If a farmer is harvesting wheat they must separate the wheat from the chaff. The wheat is the good part, like good reggae music. The chaff is not edible, like reggae that is no good. BigupRadio separates the wheat from the chaff. BigupRadio only plays the best, most slamming DANCEHALL and steady rockin ROOTS reggae music.

These free radio stations play twenty-four hours a day with no advertisements. If you are new to reggae music you can simply tune in and by paying attention to the stations playlists you will expand your knowledge of reggae artists and their work. To listen to the radio you must have Winamp, iTunes, Windows Media Player or another internet radio player installed on your computer.. To start listening to the radio, click on the radio stream links at the top of the page. Enjoy.

ORIGINS

In the beginning we launched the Dancehall stream for ourselves. At that time the sole station was mostly Dancehall with a bit of Roots and Dub. We all live in different parts of California and we wanted to listen to slamming reggae music either at home or at work. After only a few months we attracted more listeners and came to the realization that we could to share it with everyone in the world. And so Bigupradio was born. Listening to reggae music will live you up with positivity and drown out all the negativity. But don't take our word for it, take it from Bob Marley, Frankie Paul, Barrington Levy, Gregory Isaacs, Dennis Brown and many more of the featured artists who you will hear on our stations. Please tune in and feel the good vibes.

Bigupradio began broadcasting its Dancehall station in January, 2000 in an effort to share Jah's wonderful reggae music around the globe. We originally started streaming with a "No Bammer" philosophy, which meant you couldn't if you tried hear a song you didn't like. We've since then dropped the "No Bammer" but still as best we can maintain the spirit. As a representative of reggae music worldwide we make an effort to bring our listeners reggae music that should be heard not just what happens to get air time. We play the reggae that our listeners want to hear but just don't have the opportunity to be exposed to. It's hard to find good reggae music. Unless you live in Jamaica for most of us, it's not readily available. Here in the states reggae has only recently starting to attack the terrestrial radio stations and even then you will only hear it on stations in the major metropolitan cities. The problem is that today the only reggae you will hear on the radio is hardcore dancehall, most of which has been made here in the States. The young people in the U.S. seem to only know the Dancehall kings like Sizzla, Beenie Man, Sean Paul, Elephant Man and others. Go a bit farther back and you'll remember the older dancehall giants Shabba Ranks, Cobra, Shaggy and Chaka Demus & Pliers. Where is the Roots in 2004? Where is the old school Danchall and early Ska? You can't find it anywhere! Who is playing Courtney Melody, Nitty Gritty, Little John (when he was little), Lone Ranger, Ninjaman and all the original dancehall dons? By using the internet as a delivery vehicle, Bigupradio insures that a wide range of great reggae music can be heard by simply using a computer or internet appliance using broadband or dial-up access no matter where you are located so long as you can get to the internet. Now you can listen to Bigupradio's stations on your cell phone! And if you don't hear what you want please feel free to contact us or you may find that we carry stock in your favorite reggae artists here on our site.

HISTORY

In 2001 Bigupradio became a content provider on www.IMNetworks.com. IMNetworks player currently ships with Creative Labs Sound Blaster products and there are millions sold around the world. For all we know we have thousands of people using their software based player and internet radio appliances to listen to Bigupradio. Also, in 2001 Bigupradio formed an alliance with www.SonicGarden.com, and independant artist music portal with over 7,000 artists. Through joint efforts SonicGarden now has its own reggae genre section that is growing very rapidly with new reggae artists signing up for free all around the world.

2002 flew by so fast we can only say that we stuck with our program and kept out of trouble. Our dancehall station had grown to 3,000 hand picked songs and had locked down the #1 spot on Shoutcasts World Music section and to this day there it remains. At some point in time iTunes picked up Bigupradio's Dancehall High and Low stations and has them listed on under World Music on their radio player. We'd like to first thank Apple for having us and to next ask them to please list our Roots stations at some point :)

Bigupradio, Inc. based in Oakland, California, was incorporated on Cinco De Mayo (May 5th), 2003. In an effort to comply with our broadcasting fees and licenses we had to get serious and form a company. The next step was to launch a website that could generate revenues to keep the stations up. Although we originally started Bigupradio because we feel strongly that being able to listen to good reggae music is an important part of our lives but the reality of broadcasting, hosting and streaming fees kicked in. We launched a PayPal shopping cart with 3,000 reggae cds in order to make the money we have to pay for keeping Bigupradio online. Later in 2003 Bigupradio released its Roots station and it is doing quite well on the Shoutcast Charts. The Roots station plays Roots and a little bit of classic dub and ska. The Dancehall station is now strictly old school and new school dancehall ranging from U-Roy to Sean Paul. In late 2003, Bigupradio formed a joint alliance with Reggae Makossa, out of San Diego California. Reggae Makossa runs the reggae scene in Southern California and has a terrestrial radio show every Sunday. In November, 2003 Bigupradio became a content provider for www.myMBN.com which provides radio streams to cellular phones. Now you can tune into Bigupradio's Roots and Dancehall streams by dialing in.

In January, 2004 Bigupradio upgraded its broadcasting software to further enhance the stations so they sound even better than before. Our Shoutcast streams are now in sync with our Windows Media streams instead of being seperate stations. The Windows Media streams are now multi-bitrate so that both broadband and dial-up users can tune in. We have also launched a brand new site with over 10,000 reggae CDs, Vinyl Records, Cassettes, DVDs and more. Our primary focus is streaming the best reggae in the world but we do have to keep our stations up. Please shop and give your support.

There is much more to come in 2004...