Texas Radio (Sans big Beat), Zen And The Art Of Quarter Hour Maintenence, And Solid Gold Stupid In The Great White North

More Stories: Years ago I was at SXSW with some friends who owned a FM station that was heard in Austin but had studios in a town some 20 miles down the road. We took a drive one day to see the place, and on the way I came up with an idea for a format. What could be more perfect in Texas I thought than a station called "Kay Bob". Being the programing whiz kid that I was, I came up with a KBOB format on the spot: All Willie + Waylon and the Boys...and all the DJs would be named Billy Bob, or Bobbie Ray, or Bobbie Sue or..well you get the idea. After pulling into the town (complete with hitching posts and good ole' boys on the courthouse steps), I reconsidered the likey reception a long haired wise guy from MoTown might get pitching a format in those parts. Sorry Hos, no KBOB ever happened.



I had another long standing radio theory that involved a simple formula: divide the total power in watts by the number of times a day you play Stairway To Heaven, then multiply by the number of trailer parks in your Metro.... and you should get pretty close to your average quarter hour rating. My stupid formula made as much sense as most of the nonsense I heard from consultants over the years. I remember Lee Abrams telling us once to "be like the mafia on the phones". I still don't know what the fuck that meant.



Years later I gaped in wide wonder when I heard a Windsor Canada station try a Motown Gold format with 20% Can Con ( Canadian Content). That meant every fifth song had to be from a Canadian Motown artist. Go ahead and name one......... I rest my case eh. They would have been better off as CBOB.

Cindy Lou Who, , Strange Scenes Outside The Train Station, And Rage On The Via Vittorio

There is a woman I see in the cafeteria of my government office building just about every day. She is there in the morning, and there until the cops kick her out at night. I call her Cindy Lou Who because she kinds of looks like a Dr Suess character. Cindy sits alone engaged in animated conversation with no one at all. She always seems to be deeply engaged, and appears to be listening to a frequency only she can hear. I always want to say something to her, to tell her that the rest of us see her, know she is here...but I don't. And I'm not sure anyone else really notices her much. Cindy Lou is just another casualty of the American Dream: alone and crazy and passed by.

Outside Union Station in downtown DC there is always a cast of whack-a- loons, nut jobs, and Lou Who's worthy of an all start roster for crazy folks. One guy is there almost every day yelling about the government ripping off his social security check. Often when I come up the escalator from the Metro stop there, the first thing I hear is this mans deep booming voice saying " The mothefucking US fucking government stole my motherfucking check". I love watching the tourists with small kids blanch and look stunned as they hear Check Boys profane tirade. Welcome to DC motherfuckers. I once witnessed a guy go to the trouble of dragging a nice portable amplifier with speakers and a microphone and everything so he could preach from the bible. The only problem was, he preached in French. Tres' Whoopsie Msr. NumbNuts. 

I thought of the French preacher when I was in Rome last year. We were riding an open top sightseeing bus past Harry's Bar on the Via Vittorio Veneto, when I saw an Italian man on the corner raving and gesturing and looking for all the world like Cindy Lou's Roman cousin. I realized in a flash that there is something more or less universal about crazy. in spite of the language barrier I instantly recognized this guys rant: it seems that mothefucker Silvio Berlusconi stole the dudes check. Ciao baby!.

God and Dog At Yale, A Timely Rebuke, Cool Gardens

Religion... always a fun topic. Watching Karen Armstrong the other night with Bill Moyers got me thinking about how best to illustrate the insanely bad theology of most American self styled 'christians'. Try this on: I love my Dog more than your 'god' loves you. No matter what my wonderful mutt ever does I would never hurt him, nor wish him anything but joy. According to the theology preached and pounded into the heads of millions of unthinking yahoos everyday in this country, their 'god' will send people to torment for all eternity if the folks don't say the right magic words, and agree to the right set of propositions. That's insane. And monstrous. Such theology demonstrates far less love than any dog lover has for his or her pet. However, the above formula is exactly where the 'christian' doctrine of "no salvation outside the church" leads. Once in the nineties I was so broke I took a job writing commercials for WMUZ, the 'christian' station in Detroit. All in all they were very nice people, a few true believers, and quite a few just there for the job. One time I was asked to write a spot for some local car insurance guy who wanted to tell people that the bible says you have to have car insurance. I asked the guy to show me where it says that since I could not find the chapter titled 'The Gospel of Saint Geico". Another day I was having lunch with one of the salesman who informed me that I was going to hell because I didn't believe in the whole 'Jesus is my personal savior' nonsense. I then asked if my Jewish wife was also condemned. He smiled and said: "Certainly". OK I said, 'what about the six million in the Shoah who went up the chimneys, what about all those children...did your 'god' send them straight to hell because they didn't believe what you do?" He said that yes, he guessed that must be so. I tried to point out that he was expressing the same philosophy as Charlie Manson who famously said, "Hitler was just leveling the karma of the Jews"... but since I was a bit hot and said something along the lines of: " You fucking people are nuts”. I drew a loud 'rebuke in the name of Jesus' from one of the church ladies in the lunchroom. Oh well..So much for the finer points of theological debates. I don't worry much about the big existential questions anymore. The Zen guys would say that such inquiries are " inappropriate" and I think they are right. I do look forward to one day meeting Him, be it in the cool of the evening or the morning garden. And when I do I’ll be walking my dog with 'nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah'.

Janice and Uncle Ted Pop Questions, Eric's Not Here, Joey Nods, Ch Ch Changes, and Lasting Effects

More strange tales: In 1980 I was working at W-4, an old funeral home in downtown Detroit converted into a rock & roll station. Howard Stern was the morning man, Mark McKewen was the music director, and I did late nights. For whatever reason we seemed to attract a lot of groupies, My favorite was a woman who called herself 'Clitoria'. Her real name was Janice, and she was a hot blooded (literally) Irish Catholic girl who was determined to screw as many DJ's as possible. I met Janice one night when I came into the studio and found her under the console table lending a hand to the guy on before me. We had a gay program director back then who didn't like me much, and liked me less after a party at my house one night. Clitoria was pretty drunk when she decided the thing to do was sit on the guys lap and see if she could get his motor revved. When she noticed he was ... non responsive, Janice announced in a VERY LOUD voice: "What are you, some sort of Fag?". I got transfered to the overnight shift the next week. Whoops. Speaking of questions, I was in the studio one day when Ted Nugent asked our beautiful afternoon lady (my friend Lynne Woodison) if she would like an "oral pap test"... radio silence followed.
There was another groupie who would ring the front bell wearing a long fur coat (with nothing on underneath) and ask if Eric Clapton was there. I would always say that he'd just left, but might be back any time..so perhaps she'd like to come in and er..take her coat off. 
Also that year I recall doing an on air interview with the Ramones. When I asked Joey how the tour was going he just nodded. More radio silence.
W-4 changed me in many ways, I met Nicki with her ribbons and bows in that place, and I was working there when my mother died. I was not the same when I left that house of ghosts as I was when I arrived, but as Clitoria would have said: It was a fuck of a good ride.

Kiss Me On The Bus, Playing Star Again ( You Know I Had It In The Ear Before) and The Opposite Of Zen

I was about 17 when I met Jan on a long bus trip. She was a combination of Sissy Hankshaw, Goldie Hawn, and Annie Hall.. and before the ride was over she had her tongue in my ear and I was in love for the first time in my life. Jan used to come over to my house in her Burger King uniform after work, and we'd lay on the couch under the Christmas lights and make out to Simon and Garfunkel. I thought that was as good as life got until I spent the night with her at her aunts cabin in Port Huron that summer. We sat on the sand watching the night freighters, then danced up the hill, and inside Jan lit a candle and played " Will you still love me tomorrow" while we slow danced and her eyes glowed warm. Later amid the sand and the sheets and the moonlight she whispered that she was glad we were lovers. Jan had told me that the affair would end when she left for college, and it did; my heart stayed broken for years. On the last night we were together she gave me a silver tankard. I still have it somewhere, but the sip I took from her loving cup keeps me a little buzzed even now.

I have another strong picture in my mind of a Limo ride some years later with my daughters mother Gwen. Gwen must have been about 19 then, with big blond hair, bright red lips, great tits and fuck me hard high heels. She liked to pop gum and talk smack, and she was a tough sexy Detroit grrrrl. Anyhow we took a big black Limo one night with some friends to see a Bob Seger show downtown, and I still remember a scene as we drove to the backstage door. As we glided down the final block, I looked out my window and saw a parking lot attendant giving me the air guitar motion, as if to ask: "Are you guys with the band?'. Since I didn't know a universal hand signal for " No I'm the late night DJ on W-4" I just nodded yes, and the guy smiled wide as we passed. Sometimes you just have to give the audience what they want. 
A couple of other stage memories come to mind: once I was asked to go out at the Joe and tell 20,000 Ozzy fans he was running late. As I stood there blinded by the Supertrooper I could not see the crowd, but I sure as shit could feel the bottles whizzing past my head in the dark. I turned and ran for the back line, and fortunately a roadie grabbed me before I went 20 feet down to become rock and roll road kill on the cement floor. I was blinded another time while introducing the Psych Furs and as I did my rap I suddenly felt an arm around my shoulder and Richard Butlers tongue in my ear. That got me to shut up and exit stage right in a hurry.

I'm not that interested in being a star anymore..at least not most days 'cause it's soooo not zen....but I am at the age where everything reminds me of something. A long black car can set me dreaming, 'a song on the air with a love you line' makes my ear twitch, and every-time I walk our beach in Carolina and see the lights of the ships under the star light... I taste something I sipped long long ago.

Losing My Religion, Wild Dreams and China On The Line, and fun with the RCMP.

When I was 16 I spent a weekend at Sacred Heart Seminary at a retreat for men who were considering the Priesthood. Sacred Heart is an old collection of buildings on the west side of Detroit with an alabaster statue of Christ on one of the corners of the property. During the riots in '68 someone painted the face of the statue black, and it was still that way 3 years later when I arrived. The overall effect was that of a white man in black face, and so an uninformed visitor might get the impression that we were worshiping Al Jolson. Everyone was talking about becoming a Bishop except for one long haired dude in the corner who I realized was Dan Carlilse of the legendary radio station WABX. Me and Dan ended up cruising around the neighborhood drinking brandy and talking about how fucking cool David Bowie was. Neither Dan, nor I ever became priests but I did (years later) end up on the air at WABX. I was too stupid to know that you couldn't get a job in a major market with no commercial experience, so.... I got the job. The Program Director who hired me was a five foot six ex top forty jock named China Jones. After I did a live audition for him, he took me in the hall and said: "Ok, I'm gonna give you the job, but remember that I keep my DJ's under my thumb". I almost asked him if he stood on a phone book when he did , but in a rare instance of good judgement I kept my mouth shut and got the gig. My first show was on New Years Eve (they let the new guy do the midnight shift so the rest of the crew could party) and I thought I was doing OK until about five minutes to midnight when a very drunk China Jones called me on the hot line. China was at a very loud bar calling from a payphone and shouting instructions to me as I held the phone up to one ear, had my headphones on the other ear, and tried to deliver his New Years message word for word like some bizarre UN translator. I'm sure I sounded like a complete fucking moron, but I learned as time went by that the average 'ABX listener was usually way too stoned to notice. ( Let alone on New Years Eve!) Our nickname for the station was "narcotic radio" ..and if you can picture a set of offices with really really loud Iggy Pop music playing, and Scarface size mounds of blow on the General Managers desk.. well you begin to get the picture. We even had some whacked out lesbian cheerleaders that would come to our softball games to chant: " A Root, A Root, A Rooty Toot Toot..." Anyhow the WABX slogan was "The Station Of Your Wildest Dreams" And it was.
Years later I was in New Orleans on my birthday and as we walked around the Vieux Carre wham..right in front of me was the big statue of Satchmo, which for all the world reminded me of that west side Jesus in Detroit. That same day I got a call from my partner to get on a plane to Toronto for a video shoot. As it happened ( CBC pun intended) Pope JPII was in town and a TV station in LA had hired our company to provide a crew at the last minute for a Popeload of cash. The plan was that the crew from MoTown would meet me at the Holiday Inn with the gear. I reluctantly said goodbye to my N'aw lins girlfriend and hopped on a flight to Chicago then connected to T.O. Since it was my Bday and all, I figured what the hell, and hit the in flight booze pretty good... insuring that by the time I got to airport customs that evening I was pretty well smashed. The Dudley Do Right dude asked me the purpose of my trip to Canada (eh?), and I answered: "We're here to shoot the Pope". Whoops. The only thing I could have possible said worse would have been to call Don Cherry's mother a whore (who was busy sucking off Tim Horton). The Mounties thought they had their man, and for the next two hours I sat in a small windowless room trying to explain why I lived in Detroit, but was coming from New Orleans on a plane from Chicago with no crew and no TV gear to do a "shoot". When the RCMP eventually figured out that I was harmless, they cut me loose about midnight. My day was capped by the cab driver singing "Happy Birthday" all the way to the hotel in his thick Pakistani accent hoping for a tip..while all I could focus on was the plastic Jesus on his dashboard. I almost asked him if he had a black magic marker......

Photo Phun

One of these men is a low down no good dirty pimp. The other just runs a whorehouse.

The Bird Strikes Out, Fear & Loathing in Jackson , An Epiphany Outside Dallas, and Leaving The World Behind.

I have decided that I've reached the time of life to begin writing my story. I often think of the dying U.S. Grant writing his memoirs on his porch, shivering under a blanket, trying to beat the reaper. I'd rather get a head start, because you never know what's next... which leads me to this story:

I first began to suspect that things might not quite work out the way I planned during the 1976 Baseball All Star Game, when Detroit's rookie phenom , Mark 'The Bird" Fidrych didn't live up to expectations. Something in the back of my mind told me that this would prove be an important lesson.When my mother died in 1980 I remember thinking that if only the Bird hadn't flamed out, maybe she would never have gotten cancer. Nutty? Yes, but grief twists the mind, (and a steady diet of booze and blow may not have helped).

I didn't hear that back of the head voice again until 1984 when we flew into Jackson Mississippi to shoot a TV story on a kid named Scooter. We bounced and banged and though the sky on a stormy night in a 727 pounding down scotch and flirting with a girl who thought we were from CBS. One thing led to another, and she managed to get her brother to open up his steak house after hours so we could get a meal after landing late, and by the time the all night party was over we were hung over, broke, and late for the morning call at an elementary school to tape a kid named Scooter whiz around in a wheelchair. While scooter whized I kept running to the boys bathroom to barf (great example to the kiddies, but fuck 'em if they can't take a joke). Meanwhile it dawned on all of us that we had blown our entire weeks hotel and meal per diem money on the previous evenings whiskey and pussy pallooza and were therefore in some danger of testing the reaction of a Mississippi sheriff to some Yankee TV assholes who welsh on a hotel bill. As it turned out we ended up borrowing a go cart from a kid named Irving to shoot a tracking shot, and then got the bright idea to wire the home office in Ann Arbor and ask for money for rental of the " Irving 9000 Mobile Camera Support System". Thank God the nice old lady in the logistics office wouldn't have a know a Mobile Camera Support if one landed on her head, so she sent us a quick $3500 to get out of Dodge without Deputy Dawg being needed. On the day we were leaving, as we drove out to the airport saying what a cool town Jackson had turned out to be and how we should for sure come back again soon and look up the girls we had met... I knew..just knew, that I would never return. I think there have been a lot of 'Jackson's" in my life, probably for all of us there are moments when we realise we won't pass this way again, won't kiss those lips again, won't hear that voice again. Such is the beginning of wisdom I guess, at least its serves as a reminder that the clock is ticking.

Later that year we did a few days in the Dallas area, and after posing for pictures on the Grassy Knoll ( pointing to the fence like the shots just happened, the idea was to put the photo on a shelf and if someone saw it refuse to answer questions), we went out to a convent near Fort Worth to do a story on the nuns there. The women were Discalced Carmelites in a cloister so it was a rare privilege to set foot inside with the sandal sisters. I noticed a young sister who was beautiful in way I had never seen before. I asked her what she did all day, and she showed me how she spent eight hours a day on her knees in prayer with her arms splayed out and face turned to heaven. I was stunned, and all I could think to ask her was: "Why do you do it?" I have never forgotten her answer. She said: " I pray for those who can't or won't pray for themselves". I don't remember her name, and I only spoke to her for a minute or two, but I remain convinced that good woman on her knees has far more to do with the future of the world than all the kings and princes on tee vee every night.

In a lot of nursing homes I have seen people in the process of leaving this world, its as if they are packing their bags, and getting ready to let go. For the most part I find the prospect almost unthinkable.... until I remember Jackson... and then I realize that I started leaving long ago; and when the good sisters call I may find that my bag is already packed.