Wireless Nights

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BBC Radio 4 LW

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Factual: Life Stories

Factual: Travel

Jarvis Cocker explores the human condition after dark, with stories of night people

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Wireless Nights: Series 5: Megahertz

Megahertz

Series 5

BBC Radio 4 - Wireless Nights, Series 5, Megahertz

Jarvis Cocker navigates the ether in his nocturnal exploration of the human condition.

Jarvis Cocker goes on a night voyage across a sea of shortwave and megahertz as he meets those who broadcast, monitor and harvest electronic transmissions after dark.

Jarvis Cocker navigates the ether as he continues his nocturnal exploration of the human condition. 

On a night voyage across a sea of shortwave he meets those who broadcast, monitor and harvest electronic radio transmissions after dark.

Paddy McAloon, founder of the band Prefab Sprout, took to trawling the megahertz when he was recovering from eye surgery and the world around him became dark. Tuning in at night he developed a ghostly romance with far-off voices and abnormal sounds.

Artist Katie Paterson and 'Moonbouncer' Peter Blair send Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata to the moon and back, to find sections of it swallowed up by craters.

Journalist Colin Freeman was captured by the Somali pirates he went to report on and held hostage in a cave. But when one of them loaned him a shortwave radio, the faint signal to the outside world gave him hope as he dreamed of freedom.

And "London Shortwave" hides out in a park after dark, with his ear to the speaker on his radio, slowly turning the dial to reach all four corners of the earth

Jarvis sails in and out of their stories - from the cosmic to the captive - as he wonders what else is out there, deep in the noise 

Producer Neil McCarthy.

Wireless Nights: Series 5

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