With Memorial Day Weekend being the unofficial start of summer, I thought it would be a good idea to share with you guys my summer playlist for 2010! So while you're firing up those ol' grills for your weekend barbecues, check out this playlist which will be sure to have your soundsystem rocking all summer long!!!
Vampire Weekend- Giving Up The Gun
Jack Johnson- You and Your Heart
MGMT- Siberian Breaks
All Time Low- Lost In Stereo
Person L- Good Days
Phoenix- Girlfriend
The Dirty Heads f/ Rome- Lay Me Down
Neon Trees- Animal
Four Year Strong- Wasting Time (Eternal Summer)
Paramore- The Only Exception
The Rocket Summer- You Gotta Believe
Stone Temple Pilots- Between the Lines
Something Corporate- Wait
Minus the Bear- My Time
Rooney- I Can't Get Enough
Do you guys have a summer playlist of your own that you would like to share on the blog? It can be any amount of songs that you want, it can be old songs, new songs, any songs that you can think of that would be perfect to kick off your Summer of 2010! Post your playlist in the replies and let's see what you guys got!!
Friday, May 28, 2010
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Four Year Strong - Enemy of the World
Hailing from Worcester, MA, Four Year Strong are back with their major label debut, Enemy of the World. Their prior two releases, It's Our Time and Rise or Die Trying, were both released on indie labels and slowly started to build a grassroots following. With this release, Four Year Strong prove that they are a band to be reckoned with and take no prisoners with a powerful and gritty album.
The album starts off with "It Must Really Suck To Be Four Year Strong Right Now", a title that was taken from an Alternative Press article about the band. The track introduces the listening audience to the phenomenal lead vocals of Dan O'Connor, who equally shares vocal and guitar duties with Alex Day, and blast through an opening salvo of guitars, drums, and bass with furious and unbridled power. "Wasting Time (Eternal Summer)" is my favorite song off the album, a loud and melodic number that seeks to blow out your ears with perfectly syncopated guitars and blasting vocals that come along at you at just the right level, but not too much which will keep you craving for more. "Nineteen With Neck Tatz" is a melodic and heavy number that continues to show the amazing vocal power of Dan and Alan and the amazing musicianship of everyone involved to create a superb track. "Find My Way Back" is a powerful and stand out anthem that hits you at various angles to give you a taste of different rhythms at various tempos to show the amazing diversity that Four Year Strong is capable of showcasing to the audience.
As we enter the album's second half, we hear "What The Hell Is A Gigawatt?", a furious and drum-pounding tune that shows off Jake Massucco's amazing drum skills on a very complex and impressive tune. "One Step At A Time" is a melodic and mid-tempo number that gives the listener something different on an extremely rich album so far. "This Body Pays The Bill$" is a blasting tune that reaches out and grabs you from the first note with an assortment of guitars and drums to gnaw at you with vicious tenacity. "Paul Revere's Midnight Ride" is perhaps the most powerful song on the album with its guitars charging out the gate from the beginning, but finds a way to inject some melody into the chorus, which provides for an extremely enjoyable listen. The album's title track closes out the disc with a humongous crapload of guitars, bass, and drums thrown at you that sums up what the album is all about, raw and intense metalcore at its finest with melodies that hook and reel you in and immediately captivate you. There aren't alot of metalcore bands that can pull this off, but Four Year Strong do a pretty good job of making this work.
In retrospect, an amazing and intense album from Four Year Strong, who have succeeded in making a metalcore album that is appealing enough to draw you in with its insatiable melodies, but still maintains the metal sensibility that got them where they are today. Definitely recommended!
Album Score: 4/5
Track Listing:
- It Must Really Suck to Be Four Year Strong Right Now
- On A Saturday
- Wasting Time (Eternal Summer)
- Nineteen With Neck Tatz
- Find My Way Back
- What the Hell Is A Gigawatt?
- One Step At A Time
- This Body Pays the Bill$
- Paul Revere's Midnight Ride
- Flannel is the Color of My Energy
- Enemy of the World
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Taproot - Plead the Fifth
By way of Ann Arbor, Michigan, Taproot are back with their much anticipated fifth studio album appropriately titled Plead the Fifth. The new record finds the band experimenting with various hardcore melodies, while still retaining their familiar and melodic sound that attracted scores of fans to their fanbase years ago.
The album kicks off with "Now Rise", a blasting, hardcore screamer that features the fierce vocal prowess of frontman Stephen Richards, whose melodic vocals give a distinct contrast between the hardcore breakdowns and melodic interludes. "Game Over" is a blasting, no holds barred track that doesn't stop from the get go with its fast paced guitars and Stephen's melodic vocals weaving in and out of each guitar riff with clearly demonstrated ease. My favorite song off the album is the disc's first single, "Fractured (Everything I Said Was True)", a pure, melodic track that has a few hardcore breakdowns, but not as many as their predecessors on the album did. This track is probably the best track to introduce other people to Taproot who might have heard of the band, but have not yet been familiarized with the type of music that they play.
Continuing on, we hear "Stolage" which has a decent melody and an absolutely splendid bass track, but the resulting track falls a little flat and lacks the power punch that the songs before it had. "911ost" is a midtempo, semi melodic tune that attempts to recapture the essence of the first few songs of the album, but doesn't quite come close to achieving that on this track. "Trophy Wi-Fi" is a edge of your seat, barrelling opus that manages to set the album back on course with polarizing guitar riffs and Stephen's prominent vocals leading the way.
As we begin to close out the album, we hear "Words Don't Mean A Thing", a hardcore, melodic hybrid that features an excellent chorus and a plethora of guitars and bass. "Left Behind", one of the more slow paced tunes on this album, provides for a nice contrast between the other songs on the album and gives the listener a little variety in the process as well. "Stares" closes out the disc with some fierce hardcore breakdowns and Stephen once again showcasing his tremendous vocal range on this track. Taproot gained initial success with their 2002 sophomore album, Welcome which produced the massive hit single, "Poem". While Taproot have moved further from the sound that they first displayed in the beginning of their career, they haven't moved away from it completely, and the band constantly finds unique ways to combine hardcore and slower, melodic based sounds into a user accessible vehicle that fans both old and new can identify with.
All in all, a solid album that finds Taproot sticking to their guns and continuing to show their brimming creativity with songs that succeed in their mission and others that slightly miss the mark. While Taproot might not be the same band that they sounded like when they first started out, they are at least attempting to put out quality music in the process.
Album Score: 3/5
Track Listing:
- Now Rise
- Game Over
- Fractured (Everything I Said Was True)
- Release Me
- Stolage
- 911ost
- Trophy Wi-Fi
- Words Don't Mean A Thing
- Left Behind
- No View Is True
- Stares
Monday, May 17, 2010
Interview w/ Dan Mazella
I'm kicking off a series of interviews in the next few weeks with friends of mine that are DJ's and to get a feel of what their job is all about. Today, I'm starting off with an interview with my friend Dan Mazella, who is currently a part time DJ at Curry College's WMLN and also works at Kiss 108 as a producer. Here is the transcript of that interview:
Q: Give your name and your job title here at WMLN?
Dan: I'm Dan Mazella and my current job title here at WMLN is on air DJ and for right now I'm the summer program director.
How did you get this position at the station?
The on air DJ job I've had since my freshman year so this goes back 5 years. I'm not a five year person but what happened was I got to continue my services at WMLN after I graduated which is very rare. When I was a freshman, I needed basically a general elective and one thing that drew me to Curry College was the radio station. When I saw it as a general elective I said, "I'll just take it," easy way to get some struts out and play music for everyone to hear. And that's when I got the on air gig, I signed up for something, and they needed somebody to do a morning or afternoon show and I said "Alright cool, I'll take it why not." And that's how I became an on air DJ. Five years later I'm still doing the same thing. And for the summer program director, what happened was right after I graduated, which is a year ago. I was station manager for 2 years and then they said "Hey, do you want to stay behind to be the consultant because we got a crew coming up, they're great but they have 1 year experience on everybody because we lost a lot of people," and they said "Do you want to be the general consultant?" and I said "Alright, why not." And then our program director didn't happen to return so my boss said to me, "Do you want to be program director?" and he knew that was a goal in my life, I want to program a radio station one day and he said "Well you managed one, I have no doubt you can program one." So that's how I got the summer program director.
When did you first become interested in working in radio?
That probably goes back to my childhood I guess, I'm not going to give you a lost childhood moment over here. (Laughter) But what happened was, I grew up on a farm and as most kids had summer vacation, summers for me I kind of dreaded because I would have to work on a farm, and this goes back to when I was 7 years old. But what got me through the day was listening to radio and being in the barn packing vegetables, we would listen to the radio. I'd be out in the field, we wouldn't have iPods because they weren't invented yet, it was too Star Trek. So I couldn't listen to my favorite songs, back then you had to rely on radio and Walkmans were big back then and they had FM tuners on it, so I could listen to FM radio while I was working so it passed the time and everything because OK, if I start work at 9AM, I know I'll catch the last hour of Loren and Wally on 105.7. But, I know on this station, on another station, I'll get this DJ and that is another 4 hours and then once that's done, I'll be this guy's show so Ill look forward to the next DJ on a different station to help me pass the time. I had no idea back then that was foreshadowing me to take over my career as a radio professional. That's when I knew then when I got to college when I did all that stuff in the past, I looked forward to radio, maybe this is something telling me I need to do radio. You know they kind of say "Do what the world is telling you to do", well I think that's what it is, the world was telling me to do radio because I was so involved in it in the past. So, I got involved in it and that's where I am today.
Describe your first time working in radio, What was it like?
When I first had to crack the mic, I went over in my head about 30 times what I was going to say "Do I be like this DJ?" "Do I try to sound like this guy?" or "What's my own voice?" Of course I go "I've never done on air before, I don't have my own voice" so finally I just said, "you know what I'm gonna try this song," this will be my first song, it was a morning show 6-8AM, I said "this has to be my very first song" and it was New Found Glory's "Better Off Dead" and I said, "I gotta do something on my own," so I went on air and I said, "Hey, this is New Found Glory's 'Better Off Dead' and if you don't like me, well I guess I'm better off dead!" And then my boss at the time, he was there that early, he came down the hallway and just looked at me and said, "Is this your first time on the air? You have potential!" and then walked away. So I was like, "OK, this wasn't totally bad my boss liked it which kind of matters." And that was my first time I ever went on air and it just progressed after that.
When did you first begin to develop an on-air personality?
My personal on-air personalities developed uniquely, to put it that way. I used to look up to alot of DJ's such as Adam-12 when he was on WBCN, Big Jim on WFNX, Paul Driscoll on WFNX. As far as my own personality goes, I would listen to some people at WMLN, Jadd Naamani, Kevin Begley, those guys are doing their own thing right now and they're in the field as well. But I started modeling stuff after them and then there was one DJ who co-hosted a show on WFNX that was on from 10PM-Midnight It was called Loveline with Dr. Drew and I developed my intros and outros from this host, his name was Stryker. I developed that from him and I would bring it in, tell the other DJ's who I've been listening to, developed it from there, but another person who had a huge impact on my personality was Alex Durka because I was before him once or twice, and we did a thing called crossover, what a crossover is you introduce the next person who is on after you, you kind of get involved with your show to be a easier transition so people know what's coming on and thinking "Oh these shows are really different, they're pretty much the same thing." So, we would just do crossovers and we started our crossovers 10 minutes early, then 15 minutes, then a half-hour early. And that's kind of where my personality developed and that's how him and I kind of began our careers together, working on many, many shows together. That's where the personalities developed, listening to radio hosts that I looked up to and some people who were not that much older than me, who had the talent that I really felt I could really learn from.
Describe your first on-air radio show @ Curry and the basic format of the show?
That has to be back when I was a freshman. My first show was a morning drive show and the format at the time was adult album alternative which is kind of like soft rock and acoustic rock. I would sit there and we have a ton of stuff in the studio here, but I got used to using my own CD's, I wanted to know that I could do any format if I'm asked to be on-air, I know the CD's that are out there that are mine, I could just do a show with. And there were some CD's that I put aside in the back room and kind of hid from everybody and was like, "This is mine, I'm gonna use this, no one else can use this." The basic format was morning drive and I'm trying to think how I'm different from the other big shot shock jocks out there, how am I different from them and said, "Well I'm in college radio, I'm in my own category, I'm not a format station, this is a multi-format station." So, I took some songs that I liked and I kind of asked around to people and say "Hey, when you're waking up in the morning, and you've got to go to class, got to go to work and you're driving or walking and you just happen to have the station on in one way shape or form, whether you're at your computer or you're listening on the way in or you walk into a building and the station is on, What do you want to hear? Would you hear this song? Would you like this song? Oh yeah, I like this song Eh, that might not be too great." I would ask people who worked at the station what they would like to hear and that's kind of how I developed my own format within a format. Cause it was create your own show pretty much and that's how I developed the format for my show and that was my first show, a morning drive show and I'm kind of glad I had to wake up that early because I had to be ready to deliver the audience what they wanted.
Now, you also work over at Kiss 108 in addition to your job at WMLN, could you describe your position there and what you do?
I'm a board op over there, board-op producer. Those two jobs go hand in hand, so it's kind of difficult to say what my actual title is. Pretty much I'm mostly on Saturday nights from 10PM-2AM and what that is, I show up around 9PM and I load Club Kiss, you hear it every single week, just sometimes there's a different person running the board. But I'm on there from time to time and we have a show, we either have to download it or it's already downloaded for us and what we do is we take it out of the download and we throw it into the program, it's called NextGen so we know to play it. And it's an automated system so you don't have to press alot of buttons, so you listen to Kesha, Rihanna, the new Ludacris song, and then Club Kiss starts and 1 segment is 12 minutes, the other is 24 minutes and it's club music and my job is to monitor and make sure it flows and because I'm also talking to another producer and a host who is actually at a club, and that's for many reasons is to draw people to a club that the host is at and it's to get people in the mood to go out, people want to hear club music and they're like "It's 10:00, that's early for a Saturday night, I want to go out and have fun." So they listen to Club Kiss and get in the mood for it and I'm glad I'm a part of it because I'm in the studio running it, making sure and I'm always telling the host down at the club "Hey you have 10 minutes until your next live break Ok, well what are we talking about? It's open, you talk about whatever you want for 30 seconds" or "Hey you're on in 5 minutes and plug Billy Costa's Top 30 Countdown" and they've done it so many times that they know what they're talking about. And pretty much that's it what I do at Kiss and everything, I'm just the person in the studio making sure it all plays and telling the hosts down at the club "Hey, can you grab this person cause they've got a break in 2 minutes" and that's pretty much what I do in a nutshell.
What are your favorite and least favorite aspects with working in radio?
My favorite aspect of working in radio is knowing that I'm doing something for the community because there are some jobs that are out there like Office Space for example, and you have to do this report, I've seen that movie thousands of times so I can't even tell you what those damn reports that he had to fill out, but those don't matter to you, I'm not going to lose sleep or have my day ruined because a report didn't get filled out. But if you work in that field obviously it's a big deal. But for myself and working in radio, everybody's listening and especially when you work at Kiss 108, the #1 station in Boston or WMLN is a college station that is professionally run but it's free form, we kind of get to play whatever format we want and everything, there are some people telling us "OK format this time" "So you like that format" "You go on at this time." But what I love about it is that I can do a show, people will listen to it because they want to listen to radio. Some people say it's a dying market, I sorely agree with them, but I don't at the same time because people are going to listen to radio no matter what and I'm still going to stand strong behind a industry that I know will strive in the future. Another thing I don't like about it sometimes is the hours. I work some Saturdays and some Fridays and it takes alot out of your social life, especially if it's a beautiful Friday evening or Saturday afternoon. I'm in the building where the windows don't open and I can't get a breath of fresh air unless I physically walk out of the building, we're on the 3rd floor so you gotta think "Do I really want to walk down 3 sets of stairs?" and then you look outside and you just see it's so nice out, and you know you just can't enjoy it. But that's just because I'm doing weekend work right now, that could change in the future, I'm kind of happy where I'm at right now but at the same time, I just want to choose the music that I want to play. At WMLN I can, at commercial radio such as Kiss, I can't choose the music which is kind of unfortunate cause you're like "OK, this song is next" "OK, this song is next" "Oh, this song should really be played." But I have to go through somebody in order to get that done, so that's one of the things I don't really like about it, but I know at the same time you're serving an audience, and the audience expects something so I don't want to be the person that a mob comes after knowing cause I screwed something up. (Laughter)
Do you have any funny outtakes or have any embarrassing moments happen to you while on air?
I do, I do, one is I got somebody who I really wanted, it was on campus, it was a person who always played guitar around campus and I was like "I got to have you on my show, I worked it out with my bosses, please, please, please come on my show." The person's name I can't tell you for the life of me, but I know what he did and the reason I wanted him on my show. So he came in, and he sat down and I had a ringtone for my mother and it was the Cinderella song cause everytime she called me, she wanted me to do something, so I had the Cinderella theme song go off. I didn't put my phone on vibrate or turn it off, i left it on. I filled the interview live on the radio, and my phone goes off and it starts the Cinderella theme and the guy just looks at me, I look at him, and it's not like I can get up and leave or say "Hey, we're in the middle of a song right now, we're right in the middle of an interview." I couldn't get out of it and I said "This is exactly what's happening, I have no excuse for my actions." (Laughter) The second incident was a person I talked about earlier, Alex Durka. I've been on-air with him many, many times, we're like the unofficial co-hosts of each other. I explained earlier a crossover, or sometimes where he would like come on the air with me randomly, he would just say something really awkward to me on air, and I wouldn't have an answer. It's one of those moments where like "Did he just say that?" or "How do I respond to him?" or I'm laughing really hard and I can't respond to this. Those are the things, you get interrupted during something you have no way out of it which has happened to me in the interview, or bringing someone who has a great personality on-air say something you weren't ready for and it's kind of like "Oh, it's really funny but I don't know how to respond to it." So that's an embarrassing thing that has happened to me many, many times.
Did you host any other on-air radio programs while @ Curry?
I've hosted many, many programs. Just to run them down real quick by memory serves me right, I've hosted some morning shows. My freshman year for a semester I hosted some morning shows, then I also hosted these Friday shows both semesters my freshman year because on a Friday, alot of people are going home and everything, but there's people who lived on campus and everything who stayed here and of course it was great for me and everything, I got used to that time frame, so it wasn't that bad to host and everything, I got two semesters which was fine. When my sophomore year came, the people in charge of the time said to me, "Hey, you've done Fridays enough, we obviously trust you, we like what you're doing with your stuff, we want to move you to afternoons a little bit, do you want early afternoons or late afternoons, or you can tend to where you are." So I said to them, "Throw me on early, you know I want to do some early afternoons, I want to get a feel for it to see how I like it." So I got the 1-4PM and it was before Alex Durka and that's how him and I became friends, cause he was on after me and we did alot of crossovers and all that stuff, so we got to know each other that way, but I started doing the 1-4's and it was fun and everything for awhile, but I felt it was too early in the afternoon, I liked the later afternoon show. So when my junior year came, I decided I'll take the 4-7PM and that's when I developed the current show that I'm in. It was the summer before and I was in class one day and I really wanted to come up with a good show and I also wanted a catchy title, something people are going to remember and I'm sitting there and I created the show, The Alternative Modulation and I was like "Alternative Modulation, that's actually a really good name." Little did I know that I was actually doing a play on terms in there. I was on the FM dial but Alternative Modulation is AM so as I called it "The New AM on FM, The Alternative Modulation". I was in the middle of the class and I stood up and go "Genius!" Everybody looked at me like I had 9 heads but that's fine, I'm used to that. (Laughter) I was on air one day, I was just hosting a regular formatted show, alternative rock format show and this was right before the summer. I was sitting there going "If I don't do this now, I'm never going to get the confidence to plug this show or do this show." So halfway during a 4-7, I cracked the mic and I said, "The New AM on FM, The Alternative Modulation" and people were calling in going "Oh, that's a cool title" or like a direct comment like "What the heck are you doing?" "This is the name of the show." "What are you doing?" At that point, I'm like "I either do it now or I don't do it at all." That was my make or break and there were some people who were off campus who I knew who listened to the show, there were some people that were on campus that listened to the show, called in and were like, "Wow, that's actually really clever, that's not a bad title." By the way, I'm working to patent that, so no one can steal that from me! (Laughter)
But there are 2 other shows that I want to talk about, cause they are equally important to the AM on FM. There was a show called He Said, She Said. There was a girl who worked here, her name was Emily Carr, she was music director then she became program director. Her and I hit it right off the bat, we became friends, we had a personality off the air that we thought that can really work on the air. So when she asked me do you want to host a show with me I said, "Oh yeah sure." In my head "It's going to last a week, It's gonna last 2 weeks, a month, I said 'I'm gonna want out'" and said "We have a good off air personality, Will it work on air? I don't know she says it will. We'll try it, see what happens." So we picked Thursdays 7-9PM cause we know that's a perfect time for us because it wasn't early when people were in classes and on a Thursday night, what are people doing on a college campus? I started on a 7 o'clock so we thought, "This is a perfect time." So we did it, we started it and I had a blast doing it, it turned out to be one semester, then we renewed it for a second semester, then a summer came, we continued it into the summer, then we did 2 semesters following into our senior year so we literally did over a year straight of Thursdays 7-9 of the He Said, She Said and it worked out great. Em and I were both producers of it so "I get research, you get research," "Let's choose it this week," No this will work next week," "These we'll have to put in now." It was a 2 hour block so what we did was we would throw in little things like a personal experience from Em, and I would talk about comic books, and that didn't work too much on that show, it did for a little while and then we were kind of losing touch with it, but it worked on another show. Em and I really took that show to heart and we could say that's our show and people have said that in the past, but people know us for this show and the time spot, so we really liked it and we had a great lead in and a great lead out, the person after us was great, so we thought we were in the perfect time and it was on Thursday night, so we knew what people were doing and they knew what they were doing when they were listening to us.
But the comic book stuff worked on another show that I was asked to produce, it was called Hey, Are You Talkin' To Me? The first host was Paul Varga, him and I were friends, I was actually living with him in an apartment on campus and he asked me "Hey, do you want to be my producer?" and I said, "Alright, why not." In my head thinking "It's going to last a week, i'm going to get sick of it," cause I knew what Paul was like on the air, it was a talk show, I've never produced a talk show before, never ran the boards for it, maybe it'll work. And we started doing it, it started at 8AM and we get here at 7, he would bring me a sheet, "Hey, do you want to do this?" "No, I don't want to do that." "Let's take that out." "This will work" or "Hey, let's do this." What it is that Paul would do the talking and I would choose the music for it, so I was kind of like the show's music director and I would throw into "OK, we're going to take a break" and I have Paul talk over some music, so him and I played off each other very well. We decided to give myself a segment on the show, we call it the Geek Freak of the Week cause the show was weekly and Paul has said to me "A lot of movies are coming out and they're comic book movies," and I'm an avid fan of comic books, I have done alot of research on the genre and everything. So I was like, "Why not, let's do this." So we created Geek Freak of the Week where during the show at 9:00 I would go on the air and talk about comic books for 5 minutes and I would have music behind it, We'd have a great intro for it, Paul and I would bounce off each other and that was great, I loved it and actually said to me, "I want to submit our show for an AP award" and I said "OK, Let's do it." We sat down and I said, "Paul, It's your show, you're the host, you choose what you want to do for it." He chose some segments, he ran it by me, we sat down and collaborated and said, "Hey, that might work." So we put it in with the rest of the AP submissions, we sent it in and we actually won the AP award, it was for Best College Talk Show which is a very hard category to be recognized in, so we were thrilled, I gave Paul all the credit because he was the host, I was just the guy pushing all the buttons for you and he said to me, "This is just as much your victory as it is mine." he said the same thing at the radio meetings "This is your victory as well," because WMLN won the award, my show was the one that won, but I submitted under WMLN's name so it was really everyone's award, but I felt great being personally connected to it and also people were listening to it, we were online streaming and that was the first time in my life that I felt, especially with my comic book obsession and super hero nerdiness, meant something to some people because then I thought this show is really out there, it's political, it's pop culture, it's also something for the nerds and geeks out there which is right up my alley, and we had fun with it and then when we had to retire the show and our positions within the show cause we were graduating, we were a little upset by it, but we knew it was time to go and I was involved with a variety of shows, I wasn't set to one genre that alot of DJ's are. I forced myself to be involved in other genres so I could get the experience and say that I had a hand on it, so one day when I went for a job interview, I could say "This is what I did" and "I'm very flexible" and it's worked out great so far, so I'm very proud of everything that I've done within all the genres that I've done.
Now, with all the recent changes in radio, where do you see radio going in the next 5-10 years? Changes? Technological advances?
Unfortunately, I see a dark future for radio, an actual dark doesn't mean bad normally. I see radio in a transitional stage right now kind of back when AM became FM, people were listening to FM more than AM and radio had to reinvent itself. Everything was on AM, everything was going to FM, how do we survive? And that's where music came out, cause television wasn't invented, no people had to listen to radio anymore, they could just watch their favorite dramas or comedies. So, that's when radio said, "We're going to go music" and that was great and now, it's what do you do now? With the invention of the iPod, with the invention of automation, syndication, voice tracking, Can radio survive in the 21st century in the digital age? Parts of me say yes, parts of me say hell no. I feel you will always need somebody to watch what's going on over the air, you're always going to need somebody, they are not going to be paid well though, and alot I see in the future in radio is syndication. Ryan Seacrest has On-Air with Ryan Seacrest, he's on Kiss 108 from 10-2, but the same show is being broadcast on another station somewhere else from 1-4. That's what it is, someone can just create a show, don't have to mention what the weather is like outside, as long as they make it generic. That's where I see radio going is syndication, they aren't really going to have much of a host anymore, unless it's local and that's where I think the hope for radio is, local. You're not going to think inside of 10 years and still gonna have these big stations. I think local radio such as WFNX, there's another station called WXRP, The River which is up by me, this is a Haverhill station. Lower watt stations that are going to be broadcast to a certain area, and that's how I think radio is going to survive, so people are going to have local radio cause people want to know what's going on in their community. Maybe not the bigger stations but I feel they are all going to be all syndication, and of course I work for one of the big stations, so I hope that doesn't happen but then again, you're going to need somebody there. They're not going to get paid well, and that's where I think radio is going towards, syndication and more small local radio stations.
If you could have the opportunity to work at any radio station in the country, where would you work and why?
That's really, really hard for me to answer. I can tell you when I was younger, early in my career, I dreamed of working at WFNX. Then I slowly started to lose it after that cause I started changing directions with what I wanted to do in radio, and then I got really into producing and I said "I don't want to produce, I don't think I want to be on-air, I'll do bits on the air, but not something big." I've been asked this question before many, many times "Where do you want to work?" I would love to stay in Boston, New England, love to. But the station I would love to maybe one day work for would have been WBCN, just because they were The Rock of Boston and that was my thing. But another station I would love to work for if the opportunity arose and if they change their format would be Radio 929. But they're doing really well right now as an automated station, the ratings just came in, they're in the Top 5, that's very rare. And they have no DJ's, they have two people a guy and a girl, and I was actually there when they switched it from WBOS 92.9 to Radio 929, I saw them switch out the signs, and it would hurt me that day to see that happen, but I always said one day I want to work for Radio 929, of course now they're automated, It's like, you can't work for them anymore, unless I was the music director. If I were to work for Radio 929, I would love to be the music director of it just knowing that that's my music, it's the music that I know, I know I could really make a really good playlist, they're true to the fans and they have fans submit playlists and I like that, I like knowing the listeners have a say in what they want to do. As far as United States wise, I haven't found a station yet that I would love to work for. I've been looking through, I go by states, I'm currently in Tennessee right now, I'll stream a station for about 2 or 3 days so I get used to the formats and that's really what it is. I haven't found what station that I really want to work for. But going back to Radio 929, I would love to work for them and I would really love to work as a music director. Maybe that will happen someday, I don't know, it could, I don't know, maybe they'll go back to DJ's and if that's the case then if they get a morning show, I would love to produce that morning show. I would love in some way to be involved in the music aspect or the producing aspect of Radio 929 someday.
What are the differences between working at a college radio station like WMLN and a major radio station like Kiss 108?
Huge, significant differences. There are so many categories I can go through, I'll go through two and that's people being on air. At Kiss 108, we're not just Kiss 108, we're on the same floor as Jam'n 94.5 and Rush Radio 1200AM plus the HD stations they all have. I'm working with alot of different people, different personalities which are good and bad, but it's like that in any environment, it isn't just radio, whether you're in business, finance, construction, you name it, personalities are different. Some people who I work with at Kiss, there are people who are professionals, everything has to be 100% perfect, which is understandable, you want to be perfect on the air, there are often people who are more laid back that I work with, they go "Oh, we missed that break? That's fine we'll do it next time, it's not a big deal." Let's say I'm producing a show for the 1200AM show which I have been doing alot of lately, there was one thing where I didn't make something sound as tight as I could have, and tight as in flowing from one thing to another and I got a call from somebody saying "Hey, make that tighter next time" and another person said, "Hey, you did your best. So you messed up? It's radio, It's in people's one ear, out of the other, and you know what, it's fine dude." And that's what I like about being at a commercial station, they all know that there are some laid back people but then again it's knowing what you have to deliver is something that has to be 100%, you cannot half ass it at a commercial station, it has to be all great, you can't have dead air like what might happen at a college station from time to time, you can't go off the air, you have to make sure things fire at certain times because that's where the money is, we all want to be paid and those are the people who are paying us. So, that is what is at a commercial station. And at a college station, it's a little bit more different, it's much more laid back, we get to choose the music that we want to play on air, we have a music director, program director, and we have the luxury of bringing in our own music, All of the shows are my own CD's, very rarely will I use a CD here at the radio station, I have done before and I probably will, but I rarely do it. And that's what's great about college radio. And also it's public, I get paid from Curry College and the tuition money that gets brought in, once it's divided up into all the other departments, radio gets a certain budget of that, and I get paid out of that budget, but I don't have to worry about firing a certain song or firing a certain PSA at a certain time because I don't have to worry about it, no one's paying me to hear it, so I'm fine with it. Some of the personalities here are much more laid back as well, I can work with different people and jump off ideas better, and be like "You know what, let's try it and see what happens."
If you weren't working in radio, what do you think you would be doing careerwise?
Oh this is unfortunate. (Laughter) There are two possibilities, I mentioned earlier that I work on a farm, that's what I would be doing right now. Granted, it's a family business. I still work there right now, but it's not full time, it's pretty much Memorial Day cause it's our busiest time until 4th of July cause we're trying to get everything put together. I'd probably be doing that, I probably would have gone to school. Originally in my life, I thought I'm never gonna do anything else, the only thing I know how to do is farming. I wasn't great at it but I said I need the direction on how to farm, this is a family business, something I'm destined to do because you know what they say "You're supposed to do what the world is telling you to do." I was working on the farm, but I was listening to the radio. So that was the world telling me you should work in radio, but when I was working on the farm, I said "This is what I have to do, I was born into this, my grandfather was born into this, he had to do it," I was the only boy out of all the grandkids, I had to do this, I had to follow in the footsteps of my uncle and grandfather and I thought about it for the longest time and I said "I don't have to do farming, no one's telling me I have to do it," so my mom was a teacher and I really was great at history. Kids would want to sit next to me in history class so they could copy off of me for tests. I was the kind of kid that just was very quiet in school believe it or not, and would just sit there, I talked to some people when people came up to me and said "Hey, can I sit next to you just so I can get a couple of answers off of you?" And I was like "Alright, well this smart person who people view as smart, worship the ground I walk on were great. Alright, I'll sit next to you, Yeah, I can copy off of you, I don't frickin care." So I thought that I would be a good history teacher one day. Then I thought, "I don't want to be a frickin teacher, That's horrible, I'm going to get underpaid and I'm just going to hate my life." So I decided "Hey, radio is where I want to be" and if it was working in another field, I probably wouldn't have gone down that road and I'd be a completely different person.
What is the most important lesson you've learned in your radio experience?
Don't let your ego ever, ever get in your way. There are people who have egos, I have learned to work with that. It's not easy, It'll never get easy, and the most important thing that I've learned about working with their egos is just you know they have an ego, that's fine but you can't do your job without me, so what does that say about you, what does that say about me? That's the big one I've learned about and there's two other small things: Bring your own headphones to your shift cause you get a sense of this is my show, this is my equipment, these headphones are mine. It's kind of like being an Air Force pilot, they have their helmets, and their sign like in Top Gun: Maverick, Ice Man, My headphones are like that, they have my name on it. One time I've put a sticker on it so it would look like it's mine and I've signed it different ways and I know those are my headphones and I've bought other people headphones cause they're like "Oh, I can't afford these headphones" or I buy them and I'll spruce them up for them and I'll give it to them and see if they like it. The final thing that I've learned is just have fun. You may screw up from time to time, but no one is perfect, people may think they're perfect and they're not. Have fun with it, know that what you're doing is not what everyone else is doing. Just knowing that I can provide everyone else with a service that I'm good at is great.
Thanks once again to my friend Dan Mazella for carving some time out of his busy schedule to do this interview! Look for some more interviews to follow over the course of the next few weeks!
Q: Give your name and your job title here at WMLN?
Dan: I'm Dan Mazella and my current job title here at WMLN is on air DJ and for right now I'm the summer program director.
How did you get this position at the station?
The on air DJ job I've had since my freshman year so this goes back 5 years. I'm not a five year person but what happened was I got to continue my services at WMLN after I graduated which is very rare. When I was a freshman, I needed basically a general elective and one thing that drew me to Curry College was the radio station. When I saw it as a general elective I said, "I'll just take it," easy way to get some struts out and play music for everyone to hear. And that's when I got the on air gig, I signed up for something, and they needed somebody to do a morning or afternoon show and I said "Alright cool, I'll take it why not." And that's how I became an on air DJ. Five years later I'm still doing the same thing. And for the summer program director, what happened was right after I graduated, which is a year ago. I was station manager for 2 years and then they said "Hey, do you want to stay behind to be the consultant because we got a crew coming up, they're great but they have 1 year experience on everybody because we lost a lot of people," and they said "Do you want to be the general consultant?" and I said "Alright, why not." And then our program director didn't happen to return so my boss said to me, "Do you want to be program director?" and he knew that was a goal in my life, I want to program a radio station one day and he said "Well you managed one, I have no doubt you can program one." So that's how I got the summer program director.
When did you first become interested in working in radio?
That probably goes back to my childhood I guess, I'm not going to give you a lost childhood moment over here. (Laughter) But what happened was, I grew up on a farm and as most kids had summer vacation, summers for me I kind of dreaded because I would have to work on a farm, and this goes back to when I was 7 years old. But what got me through the day was listening to radio and being in the barn packing vegetables, we would listen to the radio. I'd be out in the field, we wouldn't have iPods because they weren't invented yet, it was too Star Trek. So I couldn't listen to my favorite songs, back then you had to rely on radio and Walkmans were big back then and they had FM tuners on it, so I could listen to FM radio while I was working so it passed the time and everything because OK, if I start work at 9AM, I know I'll catch the last hour of Loren and Wally on 105.7. But, I know on this station, on another station, I'll get this DJ and that is another 4 hours and then once that's done, I'll be this guy's show so Ill look forward to the next DJ on a different station to help me pass the time. I had no idea back then that was foreshadowing me to take over my career as a radio professional. That's when I knew then when I got to college when I did all that stuff in the past, I looked forward to radio, maybe this is something telling me I need to do radio. You know they kind of say "Do what the world is telling you to do", well I think that's what it is, the world was telling me to do radio because I was so involved in it in the past. So, I got involved in it and that's where I am today.
Describe your first time working in radio, What was it like?
When I first had to crack the mic, I went over in my head about 30 times what I was going to say "Do I be like this DJ?" "Do I try to sound like this guy?" or "What's my own voice?" Of course I go "I've never done on air before, I don't have my own voice" so finally I just said, "you know what I'm gonna try this song," this will be my first song, it was a morning show 6-8AM, I said "this has to be my very first song" and it was New Found Glory's "Better Off Dead" and I said, "I gotta do something on my own," so I went on air and I said, "Hey, this is New Found Glory's 'Better Off Dead' and if you don't like me, well I guess I'm better off dead!" And then my boss at the time, he was there that early, he came down the hallway and just looked at me and said, "Is this your first time on the air? You have potential!" and then walked away. So I was like, "OK, this wasn't totally bad my boss liked it which kind of matters." And that was my first time I ever went on air and it just progressed after that.
When did you first begin to develop an on-air personality?
My personal on-air personalities developed uniquely, to put it that way. I used to look up to alot of DJ's such as Adam-12 when he was on WBCN, Big Jim on WFNX, Paul Driscoll on WFNX. As far as my own personality goes, I would listen to some people at WMLN, Jadd Naamani, Kevin Begley, those guys are doing their own thing right now and they're in the field as well. But I started modeling stuff after them and then there was one DJ who co-hosted a show on WFNX that was on from 10PM-Midnight It was called Loveline with Dr. Drew and I developed my intros and outros from this host, his name was Stryker. I developed that from him and I would bring it in, tell the other DJ's who I've been listening to, developed it from there, but another person who had a huge impact on my personality was Alex Durka because I was before him once or twice, and we did a thing called crossover, what a crossover is you introduce the next person who is on after you, you kind of get involved with your show to be a easier transition so people know what's coming on and thinking "Oh these shows are really different, they're pretty much the same thing." So, we would just do crossovers and we started our crossovers 10 minutes early, then 15 minutes, then a half-hour early. And that's kind of where my personality developed and that's how him and I kind of began our careers together, working on many, many shows together. That's where the personalities developed, listening to radio hosts that I looked up to and some people who were not that much older than me, who had the talent that I really felt I could really learn from.
Describe your first on-air radio show @ Curry and the basic format of the show?
That has to be back when I was a freshman. My first show was a morning drive show and the format at the time was adult album alternative which is kind of like soft rock and acoustic rock. I would sit there and we have a ton of stuff in the studio here, but I got used to using my own CD's, I wanted to know that I could do any format if I'm asked to be on-air, I know the CD's that are out there that are mine, I could just do a show with. And there were some CD's that I put aside in the back room and kind of hid from everybody and was like, "This is mine, I'm gonna use this, no one else can use this." The basic format was morning drive and I'm trying to think how I'm different from the other big shot shock jocks out there, how am I different from them and said, "Well I'm in college radio, I'm in my own category, I'm not a format station, this is a multi-format station." So, I took some songs that I liked and I kind of asked around to people and say "Hey, when you're waking up in the morning, and you've got to go to class, got to go to work and you're driving or walking and you just happen to have the station on in one way shape or form, whether you're at your computer or you're listening on the way in or you walk into a building and the station is on, What do you want to hear? Would you hear this song? Would you like this song? Oh yeah, I like this song Eh, that might not be too great." I would ask people who worked at the station what they would like to hear and that's kind of how I developed my own format within a format. Cause it was create your own show pretty much and that's how I developed the format for my show and that was my first show, a morning drive show and I'm kind of glad I had to wake up that early because I had to be ready to deliver the audience what they wanted.
Now, you also work over at Kiss 108 in addition to your job at WMLN, could you describe your position there and what you do?
I'm a board op over there, board-op producer. Those two jobs go hand in hand, so it's kind of difficult to say what my actual title is. Pretty much I'm mostly on Saturday nights from 10PM-2AM and what that is, I show up around 9PM and I load Club Kiss, you hear it every single week, just sometimes there's a different person running the board. But I'm on there from time to time and we have a show, we either have to download it or it's already downloaded for us and what we do is we take it out of the download and we throw it into the program, it's called NextGen so we know to play it. And it's an automated system so you don't have to press alot of buttons, so you listen to Kesha, Rihanna, the new Ludacris song, and then Club Kiss starts and 1 segment is 12 minutes, the other is 24 minutes and it's club music and my job is to monitor and make sure it flows and because I'm also talking to another producer and a host who is actually at a club, and that's for many reasons is to draw people to a club that the host is at and it's to get people in the mood to go out, people want to hear club music and they're like "It's 10:00, that's early for a Saturday night, I want to go out and have fun." So they listen to Club Kiss and get in the mood for it and I'm glad I'm a part of it because I'm in the studio running it, making sure and I'm always telling the host down at the club "Hey you have 10 minutes until your next live break Ok, well what are we talking about? It's open, you talk about whatever you want for 30 seconds" or "Hey you're on in 5 minutes and plug Billy Costa's Top 30 Countdown" and they've done it so many times that they know what they're talking about. And pretty much that's it what I do at Kiss and everything, I'm just the person in the studio making sure it all plays and telling the hosts down at the club "Hey, can you grab this person cause they've got a break in 2 minutes" and that's pretty much what I do in a nutshell.
What are your favorite and least favorite aspects with working in radio?
My favorite aspect of working in radio is knowing that I'm doing something for the community because there are some jobs that are out there like Office Space for example, and you have to do this report, I've seen that movie thousands of times so I can't even tell you what those damn reports that he had to fill out, but those don't matter to you, I'm not going to lose sleep or have my day ruined because a report didn't get filled out. But if you work in that field obviously it's a big deal. But for myself and working in radio, everybody's listening and especially when you work at Kiss 108, the #1 station in Boston or WMLN is a college station that is professionally run but it's free form, we kind of get to play whatever format we want and everything, there are some people telling us "OK format this time" "So you like that format" "You go on at this time." But what I love about it is that I can do a show, people will listen to it because they want to listen to radio. Some people say it's a dying market, I sorely agree with them, but I don't at the same time because people are going to listen to radio no matter what and I'm still going to stand strong behind a industry that I know will strive in the future. Another thing I don't like about it sometimes is the hours. I work some Saturdays and some Fridays and it takes alot out of your social life, especially if it's a beautiful Friday evening or Saturday afternoon. I'm in the building where the windows don't open and I can't get a breath of fresh air unless I physically walk out of the building, we're on the 3rd floor so you gotta think "Do I really want to walk down 3 sets of stairs?" and then you look outside and you just see it's so nice out, and you know you just can't enjoy it. But that's just because I'm doing weekend work right now, that could change in the future, I'm kind of happy where I'm at right now but at the same time, I just want to choose the music that I want to play. At WMLN I can, at commercial radio such as Kiss, I can't choose the music which is kind of unfortunate cause you're like "OK, this song is next" "OK, this song is next" "Oh, this song should really be played." But I have to go through somebody in order to get that done, so that's one of the things I don't really like about it, but I know at the same time you're serving an audience, and the audience expects something so I don't want to be the person that a mob comes after knowing cause I screwed something up. (Laughter)
Do you have any funny outtakes or have any embarrassing moments happen to you while on air?
I do, I do, one is I got somebody who I really wanted, it was on campus, it was a person who always played guitar around campus and I was like "I got to have you on my show, I worked it out with my bosses, please, please, please come on my show." The person's name I can't tell you for the life of me, but I know what he did and the reason I wanted him on my show. So he came in, and he sat down and I had a ringtone for my mother and it was the Cinderella song cause everytime she called me, she wanted me to do something, so I had the Cinderella theme song go off. I didn't put my phone on vibrate or turn it off, i left it on. I filled the interview live on the radio, and my phone goes off and it starts the Cinderella theme and the guy just looks at me, I look at him, and it's not like I can get up and leave or say "Hey, we're in the middle of a song right now, we're right in the middle of an interview." I couldn't get out of it and I said "This is exactly what's happening, I have no excuse for my actions." (Laughter) The second incident was a person I talked about earlier, Alex Durka. I've been on-air with him many, many times, we're like the unofficial co-hosts of each other. I explained earlier a crossover, or sometimes where he would like come on the air with me randomly, he would just say something really awkward to me on air, and I wouldn't have an answer. It's one of those moments where like "Did he just say that?" or "How do I respond to him?" or I'm laughing really hard and I can't respond to this. Those are the things, you get interrupted during something you have no way out of it which has happened to me in the interview, or bringing someone who has a great personality on-air say something you weren't ready for and it's kind of like "Oh, it's really funny but I don't know how to respond to it." So that's an embarrassing thing that has happened to me many, many times.
Did you host any other on-air radio programs while @ Curry?
I've hosted many, many programs. Just to run them down real quick by memory serves me right, I've hosted some morning shows. My freshman year for a semester I hosted some morning shows, then I also hosted these Friday shows both semesters my freshman year because on a Friday, alot of people are going home and everything, but there's people who lived on campus and everything who stayed here and of course it was great for me and everything, I got used to that time frame, so it wasn't that bad to host and everything, I got two semesters which was fine. When my sophomore year came, the people in charge of the time said to me, "Hey, you've done Fridays enough, we obviously trust you, we like what you're doing with your stuff, we want to move you to afternoons a little bit, do you want early afternoons or late afternoons, or you can tend to where you are." So I said to them, "Throw me on early, you know I want to do some early afternoons, I want to get a feel for it to see how I like it." So I got the 1-4PM and it was before Alex Durka and that's how him and I became friends, cause he was on after me and we did alot of crossovers and all that stuff, so we got to know each other that way, but I started doing the 1-4's and it was fun and everything for awhile, but I felt it was too early in the afternoon, I liked the later afternoon show. So when my junior year came, I decided I'll take the 4-7PM and that's when I developed the current show that I'm in. It was the summer before and I was in class one day and I really wanted to come up with a good show and I also wanted a catchy title, something people are going to remember and I'm sitting there and I created the show, The Alternative Modulation and I was like "Alternative Modulation, that's actually a really good name." Little did I know that I was actually doing a play on terms in there. I was on the FM dial but Alternative Modulation is AM so as I called it "The New AM on FM, The Alternative Modulation". I was in the middle of the class and I stood up and go "Genius!" Everybody looked at me like I had 9 heads but that's fine, I'm used to that. (Laughter) I was on air one day, I was just hosting a regular formatted show, alternative rock format show and this was right before the summer. I was sitting there going "If I don't do this now, I'm never going to get the confidence to plug this show or do this show." So halfway during a 4-7, I cracked the mic and I said, "The New AM on FM, The Alternative Modulation" and people were calling in going "Oh, that's a cool title" or like a direct comment like "What the heck are you doing?" "This is the name of the show." "What are you doing?" At that point, I'm like "I either do it now or I don't do it at all." That was my make or break and there were some people who were off campus who I knew who listened to the show, there were some people that were on campus that listened to the show, called in and were like, "Wow, that's actually really clever, that's not a bad title." By the way, I'm working to patent that, so no one can steal that from me! (Laughter)
But there are 2 other shows that I want to talk about, cause they are equally important to the AM on FM. There was a show called He Said, She Said. There was a girl who worked here, her name was Emily Carr, she was music director then she became program director. Her and I hit it right off the bat, we became friends, we had a personality off the air that we thought that can really work on the air. So when she asked me do you want to host a show with me I said, "Oh yeah sure." In my head "It's going to last a week, It's gonna last 2 weeks, a month, I said 'I'm gonna want out'" and said "We have a good off air personality, Will it work on air? I don't know she says it will. We'll try it, see what happens." So we picked Thursdays 7-9PM cause we know that's a perfect time for us because it wasn't early when people were in classes and on a Thursday night, what are people doing on a college campus? I started on a 7 o'clock so we thought, "This is a perfect time." So we did it, we started it and I had a blast doing it, it turned out to be one semester, then we renewed it for a second semester, then a summer came, we continued it into the summer, then we did 2 semesters following into our senior year so we literally did over a year straight of Thursdays 7-9 of the He Said, She Said and it worked out great. Em and I were both producers of it so "I get research, you get research," "Let's choose it this week," No this will work next week," "These we'll have to put in now." It was a 2 hour block so what we did was we would throw in little things like a personal experience from Em, and I would talk about comic books, and that didn't work too much on that show, it did for a little while and then we were kind of losing touch with it, but it worked on another show. Em and I really took that show to heart and we could say that's our show and people have said that in the past, but people know us for this show and the time spot, so we really liked it and we had a great lead in and a great lead out, the person after us was great, so we thought we were in the perfect time and it was on Thursday night, so we knew what people were doing and they knew what they were doing when they were listening to us.
But the comic book stuff worked on another show that I was asked to produce, it was called Hey, Are You Talkin' To Me? The first host was Paul Varga, him and I were friends, I was actually living with him in an apartment on campus and he asked me "Hey, do you want to be my producer?" and I said, "Alright, why not." In my head thinking "It's going to last a week, i'm going to get sick of it," cause I knew what Paul was like on the air, it was a talk show, I've never produced a talk show before, never ran the boards for it, maybe it'll work. And we started doing it, it started at 8AM and we get here at 7, he would bring me a sheet, "Hey, do you want to do this?" "No, I don't want to do that." "Let's take that out." "This will work" or "Hey, let's do this." What it is that Paul would do the talking and I would choose the music for it, so I was kind of like the show's music director and I would throw into "OK, we're going to take a break" and I have Paul talk over some music, so him and I played off each other very well. We decided to give myself a segment on the show, we call it the Geek Freak of the Week cause the show was weekly and Paul has said to me "A lot of movies are coming out and they're comic book movies," and I'm an avid fan of comic books, I have done alot of research on the genre and everything. So I was like, "Why not, let's do this." So we created Geek Freak of the Week where during the show at 9:00 I would go on the air and talk about comic books for 5 minutes and I would have music behind it, We'd have a great intro for it, Paul and I would bounce off each other and that was great, I loved it and actually said to me, "I want to submit our show for an AP award" and I said "OK, Let's do it." We sat down and I said, "Paul, It's your show, you're the host, you choose what you want to do for it." He chose some segments, he ran it by me, we sat down and collaborated and said, "Hey, that might work." So we put it in with the rest of the AP submissions, we sent it in and we actually won the AP award, it was for Best College Talk Show which is a very hard category to be recognized in, so we were thrilled, I gave Paul all the credit because he was the host, I was just the guy pushing all the buttons for you and he said to me, "This is just as much your victory as it is mine." he said the same thing at the radio meetings "This is your victory as well," because WMLN won the award, my show was the one that won, but I submitted under WMLN's name so it was really everyone's award, but I felt great being personally connected to it and also people were listening to it, we were online streaming and that was the first time in my life that I felt, especially with my comic book obsession and super hero nerdiness, meant something to some people because then I thought this show is really out there, it's political, it's pop culture, it's also something for the nerds and geeks out there which is right up my alley, and we had fun with it and then when we had to retire the show and our positions within the show cause we were graduating, we were a little upset by it, but we knew it was time to go and I was involved with a variety of shows, I wasn't set to one genre that alot of DJ's are. I forced myself to be involved in other genres so I could get the experience and say that I had a hand on it, so one day when I went for a job interview, I could say "This is what I did" and "I'm very flexible" and it's worked out great so far, so I'm very proud of everything that I've done within all the genres that I've done.
Now, with all the recent changes in radio, where do you see radio going in the next 5-10 years? Changes? Technological advances?
Unfortunately, I see a dark future for radio, an actual dark doesn't mean bad normally. I see radio in a transitional stage right now kind of back when AM became FM, people were listening to FM more than AM and radio had to reinvent itself. Everything was on AM, everything was going to FM, how do we survive? And that's where music came out, cause television wasn't invented, no people had to listen to radio anymore, they could just watch their favorite dramas or comedies. So, that's when radio said, "We're going to go music" and that was great and now, it's what do you do now? With the invention of the iPod, with the invention of automation, syndication, voice tracking, Can radio survive in the 21st century in the digital age? Parts of me say yes, parts of me say hell no. I feel you will always need somebody to watch what's going on over the air, you're always going to need somebody, they are not going to be paid well though, and alot I see in the future in radio is syndication. Ryan Seacrest has On-Air with Ryan Seacrest, he's on Kiss 108 from 10-2, but the same show is being broadcast on another station somewhere else from 1-4. That's what it is, someone can just create a show, don't have to mention what the weather is like outside, as long as they make it generic. That's where I see radio going is syndication, they aren't really going to have much of a host anymore, unless it's local and that's where I think the hope for radio is, local. You're not going to think inside of 10 years and still gonna have these big stations. I think local radio such as WFNX, there's another station called WXRP, The River which is up by me, this is a Haverhill station. Lower watt stations that are going to be broadcast to a certain area, and that's how I think radio is going to survive, so people are going to have local radio cause people want to know what's going on in their community. Maybe not the bigger stations but I feel they are all going to be all syndication, and of course I work for one of the big stations, so I hope that doesn't happen but then again, you're going to need somebody there. They're not going to get paid well, and that's where I think radio is going towards, syndication and more small local radio stations.
If you could have the opportunity to work at any radio station in the country, where would you work and why?
That's really, really hard for me to answer. I can tell you when I was younger, early in my career, I dreamed of working at WFNX. Then I slowly started to lose it after that cause I started changing directions with what I wanted to do in radio, and then I got really into producing and I said "I don't want to produce, I don't think I want to be on-air, I'll do bits on the air, but not something big." I've been asked this question before many, many times "Where do you want to work?" I would love to stay in Boston, New England, love to. But the station I would love to maybe one day work for would have been WBCN, just because they were The Rock of Boston and that was my thing. But another station I would love to work for if the opportunity arose and if they change their format would be Radio 929. But they're doing really well right now as an automated station, the ratings just came in, they're in the Top 5, that's very rare. And they have no DJ's, they have two people a guy and a girl, and I was actually there when they switched it from WBOS 92.9 to Radio 929, I saw them switch out the signs, and it would hurt me that day to see that happen, but I always said one day I want to work for Radio 929, of course now they're automated, It's like, you can't work for them anymore, unless I was the music director. If I were to work for Radio 929, I would love to be the music director of it just knowing that that's my music, it's the music that I know, I know I could really make a really good playlist, they're true to the fans and they have fans submit playlists and I like that, I like knowing the listeners have a say in what they want to do. As far as United States wise, I haven't found a station yet that I would love to work for. I've been looking through, I go by states, I'm currently in Tennessee right now, I'll stream a station for about 2 or 3 days so I get used to the formats and that's really what it is. I haven't found what station that I really want to work for. But going back to Radio 929, I would love to work for them and I would really love to work as a music director. Maybe that will happen someday, I don't know, it could, I don't know, maybe they'll go back to DJ's and if that's the case then if they get a morning show, I would love to produce that morning show. I would love in some way to be involved in the music aspect or the producing aspect of Radio 929 someday.
What are the differences between working at a college radio station like WMLN and a major radio station like Kiss 108?
Huge, significant differences. There are so many categories I can go through, I'll go through two and that's people being on air. At Kiss 108, we're not just Kiss 108, we're on the same floor as Jam'n 94.5 and Rush Radio 1200AM plus the HD stations they all have. I'm working with alot of different people, different personalities which are good and bad, but it's like that in any environment, it isn't just radio, whether you're in business, finance, construction, you name it, personalities are different. Some people who I work with at Kiss, there are people who are professionals, everything has to be 100% perfect, which is understandable, you want to be perfect on the air, there are often people who are more laid back that I work with, they go "Oh, we missed that break? That's fine we'll do it next time, it's not a big deal." Let's say I'm producing a show for the 1200AM show which I have been doing alot of lately, there was one thing where I didn't make something sound as tight as I could have, and tight as in flowing from one thing to another and I got a call from somebody saying "Hey, make that tighter next time" and another person said, "Hey, you did your best. So you messed up? It's radio, It's in people's one ear, out of the other, and you know what, it's fine dude." And that's what I like about being at a commercial station, they all know that there are some laid back people but then again it's knowing what you have to deliver is something that has to be 100%, you cannot half ass it at a commercial station, it has to be all great, you can't have dead air like what might happen at a college station from time to time, you can't go off the air, you have to make sure things fire at certain times because that's where the money is, we all want to be paid and those are the people who are paying us. So, that is what is at a commercial station. And at a college station, it's a little bit more different, it's much more laid back, we get to choose the music that we want to play on air, we have a music director, program director, and we have the luxury of bringing in our own music, All of the shows are my own CD's, very rarely will I use a CD here at the radio station, I have done before and I probably will, but I rarely do it. And that's what's great about college radio. And also it's public, I get paid from Curry College and the tuition money that gets brought in, once it's divided up into all the other departments, radio gets a certain budget of that, and I get paid out of that budget, but I don't have to worry about firing a certain song or firing a certain PSA at a certain time because I don't have to worry about it, no one's paying me to hear it, so I'm fine with it. Some of the personalities here are much more laid back as well, I can work with different people and jump off ideas better, and be like "You know what, let's try it and see what happens."
If you weren't working in radio, what do you think you would be doing careerwise?
Oh this is unfortunate. (Laughter) There are two possibilities, I mentioned earlier that I work on a farm, that's what I would be doing right now. Granted, it's a family business. I still work there right now, but it's not full time, it's pretty much Memorial Day cause it's our busiest time until 4th of July cause we're trying to get everything put together. I'd probably be doing that, I probably would have gone to school. Originally in my life, I thought I'm never gonna do anything else, the only thing I know how to do is farming. I wasn't great at it but I said I need the direction on how to farm, this is a family business, something I'm destined to do because you know what they say "You're supposed to do what the world is telling you to do." I was working on the farm, but I was listening to the radio. So that was the world telling me you should work in radio, but when I was working on the farm, I said "This is what I have to do, I was born into this, my grandfather was born into this, he had to do it," I was the only boy out of all the grandkids, I had to do this, I had to follow in the footsteps of my uncle and grandfather and I thought about it for the longest time and I said "I don't have to do farming, no one's telling me I have to do it," so my mom was a teacher and I really was great at history. Kids would want to sit next to me in history class so they could copy off of me for tests. I was the kind of kid that just was very quiet in school believe it or not, and would just sit there, I talked to some people when people came up to me and said "Hey, can I sit next to you just so I can get a couple of answers off of you?" And I was like "Alright, well this smart person who people view as smart, worship the ground I walk on were great. Alright, I'll sit next to you, Yeah, I can copy off of you, I don't frickin care." So I thought that I would be a good history teacher one day. Then I thought, "I don't want to be a frickin teacher, That's horrible, I'm going to get underpaid and I'm just going to hate my life." So I decided "Hey, radio is where I want to be" and if it was working in another field, I probably wouldn't have gone down that road and I'd be a completely different person.
What is the most important lesson you've learned in your radio experience?
Don't let your ego ever, ever get in your way. There are people who have egos, I have learned to work with that. It's not easy, It'll never get easy, and the most important thing that I've learned about working with their egos is just you know they have an ego, that's fine but you can't do your job without me, so what does that say about you, what does that say about me? That's the big one I've learned about and there's two other small things: Bring your own headphones to your shift cause you get a sense of this is my show, this is my equipment, these headphones are mine. It's kind of like being an Air Force pilot, they have their helmets, and their sign like in Top Gun: Maverick, Ice Man, My headphones are like that, they have my name on it. One time I've put a sticker on it so it would look like it's mine and I've signed it different ways and I know those are my headphones and I've bought other people headphones cause they're like "Oh, I can't afford these headphones" or I buy them and I'll spruce them up for them and I'll give it to them and see if they like it. The final thing that I've learned is just have fun. You may screw up from time to time, but no one is perfect, people may think they're perfect and they're not. Have fun with it, know that what you're doing is not what everyone else is doing. Just knowing that I can provide everyone else with a service that I'm good at is great.
Thanks once again to my friend Dan Mazella for carving some time out of his busy schedule to do this interview! Look for some more interviews to follow over the course of the next few weeks!
Thursday, May 13, 2010
The National - High Violet
It's viewer request week here on the blog! This week's suggestion comes from my friend Steve MacDonald who recommended The National's "High Violet" which was just released this past Tuesday! Thanks for the tip Steve and here is my review!!
The National have returned with their highly anticipated album, High Violet. Based in Brooklyn, NY but formed in Cincinnati, OH, the band's follow up to the overwhelmingly critically acclaimed Boxer from 2007, the follow up finds the group using the same concrete formula that made their last album so unique and so successful.
The album starts off with "Terrible Love", a extremely beautiful tune that introduces the audience to frontman Matt Berninger's deep and powerful voice, sung in a very distinct baritone. "Sorrow" is a deep, harmonic tune that makes wonderful use of the guitars at hand and Matt's hauntingly beautiful voice taking charge of the song. "Anyone's Ghost" is a melodic and dynamic song that if you hear closely, you can hear background vocals courtesy of Padma Newsome from the band Clogs, who regularly contributes strings, keyboards, and other pertinent arrangements for the band.
As we continue on, we hear "Afraid of Everyone", a melodic and resourceful tune that features wonderful instrumentation all throughout, and best highlights drummer Bryan Devendorf's excellent drumming techniques. The album's first single, "Bloodbuzz Ohio", is a hauntingly beautiful tune that sounds like Matt is channeling Roy Orbison in a superb and sequenced track that features dynamic instrumentation all throughout. "Lemonworld" is a bold and rich tune that does a great job of complimenting each instrument and makes the song stand out from all the rest on the album. My favorite song off the album is "Runaway", a haunting and powerful song that best exemplifies the group's unique blend of instrumentation and harmonies into a sound that is very hard to come by these days.
Closing out the album we hear "Conversation 16", a strikingly rich tune that carries along quite nicely with commendable drumwork and perfectly synced guitars guiding the song along quite nicely. "Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks" is a somber and heart-tugging tune that closes out the album in grand fashion with pristine vocals and rich harmonies to compliment the diverse instrumentation that makes this song stand out from all the others on the disc. It's a rarity these days that we hear an album that has raw and unadulterated vocals that reach out and grab you from the first listen, this album succeeds in doing just that. Too many musical artists these day rely on Auto-Tune to drown out the natural dexterity of their music and thereby reduces it to a synthetic mess. This album is naturally devoid of any of that technological enhancement that would have greatly compromised the musical integrity of the album.
Overall, a cohesive and transcendent album that presents a band in its purest form, continuing to evolve their unique sound towards creative avenues never thought possible while still retaining their bare-bones sound in the process.
Album Score: 4/5
Track Listing:
The National have returned with their highly anticipated album, High Violet. Based in Brooklyn, NY but formed in Cincinnati, OH, the band's follow up to the overwhelmingly critically acclaimed Boxer from 2007, the follow up finds the group using the same concrete formula that made their last album so unique and so successful.
The album starts off with "Terrible Love", a extremely beautiful tune that introduces the audience to frontman Matt Berninger's deep and powerful voice, sung in a very distinct baritone. "Sorrow" is a deep, harmonic tune that makes wonderful use of the guitars at hand and Matt's hauntingly beautiful voice taking charge of the song. "Anyone's Ghost" is a melodic and dynamic song that if you hear closely, you can hear background vocals courtesy of Padma Newsome from the band Clogs, who regularly contributes strings, keyboards, and other pertinent arrangements for the band.
As we continue on, we hear "Afraid of Everyone", a melodic and resourceful tune that features wonderful instrumentation all throughout, and best highlights drummer Bryan Devendorf's excellent drumming techniques. The album's first single, "Bloodbuzz Ohio", is a hauntingly beautiful tune that sounds like Matt is channeling Roy Orbison in a superb and sequenced track that features dynamic instrumentation all throughout. "Lemonworld" is a bold and rich tune that does a great job of complimenting each instrument and makes the song stand out from all the rest on the album. My favorite song off the album is "Runaway", a haunting and powerful song that best exemplifies the group's unique blend of instrumentation and harmonies into a sound that is very hard to come by these days.
Closing out the album we hear "Conversation 16", a strikingly rich tune that carries along quite nicely with commendable drumwork and perfectly synced guitars guiding the song along quite nicely. "Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks" is a somber and heart-tugging tune that closes out the album in grand fashion with pristine vocals and rich harmonies to compliment the diverse instrumentation that makes this song stand out from all the others on the disc. It's a rarity these days that we hear an album that has raw and unadulterated vocals that reach out and grab you from the first listen, this album succeeds in doing just that. Too many musical artists these day rely on Auto-Tune to drown out the natural dexterity of their music and thereby reduces it to a synthetic mess. This album is naturally devoid of any of that technological enhancement that would have greatly compromised the musical integrity of the album.
Overall, a cohesive and transcendent album that presents a band in its purest form, continuing to evolve their unique sound towards creative avenues never thought possible while still retaining their bare-bones sound in the process.
Album Score: 4/5
Track Listing:
- Terrible Love
- Sorrow
- Anyone's Ghost
- Little Faith
- Afraid of Everyone
- Bloodbuzz Ohio
- Lemonworld
- Runaway
- Conversation 16
- England
- Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Minus the Bear - Omni
Seattle, Washington's greatest Minus the Bear are back with their highly anticipated album, Omni. The follow up to 2007's Planet of Ice takes an unexpected turn musically and delves into a plethora of groove based tracks that push Minus the Bear into a whole other stratosphere of indie rock,and with that they deliver the best album of the year so far.
The album starts off with a bang on "My Time", a keyboard and synth infested album that pushes the band into a whole new direction musically. Lead singer Jake Snider shines vocally with his laid back and melodic vocals taking charge of the song and allowing it to travel along at ease. My favorite song off the album is "Summer Angel", an extremely melodic and superb track that fires on all cylinders here with impressive guitar work from Jake and Dave Krudson, who work together brilliantly here along with the rest of the band. "Secret Country" is a slightly more aggressive track, with harder edged guitars and superb drum work courtesy of Erin Tate, showing off a little diversity and mixing up the flavor a bit on the album.
As we enter the album's second half, we come across "Hold Me Down", an extremely melodic number that best exemplifies Minus the Bear's sound, while raising the bar musically and still retaining their influences from their prior albums at the same time, which is very difficult for most bands to accomplish nowadays. "The Thief" is a totally groove laden track that may seem totally out of left field when you first hear it, but it will grow on you after repeated listens with its harmonic keyboards brought to you courtesy of Alex Rose, who also provides backing vocals on this song and various others. "Animal Backwards" is a keyboard and synth based opus that sounds linear in fashion in the sense that it borrows elements from the previous song, "Into the Mirror", and allows it to mold together in the next track without instrumental breaks in between, so that it sounds like one self sufficient song rather than two entirely different songs altogether.
As we begin to close out the album, we hear "Dayglow Vista Rd.", a melodic and spacey jam that displays Jake's vocals once again hard at work here on this one, and the rest of the band compliments each other so well musically with each member bringing something different to the table, and when it comes together it fits along perfectly. The album concludes with "Fooled By the Night", a dramatically slowed down, bare bones effort that displays Jake's vocals in its purest form: raw, beautiful, and dynamic with some earthy instrumentation that allow the song to aid in bringing the album to a close on a low key scale. It's not often that we hear a band who have continually evolved with their first release, and have sounded more and more different with each subsequent album, and have also moved away from the sound on their first release, while still retaining their small and loyal fanbase in the process. It's a very difficult task, but Minus the Bear prove they are successful on accomplishing this fruitful task and continuing to evolve musically as all other artists strive to do.
All in all, a marvelous and well rounded effort from Minus the Bear that shows their transition into a more melodic frame of mind, yet still retaining musical elements of their past releases and fusing them together to create a unique and dynamic effort here. Highly recommended!
Album Score: 4.5/5
Track Listing:
- My Time
- Summer Angel
- Secret Country
- Hold Me Down
- Excuses
- The Thief
- Into the Mirror
- Animal Backwards
- Dayglow Vista Rd.
- Fooled By the Night
Monday, May 3, 2010
Pirate Radio
If you're looking for a movie that revisits the good old days of 60's rock and roll, then Pirate Radio is the movie for you! Set in 1966 on a floating radio ship in the North sea near England, Pirate Radio is a hilarious comedy that shows the funny shenanigans and hijinks that radio DJ's find themselves in constantly while broadcasting from a radio station out in the open ocean.
In the movie, we are introduced to Carl (Tom Sturridge), who is sent to live with his godfather Quentin (Bill Nighy) after he is expelled from school. Quentin introduces Carl to the group of DJ's onboard that includes The Count (Philip Seymour Hoffman), New Zealand native Angus Nutsford (Rhys Darby), the cool yet quiet Midnight Mark ( Tim Wisdom), Dr. Dave (Nick Frost), Simple Simon (Chris O'Dowd), and the downright creepy DJ Smooth Bob (Ralph Brown). Carl is exposed to alot of free-wheeling, beautiful women who visit the ship on every "Splendid Saturday" as The Count refers to it. It's through these women that Dr. Dave introduces Carl to Marianne (Talulah Riley), who Carl immeditely develops feelings for. Simple Simon is also bitten by the lovebug with the stunning and charming Elenore (January Jones). After Simon and Elenore get married on the ship, Simon finds out that Elenore has developed feelings for legendary DJ Gavin Canavagh (Rhys Ifans). The Count along with all the other DJ's onboard, object strongly to Gavin's actions, so The Count challenges Gavin to a game of Chicken where they each climb up to the top if the ship's mast, and whoever travels furthest up the mast wins. The Count breaks his arm after jumping off the mast and landing into the ocean after Gavin calls him Chicken after he jumped in the ocean as well.
Meanwhile, back on the ship, Carl is surprised when Marianne returns to apologize for her actions previously when she slept with Dr. Dave instead of Carl, who just so happens to be Dr. Dave's niece. They make up pretty quickly and spend the night together and Carl winds up losing his virginity in the process, much to the celebration of all the DJ's onboard who just so happen to be outside his room. Carl is surprised to hear from his father that his mother Charlotte (Emma Thompson) is coming to visit the ship for Christmas. Carl confronts his mother and later finds out that Quentin is not his father, but Smooth Bob is his real father after Charlotte had a one night stand with him years ago.
Despite all the fans they have obtained through their radio station, there is an ongoing attempt to shut down Pirate Radio at the hands of Sir Alistair Dormandy (Kenneth Branagh), who simply feels that if you don't like something such as Pirate Radio, you make up a law that makes it illegal. The British government decrees Pirate Radio to be illegal and anyone who is found to be listening to it will face harsh prison sentences. After a failed attempt to shut Pirate Radio down, the government sends out a cavalcade of boats to the Pirate Radio's anchored position in the North Sea, but they come across a fishing boat instead. The Purate Radio ship had activated his engines and has gone on the move to escape from the fleet of ships currently after them.
But the aging engines prove too much for the ship to handle, and the engines fail completely, causing the ship to sink. Eventually, all the crew members manage to escape courtesy of the large group of boats filled with Pirate Radio fans who have been hearing the news of the sinking through the radio and went out to help all the DJ's onboard. The soundtrack features a sensational assortment of rock hits from the 60's including The Kinks "All Day and All of the Night", The Beach Boys "Wouldn't It Be Nice", and The Who's "My Generation", an anthem for people growing up in the 60's and a song that best exemplifies the rebellious youth living in America, England, and in various countries all over the world who were making a bold statement about themselves and not allowing themselves to succumb to the powers that be and allowing a counterculture to take shape and flourish all around the world.
All in all, an enjoyable film that takes a look at an era in music where the world was on the edge of radical change, and the music that was being created at that time was the soundtrack to teenagers lives, who were rebelling against the norms mandated to them by the authority figures who felt threatened by the music simply because it wasn't like anything they have heard before.
Movie Score: 3.5/5
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