Why doesn't anctarctica have a huge music culture?

[u/Interesting-Pen2586]

[u/Hill_Observer]

There is icestock every year, which is a really big music festival. Every new year at McMurdo a lot of people play live.

Also, there’s a radio station! ICE 104.5, owned by the American Forces Antarctic Network. I don’t think many people listen, but it’s very fun to be a DJ for it. Sometimes people will call in and request stuff. There’s also a huge record collection, somewhere around 20,000 records. (Though that number is going down because people steal them a lot.)  It’s one of the last remaining American Forces records collections, and probably the biggest. Some of the records were even used in the Vietnam war. Read more about that here:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Forces_Antarctic_Network

There’s also a music room on station. I haven’t been, but I here there’s a pretty good selection of instruments.

More anecdotally, most of the Stewies I worked with down there had a few playlists made up for when we washed dishes. In the Dish Pit, the front of house place where everyone walks by after meals to drop off their dishes, the music had to be fairly clean  (at least according to the bosses) . In the back of house Pots Room, people played pretty much whatever.

[u/forlornjackalope → u/Hill_Observer]

Do you know if it's possible to make it available for r/RadioGarden? I remember years ago, someone on YouTube was able to record a broadcast from McMurdo back in the 1980s and I had always hoped that one day something like this would happen again.

[u/Hill_Observer → u/forlornjackalope]

From what I understand of the Wikipedia page, they had shortwave from 1974 to 1995, but now the radio station is only a low power FM broadcast. It’s 50 watts, which is enough to travel around 10 kilometers

[u/forlornjackalope → u/Hill_Observer]

Ah, bummer. It would be neat to hear what's going on over down there.

Here's the rip if you want to check it out.

AFAN - McMurdo Station - 1982

[u/IT4EDU]

What are you talking about? Metallica has played there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Hi2u98VKxc

[u/Hill_Observer → u/IT4EDU]

They really dropped the ball when they didn’t play “Trapped under ice”

[u/RoughPersonality1104]

Probably has the best music scene per capita in the world actually

[u/ReadyPlantain820]

The US stations have a pretty great music scene. McMurdo has a band room. People play at Ice Stock, in open mics, at parties, and in the bars. Music is one of the positive outlets for the people in station.

[u/wai_o_ke_kane → u/ReadyPlantain820]

also a radio station/dj booth, massive vinyl collection, and two anechoic rooms. and heaps of instruments to rent. MCM has it pretty good

[u/Hill_Observer → u/wai_o_ke_kane]

Where are the anechoic rooms? I hadn’t heard of any on station

[u/vosper → u/Hill_Observer]

More of a roughly soundproof booth. They're on the second level of the big gym behind the climbing wall

[u/Heffe3737 → u/ReadyPlantain820]

I have it on very good authority that the McMurdo janitorial staff likes to laugh and tell jokes in their morning meetings. Or at least they did about 10-15 years ago.

[u/Ok-Alternative-5175 → u/Heffe3737]

They did last year too! What a great crew

[u/Ben_Turra51]

What? You have never been to a Waste Barn party. Or Ice Stock. Or Gallagher’s when 3 or 4 bands play, like Gopher Dale.

[u/Hill_Observer → u/Ben_Turra51]

What is a Waste Barn party?

[u/wai_o_ke_kane → u/Hill_Observer]

when theres a party in the waste barn. duh

[u/Ben_Turra51 → u/Hill_Observer]

I don’t completely rememeber, but that means they are really good.

[u/Gapedout → u/Ben_Turra51]

That building is now condemned so they have to have wastemas outside now

[u/Ben_Turra51 → u/Gapedout]

Well the new MCM station rebuild includes a rotating stage and heated dancefloor right? Multiple disco balls, and NSF approved brewery so they don’t have to ship beer on the vessel? Or am I wrong?

[u/sciencemercenary]

You've obviously never been to a South Pole New Year's Eve party. 🎵

[u/digitalgreenhouse → u/sciencemercenary]

Yess! This really brought me back. Glad to see that old cargo parachute is still going strong.

[u/pizzatanktopbro]

I watched a YouTube tour of one of the bases and they had a music room with recording capabilities and a ton of instruments. If any of the scientists or staff on that base wanted to, they could be churning out some good stuff

[u/nsfgod → u/pizzatanktopbro]

Rothera has a great music room and runs several music events a year.

[u/Vergil_back_in_hell]

I thought this is r/Mapporncirclejerk for a sec.

[u/Quartzalcoatl_Prime → u/Vergil_back_in_hell]

"No data" if it were a continent

[u/Agatheis]

Pretty sure this is a bot account. Check their history. They just repeat the same queaitons in multple subs every day.

[u/Interesting-Pen2586 → u/Agatheis]

I posted a topic 2 one serious and one joke and reposted them. What are you talking about?

[u/sciencemercenary → u/Interesting-Pen2586]

Your post history is basically asking the same questions on bunches of different subreddits, generally without engaging in conversation. This is typically the behavior of either a bot or someone trying to farm karma without really caring about the answer, and it's annoying as hell. We (this sub's mods) have little patience for this sort of thing and have already attached an internal spam warning to your username. You're about a millimeter away from being banned. FYI.

[u/blackbeardcutlass]

I played more live music when I was on the ice than I ever did up north!

[u/Technically_Salt28]

It does

[u/happyjello]

How can you forget about Happy Feet?

[u/fgorina]

Have you never heard a penguin concert?

[u/PathfinderCS]

I'm sorry, but you clearly haven't heard of this symphony written by the landmass itself*

Vaughan Williams: Symphony no. 7 "Sinfonia Antartica"

*Composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams shut up

[u/Stardust_of_Ziggy]

It does, you just can't hear it cause it's so far away

[u/RedditJennn]

Icestock!

[u/Minervas-Madness]

The existing bases have no permanent population. So while you have a group of returners who are a regular presence, a large part of the population changes every few months. Kinda tricky to have one music culture Wren you're constantly working through the 'getting too know you' stage.

[u/Uncle_Charnia]

Have you been under a glacier?

[u/Savings_Art5944]

I heard it's cool to play there.

[u/womanonice]

but they do.

[u/ScrappyMokey]

Man, I'm currently trying to do a 7-continent audio/music milestone :). I'm a remote mixing/mastering engineer and I've been fortunate enough to have participated in music from 4 continents so far (North America, Europe, South America, and Africa).

If you are currently stationed down there, have been jamming, and tracking your music, I’d love to team up and mix or master your track. If you have an upcoming project, field recording, or station jam that needs remote mix/mastering work, I'd love to stay in touch!

[u/JDeezi]

Check out the McMurdo tavern

[u/grunge-insomniac]

gwar

[u/vosper → u/grunge-insomniac]

RIP Chuck Varga :(

[u/stevejscearce]

Metallica played there once.

[u/Adventurous_Soft9210]

Saw this and thought it was a giant flake of dandruff