Before we trolled the internet looking for new (or old) sounds, those of us lucky enough to live in the broadcast range of someone more enlightened or informed would crowd around the radio and listen. College stations were the obvious sources of many early punk educations, but I remember tuning into a hazy KMOD from Tulsa and adjusting the foil outside my window so I could hear their "deep cut" classic rock LPs on Sunday nights (I recorded many of them, and the thrill of snagging an early '70s DEEP PURPLE record as a 13 year old was immense). When I was 15, I started a new wave radio show on the AOR/easy listening/schlock format station in my small town, and ran with it until I left town, so hopefully someone tuned in to hear whatever gems I had unearthed during the week (though for the first couple of years it was mostly non-single cuts off of CURE and VIOLENT FEMMES with a DEAD KENNEDYS or THRILL KILL KULT track thrown in here and there). Maybe (probably?) the internet will take over completely (or maybe the radio format will just transfer to the internet, as with the still excellent and still weekly Maximum Rocknroll Radio whose show this week features pals of mine) but there's something special about the static swelling in and out of a poorly recorded cassette recorded by a kid hoping to hear something new, and last winter I definitely cruised through Grants, New Mexico at 3am listening to a certifiably ill black metal show on a Native community station. Found a place to park on a hill where I could get a clear signal and I just listened...
Anarcho punk, late '80s college rock, reggae weird snippets, and two dudes talking about tunes they like and generally being weirdos. Exactly what we want.
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