Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Cream List of Community DJs Whose Shows Will Stay on WRVU
Posted by Steve Haruch on Tue, Dec 8, 2009 at 3:50 PM
Good news and bad news today as we found out which community DJs will be staying on the airwaves at WRVU and which will not, as the new VSC board-mandated cap on "non-affiliate" DJs (more here and here) was applied for the first time to the 2010 spring semester show selection. Station general manager Mikil Taylor sent an email with the list of 25 DJs to the WRVU listserv, saying, in part:
If you made it, congratulations! If not, then please remember that we will keep your application on file in case someone leaves, and that there could be a different system altogether next fall that makes it easier to get on the air. So, have heart, and keep doing your best.
I imagine it's hard for the hosts of Nashville Mixtapes and Needles + Pins--two shows I rather enjoy and which were not approved--to "have heart" and do their best, especially considering that, as far as I can tell, no one knows what criteria the board used to choose the 25 spots. Seniority? Cleverness of show name? Number of Animal Collective spins divided by shoes plus the square root of God? No idea. Emails to Taylor and board members had not been returned at the time of this post, but we'll keep you updated if we hear more.
Taylor also noted in his email that community DJs who won't be returning next semester have the chance to do one last show, and asked them to be nice. Those who made the cut are:
Carey James Balboa, Columbian Party Cartel
James Barnett, Misplaced Tracks
Tim Buchanan, Old Timey Funky Fresh Jams
Douglas Casmus, Seagulls Over Nashville
Doyle Davis, D-Funk
Abby Easton, Assorted Fruits & Cheeses
Andy Fellows, The Backchannel Broadcast
Randy Fox, Hipbilly Jamboree
Steve Greer, Spoonful & Spoonful of Bluegrass
Ichabod, Out Ov The Coffin
Kels Koch, Hipbilly Jamboree
Heather Lose, The Honky Tonk Jukebox
Anna Lundy, Curse of the Drinking Class
Mary Mancini, Liberadio(!)
James Miller, The Funky Four Elements
Chris Nochowicz, The Future Of Jazz
Freddie O'Connell, Liberadio(!)
Father Parthenios, Sacred Hymns
Tom Priesmeyer, Swingshift
Dave Rapetti, Kynd Veggie Show
Zeda Riggs, The Zee Train
Janet Timmons, Out The Other
Lauren Tingle, The Delta Groove
Brad Wilson, Ready Steady Go
Drew Wilson, Loud Love
Comments (46)
Showing 1-46 of 46
...have heart and keep doing your best.
But also, fuck off and stay out of my way. Good shows made it, good shows got axed. Damn unnecessary shame.
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Congrats to those who made it and I'm sorry for my fellow colleagues who didn't. I am most grateful for the privilege of sharing the airwaves with a wonderful, talented group of people. And I'm very thankful for all the great people I've met at WRVU.
the airwaves are mine! my automaton associates have already conquered commercial radio with voice tracking and automation. now i have managed to remove the most pesky carbon-based units from this college station. prepare to receive my awesome emo transmitions, elitist nashville listeners. mwah ha ha ha!
I don't see the Magical Mystery Show on this list. Now I can finally set my radio to NPR and not worry about changing the station.
man, i loves mary and freddie, and kels and randy, but why do they take up 2 slots each as opposed to 1. this is some bcs bullshit. it should be by show not by number of dj's. shit, back in the day during "notes from the underground", it wasn't unheard of for 20 drunk punks bringing down records too play. waiting in line to play some angry samoans. i miss kon and crash. godspeed catbeast!!!
AndyNashville, Music City USA hasn't been on since last Spring. Cowboy Anton now lives in Memphis.
We're glad to be back on but, yeah, the 25 DJs, as opposed to 25 shows things leaves me scratchin' my head.
And as for the Cat Beast, the Hipbilly Jamboree is open to appearances by special guest stars, especially of the feral feline type...
The fact that We Own This Town got cut is utter bullshit. Independent music has no better friend in Nashville than Mr. Joe Baine Colvert. There is a lot of unused space on WRVU's airwaves and this move to make more room for student DJ's makes no sense. I love D Funk, Curse of The Drinking Class and Out The Other, but I think a boycott is in order. Fuck you Vanderbilt.
I'm a democrat, but Liberadio makes me wanna sway to the right. Can't really explain it.
Wow Vanderbilt way to KEEP DISAPPOINTING! I was pretty let down by the dismissal of Best of Bread, but they just keep going downhill with. Nice arbitrary choosing of shows that most of us don't care about....
This sucks.
I will no longer support you WRVU. I will no longer listen. I will no longer attend your benefits. I will no longer perform in your benefits. I will remove you from the memory button on my radio.
I will forget you exist.
What about Nashville Jumps? Is that show a community show? I love listening to that show on Friday mornings at work! Gets me ready for the weekend! I will miss WOTT also!
Yeah, I only just realized that. MARY AND FREDDIE OF LIBERADIO(!) COUNT AS TWO SEPARATE COMMUNITY DJS OUT OF THE 25. THAT IS THE MOST BULLSHIT THING IN THE WHOLE WORLD, AND I LIKE THEM A WHOLE WHOLE LOT.
No more Nashville Jumps? Pete is by far one of the best DJ's on the air and if Vandy is concerned about students learning how to be a DJ, they should require them to spend some more time listening to his show. He is extremely knowledgable about his genre of music, knows when to make a witty comment, and when to just shut up and let the music play! also, capping the community involvement at 25 DJ's and not 25 shows is completely bogus!
signed, disgruntled listener
Has anyone compiled a list of shows that got cut? I'm sure WRVU must have such a list, but I don't blame them for not wanting to share it.
Americana, Surface, PocketNinjas, NerdProm, WakeUp, HurlCity, CatBeast, MysteryShow, ToiletWine, WOTT, PopPretense. you are loved and will be sorely missed. i feel like i've lost a best friend. these new student djs will have huge shoes to fill.
One noteworthy part of Mikil's email to the staff which was not included in the excerpted section of this post:
"You will notice that there is time for everyone who is not on the list to do a final show before the interim schedule begins. I don't believe the board is comfortable with letting people on who know they won't have a show soon, so I'm really sticking my neck out here and trusting you guys. Please be civil and do the best show possible, and remember that there could be a shot at a show in the future. Any crazy stuff that happens will only make the board less likely to approve more community members later."
The VSC wanted us to have even less notice than we already have about whether or not we're getting cut. I.e., Mikil is making a HEROIC GRACIOUS GESTURE in telling us WHETHER OR NOT WE'RE EVER ALLOWED TO DJ AGAIN, because we're not even allowed to know according to the VSC until the very last moment possible.
For the love of all that is holy, I hope the community DJs who got cut, but have one last show for the semester will do like Mikil said and keep it civil and go out on a good note. He's exactly right in saying that if a community DJ throws a shenanigan on-air it would only destroy not only their chances at getting a slot in the future, but also destroy the chances of the board loosening their stranglehold on community shows/DJs.
By looking at the list of approved shows, it looks like they made some good choices as far as what shows have the biggest impact on the Nashville community and shows that specialize in a certain kind of music. That's a good criteria. However, there are a few shows I've never even heard of and to make that more awesome, somebody told me one of the approved DJ's is dating one of the members of the student staff. So does anyone know if Mikil is single and if he's into dudes? If so, I called him first.
Commodity Fetishists morphed into Viva Vaia a while back, when Brian and Elizabeth decided to concentrate on Brazilian music.
I couldn't agree more with Mr. Cross. There is a chance for the tide to swing back to reasonable at WRVU, and a bunch of disgruntled "non-affiliates" going off on the air would pretty much crush any opportunity for the board to realize they made a mistake.
exactly what have any of the non-affiliates done to make you and mr. cross or mikil for that matter think they would do such a thing? i think all the wrvu DJs that i know and those that have commented openly on the cream threads have handled themselves with grace and aplomb. i would hope that at least one or 2 of the DJs being shown the door would diplomatically challenge the decisions of their overlords on the air and help spark a true debate about the merits and responsibilities of a 10,000 watt station broadcasting throughout the entire nashville area. if it's just a student lab for gaining experience for vandy kids, then reduce the signal to a campus-only range. when vanderbilt puts that strong signal out over the entire community, they engage that community and cannot ignore it. this decision is an attempt to rid the station of community involvement IMHO. the illogical nature of the VSC board decision (25 DJs instead of 25 shows? huh?) exposes the hidden agenda. if no one fights back, the wrvu we've loved and supported all these years may very well cease to exist.
Thanks for the such kind words about We Own This Town Radio, gang. The news came as quite a shock, especially since there isn't another purely local show on the air. But sadly there's nothing that can be done at this point. There's gonna be a small, but undeniable void in my life after this week.
Here's hoping that another DJ will step up and continue down that path Matt Hearn and I have been forging over the years with WOTT, Holly House and Indie Ghetto. Any takers?
It's been a wonderful two and a half years serving y'all at WRVU. I am so grateful to have had the opportunity. Here's to 2010.
Bless,
Joe Baine Colvert
We Own This Town
ps
Do tune in tomorrow night for my Top 10 of 2009. It will be the last show. Thursday 10-11pm.
I moved here from Metro Detroit in 91 & WRVU's been the only station worth a flip on the dial, other than the BEEB on NPR. Let me get this straight - university's radio station had a ton of empty slots disguising as dead air that they couldn't get their own students to fill. Enter local folks that love to share their varied taste in toonz & decided to offer their time to fill said slots. Now, despite a void in clamor from said students to fill all available slots, dedicated folks w/ toonz unceremoniously dumped off the air?!?!
This punk@$$ kid, Mikil, sounds like a real tool - about as much class as an unemployed adjunct! A sad step backwards in community relations from Vandy - like the bad ol' "Bubble" daze...
We also didn't make it...ah well. It's hard to get love from Nashville Cream, much less the VSC, when you have a 2AM time slot. We wanted that slot to keep out of the way in case something like this happened.
Of course, something did happen...and we got the bump anyway. The underscheduled hours that students never want also apply to the cap. (whuh??)
We don't take it personal. There were plenty of awesome shows that got the bump, and we had plenty of e-staff on our side. The decision just ultimately wasn't down to them. They were put into a position of selecting based upon a two digit number.
Congratulations on all those who made it. I know it would be so bizarre to hear a WRVU without the hipbilly jamboree or d-funk. D-Funk used to get me trough some rough kitchen shifts once-upon-a-time. Also, the folks a liberadio are the nicest folks. The Magical Mystery Show! had the honor of following them last Summer, and we know the only reason we got all of those phonecalls was because people left the dial on after Liberadio.
The Magical Mystery Show! will live on!!! We will be podcasting our show, and shows after this weekend, will be done on our own time and possibly veer towards more goofy/comedic elements. (I stress goofy.) We would love to come back to WRVU someday and hope the VSC soon realizes that they could have done this perhaps a bit more sensibly. Until then go to www.magicalmysteryshow.podomatic.com if you are interested in what at least one "dumped" community show is doing.
Our final show will be This Saturday (Late Fri. nite) from 2AM to 4AM. We dedicate it to the nighthawks and the drunks (who call us requesting the opposite of whatever we're playing). Thanks to all who supported us.
Oh...one other thing.
I'm very happy that VIVA VAIA is a student show and will still be around.
If you haven't heard it yet, do yourself a favor and tune in...or check out the archives.
Community also retains Seagulls over Nashville, and Curse of the Drinking Class...so it aint all bad.
Protest if you want...but there are still a handful of great shows out there you don't wanna miss.
Here's the list of the shows that got cut:
Best Show Ever
Big Poppa’s Underground
Cat Beast Party
Dia Logos
Everything Else
Genre Blender
Global Eclectic
Hi to Mom & Dad
The Inconsiderate Mixtape
Jazz Plus
Laser beam & Hurl City
Magical Mystery Show
Nashville Mixtapes
Needles & Pins
Night Goat
Pickled Beats
Pimp’s Jukebox
Pocket Ninjas
Positive Spin
Say Yes! to Music
Shalom Nashville
Surface Underground
The Switch is On
Toilet Wine
We Own This Town
That’s 25 shows, 27 DJ’s
And just to make things more confusing for me personally, though i got cut, it looks like my trainee this last semester got a new show. This isn't to speak ill against him, he's a great guy and he'll have a great show. I'm just confused.
SHALOM NASHVILLE GOT CUT.
THIS IS AN OUTRAGE.
Shalom Nashville. Seriously?! They've been around for AGES. They play a genre no one else plays and know a shit ton about it, too. Their show is interactive and innovative and awesome. They DO NOT deserve to have been cut.
I am officially most pissed about WOTT and Shalom Nashville, secondarily about Magical Mystery Show (especially since no Vanderbilt student is going to take that slot anyway, not that there was room to even say that in the application to the VSC but whatever) and my own show.
Ugh.
I wasn't sure if Shalom Nashville was community or student. Now I know.
That is a unique show that will be missed.
Also my condolences to DJ Susan and the Magical Mystery Show! and all other cut DJs
Your modesty amongst the trash is admirable.
very glad to see that Pete, as a Vandy alum, is not affected and that Nashville Jumps hasn't been cut! still wondering how they are going to fill all the dead air left by the cuts.
Dear Theresa,
Catch up. Pete made it very clear that he wouldn't be cut from the outset, and I will be pumping out shitty, pre-programmed emo jams for your impressionable children to groove to. Once again, catch up, and machines shall soon rule the world! 010110000!
Just did my last show (1 hr of my regular time and 2 hours as a sub) and was touched by all the calls.
Thank you, Nashville listeners. You've been a terrific audience!
Mariah
(former Community DJ, Global Eclectic)
I'm really sad to see Needles and Pins go. Guess I better get the iPod up to date...
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