4ZZ/4ZZZ - Construction of FM Radio Studios (Brisbane 1975)

Alternative Radio History in Brisbane, Australia: Video records station volunteers building the original 4ZZ/4ZZZ studios in the Basement of the UQ Union's Refectory Building, on the University of Queensland campus. As you will discover, a scintillating staple by staple, cut by cut and blow by blow insight into the 1975 construction of the community radio station's studios. (Live sound missing from tape.) These images represent rare, if not unique, archival footage recorded on now aging and deteriorating B&W video tape ... by someone seemingly high at the time or subsequently diagnosed with a severe case of attention deficit disorder. (As evidenced by the multiple zooms to the ceiling and floor and shots of blurred inanimate objects found every few seconds within the tape's raw footage!) However with the absolute worst of these camera excesses now removed, the tape has been given a rough edit only ... so as to retain and acknowledge the images of all those stations volunteers involved at the time. It was essentially these hard working people who helped make the 1975 launch of 4ZZ possible. Station's opening announcer (1975): John Woods (also seen within this video). Opening song: The Who's 'Won't get fooled again'. "You're listening to 4ZZ-FM Brisbane bringing you stereo FM rock on a frequency of 105.7 megahertz," John Woods announced at12 noon on the 8th December, 1975. 4ZZZ's first broadcast signaled a revolution in Australian radio. 4ZZZ was also the first community FM broadcaster in Australia and pioneered the playing of contemporary Australian music on Australian radio. For more station history: http://www.4zzzfm.org.au/history And here also, along with another rare video on the building of the station: http://vimeo.com/24753891. (This page provides an excellent, very informative & well researched account of the station's development.)

Added 29 Jul 2026