WIWT Radio: Grungy Mix

I wrote a post last week mainly about Nirvana and kind of ended up getting a few comments that could be perceived as requests. I guess I tricked you into it unbeknowst to me at the time. So there’ll be some Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains, Hole, Soundgarden, Faith No More, and S&M for you this time. I tweaked my sound a little bit so the whole mixing process would be a little faster. Let me know if there are any changes I could make to make my voice sound a little better, if you can think of any.

And please give a request if there’s something you’d like to hear. Enjoy!

WIWT Radio

WIWT Radio: Cats in the Cradle & The East Coast

Here’s another WIWT Radio show for ya. I’ll be playing a few favorites from my ECMA experience and reading a few comments.

This weeks line up includes Harry Chapin, Rose Cousins, Clinton Charlton, Kim Wempe, Carmen Townsend and The Trews. I hope you enjoy it!

What do you think of the radio show? Is there anything I could improve on? Any requests for next week?
Here it is… http://soundcloud.com/plholden/wiwt-proj-apr-21-wave

Back From “Radioland”…

Most rock journalism is people who can’t write, interviewing people who can’t talk, for people who can’t read.
Frank Zappa

It’s been a somewhat busy week. I had a great time visiting the ECMA events, did a few interviews, heard a few live acts, and met some great people. On Wednesday I was on the air as one of the disc jockeys from 8pm until 6am. We interviewed Amanda Rae Gallant, Crazy Ann, Moe & Martin, Clinton Charlton, Color Code, and Sean Dalton. If any of the interviewees ever read this, thanks from the bottom of my heart. Amanda Rae and Clinton also did some wonderful performances. I am super-grateful for everyone who helped make my radio experience so much fun, especially Joseph, Mac, another Mac, and Bob. If I sounded good, they sounded tremendous!

Yesterday I went to the ECMA “Tweet-up” for a little while, it was sort of a meet and greet for people on Twitter and some people involved with the awards. I also got to hear a few songs from a band called The North Lakes. And a few hours ago I stopped by to talk to my friend Paul who was also volunteering at the Delta Hotel for the awards and heard a few songs by Carmen Townsend, who’s voice was wonderfully “wonderlandish”.

The Anatomy of an Interview

I may get back in town to check out some more music, but if I don’t, I’ve had enough fun for a while, I really want to get my writing back on track now that my little stint on the radio over with. I think it was a valuable experience for me as far as meeting people and learning to conduct interviews. The ability to establish an instant rapport with people isn’t really as hard as I thought it would be, I’ve done it many times before, I think it’s just a matter of keeping in mind that the other person is the guest and what they have to say trumps any questions that I’m curious about, while at the same time remembering to have those questions ready to avoid any awkward pauses. In the end an interview should probably sound as unscripted as possible and besides the interviews I was doing I got to hear radio veteran Bob Stanley pull off a really good one with Clinton Charlton just a little after midnight.

I remember seeing the coming of age film called “Almost Famous” about a teen who chases his dream of being featured in “Rolling Stone” magazine back in 2000 and thought to myself if I had the choice between being interviewed, doing the interview, and reading the interview, I would probably be content to just read it. The assumption that you would have to bend over backwards and follow around a bunch of ego-centric, under the influence rockers who could be replaced on the billboard charts in a heartbeat seems about as much fun as waiting for a lab-raised orangutang to recite his first Dr. Suess rhyme in sign language.

Of course, it’s not like that at all, at least for the artist’s I’ve met. Musicians are real people, too. They have a gift that they want to share with the world and the musicians with a real passion are the ones with the most real talent in most cases. I am so thankful that I was able to brush aside any fears about getting the “perfect” interview and just be myself with these people because I think their motive for being interviewed in the first place was to show that they are just as down to earth as the people buying their records and attending their shows.

Is that the end of my radio career? It may only be the beginning…  Here’s a video by Led Zeppelin called “That’s the Way“.

Have you ever met any musicians or actors that turned out to be really cool?

WIWT Radio: Dress Rehearsal

OK, here’s another edition of Wish I Were There Radio. The day is finally here! I’ll actually be on the airwaves on http://www.ecma.com/ at 8:00pm (7:00pm EST) until 6:00am (5:00amEST) with streaming audio, please feel free to check some of it out if you have time. It’ll be 10 hours of spinning tracks, introducing live music, and doing interviews (and maybe a couple of music jokes). I spent most of my free time in the last week researching Eastern Canadian artists and I’ll be playing a few of their songs today on WIWT.

This show’s going to include tracks by Jenn Grant, Matt Mays, Meaghan Smith, The Trews, and a hilarious Gypsophilia song (I don’t recommend listening to it if you have to pee, because there’s just something about it that’s sooooo funny you’ll probably wet yourself). I’m also reading some of my favorite comments from last week. If the embed doesn’t work click on the link http://soundcloud.com/plholden/wiwt-radio-apr13-wave

I hope you enjoy and thanks for listening.

Any suggestions about how to make a more interesting radio show?