After four years, Chris and Greg Crofton's WRVU show "Best of Bread" is toast
by D. Patrick Rodgers @dpatrickrodgers
As a comic and frontman for local cock-rockers The Alcohol Stuntband, Chris Crofton is known for his adept use of vulgarity. But as co-host of WRVU-91.1 FM's The Best of Bread, with his brother Greg as straight man, Crofton was downright...wholesome.
For four years, the Brothers Crofton doled out weekly shenanigans on the Vanderbilt station. For four years, people listened as Chris and Greg promised the new Bonnie "Prince" Billy-Animal Collective collaboration, only to play "Greased Lightning" or "YMCA" instead. Or as they introduced Newt, their fictitious foreign assistant who made mashed potatoes in his bathtub.
And people tuned in. The employees at Hatch Show Print and Grimey's listened. The intercom at McKay's Used Books and Music blared it each Thursday morning. At The Alcohol Stuntband's record release show last May, a farmer from outside Nashville requested Crofton's signature with trembling hands as he expressed what a fan of The Best of Bread he was.
"It's good, clean fun in a weird way," Crofton says. "I just acted a fool and appealed to people of all ages and all different demographics. Sure, I was irreverent. But we were always respectful of the fact that we were lucky to have a show."
That changed the morning of Tuesday, Sept. 1, when the Croftons awoke to find an email from Vanderbilt's Assistant Director of Student Media/Broadcasting Jim Hayes. "This message is to inform you that your show, The Best of Bread, has been removed from the WRVU schedule and you have been dismissed from the station for violation of WRVU equipment policy," the message read. "The removal is effective immediately."
Hayes went on to explain that because Chris Crofton had moved a plastic web camera from its position facing the DJs, the brothers were never again to set foot in the station. Their program would be replaced by automation.
The webcam in question was installed in early August. According to the Croftons, Hayes initially told camera-shy students they could just avert it. But in the ensuing weeks, emails sent to the WRVU DJ listserv spelled out the station's new webcam policy: moving it would result in dismissal.
The Croftons were on the list that received the emails. But because the staff list is frequently inundated with DJ substitute requests, they admit they didn't always keep up with messages. They say they didn't know warnings this severe were now sent to the whole list, and they failed to see them.
Greg and Chris were granted a meeting with the station heads on the Friday following the show's removal. While student General Manager Mikil Taylor wasn't present, Hayes and Director of Student Media Chris Carroll made it clear that this was a zero-tolerance policy. As there was no dispute that the Croftons moved the camera, there would be no second chances for The Best of Bread.
Reached for comment, Hayes referred the Scene to an email statement from Taylor: "No matter their previous show history, any show would have been removed for the same violation."
In an interview with the Scene, Crofton claims that Carroll told him, "I don't know why I have community DJs, because, to be frank, they've become an ass-pain for me." When Greg Crofton asked why, if community DJs were such a burden, they weren't simply removed from the air entirely, he claims Carroll responded, "You may be seeing the beginning of that right here."
Carroll says there is no movement afoot to remove community DJs. "Nobody's getting rid of community DJs," he told the Scene in a lengthy conversation. Carroll confirmed that The Best of Bread was dismissed solely because the Croftons violated a zero-tolerance equipment policy. "It had zero to do with their content," says Carroll. "That was absolutely not a consideration." He declined to discuss the particulars of the meeting, only to say the details were "inconsequential and irrelevant."
Except to the hosts. "I was hurt," says Chris Crofton. "I have always cared about that show. I know it's a big deal to have a show where you reach that many people. I'm sad about the whole thing."
On Sept. 10, WRVU posted the semester's updated schedule, with several slots filled by "DJ HAL Automation Mix." Most conspicuously, automation runs at 9 a.m. on Thursday mornings—the Croftons' former slot.
Chris and Greg Crofton say they may pitch The Best of Bread to a different station. But for now, the city and WRVU have lost one of their most distinctive shows. Even so, the Croftons remain grateful to everyone who stopped by for a slice.
"The main thing I want to get across," says Chris Crofton,
"is a 'thank you' to the listeners. I want them to know how
appreciative we were that they tuned in."
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