Radio

My Introduction to Underground Radio: KAAY – Little Rock, Arkansas

~ Joe Accardi ~ 1 Comment

It was fifty years ago, but seems like a blink of an eye. I was home from college for the summer, making my getaway in dad’s car after working second shift as an amateur sand-blaster at Fairbanks-Morse Corporation. Twisting the radio knob as I pulled out of the parking lot, searching for my new favorite station, I heard the unmistakable strains of Sugar Loaf’s ‘Green-Eyed Lady.’ That’s the one! I yanked out the rightmost pushbutton, then shoved it back in, engaging the preset.  KAAY, an AM station broadcasting all the way into southern Wisconsin from Little Rock, Arkansas, came in loud and clear. The program, Beaker Street hosted by Clyde Clifford, was on the air.

Beaker Street began sometime in 1967, the brainchild of disc jockey Clyde Clifford, whose real name, Dale Seidenschwarz, was kept secret per KAAY station policy. When I first discovered the station around that time, I was still in high school. After a steady diet of top forty “hits” and fast-talking DJs, I was mesmerized by the mellow voice of Clifford and the loosely structured format of acid rock, folk rock, blues, jazz, and what later came to be known as progressive rock. The show was heard six nights a week, from 11 p.m. until 2 a.m.

ClydeClifford1970
Clyde Clifford at KAAY

It was on Beaker Street where I discovered artists like Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd, Albert King, Phil Ochs, East of Eden, Tom Rush, Grateful Dead, and Herbie Mann among many others, including Jaime Brockett singing about ‘The Legend of the U.S.S. Titanic’ and Deep Water Reunion covering the Tom Paxton ballad, ‘Cindy’s Crying.’ And what a pleasure it was to hear full versions of songs by familiar artists — versions not constrained by the three- or four-minute time limit so common on commercial radio then.

clyde
Cylde Clifford at KAAY

Thanks to the Internet Archive digital library, portions of some original Beaker Street programs have been preserved. Here you can listen to the first hour of a program originally broadcast on June 26, 1970:

The playlist for that first hour was:
Sugarloaf – ‘Green Eyed Lady’ (from Sugarloaf)
Sugarloaf – ‘The Train Kept a Rollin’ (Stroll On)’ (from Sugarloaf)
Temptations – ‘Ball of Confusion’ (7″ single)
East of Eden – ‘Xhorkom/Ramadhan/In the Snow For a Blow’ (from Snafu)
Flow – ‘Arlene’ (features Don Felder on guitar; from a now rare album, Flow, on CTI)
East of Eden – ‘Gum Arabic Confucious’ (from Snafu)
Grand Funk Railroad – ‘Hooked On Love’ (from Closer To Home)
MC5 – ‘Ramblin’ Rose’ (from Kick Out the Jams)
MC5 – ‘Kick Out the Jams’ (radio version uses “brothers and sisters” in place of  the opening expletive) (from Kick Out the Jams)
Bob Dylan – ‘Like a Rolling Stone’ (from Self Portrait)
John Hartford – ‘To Say’ (from Iron Mountain Depot)
The Amboy Dukes – ‘Prodigal Man’ (from Migration)
The Corporation – ‘India’ (from a now rare album, The Corporation on Capitol)

Most albums from which the tracks were selected are 1970 releases. Clyde was always on top of the latest music, but never hesitated to juxtapose an older, more popular song with one never before heard.

Clifford left Beaker Street and KAAY in 1974. By that time, FM had taken hold, and I was now listening to “underground” radio on Radio Free Madison, WIBA-FM from Madison, Wisconsin. Still, I missed the unique Beaker Street format. So it was sweet when, in the mid-90s, I learned that Beaker Street with Clyde Clifford had returned to the airwaves.

This time, Clyde was on every Sunday night from 7 p.m. until midnight, bouncing around first on KZLR (KZ-95), later on Magic 105.1 FM (KMJX), and finally ending up on The Point, 94.1 FM where Beaker Street lasted until 2011.  During that time the show was also streamed live, from its Beaker Street web site.

Recently, again thanks to the Internet Archive, I located a number of Beaker Street playlists from the years 1996 to 2000, which were published on the program’s web site at the time. Here’s a playlist for the first two hours of the program which was broadcast and streamed on January 9, 2000:

1-9-2000 BSPL
Beaker Street playlist: January 9, 2000

I was unable to locate recorded shows from the later years of Beaker Street. Instead, I’ve tried to re-create some of those playlists on Spotify, to provide an aural sense of what music Clyde put together for his five-hour programs. By necessity, I had to either substitute one song for another from the same artist, or skip some songs entirely because, in case you didn’t know it, Spotify doesn’t have everything. In fact, the tracks from Abraxas Pool and Gypsy in the example above weren’t available on Spotify. Neither were The Corporation and Flow from the 1970 playlist.

If you’d like to listen to Clyde Clifford’s (nearly) complete playlist from the January 9, 2000 Beaker Street, along with several playlists from his other 1996-2000 broadcasts, you must logon to Spotify.  Once there, simply enter “Beaker Street” in the Spotify search bar and scroll down to “Playlists.” Click on “See All” and you’ll see a couple dozen Beaker Street playlists by “joeybooks.”

kaay

You can listen to my radio show, Life Out of Tunes with Joey Books every Monday afternoon from 2 p.m until 4 p.m. Eastern (1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Central) on 103.3 Asheville FM, and stream it live at: http://www.ashevillefm.org. Happy listening!

 

Readin’, writin’, reviewin’

~ Joe Accardi ~ Leave a comment

I haven’t been writing much lately.  I’m not much of a writer anyway, so it really doesn’t matter.  Most of my time now is spent listening to music, new and old — and I use “old” in the very broadest sense, applying to recorded music from the 1920s onward — to determine what the next playlist for my radio show, Life Out of Tunes, should sound like.

Some folks experience personal catharsis from writing.  For others, like me, it becomes a task.  It’s frustrating to “think” wonderful prose and not be able to transfer it to actual words on paper or a screen.  My thoughts are fleeting.  Perhaps I should take a cue from James Joyce and simply let my stream of consciousness flow out on to the keyboard or the notebook.  That would work if I wasn’t so easily distracted by a tune playing in my head, or on the radio, or on the stereo.

Now, most of the writing I’m able to accomplish is in the form of brief reviews for new CD releases.  When I was a working library professional, I wrote more than a hundred brief (150 words or less) book reviews for Library Journal, mainly covering two subject areas.  One was humor.  The other could be described generally as the social impact of technology.  Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference.

Al Franken

Here’s one of my book reviews from 1999 I had framed along with a personally autographed publicity still of its author, Al Franken.  Al’s book was titled Why Not Me? The Inside Story of the Making and Unmaking of the Franken Presidency.  If you’re wondering into what category his book fell, it was humor.  He was a merely a comedian at that time and didn’t run for a senate seat until ten years later.  The book’s premise about a Franken presidency was funny.  Franken’s actual political career in the Senate was serious.  I wish he were still in office now and actually considering that run for a Franken Presidency.

No, I haven’t framed any music reviews. Yet.  They’re not actually published anywhere other than in a DJ discussion group for the community radio station, Asheville FM, where I volunteer as host for Life Out of Tunes, the radio show.  Among other things, I’m a reviewer of new music.  In a year since starting there as a DJ, I’ve written and posted about thirty or so reviews.  The hundred book reviews I wrote for Library Journal spanned about twenty years, so I should be hitting my stride soon.

Beginning Saturday, October 27, 2018, Asheville FM will enter it’s week-long Fall Fund Drive.  The goal is to raise $30,000 during that time.  Even for a volunteer-driven, community radio station that broadcasts locally and streams its signal worldwide via the Internet, listener support is crucial for our ongoing operations.  Please consider giving any amount you can to support community radio.  And thanks for listening to Life Out of Tunes on Asheville FM!

~Joey Books, host of Life Out of Tunes

LOOT 1957 Orthophonic

Summerfest 1971 and beyond

~ Joe Accardi ~ 5 Comments

Summerfest is an annual music festival held in a permanent, seventy-five acre Festival Park along the beautiful shoreline of Lake Michigan in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  The festival runs for eleven days, on eleven stages, with performances from more than 800 acts with over a 1,000 performances.  Since the 1970s, it’s run from late June through early July.  Summerfest attracts between eight and nine hundred thousand people each year, making it “The World’s Largest Music Festival,” a title that’s been certified by Guinness World Records since 1999.

My first experience at Summerfest was in 1971. Though memories of these things sometimes fade, I located newspaper clippings published at that time to corroborate my recollection.  Among other things I recall, it was a very wet experience.

710726 MilJour Summerfest.jpg

Admission to the festival grounds was a dollar fifty at the gate or an even dollar if you bought a mail order ticket in advance. There  were no additional postage or handling charges.  Just mail a buck with a SASE.  Postage was eight cents back then.  A savings of just thirty-four cents, once you subtract the cost for two stamps, wasn’t even enough incentive for a college kid to plan ahead.  Besides, my summer job at the local cheese factory kept me in enough pocket money to enjoy an occasional concert spontaneously.

This event was on a Sunday, the final day of the festival.  Early on, it had been promoted as a “Surprise Rock Spectacular.”  The acts were revealed just two weeks before the show. They were John Sebastian, recently gone solo from the Luvin’ Spoonful; Poco, founded by some former Buffalo Springfield members; and Mountain, four loud, hard rockers led by behemoth guitar shredder, Leslie West.  A band named Tayles, from Madison, Wisconsin, and Mylon, a southern gospel-rock group were the opening acts.

Fifty thousand music fans were gathering at the Lakefront Amphitheater stage when my date and I arrived late Sunday afternoon.  It had been raining intermittently all day, leaving a sparkling sheen on every exposed surface.

Like today, Summerfest was sponsored primarily by Milwaukee’s famous breweries.  Miller High Life and Pabst Blue Ribbon are perhaps the only originals still around.  Unlike today, festival beer was served up in glass bottles.  A new minimum drinking age of eighteen had been enacted recently, so there was plenty of bottled beer consumption, resulting in plenty of empty bottles.

One newspaper account had listed John Sebastian as the concert headliner, clearly an error as we’d suspected and confirmed by handbills posted on the festival grounds.  Mountain would be the main attraction. We missed Mylon who, I learned recently, was managed by Felix Pappalardi of Mountain, the concert headliners.   We arrived instead near the end of Tayles’ set.

I’d really been looking forward to hearing Poco and hoped the concert wouldn’t be affected by the rain which had started up again.  After a lengthy delay, Poco came out on stage, tuned up a bit, and began playing.

After just two songs, Hurry Up and Hear That Music, frontman Richie Furay tersely announced that Rusty Young, their pedal steel guitarist, had been hit by a beer bottle.  To my great disappointment, Poco abruptly left the stage as loud booing and buckets of rain began to pour forth.

When the rain eventually eased up, a soggy audience cheered as John Sebastian, acoustic guitar in hand, strolled out to a microphone and announced, “I’ll play for ya. Jus’ don’t throw no bottles at me.”  He played an entire set and two encores without incident.  Memorable songs included Younger Girl, Darlin’ Be Home Soon and Red-Eye Express.  Sometimes all it takes to tame an otherwise unruly concert crowd is politely asking not to be a beer-bottle target.

Finally, as rain continued to fall, Mountain took the stage.  Leslie West, Felix Pappalardi, Corky Laing, and Steve Knight simply blew us away.  If any bottles were thrown toward the stage during Mountain’s set, the high decibel sound waves might’ve stopped them in flight.  I could still hear Nantucket Sleighride, Mississippi Queen, and For Yasgur’s Farm ringing in my ears on the long drive home after the show.  It helped me forget about how wet and cold we were.

In four decades of semi-regular Summerfest attendance since then, I’ve heard such notable artists as Roy Orbison, the Moody Blues, Robin Trower, Linda Ronstadt, Kansas, Michael Franti, the Freddy Jones Band, Green Children and many others, including jazz, folk and blues musicians from all over the world.  There were rising stars and those at the end of long careers.  I saw comedian Billy Crystal perform there early in his career, and heard Linda Ronstadt announce to the Milwaukee crowd, “It’s so great to be here in Indiana!”  We were quick to correct her geography.  My wife saw comedian George Carlin arrested by Milwaukee police for performing his Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television routine.

The biggest stars continue to perform at Summerfest in what’s now a 25,000-seat amphitheater at one end of the festival grounds for which tickets are sold at much higher prices than Summerfest’s nominal gate cost.  And though it’s no longer just a buck fifty for general admission, Summerfest remains one of the best bargains for live music around, still hosting hundreds of musical acts on eleven different stages, over eleven consecutive days.

On my July 2, 2018 radio show, Life Out of Tunes on Asheville FM, I’ll be spinning songs from that first Summerfest experience and from other artists I’ve heard at the festival over the years.

Fundraising or Fun-raising?

~ Joe Accardi ~ Leave a comment

Most of you know I have a weekly music show on a local community radio station in Asheville.  As a matter of fact, it goes by the same name as this blog, Life Out of Tunes.  It’s a joy for me to play music for a listening audience and it’s fun to know those listeners are not only from here in Asheville, but from anywhere in the country and perhaps the world.

Spring Fund Drive Logo by Jess Speer

In order to make that happen, many resources are needed — human, technical and financial.  The community radio station for which I volunteer, Asheville FM, is no different with regard to those needs.  That’s why twice each year we hold fund drives.  With spring now in full swing, we are celebrating the season with new ideas and new goals to make our commercial-free radio station even better and stronger than it is now!

The Asheville FM spring fund raiser begins Saturday, April 28 and runs through Friday, May 4.  Our focus this time is GROWTH.  Community radio is a powerful medium, but we need your support to continue presenting more than sixty shows spanning virtually every genre of music, as well as providing news and community interest programming.  Our goal is $23,000.  It’s ambitious, but attainable.  So please consider contributing any amount by clicking on the DONATE button next time you visit AshevilleFM.org.  (If you call the station at (828) 259-3936 and pledge or donate during my show, Life Out of Tunes, on Monday, April 30 between 2:00 and 3:00 pm Eastern time, I’ll be especially grateful!)

That brings to mind some memories.  In 1982 I was associate director of the Janesville (WI) Public Library.  I also fronted a band named Heavy Chevy & the Circuit Riders.  We were a fifties and sixties rock ‘n’ roll revival band that specialized in working fund raisers for schools and other non-profit organizations.  Here we are rehearsing just before a library fundraiser.  (That’s me in the green shirt.)

Heavy Chevy & the Circuit Riders (1982)

Later that year I was asked to co-host local televised segments of the annual Jerry Lewis Muscular Dystrophy Telethon alongside Janesville school district’s PR manager and the manager of Total TV.  During the telethon I offered to shave off my mustache while on camera for a specific donation.  I don’t recall the dollar amount.  A donor called to offer the requested amount, but asked me to shave only half the mustache.  His hope, he said, was that someone else would call with the same donation amount to shave off the rest.  Someone brought me a can of shaving cream and a razor. I continued the telethon with only half-a-stache until a second caller made the rest come off.  Another caller who recognized me from a Heavy Chevy gig requested that I recite the spoken interlude of a song, Little Darlin’  by the Diamonds.  It was a song from the Heavy Chevy playlist, so I accommodated her request and she made her donation.

Telethon ad from Sept 5, 1982 Janesville Gazette

Isn’t it a shame no visual archive of that telethon show exists?   Well, perhaps not.  Unfortunately, though, there is an audio-visual archive of Heavy Chevy & the Circuit Riders on YouTube.  Here is:

The Ballad of Heavy Chevy

Please give generously to support community radio on Asheville FM !
Thank you !

The Annotated Playlist in My Head

~ Joe Accardi ~ Leave a comment

Perhaps it’s a lingering librarian obsession within me.  A way to catalog and shelve that playlist in my head.  Or maybe it’s because I can’t think of anything else to write about.  Either way, here’s an annotated edition of the playlist from my January 29, 2018 Life Out of Tunes radio show.

  1.  Ernest Tubb – Walking the Floor Over You.  This tune was floating around in my head for many years as I reminisced about running playbacks of The Ernest Tubb Show in a previous blog post.  One thing missing from the radio broadcast was a visual of Tubb flipping over his guitar at the end of the show and displaying the word THANKS in big block letters stuck to the back of it.  My No Left Turns bandmate and cousin Mike, whose dad was a country music fan, would do the same thing with his electric guitar at our gigs.
  2. Chris Rea – The Road To Hell (Pts. 1 & 2).  Not only have I been a Chris Rea fan since the 1980s, but I have two friends, also Chris Rea fans, who would agree that we, as a country, are traveling down that road.  This one was for you, Mike and Brad.
  3. The Flock – I Am the Tall Tree.  I always liked the Flock from Chicago.  I missed their performance at the Pop House, a teen club in my hometown, around 1966-67.  I have it on good authority they closed their show with, “We’re gonna play one more song, then get the flock outta here.”
  4. Umphrey’s McGee – Forks.  I confess to enjoying jam bands.  The Grateful Dead have always been among my favorites.  UM elevates it with scorching, jazz-infused solos and time signature changes accompanied by smart lyrics.
  5. First Friday – Maryanne.  A blast from my past, circa 1969-70.  While students at ND, these guys were talented enough to record an album.  I bought the LP new at that time and played it so often, the grooves wore out.  A favorite at parties both on and off campus, First Friday disbanded upon graduation.  Members of Umphrey’s McGee are ND alums too, separated from First Friday by three decades.  This must be where I say, “Go Irish!”
  6. The Rums & Coke – Glad All Over.  Growing up in Wisconsin during the 60s, I knew many “garage bands.” but had never heard of this one until researching a recent post to Wisconsin Garage Bands 1960s, a Facebook page I admin.  A five-piece, all-girl band from south of Milwaukee, the Rums & Coke were popular in southeastern Wisconsin.  They recorded this Dave Clark Five song across the border in Chicago and released it as a single in 1966.
  7. Roxanne & Dan Keding – Little Drummer.  Originally from Chicago, this talented folk duo moved to Wisconsin, near the town where I was working and where we became friends.  I was invited to join them and four other musicians for a one-off fundraising gig, performing together as a 50/60s rock ‘n’ roll revival band, Heavy Chevy & the Circuit Riders.  That aside, the Kedings recorded an album of traditional folk songs, From Far & Near, in 1980.  It was followed by an album of children’s songs, In Came That Rooster, in 1981.  I had both albums.  They split up and eventually I split, leaving both LPs behind.  I regretted it (leaving the records, that is) until I found From Far & Near at a used record store in Asheville, NC, 850 miles from where it originated!  From far and near indeed!  An old Irish folk song about love at first sight, I selected this track for Frank, my Irish friend.
  8. The Clientele – Lunar Days.  If you caught a glimpse of either the super-moon or the lunar eclipse last night, you’ll understand why I spun this tune.
  9. Van Morrison – Moondance.  See #8.  “Can I just have one more moondance with you?”
  10. The Broadcast – Battle Cry.  Threw in something from a great Asheville band featuring an equally great vocalist.
  11. Hot Tuna – Water Song.  Sylvia (the one with whom I moondance) and I heard Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Cassidy (a.k.a. Hot Tuna) shred this guitar instrumental in concert a couple years ago.

Hope you enjoyed reading the stories behind each song on this week’s playlist!  If you missed it, you can still listen to this Life Out of Tunes show through Monday, February 5, 2018 by following the link:  https://www.ashevillefm.org/show/life-out-of-tunes/ and clicking on the “Play Archive” button.  Peace!

Martin Luther King Jr. Day

~ Joe Accardi ~ Leave a comment

When Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, I was finishing my senior year in high school.  His senseless death impacted me.  I’d been accepted at the University of Notre Dame as a freshman for the fall semester where it didn’t take long before I’d become one of the “effete corps of impudent snobs” so colorfully described by vice-president Spiro Agnew.  We didn’t like war.  Or discrimination.  Or pollution.  Or republicans.  I guess that qualified me as an “effete snob” or, in the words of one conservative music blogger who no longer reads my work, a “smug hippie.”

Monday is Martin Luther King Jr. Day.  The memory of his senseless death impacts me all over again.  On this commemoration of his birth, January 15, I’ll broadcast my weekly radio show.  Every tune will deal in some way with resistance, struggle and hope.  Isn’t it strange?  Nearly fifty years have passed and we’re still singing about the same things.  Listen to Life Out of Tunes at 2:00 pm (EST) on MLK day for an earful.  “Remember.  Celebrate.  Act.  A day on… not a day off.”

Life Out of Tunes radio, hosted by Joey Books
Monday, January 15, 2018, 2:00-3:00 pm (EST)
Asheville FM, WSFM-LP, 103.3 (Asheville, NC)
Streaming globally at: https://www.ashevillefm.org/show/life-out-of-tunes/

Not-So-Cheap Self Promotion

~ Joe Accardi ~ Leave a comment

Waking up grumpy on Mondays?  After your morning coffee and a quick walk around the neighborhood with Fido, you might be heading off to work.  Or perhaps you’re not working, whether by choice or by circumstance.  Whatever the case may be, figure out a way you can listen to my new radio show, Life Out of Tunes, on Monday afternoons at two o’clock on Asheville FM.  It could brighten your day.

I know what you’re thinking.  You’re thinking Accardi has sunk to a new level of cheap self-promotion.  I can assure you that is not the case.  Maintaining this blog isn’t cheap!

My first show will feature a sampling of great music from Chicago which has had an influence on me.  Tunes, old and new, from the Mauds, the Siegel-Schwall Band, Steve Goodman, Patricia Barber, Koko Taylor, Rotary Connection, Bill MacKay & Ryley Walker and the Safes, just to name a few.  But I’m warning you.  They won’t be the “hits.”  This ain’t no oldies program.  Together we can explore and enjoy a few deep tracks from these great artists.

Life Out of Tunes on the radio, hosted by Joey Books, can be heard Mondays, 2:00 to 3:00 PM (Eastern) on Asheville FM (WSFM-LP, 103.3) and streaming worldwide at http://ashevillefm.org.

Tune in and turn it up!

Life Out of Tunes: the Radio Show

~ Joe Accardi ~ Leave a comment

I’m pleased to announce my new weekly radio show, “Life Out of Tunes” on Asheville FM (WSFM-LP 103.3).  Asheville FM is a volunteer-based, listener-supported community radio station and I’m proud to be aboard!

Broadcasting as DJ “Joey Books,” my show will begin Monday, December 4, 2017, airing weekly from 2:00 to 3:00 (Eastern) every Monday afternoon. It will feature a freeform selection of music with connections to this blog, Life Out of Tunes.

I’ll share a few memories and personal observations on the music that helped shape my life, so you can expect a wide variety of songs and an occasional story or two.

Asheville FM streams worldwide at ashevillefm.org, where you can check out the entire on-air schedule and “Listen Live.”  So tune in and turn it up!

 

A Progressive Thanksgiving Dinner

~ Joe Accardi ~ Leave a comment

I won’t be home for Thanksgiving this year.  It’s happened before, missing the big family gathering along with all those special foods prepared for the occasion.

Instead, I’ll be hosting a Thanksgiving Day edition of Closer to the Edge, an outstanding Progressive music radio show on Asheville FM (WSFM-LP, 103.3).  I feel honored to have been asked to substitute for host JD, the “Professor of Prog” while he takes a well-earned holiday break.

For three hours, from 2:00 to 5:00 pm (Eastern) on Thanksgiving Day I’ll be serving up some of the best in classic Prog music for the main course, garnished with a healthful helping of contemporary selections.  We’ll begin with an Hors D’oeuvre (served with mathematical precision) and progress through each subsequent course until Supper’s Ready.

I’ll be spinning some delicious classic dishes from the likes of Touch, Wishbone Ash and the Moody Blues, followed by fresh desserts from Anathema and others.  There may even be something special from Wisconsin for all you cheeseheads.

So tune in Thanksgiving Day, November 23, at 2:00 pm EST to hear me, Joey Books, take over as guest chef on Closer to the Edge. You can stream it live on AshevilleFM.org by clicking on the “Listen Live” button.  Join me for a truly Progressive Thanksgiving dinner!

Chasing a DJ Diploma

~ Joe Accardi ~ 1 Comment

I have a BA.  I also have an MA.  Now, I’m working on a DJ.

Let me explain.

I’m fortunate to live near a listener-supported, community radio station known as Asheville FM.  I didn’t know much about them until one day while walking by there I noticed a canopy over a table set up in front of the small, nondescript corner building where some friendly folks invited me over to chat.  They told me about the organization, an entirely volunteer driven Friends of Community Radio station, save for one paid manager position.  They showed me a program schedule and pointed out the eclectic shows that are hosted entirely by volunteers.  Of course, it was also their spring fund drive and they asked if I might be interested in contributing, either fiscally or physically, to their efforts.

Anxious to jump on board, I walked home to get my checkbook and then, after donating enough money to snag a snazzy Asheville FM t-shirt, stood behind the table, meeting more of the volunteers, learning more about the station and its programs, and urging other passers-by to stop, listen and learn about this community-powered radio station located in their backyard.

Days later I found myself standing under the canopy, behind the Asheville FM table at another community event, talking with  folks about the station, its programs and its opportunities to serve the Asheville listening audience.  I listened to the programs broadcast on-air and streamed over the Internet.  Upon attending a DJ orientation session, I began the path toward earning a chance to host my own radio program, “shadowing” other program hosts and even appearing as a guest on a couple of shows, bringing music from my own collection to play and discuss on the air.

Twice as a guest (and “shadow”) on the Thursday morning show, Riffin’, hosted by Vance and assisted by Rick, both with their vast record collections of 60s and 70s music, I shared some similar music from the Midwest, discussing the bands and songs we heard growing up.  We played music by the Robbs, the Cryan Shames, the Buckinghams, the New Colony Six, the Mob, the Flock, the Ides of March and other Midwest groups.  What a gas!

One Monday evening found me shadowing on a program aptly named Uncorrected Personality Traits with hosts Jaybird and Juliet.  It was a deliciously juicy treat, playing what can only be described as a truly eclectic cacophony of ear candy, some sweet, some sour, but all highly digestible with little or no antacid required.  Two other program hosts, Sarah and Erik, graciously opened their programs to me for shadowing, and I was able to watch, learn and earn more air time with them.

The week of October 28 – November 3 is the Asheville FM “Fall Fund Drive.”  You’ll find me volunteering again at that table under a canopy set up in front of the station.  I was also invited to be a “pitch partner” for an hour with Professor JD during his prog rock show, Closer to the Edge, on Thursday afternoon of the fund drive.  I’m bringing some classic prog music from the late 60s to mid 70s, including King Crimson, Moody Blues, Touch, Renaissance and Pink Floyd among others.  Perhaps we’ll even share some stories along the way as we try to raise money for the station.

So when you get a chance, turn on, tune in and turn up your radio to Asheville FM (WSFM-LP 103.3) or click on AshevilleFM.org and give some real community-powered radio a listen.  Check out the schedule.  There’s sure to be something to tickle your eardrums.  And one of these days, I hope to be doing the tickling.