Pirate Radio was a substantially controversial radio program that aired Friday nights from Midnight to 1 AM on T-FM (90.7 FM and 105.1 FM) in Nashville, Tennessee. The program ran from 1999-2001, until it was cancelled suddenly and without explanation by the parent station, WNAZ. For other cities named Nashville, see Nashville (disambiguation). ... WNAZ is a radio station operated by Trevecca Nazarene University and plays primarily music in the Contemporary Christian music format. ...

Content

Classified as "comedy", Pirate Radio combined live on-air personalities with pre-recorded sketches, commercial parodies, live call-ins, and alternative rock. The title and premise of the show seemed to revolve around the hostile takeover of a commercial radio station. The show was hailed as, "Saturday Night Live" for radio, and often compared with "Monty Python's Flying Circus", "Mr. Show with Bob and David", and "The Howard Stern Show". These comparisons are due largely in part to the detail of the scripted sketches supposedly producing visual stimulation -- despite the fact that the show was only an audio production. Production values varied from excellent to poor, although it is unknown if obvious "mistakes" were or were not intentional -- meant to simulate an actual illegal broadcast. Saturday Night Live (SNL) is a weekly late-night 90-minute comedy-variety show based in New York City which has been broadcast by NBC nearly every Saturday night since its debut on October 11, 1975. ... Monty Pythons Flying Circus (also known as Flying Circus, MPFC or just Monty Python during the fourth season) was a popular, surreal BBC sketch comedy show from Monty Python and the groups initial claim to fame. ... The logo Mr. ... Self-proclaimed King of All Media Howard Stern, circa 2000. ...

Controversy

Miscellaneous

According to the FCC, 78 complaints against "Pirate Radio" were filed due to objectionable content; there were 63 complaints in the year 2001 alone. Pre-recorded sketches often parodied celebrities and varying social situations using extremely explicit dialog. The abbreviation FCC can refer to: Face-centered cubic (usually fcc), a crystallographic structure Federal Communications Commission, a US government organization Farm Credit Corporation/Farm Credit Canada, a Canadian government organization Families with Children from China, an adoption support organization Florida Christian College, a college in central Florida Fresno City...

Telephone call-ins seemed to be unscreened most of the time, and callers on occasion used profanity or sexually explicit dialog. Although the calls were immediately terminated, many complaints were still made.

The wattage of both 90.7 FM and 105.1 FM were reportedly elevated during the broadcast hours of "Pirate Radio" to levels that required a higher classification than the station currently possessed. Warnings were supposedly issued by the FCC, but it is unknown if the producers ever complied. No citations regarding power were ever issued.

Lipscomb Comments

The show was put on hiatus for two weeks when Travis Young made disparaging remarks about Lipscomb University during a news segment. He commented that Lipscomb University "charged an arm and two legs" for tuition, regarding a student by name whom at the time was in the news because she recently had several limbs amputated due to complications from meningitis. Friends and family members of the student lodged numerous complaints with WNAZ in protest. In response, the station suspended production of the show for two weeks as a punitive measure, however no public statements were released by WNAZ, Mr. Young, or any representatives of Pirate Radio. The Tennessean covered this scandal extensively. Lipscomb University Lipscomb University is a Church of Christ-affiliated university in Nashville, Tennessee. ... Meningitis is inflammation of the membranes (meninges) covering the brain and the spinal cord. ... The Tennessean is a dominant daily newspaper in Nashville, Tennessee. ...

Pirate Radio Staff

Infamous Sketches

Trivia

• The music playing during the intro is the same soundtrack playing during the main titles of Fight Club, by the Dust Brothers.
• During the show aired on February 23, 2001, there were a total of 29 gunshots, including the two during the intro.
• At least one-third of the call-ins were staged. They were some of the same voices doing the sketches. Sometimes you could tell the callers were talking into a mike in the studio, instead of a telephone.
• "Plethora Man" was the only sketch never replayed.
• The producer got into a 7-minute argument with a caller who was complaining about the content of the March 9, 2001 show. This was obviously live, unscripted, and unplanned. The caller complained about sketches that hadn't even aired that night, and told the producer he was going to hell.
• The "Poor Sally" sketch that aired on April 27, 2001 recycled a joke from The Daily Show with Craig Kilborn used in 1997. The joke referred to the crash of TWA Flight 800, and said, "TWA: the airline that covers the world...and sometimes New York harbor."
• Every week, D-Rock told Christiana to "shut-up" at least 3 times.
• Two different sketches referred to the Trix Rabbit being a homosexual, or being "fruity".
• The weekly segment "D-Rock's Fables" featured an instrumental (acoustic guitar) version of "What a Wonderful World" playing softly as background music.
• For the first 6 months of the show, no one used their real names. They went by aliases like, "Chunky Cheese" and "Albino Alligator".
• Many sketches had subliminal messages backmasked into the audio. These messages usually were either inside jokes, or self-referential promotion. This was most notably heard in "The Exercisist" when the Rosie O'Donnell character speaks gibberish while possessed.
• Britney Spears was killed off quite horribly two times during sketches for the show. She suffered 4 fatal gunshot wounds in "COPS at DisneyWorld 2", and in the January 26, 2001 "Poor Sally" she was pureed by a giant oscillating fan blade. Both times they used an obviously male, squeaky falsetto voice to parody her.
• The credits at the end of the show were said over a live recording of Andy Kaufman singing, "It's Time to Say Goodbye".

Fight Club (1999) is a film based on the novel Fight Club (1995) by Chuck Palahniuk. ... The Dust Brothers are the Los Angeles-based producers E.Z. Mike (Michael Simpson) and King Gizmo (John King), famous for their creation of sample-based music in the 1980s, and specifically for their work on the groundbreaking albums Pauls Boutique by the Beastie Boys and Odelay by Beck. ... February 23 is the 54th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... March 9 is the 68th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (69th in Leap years). ... April 27 is the 117th day of the year (118th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 248 days remaining. ... The Daily Show (currently The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, also known as TDS) is a half-hour satirical news program produced by and run on the Comedy Central cable television network in the United States. ... This article or section seems not to be written in the formal tone expected of an encyclopedia entry. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... Trix is a popular brand of breakfast cereal made by General Mills. ... What a Wonderful World was written by songwriters Bob Thiele and George David Weiss, first performed by Louis Armstrong, and released as a single in early 1968. ... Backmasking (also incorrectly known as backward masking) is an audio technique in which sounds are recorded backwards onto a track that is meant to be played forwards. ... Rosie ODonnell (on right) and life-partner Kelli Carpenter-ODonnell speaking after their legal union on February 26, 2004 in San Francisco. ... Britney Jean Spears (born December 2, 1981) is a Grammy-winning American pop singer, dancer, occasional actress, and author. ... January 26 is the 26th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Andy Kaufman Andrew Geoffrey Kaufman (January 17, 1949 – May 16, 1984?) was a New York-born American entertainer. ...

See Also

• Pirate radio in North America
• WNAZ