Fresno Famous

'...Frank for Saaaaale, Frank for Saaaaale... who's prepared to pay the
price, for Frank, tunes and fire-spinning paradise...

-Frank...

For

....saaaaaale..'

(sung to the tune of 'Love for Sale,' y'all)
-where's Benny Hill when you need him?

So... having showered up for the event, (hey, I'm supposed to go on with DJ
Soreath.. total music goddess,) I navigate the ancient F-250 through the
tree lined, (TREE LINED!... so that's where they keep 'em???!) Streets of
Cal State Fresburg... reading the directions FrankD emailed me about ten
minutes earlier, trying not to run over college co-eds...
(or as it turns out..college-high school co-eds...)

I call DJ MGarcia...
MGarcia (known as Matt, or presumably as 'Matthew' to his Grandmere and
Priest),
comes walking across the lawn,
talking into his cel,
while I'm walking across the lawn talking into mine...
(It's like the 'Wish You were Here Album cover,,, but nobody's on fire... (a
good thing.)
Fire comes later...

We all look different in person than on the radio...
For me?
the radio has always put on about 200 lbs... (I have a 20lb voice...)
M.Garcia is one huge smile. '..dude, it's so nice to meet you... (we both
say.)
-This kid is so cool he could even get Donald Freakin' Trump to shake hands
with him... (The Donald don't do the grip thing...)

We yak...
then suddenly he remembers the parking thing that has to go in the window...
'...UH... UH...
-oh man, could you go stand by your truck for a minute?
I need to go get your parking pass, the cops are really really, you know,
REALLY here, and if they don't see a sticker...'
'..no probs bro...'

I'm standing there, like a lost bulldog hoodornament looking for a
Thermodyne B, (that's a truck,) when DJ M. comes back, we put the
'campus-fuzz-be-gone,' thingie on the dash, (next to the rebar stakes which
I need to be installing, like,,,, um, now,) and head off to the station.

Bummer, no Soreath, she got called into her regular gig..
It's me, Matt, and Joe...
(...rats...
I mean,
cool..)

Matt and I yak about everything and become totally best buds with histories
of carrying each other through the trenches of guadalcanal in about... three
minutes.

M. Garcia is cool...
If he's steering the ship, when FrankD moves along next year, humanity is
saved...
(No disesptect to Joe... Joe's da man, (not in the GrindHouse-oppressive
sense...
he's literally the stitches and fabric required for a pair of toughskin
jeans, and KFSR don't exist without him...
But,,, if Church is to Holy Spirit,
and 'They My Be Giants' are the radio station staff?
M. Garcia is the light on in the birdhouse of KFSR's soul...)
....okay, maybe the light is actualy DJ Kirsten,,,
But Matt is definitely a
'right-out-of-the-box-75watt-bulb-in-a-room-where-there-are-NO-windows...
---Great taste in songs, and flawless segways...

Speaking of which.

-How many of you have been in a radio station before???
(show of hands?)

My first station (WRFT: Temple Ambler)
--carrier current, I literally closed a couple of broadcast days by
hollering my final station ID out the back door when the power went down...
but Tunes were played, yes they were lemme tell ya...
---RFT?
No windows in the broadcast booth there... (it was a closet, if I recall,
with two massive posters, one, a signed 'Simply Red,' by Mick Hucknall, and
the second, a signed 'Hooters,' (it was 1985l...)

My more recent station? (WNYK: Nyack College)
----waaaay more broadcast power(couple county's worth)
.... located high atop Pardington Hall (with two, count 'em TWO beautiful
views (one of the Hudson and Tappan Zee bridge... -the other ... the campus,
lawns and girls dorm....
--but the most entertaining thing was the family of massive grey squirrells
in an oak tree just outside the window...

KFSR is more like RFT..
IN fact....
KFSR still has a turntable, (and lotsa records... like, walls of 'em.)
And KFSR has 'knob-pots,' versus 'slider pots.'
---The difference?
One's a knob, the other is.. (okay, you get it.)
---a pot is basically the outlet (or 'inlet,) by which microphones,
turtables, CD and other music sources are brought into the mix...
You turn up your pot, (after switching it on,) speak in, and there you are,
blabbing away and making sure that your needle (dial, y'all,) stays in the
'good zone.'
----Ever hear folks who you can't hardly hear??? There pot isn't up enough,
(or they're speaking into their shoe, versus a microphone...)

I digress...

The first thing I see is a wall of records, quite a few CD's (behind me,
more CD's, behind that, more CD's... all arranged by... um, I think a
witchdoctor who has had waaay too much peyote.
(Actually, they're by 'genre,'
-there's the blues section, 'world music,' and 'Bermuda Triangle.'

----What folks don't realize is: There are literally thousands of CD's
produced every day, and they get sent to Stations enmasse by labels and
artists alike, ---all with hopes of getting some airplay.
(DJMatt Garcia??? The man has to listen to (at least 200 CD's a week as part
of his job... (Frank and Joe have done this too... it's a rite of passage
for station managers/music directors.)

Down the narrow catacomb, behind the non-descript door, behind more
non-descript doors, (yes, Frank, it is theatre of the mind...
Picture 'Get Smart,' ---all the doors without a shoephone... Hello, Chief???
(agent 99 comes in later.)

Finally, I hear the friendly and welcomed voice of JoeMoore, yakking jazz
and talking his usual cheery self...

(note: at this time?
in his natural environment?
DJ MGarcia's decloaked, his skin is actually scales, and fangs have come out
of his cheeks...
It's cool, though, he offers me some water through the smoke and
brimstone...)
Joe...
(did you know Joe actually has fangs and gills too?) welcomes me...

'Hey, Eric, we're on in about three minutes, thanks for coming aboard...'

M.Garcia goes back and throws another Freshman on the grill...

I take a seat, pop in a coughdrop, sprinkle a little holywater and put on
the headphones...

(okay, some of the above is made up...)

Actually,
nobody transforms into anything satanic...
It's just two nice guys in adjoining broadcast studios completely encased in
grey foam sound deadening material, completely buried in walls and stacks of
music...
No Windows.
Pure fun.
(feels like home.)

The equipment?
Remember the small sidebar about 'pots,'
KFSR has dial pots... (the knob ones,)
Very cool, very retro, very 50's...

Though, for this evening I'm not twiddling anything and don't have to worry
about my voice levels...
(There isn't even a fuzzy weird cap on the mic's (wind-spit guard) that
smells nasty to talk into... (we used to draw smiley faces on ours...)

It's just '...so, Eric,-hows it going,-what does KFSR mean to you,-wouldn't
you say it's a creative glue to the community,-and bikehop,-and stuff,-and
we need money 'cause we're LISTENER SUPPORTED RADIO...-hows yer mom,-hows
yer shoulder- whaddya say...?'

Stuff like that.
You see, Joe talks a lot.
I talk a lot.
DJ M.Garcia???

He's in the booth next-door, waiting to spin some tunes...
I think I make his day by bringing in a CD of my friend Annie Quick, and,
with the first distortion power cord by Annie he's like, 'dude I'm in love.'
(Annie's husband Jad is in love too... they're also Northern Californians
now in NYC... who I want to get back out here...)

Me, Matt, Joe,
-and the point that we're looking for folks to pledge (sincerely,) money for
the station, is put forth no less than three separate times.
In between killer tunes.

I do a little szhpeel about how KFSR is so different than other stations.
---This is true.

Why?

---Okay, remember that stuff I said about the fangs and the brimstone and
all the music?
Well, the music part is true.

---It sort of mixes in with the 'dial up pots,' vs. more modern tech.
(They do have a slider board ready to install, and the tech is very modern,
btw, it just has a vintage feel... very very cool.)

Back in the days when I used to broadcast... (and I had waaaaaay too much
fun... with both stations.)

I was a total dinosaur (and this was the late 90's)
In that my managers (on NYK especially,) just let me play what I wanted...
Nobody is allowed to do that in the world anymore, (except on KFSR.)

We had rules as to what soungs we coudl play (due to FCC restrictions,)
---and did the weather, the news, the time, PSA's and all...
But basically?
For hours and hours (back at NYK,) it was just me, and whatever I felt like
playing...
(and I had a wall full of tunes, and knew how to use them...)

---Same deal with RFT... We brought in our own records.. (a milkcrate full
of LP's lugged across a campus is a respectable thing...)
---but, aside from the 'heavy-med-light,' rotation list (you had to play a
couple from each every hour..)
-you could play what you wanted.

This is what makes KFSR most excellent, and really an endangered species ta
boot.

Pretty much nowhere else, in civilized society can DJ's just play what they
feel like, and have tons of music thrown at them to pick from...
(unless you're handling the tables at your cousin Heffie's bar-mitzvah...)
-Joe and Frank let the 'jocks come in and throw down their own strings, (and
it shows...)

Everbody else on the planet?
Computerized and programmed out the wazoo...

Sometimes? letting the DJ's work completely without a net is not a good
thing..
But Everytime? it is.
---Why is that so?
Well, back east I have a buddy of mine who has been in radio forever... He
teaches on a highschool about broadcasting.
He's frustrated and really bummed out because he knows he's training his
kids to just sit there and hit buttons for pre-recorded shows...
-They don't get to pick nothin', not even their nose.
--Most commercial radio, ---even most non-commercial radio is all layed out,
you have (maybe,) an option of subbing in one song (or two,) over an hour,
----but you're stuck playing whatever the suits want...
-Nine times out of ten?
You're not even cueing up songs anymore and doing PSA's... you just sit
there and look at lights flashing and know to call 911, in case something
catches on fire...
SpaceMonkeys in the early NASA program had happier existances, (and
outcomes.)

KFSR is exceedingly rare in that, each DJ really can play what they want,
and what their listeners want...
And the place lends itself to that, as well.
Music all over the place,
Records on shelves for a mile or two...
literally you can walk in before your show, start pulling CD's and lay out
what you want to put together (right there?) ---or, as some of the DJ's do,
slave for hours and tune their show to perfection...
Bottom line?
What you are hearing is the work of that artist (the DJ,) who is painting
and weaving songs and moods together not unlike the AirTraffic controllers
at O'Hare guiding in jetliners during heavy fog...
Too cool.

--Even if a DJ has a rough night, or a rough start in broadcasting, Frank
and Joe realize that you can only learn and get better by making mistakes
and improving...
This is how we grow, This is how we get good...
This is why KFSR is so vital...
Nobody takes that risk anymore...

My reason for being there?
Well... to be honest, I wasn't sure at first.

I mean, I know I blathered on about varying involvements of KFSR in life,
how it knits things together and how truly, the creative community really
does get linked by music and art, ---and KFSR really does link a lot of
different individuals and events each day...

--But it's 'pledge drive,' week(s) ---it continues next week,)
And the point of it is, 'bring in varying folks from the community who are
really into this station, who can demonstrate how KFSR has worked in the
community.

Me?
Well, (according to JoeMoore)
I'm the Bike-Hop Mascot...
(nice, nice, I'm small furry, and barely housebroken...
(it's a shame they took your Schwinn, Dude, it really brought the room
together...)
---but seriously... I get the point.

I hear of stuff on KFSR, (such as the EnVivo Crossroads (Brazzaville,)
show... I go, friends go, we are totally pumped about it, and local bands,
(not to mention the lads from Barcelona,) all have one big happy for a
reasonable price...

And that's how it works in life...
So much happens in this town based upon what you hear on radio, what you
read on 'the Hub, and what you read on Fresno Famous.
--and it goes viral (in a good way,) from there.

---I'm not amazed that things intertwine so much here in 'the no, so
thoroughly...
This is not a land of six degrees of separation, it's a land of a degree and
a half... (I think that's Blake's quote, but I'm swiping it...)

---I know how the creatives and the listeners all can be all about each
other's lives in this town,,, and am living proof of it... (It's both an
honor and a privilidge, folks, I'm serious...)

What amazes me further
-is how folks DON'T know about what the station and the creative society is
doing,
---or what events are not known, and have such low attendance, sometimes.
And that truly is a shame, and we need to address it.

I mean, how to folks NOT know about the Rogue?
How do they NOT know about Art-Hop? (or Bike-Hop?)

So many, many things that need to be experienced, and truly make Fresno a
throw-back (in a good way,) in time,
----In that creative people can just get together and 'do stuff,' (like the
shows that happen, events like poetry slams, Art-Hop, ---you name it..)
---And they need to be declared and talked up
We need to be a 'small town that knows each other, ---yet using the latest
tech and every advantage to communicate and share our talents...'

We need to talk stuff up.
-NOT because they need hype and aren't good, and need bodies thrown at
them,,
-BUT
-because they are excellent and well done events that are just so cool,
involve serious talent,
are affordable,
and will inspire you and remind you how cool the people of this place really
are.
(There is nothing to 'hype,'
-just the truth to be gotten out and heard.)

-Would you believe that, before Eclectic EnVivo?,
Frank and the folks at KFSR were just sort of 'hoping that folks would show
up?'
(like a few... like, '..call in the cousins, pay them in beer, we need
bodies at this thing...'

---But people came out in droves,
it was SRO,
and it became readilly apparent to all of us, that this thing was going to
be extremely cool from the moment Patrick Contreras threw catgut across his
strings... '
There was nothing to worry about...
Quality was on hand, and quantity showed up to enjoy it and make it a
success.

That's what I'm talking about.
That's why Frank opened the station up and said
'...anybody, if you like us, come aboard, during Evening Eclectic and tell
the world why..'
--and the lineup of folks from this town who are doing so is unreal... (I am
soooooo, not in this league, kids... yet, they wanted my opinion, so I
shaved, threw on a fresh shirt, (expecting Soreath,) and made my way to the
broadcast booth.

For me?
Easy thing to do.
I know good when I see it and hear it, and KFSR is excellent.

(After me? the Pedi-Cab guy (Joe Burke, (sweet GoldWing, bro,) -very cool
segment,
and after him???
FrankD (back from his home economics class, (nice cake, Frank,)
had two lovely ladies (one who spun fire (Jamie Holt,) the other a designing
woman with nice eyes,,,, ---and lovely voice afterall (Lynne Baker...)

-To which, hearing them on the truck-radio?,
and calling in to DJ M. Garcia to complain..?
'...dude, you got fire twirling hotties up there NOW...
before it was just you, me, and Joe... whats up with THAT?????!'

'...got an open mic for you here, bro, get back over here...'

-so I again parked the F-250, (having made spun the beast on Shaw,) and
found myself back in Uncle Frank-n-Joe's crypt-o-tunes,
again swallowed up in the broadcast world of people who seriously love
tunage,
dig Fresburg,
and totally get KFSR...
(...one of which who likes to play with fire while her hair is in braids...)
....My Great Aunt Ruth (a flapper and suffragette,) would have liked
Jamie...)

'...UM...

OH YEAH...
WE'RE RAFFLING OFF FRANK D TO THE FIRST PLEDGE OF 500.00 (IN A SINGLE PHONE
CALL,) --WHERE HE WILL COME TO YOUR PLACE, SPIN AN ENTIRE EVENT'S WORTH OF
TUNES...

(AND GET THIS,)

-THE NICE FIRE SPINNING LADY IS THROWING IN HER SKILLS AND TALENTS
(pyrotechnically,) TO SWEETEN THE POT... AS WELL...'

-(now all we need is Mike Oz belting out more freakin' Madawna tunes... yah
baybee...)

So far??? No takers, but the fund-drive is young...

---So...
Money was raised...

(Jodi Fitz... you rock babe, you and the mister pony'ing up in the first
twenty ten minutes of the show,
(because I was there... AND you love KFSR... brought a tear to my eye...
(we talked about ya on the waves...
'...Yes, Joe, Jodi,,, she is not only a fierce writer, but she is an
excellent designer, and the woman is amazing with powertools... truly a
force to be reckonned with...')

By the end of the three hour stretch, another 550.00 was raised (cool, very
cool.)

And, regrettably, Joe was not able to raise more money in a single stretch
than Frank...
(It would seem that there is a (friendly,) rivalry going on in the
fundraising department.

(...why Frank ducttaped Joe's mouth, and put him in a seachest in the hall
for the last hour??? who knows... it's all in the name of fundraising for
KFSR, and besides, we poked plenty of holes in the lid... though I hope the
janitors found him before last call at the RedWave...)

But here's the deal, folks:

Running a competetive, (or even viable,) radio station takes thousands and
thousands of dollars. (Millions in some markets.)
-Usually there are buckets of cash flowing in from varying sources for
stations to dominate the airwaves...
Their equipment is top-notch, their staff are selected and paid a ton, their
connections are well into corporate pockets, ---and mostly? they're robots,
and (usually,) miserable.

KFSR?
Different animal entirely.
Not only have they heart and soul, (and chopsticks too,... a little
beginners piano humor there...)

-But they are unique,
continuously dodging the financial bullet, and are on the air 24-7-365 with
quality tunes at a price you can afford and brag about... (Free.)

--But nothing is free in this world,
their bills are huge,
and they truly are artful underdogs in this whole thing...

Your support for the station,
quite frankly, could easily all too soon be ALL that they get.
Cutbacks happen all the time, the fact that they are on a college campus
does NOT mean that they have a guaranteed ANYTHING in terms of funding,
(It's not like we're talking about the football team, here folks...)

--and (correct me if I'm wrong,) just about everybody involved with the
station (broadcast wise,) is there as a volunteer.
(--and, trust me, when you get into a station, and you're any good? you will
find yourself doing more hours there (for the love of radio,) that RIVAL
those of a full time job... -and you get paid zilch.)

KFSR needs our support, (financially,)
deserves our support...

It continues to win not only my respect, but my heart...

(I hear 700.00 single shot donations get not only FrankD and the nice braids
lady dancing with fire, but Joe Moore dancing on a table in a thong...)

(Theatre of the mind, kids, Theatre of the mind...)

Okay, gotta go build stuff.

-Joe, Frank, Matt...
Thanks...