Having grown up as the child of a teacher and a coach, it was not uncommon to see young adults come up to my Dad and thank him. They'd let him know that his guidance in math or sports really made a difference in their lives. It was something Dad is always quietly, clearly proud of.
While my job isn't as profound or important as a teacher, every now and then I get a taste of what my Dad experiences with each bit of gratitude shown to him.
I got this email on Wednesday:
Hi P.J.,
I found your blog a few months ago
by searching for the key words Whats The Alternative, WABN, 92.7, and
Abingdon. My friends and I grew up in Saltville, VA about 20 minutes
north of Abingdon. We loved WTA and listened to it regularly. To this
day I still listen to many of the bands that I heard for the first time
on WABN. The reception in Saltville was pretty bad so me and my skate
rat/punk rock friends connected tin foil and unraveled coat hangers to
our stereos and hung them from our walls and ceilings in an effort to
improve our listening experience and to record better quality tapes. We
had several volumes of tapes that we recorded from Whats The Alternative and traded them with one another. I was very excited to see
your blog and read some stories about WABN. I had always wondered what
happened with the station. I moved away in 2000 and eventually came
back and settled in the Tri-cities. To this day the area still lacks a
station that's like WABN. WABN was a huge part of my early teenage
years as it was always on in our rooms and on our car stereos. Again, I
enjoy the blog and I hope all is well for you. Attached are two photos
of a tape I recorded from the show. The tape will not play anymore due
to warping from sun exposure. It is dated 7/28/1995.
Take care,
Jesse Whitt
Mt. Carmel, TN
If you look closely, "Stutter" is one of the tracks on this casette. And if you search on the blog, you'll find that almost every other track listed on the cassette, has appeared as a fond memory/Weekend Post.
In high school we took a class trip to Washington DC as part of a program called “Close Up.” It was there I discovered the terrible truth about myself.
I had an accent. A New England accent. A strong New England accent.
One of the very smart, interesting things about the “Close Up” program, beyond showing you the sites of Washington, DC, was that they made pairs of kids share rooms with other pairs of kids who were from a decidedly different place. The week we were there, we New Englanders were paired up with kids from California and Colorado.
Our accent became a point of discussion for the kids from elsewhere. It was funny sounding. Stupid sounding even.
I watched in our group discussions, as classmates who were making bright and salient points, could be dismissed for the “dumb” way they sounded, due to their accent.
I realized then and there that if I wanted a life beyond New England, if I wanted to be taken seriously, I had to tone down my thick, thick accent.
And in the ensuing years, I became hyper-conscious of the way I pronounced everything. By the time I had graduated college, my local accent was mostly gone.
Little things did persist. I could never get the hang of “drawer” so it didn’t sound like “draw.” And “figures” remained “figgers” for a long time time.
But most vexing became the words that inadvertantly just made it sound like I had an accent.
A college friend pointed out that she would call it a “door handle,” because saying “knob” just sounded like a New Englander mispronouncing the word “Norb.”
Years later, I became a DJ, and much like being on TV adds 10 pounds, being on the radio has a way of amplifying your accent.
For instance, on my first day on the air, the station owner at WABN pulled me aside to help me straighten out the way I said the call letters.
“What is the first letter of our call letters?” she asked.
“W?” I answered, unsure if this were a trick question.
“Say it again.”
“Dubya,” is how I was pronouncing it.
She wrote the letter in cursive on the piece of paper.
“The letter is actually two ‘U’s put together. It is a double-U. Say it like that.”
To this day, it’s like fingernails on a chalkboard when I hear a professional broadcaster pronounce the letter “dubya.” Or just really fumble any pronunciation.
And in my years in Virginia, I really had to guard against picking up that accent, as it was all around me every day.
It was easy to let words like "fire" rhyme with "car," and "pen" sound like "pin," unless you were vigilant, careful and conscious.
It's a practice I have to continue today.
Which is why I have so much trouble when I talk on the air about JD McPherson.
Initially, I just assumed you pronounced his last name “mick-FEAR-son.” That’s a pretty common pronouncation.
But then I watched a Youtube video where he introduced himself.
He pronounces it “mick-FUR-son.”
So now when I say it on the air, I try to pronounce it, respecting his way.
But me saying “mick-FUR-son” for some reason sounds, to my ears, like it’s just me mispronouncing the guys name with a Virginia accent.
Listen to me on the air sometime. You’ll actually hear me stumble, as the professional in me who's trying to say it right, is brawling with the kid in me, trying not to sound stupid.
There was this girl that I had a huge crush on . . .
Okay, let me stop right there and point out that there are manymanyentries of this blog that start with some form of that last sentence. But I don't think I've ever written about this girl before. It's true, I had a lot of crushes on a lot of girls in my day, but never did I pull of a coup such as this.
It all started 7 years prior, somewhere circa 1993. I had met this girl at a business meeting and was completely lovestruck in the first 30 seconds when she said, apropos of nothing, "Would you like to hear my imitation of a moose?!" I was utterly charmed.
I asked her out and, I dunno, something happened. A miscommunication or something. And it seemed like she blew me off. I was crushed. Not long after, I heard she moved West.
Seven years later, I was walking out of the grocery store and did a double-take. There she was, walking into the store.
I quickly shoved my groceries in the car and went back in, to find that item I, um, forgot. Yeah. I forgot toilet paper. So even if I tried to talk to her and she blew me off again, at least we'd have extra toilet paper at 7 Maples.
But she didn't blow me off. She remembered me. We chatted. I played it cool. I asked her what she was doing for work. Told her that now that she was back in town, I'd see her around.
And then I stalked her.
Okay, not really stalked her. I mean, it just so happened that my favorite coffee shop was right across the street from the office where she was working. So I'd go there every day, and sit at a table and read a book and hope she'd come for a coffee break. Or that she'd leave the office at the same moment I was leaving the coffee shop, so I could wave to her.
It did happen from time to time.
She was very friendly and warm, and she prolonged the conversations. She seemed interested. Right up to the point where I'd say, "So and so is having a party this weekend . . ." and she'd say that she had something going on.
One night on the town, I figured out where the resistance was coming from. I saw her in a local bar with a nicely dressed, good looking dude.
Okay, so she's seeing somebody. But I think she's still interested in me. Because in all our conversations, she never mentions this guy. I think I have a shot.
I needed to do two things.
I needed a way to get her to hang out with me, without it seeming like she was on a date. Because if she was seeing someone, she wouldn't go out on a date. But if it were just a night out---not a date---then she could say Yes.
Secondly, I had to pitch an irresistible line. And I found that line:
Well, I didn't say "Hello I'm Johnny Cash" to her. What I said was, "I have an extra Johnny Cash ticket, would you like to go?"
Now understand, this wasn't just a ticket to see Johnny Cash. This was an opportunity to see him at The Carter Family Fold.
I'm sure you know the Johnny Cash story. He married June Carter, who was a member of the famous Carter Family, known as some of the originators of what we call country music. The Carter Family had a farm not far from where I lived in Virginia. And on Saturday nights, they opened up their barn for concerts, usually featuring bluegrass and Old Time bands. But June had a new album out, and she was putting on a concert, and Johnny, as well as their son John, were on the bill. My friends and I scored 10 tickets.
Come with me and my friends to see what would perhaps be the last chance to ever see Johnny Cash (and yes, it turned out to be one of his last ever live performances)?
She couldn't say no.
And no unmentioned boyfriend in the world could veto an invitation like that.
We met up on the day of the show, and, as preplanned, my friends got into two four-seater cars, in two groups. No room for anyone else in either of those cars. That left two people behind. Me and my non-date.
"We can take my car, I guess," I said, nonchalantly.
And that was my whole plan. To be nonchalantly awesome.
I had music by her favorite artist on the tape deck in my car. I had racked up and road-tested a dozen stories to tell, just in case the conversation slowed. I made her come up to the concession stand with me, and I bought her a 50 cent ice cream sandwich, which came off as wholesome and charming---all part of the plan.
The Carter Family Fold is literally a barn-like structure, built into a hill. If you get there late, you can sit on the hillside and look into the open side of the barn. But if you get there early, you can sit inside, because it's first-come, first serve. And these are not Skybox seats we're talking about. These were wooden benches, made "softer" because they had rug samples stapled to them.
We wanted to get there very, very early. Mostly because we wanted to be close-up to Johnny Cash. But yeah, it didn't hurt that this extended my non-date.
I was deftly managing to walk the thin line between date and non-date, quite well. Being fairly awkward as a rule, telling myself this wasn't a date took a lot of the pressure off. I was only off my balance once, when one of my friends made the crack to her about "PJ doesn't bring all his dates to a show like this." I shot laser eyes at him to indicate: "THIS IS NOT A DATE."
Hours were passing and my material was running low, but The Plan was working. I felt like I was winning her over. And then . . .
"Hello, I'm Johnny Cash."
He was old and he was grey and he was hoarse. But he was Johnny Mother-F-N Cash and he was standing right in front of us singing "Big River." He was playing straight man to the ever hilarious June. And when he ceded the stage to let her sing, he would sit on the bench in the back, and somehow, miraculously, cease to be "Johnny Cash." Somehow, miraculously, he could turn that charisma off and become human again. Only to fire it back up when it was his turn to absolutely slay the crowd by singing "Far Side Banks Of Jordan" with June.
When it was over and we exited The Fold, we, along with the crowd, shared in the buzz of knowing that we'd just seen something pretty special, we'd witnessed a moment in time that we'd carry with us for the rest of our musical lives.
I was at peace, knowing that despite the many, many disappointments and failures I had had in my dating days, I couldn't have made this night any better.
We reached home, and I distinctly remember the sound of my car door shutting, as I walked her to her car. And when I heard that sound, I knew it was over.
"Well, thanks," she said.
"That was amazing, huh?"
"Yeah. It was. Thanks again."
"We'll do it again sometime," I said, pitching it somewhere halfway between a question and a suggestion.
"Uh, yeah, yeah. Of course." The hesitancy had returned.
"I'll see you down the coffee shop."
But the magic of seeing Johnny Cash, live and in person, was never coming back, and neither was this moment with her. She had a boyfriend, and the temporary effects of a Johnny Cash show weren't going to override that.
Sometimes, even when you walk the line perfectly, she's still going to end up on the far side banks from where you are. No matter how awesomely nonchalant you walk it.
What you don't get from one blog post, was the drawn out uncertainty of it all.
I was at WABN for 6 years. And every three months (if not more often) for six long years, we'd have another court date.
"This could be it," we'd be told by our lawyers. There was every possibility that the judge would take immediate and harsh action, either shutting down the station or removing us completely.
The family that owned the station would go to these hearings. Dress up. Look respectable and responsible. Do their best to convey the sincerity of their desire to just run the radio station and live in peace.
It was my job to hold down the fort.
The four family members would go to court, and I would go to the station and wait.
I might do my shift. Or I might let the automation system we had, spin its wheels.
Minutes ticked by slowly. Hours progressed at a glacial pace.
Every time the phone would ring, I'd lunge for it, hoping it was the gang calling from their way home from court with some kind of good news.
Lunch would pass. The many cups of coffee would sink in. Tension would mount.
Eventually, I would get a call. A brief overview of what had happened. And a promise of lunch to be brought to me soon.
Relief, tempered by the notion that the court session ended with the promise of a reconvening within a just a few weeks. And that we'd do this day all over again.
The night before each court date, I'd play "Bad Luck." It was my idea that if I played "Bad Luck" today, it would mean good luck tomorrow.
Mostly, it worked.
I was thinking of this song earlier in the week, because I'm playing the waiting game right now.
We still don't know when our last day on 92.7 will be. The signal is all but sold, just some paperwork has to be signed. And then we'll be off.
Unlike the WABN situation, there is a future for WMVY. We'll continue on the web. I'll continue to work. Stress about what is going to happen doesn't play a role here (just the "when").
WABN was going off the air. It was our last day. Goodbye. Gone. Kaput.
I'd been on the air for 6 years, from 1994 to 2000. Sometimes for 10 hours a day. I worked and lived with a close knit group of friends who'd become family. We'd fought for the station. But the fight was over and it was time to say goodbye.
I helped orchestrate the final run-up, giving every DJ and friend of the station one last chance to step up to the mic, say something that mattered, and play one last song.
I rehearsed, in my head, what I wanted to say, and how I wanted to leave the airwaves.
Six years earlier, I'd quit my job in television in a power struggle with the boss. He demanded that I leave my part-time job at WABN. I told him he couldn't tell me how to conduct my private life. My check-mate move, was to quit.
"Bold move," said Rita later that afternoon. "Now what?"
Rita and her husband Craig owned WABN, an AM/FM combo in Abingdon, Virginia. They literally did everything related to the station---sales, billing, maintenance, Craig went on-air, called local sports games. This was true DIY independent radio.
Part of the reason they were so fiercely independent, had to do with the mess they'd just come out of.
They had purchased the station several years prior, with a partner (a relative). After only a few years in, the partner tried to sell the station without their input or consultation. He had controlling interest. He fired Craig and Rita, and expected them to quietly hand over their stock. Craig and Rita were doing no such thing. What's more, the partner incorrectly thought he could sell the station without their consent. He was wrong.
A protracted legal battle began, for control of the station. Craig and Rita were barred from even entering the building. Two years passed. The station suffered from inattention, the partner tired of the fight, and finally, he turned control of the station over to Craig and Rita.
And that's when their troubles really began.
The damage had been done to the station's billing. They were deep in the red. The creditors were lining up.
When Rita said to me, "Bold move," she knew what might be on the horizon.
Shortly after I went to work full time at WABN, the station filed for bankruptcy.
Let me tell you this---I learned more than I ever care to know about bankruptcy court in the years that followed.
Craig and Rita scraped and fought to bring in enough billing to keep the station alive, while working tirelessly to come up with a plan they could present to the bankruptcy court for a way to emerge and go forward.
The partner, meanwhile, because he was a creditor, re-entered the picture to resume his efforts to sell the station to another party.
. . . Let me stop right here and say that the story of the 6 years of bankruptcy court is a long and complicated journey, that I hope Craig and Rita publish some day. Suffice it to say, that despite community support, a fight at the FCC level, arguments before the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals and a truckload of craft, smarts and passion, we lost this fight. The station, which had been an award winning community radio outpost, would land in the hands of a large radio group who would use the FM signal to rebroadcast their syndicated Talk Radio station. They would simply turn the AM off.
I could have walked out the door of WABN the day Craig and Rita told me they were filing for bankruptcy. But I didn't.
I believed in them, and I believed in their mission. I believed in a radio station that let teenagers call in and have their voice heard. I believed in a station that let the DJs pick the music. I believed in a station that talked to you, not at you. And I believed in Craig and Rita themselves---that their fight was right and that it was worth fighting.
We were winding through the final day at WABN. Friends of the station had a chance to pop on air and pick a last song. The part-timers were on now, with their last words. Craig and Rita's adult children (who made up the rest of the full time staff) would have their say, followed by Craig and Rita themselves. Then the transmitter would be shut off. Right before the family spoke, I would have my turn.
I had written out my speech. I wanted it to be good. I didn't want to cry.
I talked about how I had come to be at WABN. About what I had learned by living in the presence of people with dedication, passion and conviction.
I said that I learned the importance of fighting for something you believe it. The point is not to ask whether you can win, it's to stick with it if you are right.
And I ended my 6 years of independent radio the way it started. I played "Disarm."
That was 12 years ago, and it's still painful to write about. In fact, when I started this blog I knew that the "Disarm" stories were on the top of the list of posts I needed to write. I've been putting them off for 3 years.
Twelve years later, WABN FM still rebroadcasts Talk Radio. WABN AM is still silent. And the building where Craig and Rita and their kids and I worked for all those years, remains empty and unused, the fields around the brick building are overgrown, the whole thing abandoned.
Nothing has come to Abingdon to replace WABN (the Talk Radio station is located 20 miles away). No station does high school sports. No station has a request radio program. No station shows up at the American Cancer Society's Relay For Life or any of the other dozens of charitable events that WABN supported.
I don't live in Abingdon anymore, but I am certain that the community is less, for not having WABN.
But because of it, because of them, I am much more. And I am thankful for that . . .
Words on the page can't really express the emotional complexities and layers of meaning that were infused into the reading of this line when it was spoken to me. On the page, you can't hear the melody and counter-melody running through it.
Some background . . .
I had moved to Virginia at the end of summer, 1993, to take a job at an NBC affiliate in their creative services (that is, commercial making) department.
This was a blind move---I did it for the job. I didn't know a soul. So I was working hard to insert myself into whatever social scene was available.
I'd grown up in Massachusetts, had spent four years at a very liberal University (UMass) and had lived in Florida---not as liberal, but not as reserved either---for the previous two years.
Now I was living in The South, which was a new cultural landscape for me. It wasn't the head-snapping, cultural 180 that I think some people who've never spent time in The South expect it to be. But there were things that were different. Social mores that I was ignorant to.
I'd gone to The Lemonheads show in Atlanta with a couple of girls my age. We crashed overnight at a friend's place in the city.
This is something I wouldn't think twice about. In my collegiate world, there was no difference between hanging out with guy friends and hanging out with girl friends. No one in my college orbit would have thought so.
But for some of my in-The-South co-workers an overnight trip with female co-workers? That was risque. Perhaps scandalous. At least something to raise an eyebrow at.
Especially for the girls' father.
Who happened to also be my co-worker.
Yes, her Dad was my daily partner. A talented cameraman, photographer and all around creative mind, he brought to life whatever creative vision I had for, you know, the local car dealer or beauty school.
He was a very cool guy. Smart, multi-talented, creative and down to earth. A big and gruff self-described "redneck" on the outside, but a sensitive artist lurked below.
But he was also a Dad. A dad who lived in a world where you protected your daughter from things like (gasp!) single guys.
Just to be clear, the daughter was a friend, not a romantic interest. But in this world I was living in, for many, men and women (boys and girls), did not mix without the specter of sexuality hanging heavy over the proceedings.
I was not really aware of this when I went away for the overnight to the concert. But on the first morning back to work, someone pointed out to me that the Dad was a little weirded-out that his daughter was out overnight with this new-young-dude-in-town.
And now we were about to be in the van together for a long haul.
We had a commercial shoot that morning, which meant we'd be riding a long stretch in the production truck, just the two of us together.
We rode in silence for the first few miles, but I think we both felt the awkward tension that someone was going to have to alleviate. He addressed it head on.
"How was Hot 'Lanta?"
Here is what was infused within those four words.
"I'm trying to be cool about this, but I'm not really sure what your intention is with my daughter, because I think you are a nice guy and I like you but if you so much as touch her I am ready to kick your little Yankee ass up and down State Street because who goes off on an overnight with a young girl to a big wild city like Atlanta without sexual intentions, so just tell me I've got nothing to worry about and let fucking drop this subject so I don't have to think about it anymore."
I was nervous, I rambled, but I tossed out a quick run-down of what a fun, wholesome time we had and about how the friend we stayed with had comfortable sleeping accommodations with separate rooms for boys and girls, and that the band was good (he asked if they were "New Wave"?) and the city looked fun but that after the show we didn't party it up because it had been a long drive so we just retired early after the show. Oh, and there was no drinking.
That seemed to suffice.
His four words were all he cared to say or think about the subject. And we never talked about it again.
Don't let it escape your attention this song, that invokes the memory of today's post, this song you are about to hear while you imagine Dad and I are driving off through the southwest Virginia countryside not talking, is an instrumental.
There are songs that influenced my life, and there are songs that are a part of great memories, and there are songs that evoke emotions, but very, very few songs can be credited with changing the course of my life.
"What is this station?" I asked, surprised to hear a band like this on local radio.
"It's WABN."
"Man, if I ever worked in radio, it would be for a station like this."
Two years prior, in 1991, my college girlfriend and I graduated, and we ran off to Florida to start our lives. I pursued a career in TV production, making low-budget TV commercials. That turned out to be a flame-out for me. The girl and I broke up. I was unhappy. Lonely. Hated Florida. I was this close to moving back home with my family---I had a job lined up and everything---when I received a offer to join the creative services department of an NBC affiliate in Bristol Virginia. I took it.
Where is Bristol Virginia? I had no idea.
Bristol is in the most Western part of the state of Virginia. NASCAR is big. It is the birthplace of country music. It is far, far, far from any major city. Growing up in New England, having Boston within our reach, I was used to certain kinds of cultural access that did not exist in this part of the world
No Professional sports teams. No Dunkin' Donuts. And no modern rock radio.
I was riding with Brian, one of the NBC-TV station's salespeople. We'd just gone to meet with a client, and were cruising back to the office.
He was flipping through the dial when Smashing Pumpkins "Disarm" came on.
"What is this station?" I asked, surprised to hear a band like this on local radio. I'd been in Bristol for several months, and had only found Country, Classic Rock and Gospel on the airwaves.
"It's WABN."
"Man, if I ever worked in radio, it would be for a station like this."
"Huh. You know, they are one of my clients. And I know they need some part-time help."
In a few short days, I was in the office of WABN, a family-owned, independent AM/FM combo. They were looking for someone to host their 2 hour Request Radio program, 4 nights a week. I asked them if they had any interest in having me create a modern rock radio show---as this burgeoning genre (it was 1994) seemed to be gaining traction with young folks ever since Nirvana arrived. They were open to the idea, if I was willing to take on Request Radio.
I had never done radio before, but they were warm and welcoming and encouraging. I said Yes.
I'll write another post about the beginnings of my on-air career, but let's cut to a few days later.
At the TV station, my manager had poked his head in my office to ask me something, and before he left I said, "Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I picked up a part-time job for a few hours a week."
"Okay," he smiled. "I'll let the boss know."
The GM of the TV station was notoriously unpopular with the staff, but I hadn't had any run-ins with him in the 6 months I was on the job.
Until the next day.
He was passing me in the hall when he said brightly, "Hey, I heard you picked up a part-time job! What'cha doing?"
"Oh, I'm going to do airshifts a couple nights a week on WABN."
"Oh . . ." His mood turned instantly dark, and he walked away.
Later that day, my manager called me in to his office, to tell me that the GM did not approve of my new job and that I would have to quit.
"He thought you'd be doing some weekend work. He doesn't want you working on weeknights. He feels that you'd be wearing yourself out, and would be tired when you came to work here."
I calmly but quickly rattled off a bunch of reasons why this was ridiculous. Most notably, that adding 8 hours to my work week would still mean I was working fewer hours than the GM normally did---and I was half his age. But I was also accommodating. I said that I would we willing to do a 3 month trial---if my television work faltered due to my part-time job, I would quit.
The manager took this to the GM. The answer came back with another, No.
I asked for a meeting with the GM. I was told to come to his office at 3pm.
I walked into his office, promptly at 3. He acted surprised to see me, and said he didn't know I was coming. He asked me to wait outside his office. He kept me waiting for a while. I was young, but smart enough to know this was a bullshit power move.
We had a brief but friendly conversation where I reiterated my arguments, and my offer of a review. I told him it wasn't really his business what I did with my off-work time, as long as it did my work, and that I had respected the company enough to tell them about the job---something that deserved respect in return. He was resistant, but finally, he said he'd think about it.
I knew how this was going to go.
The next day I waited in my office. My manager came in. Not the GM. He said the GM had decided, I couldn't work both jobs and I would have to quit.
And that's what I did.
"Here's my key."
I had already cleaned out my desk and had my office key off its chain. If they were making me choose, I was not going to be bullied into that choice.
Was I nuts to quit a full-time, stepping stone job, with a national company, so I could make minimum wage for 8 hours a week?
Yes.
But I felt like I was in a power struggle where the struggle wasn't over the thing (meaning, could I have the job or not), but over who got to decided. The GM felt like he was in the ultimate power position, because he controlled my salary and my livelihood, and considered that his "checkmate." What he didn't count on, was that the ultimate checkmate move is to walk away from the game.
At 25 I was wise enough to know that there are only a few times in your life where you are offered the opportunity to make such a statement, to make such a stand. Today, at 43, there is absolutely no way I could do the same thing, because of the responsibility I have to my family, my mortgage, my creditors, etc.
That moment formed much of who I became. That choice to make a stand. To do the stupid thing, because I thought it was the right thing.
And it set the stage for the next 6 years.
All because I heard a song on the radio.
To be continued . . ."Disarm" Part 2 and what happened next, coming soon.
I had the strangest sensation as I drove by my old girlfriend's house.
My friend Tip had let me know that he would be visiting the East Coast with his kids and new wife, so I made plans to trek up to Rockport earlier this week for a visit with his family and my two small kids.
Tip had sent me directions, but I didn't give them too much thought until I pulled crossed the bridge into Gloucester, which I'd have to pass through on the way to Rockport. I'd crossed that bridge many times in my early 20s, going to visit the girl from Gloucester that I dated through the end of college and into the first couple years of real life.
Mom always said, "Everybody gets one heartbreak," and this girl was it for me. We had a deep relationship, and when it ended (and, to put the blame squarely in the right place, the end of things was largely my doing and fault), I was rudderless for a pretty long time. Years, even.
It took me years just suss out where I had gone wrong, and more years to figure out how I was going to be a better person. Years before the thought of her wasn't painful. And years before every little damn thing---book, tv show, song, catchphrase, landmark, coffee cup, article of clothing, et cetera ad finitum---didn't remind me of her.
In my rudderless period, in the years I was living in Virginia, I had a roommate, who had the gone through the same kind of experience. And for him, there was a house that he'd go by where all the good times had happened. He'd drive by there and know that someone else lived there now and life had moved on.
When "Missing" came out, it struck a chord with him, and he'd play it when we was down.
I step off the train
I'm walkin' down your street again
And pass your door
But you don't live there anymore
It's years since you've been there
And now you've disappeared somewhere
Like outer space
You've found some better place
And because he played it often, whenever I heard it (mvy used to play it) I'd think of him and then think of me in my rudderless years.
So there I was, following Tip's directions to the beach house he had rented, realizing that I knew these streets, thinking that certainly the map would tell me to turn left at some point where I used to turn right.
But it didn't. And soon I could see the hill that her house was on, off in the distance, coming closer.
This wouldn't be the first time I had gone by her house since our break-up. At some point in the rudderless period, when I was home from Virginia visiting my folks, I was restless, unable to sleep. I took the car and drove from my folks place in Newburyport, along the long and winding Route 1A until I reached the house where her parents lived, where I'd gone to visit her when we were on college break. I knew she didn't live there, so I don't know what I was looking for, but I felt so sad inside.
She lived within walking distance of the beach, so I parked my car and stood on the sand. It was late, but there was a woman off in the moonlit distance. I knew there was no way it could possibly be my old girlfriend, but my mind kept telling me that, yeah, maybe it could be. Then another voice from inside said, what if it is? That thought terrified me. I got back in my car and drove to Newburyport, far worse off, mentally, than when I'd just been restless in bed.
I wasn't thinking about this as I turned off my route to meet Tip, to get a look at the house.
I looked into the back seat and smiled at my kids. "Daddy used to have a friend that lived in this neighborhood."
The house, on the whole, looked the same as it ever did, with a well-kept yard and a pretty set of bushes and a sloping driveway that tucked behind the house.
On the porch was a gigantic Red Sox banner. And I knew right away that her parents must not live there anymore---that really wasn't their style.
I kept driving past, and got back on the route to see Tip.
I had the strangest sensation, as I drove away.
Nothing.
I didn't feel sadness. Or pain. Or regret. Or hurt.
I had some warm memories of fun times we had, but it felt so far in the fuzzy past, that I couldn't help but notice that the feeling I was feeling, was missing.
"What the hell happened to you?!" the kid behind the counter at Subway had apparently asked, with just a little bit of trepidation.
Looking at my roommate, it's not hard to understand why the kid would have thought a crazy, perhaps dangerous man had just been in the sandwich shop.
It had been a loooonng day, and it started early.
This was when I was living in Southwest Virginia, in the a big farmhouse called 7 Maples. Living out the post-college dream of being on the radio, drinking beer, staying up late, being with friends, watching a lot of sports and listening to a lot of music.
My roommate was both a huge Bob Mould fan, and (because he was an alumnus) a Virginia Tech football fan. And on a hot, hot fall Saturday, there was both a game, and a Sugar show to go to.
So we were up early, with his Dad. I didn't have tickets to the game, but I took the road trip two hours up I-81, to sit in a bar within earshot of the stadium to watch the game on TV, while they went to the game.
I knew it was going to be a long, long journey into the night so I sipped my beer slowly, as the frat kids around me got sloppier and sloppier.
The sight of my roommate after the game, made me laugh.
"You sat on the sunny side of the stadium, huh?"
Lane Stadium could be a cold, unforgiving place in November and December. But on this day, half the crowd was on a concrete cookie sheet baking in the sun.
And my roommate was quick to turn lobster red in those conditions.
We split with his Dad, who returned to Abingdon, and we traveled on to Chapel Hill for Sugar, who were touring behind "File Under Easy Listening."
The Cat's Cradle that night was like a convection oven---mostly airless, but except of gusts of hotter heat that swirled around the raucous activity of the crowd.
Sugar was just a singular kind of band. They had this focused, precise, tight type of anger---a really amazing mix of ferocity and control. And the audience acted accordingly, moving and swaying and sweating en mass, both exhausted and still frenzied.
With our ears still ringing, we started our long drive home.
We were both broke, having spent what we had on gas and beer, but we scraped together a couple of bucks as we pulled into a local Subway. My roommate offered to go in himself, while I kept the car running.
I wish I could have seen the look on the kid's face when this large, tired-looking, wrung-out red man, fully drenched in sweat, walked into Subway and said, "Can I have two Gatorades and a small bag of pretzels?"
But my roommate came out laughing, having been previously unaware at just how horrible and weird he must look to the rest of the normal world, a world that hadn't spent the day watching football, drinking beer, driving a few hundred miles, jumping around at a rock show and steeling himself for another few hundred miles of highway home.
The first radio station I worked at was a very small, independent, family owned-and-operated outfit. We did a lot with a little.
But in my early days with them, we didn't have the resources to be a 24 hour station. And since I worked the last shift, it was my job to sign off the air, shut off the transmitters and close down the building for the night.
On weeknights, I had an alternative music specialty show, that ran from 10 to 12, but on Fridays and Saturdays, I got to expand it to a full 6 hours---on at 8pm and off at 2am.
It was a joyful and exhilarating task, to build that much live programming, on the fly, playing CDs and keeping the night moving. By 2am, I was usually a little punch drunk.
I had a ritual to close out the night.
There was a checklist of things I was supposed to do throughout the building before walking out the door. Shutting down certain computers, turning of certain lights, checking certain locks, and finally, turning off the transmitter.
And I did it to the strains of Tony Bennett.
Tony Bennett isn't particularly alternative, but this was the little window in the mid-90s, when he had gone through an image rehab. He'd appeared with The Red Hot Chili Peppers and performed with kd lang and recorded an MTV Unplugged CD.
And let's face it, there just weren't that many people listening to an alternative specialty show on a 3,000 watt rural Virginia radio station at 2 in the morning. So why not do something weird.
"Fly Me To The Moon" the MTV Unplugged version, was about 2:30 minutes long, and when I hit play on the track, I had just enough time to walk out of the studio and weave in and out of the other rooms in the building, flipping switches and securing locks, all while singing along with Tony, at the top of my lungs.
My loop around the building would get me back to my chair just as the song was ending and the roar of the audience surged.
The album left nearly 30 seconds of clapping, where I had time to say something along the lines of:
"That's What's The Alternative? for tonight, I'll be back on Monday at 10pm for more. We'll be back on the air tomorrow morning at 6am. For now . . . you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here. WABN concludes another broadcast day."
And I'd fade out the track, walk to the transmitter and shut it down, and then head out the front door and into the night, my throat a little scratchy from the Bennett-belting and my mind a little fuzzy from the fun.
I grew up in a family where Religion played a sincere and apparent role.
Meaning, we were good Catholics. We never missed Church. Religious discussions might come up at the dinner table. My father had been in the seminary and his sister was (and still is) a nun.
But when I moved into the South, it was evident that Religion played a much larger role in people's day-to-day lives.
Not so much in the morality or piety---I don't think people in the South had greater or better convictions than the people I grew up around. But that Religion was much more a part of the social structure.
Growing up, my friends were usually kids I went to school with. And my parents' friends were people they worked with, or were folks from the neighborhood.
But for many of the people in the town where I lived (Abingdon, Virginia), the people that they were more likely to socialize with, were the people from their Church.
Churches weren't just for Sundays. Churches organized picnics and trips and hikes and had classes/services on Wednesdays. A person's relationship with their Church wasn't just about Religious beliefs, it was about interacting with the world at-large---so much of what they might experience in a day could be filtered through Religious eyes.
I co-hosted a nightly call-in request program. It was mainly frequented by Middle and High School kids who wanted to send out dedications to their friends and such.
It was interesting to chart the reaction of the listenership to Joan Osborne's "One Of Us," which became an unlikely hit in 1995.
Some folks were horrified that we would play a song that suggested that God could be a "bum like one of us." That was practically sacrilege.
And others didn't really seem to hear what the song was about. They only caught the lyrics "God Is Great," and jumped to the conclusion that this was a Contemporary Christian song, singing the praises of the Lord.
It made me wonder if sometime being too close to something, prevented you from seeing it. If you focus on it being about God, are you missing that it's really a message about everyone?
Oddly enough, when I hear "See A Little Light" it takes me back to being in the dark. Literally.
Ah, to be young and single. There are so many aspects to the story that follows, that are so far removed from the life I have now . . .
Let's see, where to start.
I'm on a lawn chair, on the deck of a house that is not mine. It is after midnight. I am with a girl I like. It is completely dark.
Honestly, this scenario was not a one time thing. I often brought a girl to this very location.
I'm in my late 20s, living in southwest Virginia.
I live in a 100 year old rented farm house, known as 7 Maples, with two of my friends. The house is huge, the rent is cheap. We are all single and generally unencumbered (we own little and owe little). Beer and cigarettes and coffee and friends and dates come and go, frequently and at all hours.
I'm a DJ, working the evenings, which means I don't get home until after midnight, every night. So much of my social interaction occurs when most of the town has gone to sleep.
The farmhouse is on the road. A country road, but right on it. Walking out of the wood stove room/back door to the driveway in the back is a slight incline, which then become a steeper, brush covered incline. Cutting a path through the brush is a dirt road, winding its way up the hill. At the top of the hill, just before the treeline, is the studio.
The farmhouse is owned by a husband/wife artist team. They have just built this beautiful studio, for their expanding production. They bought the land to build the studio; 7 Maples came in the bargain, so they rent in cheaply. On the lower level, is her kiln and her rows of tiny, handmade jewelry. On the top level, are his looms for his giant, rich, wall hangings. And on their deck are a few lawn chairs.
It is not unusual for me to bring a girl up here. The landlords don't mind. Encourage it, in fact. Just pick up your empty beer cans. Otherwise, enjoy the view.
When I hear "See A Little Light," even today, this is where I am. On a warm summer might with a warm summer beer, hoping to impress a girl, and generally unencumbered by anything more taxing than that.
It seems kind of idyllic, and I could probably paper over the reality with nostalgia. But the truth is that what felt like freedom on a good day, felt like being set adrift, aimlessly, on another day. There could be drama and mood-swings and angst. Some of that generated internally, and some of that manifested in the people around me.
7 Maples, due to its fluid and welcoming nature, attracted its fair share of friends and hangers-on, drunks and lost boys/girls. People searching, or flailing, or failing. People who's only reaction to things that didn't make sense, was to curse the darkness and shout out into the night.
"Ahh, shit. I'd better go see what that is."
I reluctantly got up from my lawn chair, which had been pulled close to her lawn chair.
Remember in "Say Anything" when you first hear "In Your Eyes" and you just think it's the movie soundtrack, until they show Lloyd in the yard with his boom box?
At first I didn't notice the melody in the air for anything other than a soundtrack to whatever I'm sure I was going on about in an effort to impress this girl. But then I realized that Bob Mould was booming from my house, which was a good 300 yards away.
We ambled our way in the dark, down the hill and as we got closer to the house, I could see a little light, literally, from the wood stove room where the stereo lived and most of the beer was consumed. The stereo speakers were now in the window, and the stereo was cranked up to 11.
I walked inside, smoothly and succinctly, heading straight for the stereo to turn it down.
"It's a little loud," I said, with a cocked eyebrow.
There was no point in making a salient argument, or getting too angry. He was drunk.
He was a friend of one of the roommates. The kind of guest that doesn't leave, even after his friend has gone to bed (if the are still drinks to be had).
I'm not sure what he was trying to accomplish by putting the speakers in the window and blasting Bob Mould across the hillside. And I'm fairly certain that he couldn't tell you either.
It was just the kind of thing you did when you were in your 20s, a little lost, a little drunk, a little in the dark, searching for some kind of answers.
He thought about it for a second and said, "Maybe . . . The Allmans?"
I was in my favorite local bar, about to watch my favorite local band.
Admittedly, both the bar and the band were a little dank, dirty and down-and-out for a date, but this new girl I was dating seemed game.
When she asked what the band sounded like, I said that their main reference was probably The Band. But she didn't know The Band.
"Take a load off, Annie, Take a load for free . . ." I sang, trying to rattle a memory that clearly wasn't there for her. "No, doesn't ring a bell?"
Nope.
So I asked the guy in front of me, and he suggested The Allmans, which was a reasonable second suggestion.
She nodded, approvingly.
True to form, Janie Grey came out and threw down a great bar-shaking set. And yes, in the model of The Band, three different guys in the band took shots at lead singing, some of the songs extended out, out, out in jam fashion, and they even did staples The Band were known for doing, like "Down South In New Orleans" and "Mystery Train."
She seemed to have a good time, trying groove along with the proceedings.
In the car on the way home, I asked her what she thought of the band.
"Oh, they were good I guess. Not what I was expecting."
"What were you expecting?"
"Well, based on that guy's description, I guess I was you know, expecting the white suits and the dance moves and stuff."
"Dance moves?"
Wait a minute.
"Are you confusing The Allman Brothers with The Osmond Brothers?"
"Oh! Yeah, I guess I am!" she said, cheerily.
(The post script, unsurprisingly, is that this relationship did not work out . . .)
It was some kind of amazing teenage Rock N Roll fantasy come true. I was on the radio.
Better yet, after only a couple of weeks on the air, I was getting my own specialty program, and it started tonight! It was April 8th, 1994.
I'd been hired to work at a small, independent radio station near the Virginia/Tennessee border, as a part-time evening DJ. They needed someone to cover their nightly 2-hour call-in request program. But in the interview, I pitched the idea of having an Alternative specialty show.
It's kind of hard to imagine this, but in 1994 much of the country still didn't have radio stations for Modern Rock. Classic rock station were playing Soundgarden and Pearl Jam, but as "Alternative" got punkier and/or weirder, there wasn't a place for it on the radio dial yet.
And in Southwest Virginia, there was nowhere on the radio to hear Beck or Smashing Pumpkins or this up-and-coming little band called Green Day. But that was about to chance.
I was positively giddy at the notion that I'd be sharing this great music with an audience that (I believed, anyway) hungered for it. So I spent the week preparing and refining the playlist for my first program, Friday, April 8th.
Unfortunately, the pickings were pretty slim at the station. WABN was a Top 40 station, so the CD selection for Alternative tracks was limited. I used a ton of my own CDs, but there were still gaping holes between what we had, and what we needed.
Still, I had crafted a playlist for an amazing tour-de-force of a debut program, and bounded into the station Friday evening, ready to set the world on fire.
Rita, one of the station owners, stopped me dead in my tracks.
"PJ, Kurt Cobain is dead. I'm sorry."
She said "I'm sorry" with a seriousness that made it feel like I had known Cobain personally. That this loss was real and profound and near.
The wind was definitely taken out of my sails.
Instead of hitting the airwaves like a gleeful pirate, spreading musical anarchy to southwest Virginia, I now had the unpleasant duty of being the guy who came on the radio and told you about a terrible human tragedy.
Worse, we only had one Nirvana song in the building: "Heart Shaped Box." It had crossed over to Top 40, so the station owned a copy of that, and nothing else.
In the ensuing years, I would do a Cobain tribute on April 8th, and play songs from throughout the band's career: "Lithium," "About A Girl," "Sliver."
And I would play that one song that I had played (and replayed) on that sad day in 1994, that represented a small and feeble gesture in the face of incomprehensible sadness.
It was called "7 Maples" and it's where I called home for five years in that stretch of the 90s when I lived in the most western part of the state of Virginia.
The farmhouse had come with the acres purchased by our artist landlords, who had built a beautiful studio at the top of the hill. "7 Maples" was the original homestead on the land, with parts of the structure dating back 100 years.
It was called "7 Maples" because the land had 6 maple trees on it, but the original owners thought "7 Maples" was more poetic-sounding than "6 Maples."
It was rickety and rustic and just right for as a space for a pair of 20-somethings to live in. It wasn't too nice---we couldn't really do anything to ruin it. And it had space for me and my roommate.
And one more.
Throughout our tenure, we had a rotating array of 3rd roommates. They were always close friends, but always changed the dynamic from the consistence of the two of us.
The sprawling layout was charming in the daytime, and would have been as charming at night, if we'd never heard the story of the murder/suicide that had occurred in our front room, early in the century.
At night, when the mind plays tricks, the house could be a bit scary, with its creaky floors, and maple branches brushing the roof, and the quiet, quiet countryside of southwest Virginia.
And then there was the creepy appeal of the 2nd floor room that we gave to the rotating 3rd roommate.
The room itself was fine, but it lead to a large walk-in closet. The closet was only partially finished. And off the walk-in closet, was another totally unfinished space.
A room, within a room, within a room. Like a panic room. Or a place you'd hide a body.
As I said, Roommate #3 was always the wild-card. And one night, I came home to find a certain #3 passed out on the couch.
Not unusual. Roommate #3 liked to take a drink. Or five.
Climbing the stairs to my bedroom, I had to pass by her room. And from the room I heard breathing.
Not unusual. Roomate #3 liked to take a drink or five and bring home a guest from the bar.
I worked the night shift those years, and sometimes, on my way in well after midnight, I'd pass some stranger, on his way out.
But this one was breathing loudly. I shouldn't be able to hear breathing through the closed door, should I?
I inched closer to the frame. Heavy, heavy breathing.
Mechanized sounding breathing.
There was something strangely robotic about this heaving, in and out, in and out.
It's after midnight. It's dark. I'm alone, except for a passed out roommate on the couch downstairs, and whoever is behind the door.
In and out, in and out.
Breathing from the creepy room.
I'm a reasonable, rational human being. What is there to be afraid of?
I stood there for another full minute, hoping I could come up with a good excuse.
Failing that, I thought I'd better look in the room.
The hallway light was harsh, entering the bedroom that was completely dark, except for the tiny glow of a stereo light.
A stereo that was playing. Counting. Spinning on low volume.
I'd been haunted by the ghost of Southern Culture On The Skids album "Dirt Track Date."
At the very end of the album, when the title track fades out, you are left with a sound. The sound of a dirt track.
Cars, vroomming around the track past a microphone. The doppler effect making the pitch rise and fall.
It goes on for 5 minutes or so, this mechanical pulsating of cars roaring by, which, when turned low on your stereo, sounds a lot like mechanical breathing.
Jump ahead to 3:21 on the Youtube video, to hear the song end, and the cars/creepy breathing. (they fade it out; it actually goes on for 5 minutes on the record)
In my mid-20s, through a series of life twists and turns, I found myself working at a radio station in the most western part of the state of Virginia, right on the Tennessee border. I’d been a lifelong New Englander, and had my ideas about the American South.
My 7 years living there both confirmed my ideas, and completely challenged those ideas.
I worked for a bright, educated, well-read, thoughtful, liberal family. And at every opportunity, they caused me to consider the stereotype of a Southerner, and to reject it.
Does the stereotype exist? Yes it does. Yes, in the South there are pick-up driving, country music loving, under-educated, super-religious, right wing folks, who are pretty much exactly like the people TV might lead you to believe were in the South.
And truthfully, there are a lot of Southerners who embrace that image, and try to own it, whether they live up to it or not. Bright, educated, well-read, thoughtful, liberal folks who would still readily identify themselves as Rednecks.
My friends were quick to reject that kind of simplified categorization of themselves, or the part of the world they live in. And in a town full of doctors and lawyers and college professors, it became pretty evident to me that my preconceived notions about Southerners were pretty limiting. I, myself, learned to be vigilant about stereotypes, assumptions and pigeonholing.
I’ve especially kept an ear out for it in Country Music, where some artists will sing songs that are intentionally crafted to fit an anti-intellectual, jingoistic, good ol’ boy/girl image. Songs and artists like this serve to reinforce a stereotype that, like all stereotypes, at best over-simplifies who people are and at worst limits who they can be.
So what to do about this new Bruce Hornsby song, “In The Low Country”?
Hornsby is from Virginia, too, albeit from the other side of the state, in the eastern, Tidewater area. And in this new song, he sings in the first person, as a Southern stereotype. A gun-toting, squirrel-skinning, booze drinking, wrasslin’-watching, NASCAR conservative.
Certainly, this is a tongue-in-cheek performance from Bruce, that recalls, in a more subtle way, Randy Newman’s “Rednecks.”
And that’s the problem. The subtlety. I think Hornsby is singing this tongue-in-cheek, but that’s only after listening to the song a number of times, and closely reading the lyrics.
That’s not how most people listen to a song on the radio. They’re driving or working or cooking with the radio on. They’re not listening with a critical ear.
And in that case, does a song like this serve to support the stereotype, rather than skewer it?
I'm the Program and Music Director of mvyradio, a broadcast and internet station on the Island of Martha's Vineyard. You can hear it here.
I've been in radio since the early 90s, programming shows. As Music Director, I receive dozens of CDs and songs every week, from Record Labels, Promotion People and Independent Artists. I try to listen to everything anyone asks me to.
So the old iTunes list is pretty long.
The idea of this blog is to go to that list, grab one (usually at random, but not always) and write about it. Every song has a story. How it fits into the artists oeuvre. What it meant to me when I first heard it.
I'll try to post the song in full, whenever possible, and I invite you to listen and tell me what it makes you think of.
And for more great music, you can stream mvyradio from anywhere in the world, here.
