Nathan "Nat" Bernstein was probably a second-year senior or so when I was a second-year sophomore or junior. Hold on a second – using class ranks is often pointless in college; suffice to say he was older than me and graduated a year before I did. Anyway, Nat's biggest goal in life, it seemed, was to excel in some sort of entertainment program, though his biggest achievement while associated with the communication department was that of a joke.
One of his good friends was Syd ("the Kid"), the program director. Syd worked at a top-40 radio station and tried to make this undergraduate, college-run station sound like one. Nat wanted to work at a top-40 radio and tried to sound like he did on our station. Syd, who kept things around the station fairly professional, heavily influenced everything Nat did or tried to do (perhaps too professional for a bunch of kids just learning the ropes). Nat made a point of jumping on current music trends, subscribing to the Billboard Monitor magazine, and trying desperately to sound hip and cool and relaxed.
His attempts to get "in" didn't always take well with others. Wanting to get his feet wet with broadcasting, he would often sign-up for extra shifts (rock shifts if possible) and make appearances to get his name out there. Here the problem was that he usually arrived on the scene with his idea of how things were going to happen, tepid to the changes insisted upon by whoever was coordinating the event. This "doing it my way" attitude didn't sit well with people. Nor did his personality, described in one word: fake. Fake smile, fake interest, fake appreciation, and so on. He also wasn't too keen on having things explained – he usually already "knew how" to do something.
In fact, Nat usually had always "heard" of something previously but, though he felt he knew enough to get by, he usually had to enlist help from someone else. For example all students on staff had to know how to receive and give a weekly Emergency Alert System (EAS) test. Well, Nat had "heard" of it and "seen" it done, so he was in the clear. Then such a test showed up on his shift and whoever was in the hall or the music office would get caught up in one of his acts. Feigning friendship, Nat would call you in to the studio and explain the predicament he was in – since "no one showed me how to complete one of these." Once you helped him out of his jam, though, you were expendable. You might be allowed the pleasure to be seen talking with Nat but soon the novelty would wear-off and he'd run you out, citing the "do not disturb studio host" rule.
Speaking of someone who might be stars, who could forget the Wannadies’ cheerful tune of trying to find exposure? Might Be Stars popped up on a weekly preview disc and quickly became a station standard, though it wasn’t until later we discovered they were from Sweden (and thoughts of ABBA and Ace of Base circulated...). We also, surprisingly enough, received a copy of the actual album (a rare treat for any album), which I didn’t discover until years later was a grab-bag of songs from previous Swedish albums repackaged to make a bigger splash in the American charts.
While I liked most of the tracks, I don’t think the Wannadies got as to be the stars they wanted to be (at least, in America).
Also, neither did Nat.
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Might Be Stars
(Wannadies)
The Wannadies
From the album The Wannadies
1997
We spend our money on guitars, write songs about our broken hearts
We're shit city stars
And when we don't we're still aware that we're pop revolutionaries
Aren't we cool
Some say we pretend we live in a dream world
We don't think so
Rule number 1 pretend it's fun, OK now
Chances are we might be stars and live forever
Chances are we might be stars beloved forever
Chances are we might be stars and shine until
We fall down
We know the faces one should know, we know the places where to go
We're on the radio
We never stop we carry on, pretending life is like a song
Aren't we cool
Some say we pretend we live in a dream world
We don't think so
Rule number 10 just try again, OK now
Chances are we might be stars and live forever
Chances are we might be stars beloved forever
Chances are we might be stars and shine until
We fall down
