29 January 2025
56a–76d Chertsey Crescent, New Addington – removed on Wednesday 28 May 2025
1–15 Essex Court, Upper Norwood – removed on Friday 13 June 2025
55–133 College Green, Upper Norwood – removed on Tuesday 5 August 2025
NOTE: Sasradiogroup policy – we only report exact locations when it is the public domain.
Otherwise, we might just say a particular London borough etc.
These were reported as four pirate stations were dismantled in 2025 with none found in the previous four years. Of course the above could be one and the same station but moved a few times. The ones in Upper Norwood were council owned properties
As usual it was reported that unauthorised broadcasting concerns over public safety and spectrum interference.
The locations are very close to each other and could be the same or close rival stations. Mast removal is said to cost £150 to £240. This includes locksmiths, electricians and Ofcom officials. Police also provide security for these operations.
As you can see above one site was in New Addington, the southernmost part of the borough. Croydon used to be a pirate alley due to the borough altitude but fell out of favour due to activity by the authorities.
The masts had been noted by council officials and it may be that they were tipped off by the public. and then bought bring in Ofcom and other parties. Once spotted the sites were quickly inspected and dismantled. None appeared to have been live.
IMPORTANT NOTE:
Any mention of radio stations and services included on this newsletter are intended purely and simply as NEWS. They do not imply any support, endorsement or otherwise of the reported stations. We are forced to include such a disclaimer as UK law makes it an offence to support or endorse any unlicensed radio stations. And have in the past threatened legitimate news media with prosecution as they were deemed to be supporting these stations.
SAS Interference is published by the Surrey Anorak’s Society and is for private circulation within the membership of the Society and interested parties, copyright of the Surrey Anorak’s Society or its’ authors with all rights reserved. No part may be reproduced without the written or verbal consent of the society.
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