Stumbling around, can't even see, all to escape reality

Walking through the ground-level halls of the Communication Building, it would be hard to miss the main control room/studio of the radio station through the two large glass windows. From the hall, one could look in at the student on duty getting hands-on training with the various consoles, controls, and other equipment needed to get the station on the air. While on the outside the studio appeared to be kept somewhat neat and presentable, inside it could be a real mess.

Hidden under counter tops or inside cabinets were jumbled nests of cords and wires, each a vital component to getting the station up and running. Just how vital some of these random zigzagging wires were was another story. What happened if we removed that dusty cord along the back wall: would it disconnect the seldom-used studio television from the audio board (and therefore cause little notice), or was it one that bridged the studio to the newsroom, one that, if removed, would cause the engineer headaches and wild cursing streaks? I dunno – let's unplug it and see.

Anything? Anyway....this general disorder of equipment was something I didn't know about until my senior year, when something was mentioned in passing with one of the production assistants, or PA. PAs were senior-level students that showed some ability to retain knowledge and therefore were paid a scrawny stipend to work after hours and assist other students with audio and video equipment. Doug Landau was one such PA, one more interested in engineering aspects of audio and video production than creative side most students had.

Doug had been supporting the current department engineer with the installation of new equipment somewhere and said how both of them were getting tired of dealing with "the house that Jack built." When I questioned him, Doug said this was their reference to the previous engineer, Jackie Abbott, and his disorganized, slipshod way or setting up equipment.

Ah, Jack! Yes, I remembered Jackie, or Jack, Abbott from my freshman year. He was the older gentleman with the buzzed haircut and black horn-rimmed glasses that looked like he never quite left the 1950s or 60s, the guy who seemed distant and aloof and who had little in common with the students he was surrounded by on a daily basis. Judged solely on age, Mr. Abbott surely must have been the engineer (some sort of parlor magician, perhaps?) who helped setup the original equipment when the Communication Building opened. As new items were added in later years, Abbott apparently did little to keep things neat and tidy behind the scenes. This was why it took longer for Abbott's replacement to tear out the main studio's equipment one summer – he had to sort out what wire went where...and why.

That's why Abbott was the bane of existence to Doug: simply updating a piece of equipment meant sorting through unmarked wires and trying to understand why five cords were used when one should have sufficed.

Jackie all but disappeared via retirement after my freshman or sophomore year – I don’t recall which and frankly it doesn’t really matter. I hope all his original projects have been cleaned up, though.

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Jacked ‘95
(The Parka Kings)
The Parka Kings
From the album 23 Skidoo
1995

We're all dressed up with no where to go
Where to tonite hey I don't know…
Stumbling around, can't even see
All to escape reality

Hacked, I'm jacked
Messed up and out of whack
Hacked, I'm jacked today

(Who) Left with our friends?
When will this drug -crazed madness end?
Responsibilities out the door
I just want more and more and more

There's no one home, no messages on the telephone

There were two telephone machines in the main studio of the radio station. One sat to the left of the audio board and was the main line of communication in and out of the station – requests came in, calls went out seeking a current temperature (and wind speed, if so desired...). On the right side of the audio board, pushed back behind everything else in the world, was the other phone, a dingy, dusty thing that saw little daily use.

It was, in effect, the back-up phone. Say, for example, we're on the road broadcasting university basketball games. We can't take the portable transmitter unit over great distances, so for some out of town (practically out of state) games the play-by-play team would broadcast via a phone drop. Using the second phone meant the main phone lines could be kept open for their intended use, like requesting music by groups such as the Hunger. This Houston, Texas based group’s best known song was probably Vanishing Cream, a song I always thought somehow fused reggae with metal. It got some decent spins on our station, as well as countless others, during the mid-1990s.

Anyway, that’s where the story of the secondary phone should end - the story of an underused appliance and the people who scantily used it. But it doesn't. The main phone line was connected to a small light box sitting atop of the audio board. We knew we had an incoming call when the light flashed, thus preventing any awkward ringing noises from going out over the air. The secondary phone line didn't have a light box and therefore did make noise – regardless of whether or not the microphone was open or not.

Dubbed the "magic phone," the number was shared amongst student management and faculty as a way to get the attention of the DJ on duty. I think the original concept was that if a shift was going badly, someone could call the secondary phone for prompt service. Actually hearing a phone ring would grab the DJ's attention, who would answer it and either be read the riot act or asked what just what the heck was going on in there. You knew if you got a call on that phone that it just was more than just a regular listener.

But somewhere along the way the concept blew a bit out of proportion. I don't remember what combination it was of on-air DJ and dissatisfied student director, but the student yammering away on the air was suddenly taken back by the sound of a phone ringing in the background. You could hear it plainly on the air and it was actually a bit funny, the DJ fumbling for both an excuse to its sudden sound as well as a way to pick it up without walking away from the microphone (it always sat just out of arm's reach).

Heh-heh...well, now, this was a way to test those pompous jocks who thought they were the bee's knees at the station. What better way to deflate their ego than having a phone suddenly ringing? And what would be the best way to infuriate them just a bit more? Hanging up the phone as they ended their break, of course. Unfortunately the "magic phone" trick got to be too popular and soon DJs were starting their three-hour shifts by unplugging the phone. While it was a nice way to get back at the people calling, it didn't help that the DJs were forgetting to plug the phone back in.

Oh, well.

For those expecting a call about the Hunger, don’t count on it. They’re still going at it with their most recent album being 2005’s Finding Who We Are.

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Vanishing Cream
( The Hunger)
The Hunger
From the album Devil Thumbs a Ride
1996

Who fills the sky
Who answers when I cry
I feel alone, I feel abused
I feel there's nothing I can do
It's getting late
There's no one home
No messages on the telephone
I feel so good today
It's hard to stay away
A hunter and his prey
Today will be the day
Is this real, is it you
Are you what I see
Is it him, am I good
Or just vanishing cream
Is there truth, how many lies
Am I a fool to believe
Who's in my bed
I feel misled
It's just vanishing cream

Someone who knows how to ride without even falling off

I never really put much thought into how a body reacts to a DJ shift. Granted, when I started out in radio, I wasn't too interested in that aspect so naturally I paid it no mind. But as I branched out – and finally took the plunge, as it were – I realized that it took some stamina.

In my undergraduate days, all music shifts (save the Saturday morning four-hour folk show) were three hours shifts; when I went off to graduate school, that station's shifts were just two hours. I still think three hours is the best way to go. This way the student has the chance to warm up to the craft: if the first hour is a little stale, he or she still has two hours to pull off something listenable. If the shift is two hours then by the time things start falling into place, the DJ is getting ready to leave. I remember making the comment in graduate school that two hours seemed short. I wasn't expecting, however, most of those students to counter with three hours sounding too long.

Well, to be honest with them, it could be long, but I think it mattered which music format you were stuck with. Shifts that allowed the DJ to interact – such as rock, jazz, folk, or hip-hop – tended to move faster because of shorter songs, more breaks in programming, and the feeling everything is clipping along at a quick pace. A classical shift might end up with two different but similar sounding dirge-like pieces making up the entire three hours – and if classical wasn’t your bag then you were stuck like Chuck.

There was another definition of "being stuck" that was worse, though. That was being stuck at the station because the DJ that was supposed to come in after you didn't show up. That was one of the worst feelings to have, watching the clock dip into that fourth hour. Did the guy who was supposed to relieve you just vanish off the face of the earth? Usually not, but there was a good chance you would have to at least start the next three hours of music, in hopes he or she was just running late. Often that wasn't a problem but it could be if you had to jump formats...say, from three hours of classic rock to the first of three hours of R&B.

I can speak from experience on that. My regular classic rock shift was noon to 3 pm, but I had made a deal that week to cover for the DJ who went on 3-6 pm. After six hours in the booth I was ready to go...and then 5:45 rolls by and no one’s there to replace me. Now, when this happened to other people it was always fun to hear the exasperated or exhausted voices mouth off about picking up the slack for so-and-so or that whosis was tardy. Moving to the R&B playlist, I kicked off the next hour in hopes someone would show up. Telephone calls were of little help, as no one answered the phone. With a sigh that almost sounded like a yawn, I opened the microphone at my first break and welcomed the listeners with, “Greetings and Hallucinations, everyone....” Based on that alone, the faculty advisor called and said to hold tight, he’d come pinch hit for a bit and let me get out of there.

One of the first songs I played that night was Ginuwine’s Pony (and if you know anything about the song, the next thing you don’t want to hear is “Greetings and Hallucinations”). With a weary and wandering mind, and somewhat annoyed to be put in this position, I made a mental note that cemented that song, my situation, and my disdain for the delayed DJ in my head: that DJ, whoever he was and wherever he had disappeared to, was a genuine horse’s ass.

No offense to Mr. Lumpkin, of course. His Back II Da Basics was released in 2005, followed by a greatest hits album the following year. A new album is reportedly in the works.

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Pony
(S. Garrett/Elgin Lumpkin/Tim Mosley)
Ginuwine
From the album Ginuwine... The Bachelor
1996

Im just a bachelor
Im looking for a partner
Someone who knows how to ride
Without even falling off
Gotta be compatible takes me to my limits
Girl when I break you off
I promise that you wont want to get off

If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it

If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it

Sitting here flossing
Peepin your steelo
Just once if I have the chance
The things I will do to you
You and your body
Every single portion
Send chills up and down your spine
Juices flowing down your thigh

If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it

If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it

If were gonna get nasty baby
First well show and tell
Till I reach your pony tail, oh
Lurk all over and through you baby
Until we reach the stream
Youll be on my jockey team, oh


If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting

Come and jump on it
If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it


If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it

If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it


If youre horny lets do it
Ride it my pony
My saddles waiting
Come and jump on it

Arise and Dress Yourself

Our Saturday morning folk show (see Jesse James behind the wheel) at the undergraduate station was a hybrid of music, a juxtaposition of sounds that didn't always sound the best together but we made them work the best we could. One form of music that we played was something one might consider "Celtic" music – traditional reels and jigs played on pipes, fiddles, and the eccentrically named and sounding hammered dulcimer, among other instruments.

I never knew how we ended up with a lot of this music. Did Brad, the format’s creator, have a fondness for this and seek it out, or was some of it sent blindly by an independent record company and we were so far fetched for music that we'd play anything? While I personally never disliked the music, I often wondered about the listening audience. This was about the most abnormal type of music the station played up to that point (maybe some obscure classical or jazz pieces coming in a distant second place), especially since it wasn't always sung in recognizable English.

I often wondered what would have happened had we decided to "go Celtic" one morning and throw out the program clock to predominantly play this type of music for the entire program? To the untrained ear I could surmise that it might have sounded like one four-hour song, a bouncy, airy tune that sped up and slowed down every few minutes or so. In other words, the one downfall was that a lot of this music sounded the same after a while.

The other major problem would have been properly identifying the musicians or song titles. For example, someone took the time to put together a pronunciation guide for the classical shifts to assist those announcers who had never heard of Handel and Waggoner and to correct people who thought it was pronounced “terra cotta and fudge.” While it would have been very useful, a pronunciation guide would have been much difficult to do for the folk show because, to begin with, we didn't know where to go to get a proper pronunciation of Ceoltoiri. That fledging novelty, the World Wide Web, didn't have pages of text about every obscure Celtic group or song we played.

So that left the DJs of the folk show (meaning, first, Brad and then me) to come up with something that sounded believable yet mildly foreign. Ceoltoiri came out "seal-a-tory," "soul-tor-ee," and "kel-terry." I see now it’s pronounced “kyul-tory,” and Irish Gaelic for “musicians.” (Boy, were we way off....)

The group consists of Karen Ashbrook (hammered dulcimer), Connie McKenna (vocals, guitar), and Sue Richards (Celtic harp). The song tells the story of an impatient suitor [who] begs his lover to wake up and cut her hair in preparation for their wedding. By the end of the song, overtaken by eagerness, he vetos the haircut, and the trip to the priest, too!

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Arise and Dress Yourself
(Traditional)
Ceoltoiri
From the album Silver Apples of the Moon
1992