Documentary Reveals How FM Radio Changed American Music and Culture

If the 1930s and 1940s were the golden age of radio—a time of polished network broadcasts, scripted dramas, and family gatherings around living room consoles—then the late 1960s was the era of the great radio rebellion. It was the dawn of the FM Rock Revolution.

WBCN in Boston was one of the few stations there to lead the charge. The acclaimed documentary, “The Airwaves Belonged to the People: WBCN and the American Revolution”, brings it all to life with a screening at the Orpheum Theatre in Saugerties, NY on Monday October 26th.

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Living approximately 3 hours from Boston, WBCN's FM signal didn't reach my radio but the stories of DJ's hand-selecting their playlists, breaking "new" artists such as Bruce Springsteen and Aerosmith, and personalities talking about real life, my life, certainly did.

Stations such as KMET in St. Louis, WNEW in New York and WBCN were not your dad's radio station. These stations made an entire city feel like they are part of something special. The stations became the DNA of the community.

LCMedia Productions

According to a press release, the film is built from more than 100,000 pieces of archival audio, photographs, film and ephemera from the era, much of it donated by the people who were there, including never-before-exhibited footage shot by Andy Warhol.

“At a time when many Americans feel powerless, the film is a reminder of how media, dissent, music and collective action can bring real social change,”  - Director Bill Lichtenstein, who started at WBCN in 1970, at 14, as a volunteer on the station’s Listener Line and later became a newscaster and announcer with his own program.