I have aspired to be a disc jockey ever since I was a young kid. Local LA radio personalities like KRTH 101's ""Real"" Don Steel and 95.5 KLOS' Uncle Joe Benson were consistently on the family radio during my childhood. Growing up, I began to develop an admiration for such on-air personalities: they just sounded so smooth, so cool as they talked about music. These guys, Shotgun Tom and Uncle Joe, were all about keeping the oldies alive during the 1990s. Because of my youthful exposure to the FM throwback stations, it became my prime objective in life to be heard on the airwaves.
While my friends would cruise around listening to their iPods, my car radio was (and still is) firmly set to 93.5 KDAY-LA's prime source for back in the day hip hop jams. I'm talking Run DMC. Dr. Dre. Naughty By Nature. LL Cool J. TLC. It really goes without saying that the bass of my tiny Honda is permanently cranked all the way up. Socialite mothers on their power-walks shake their heads in disgust as I roll by in the Civic.
When going through the ponderous decision-making process of college selection, I discovered that the University of Wisconsin had a student-run radio station. Upon further investigation, it became clear that WSUM doesn't play by the rules of most radio stations. Whereas big corporate channels (a la CBS' KROQ or Clear Channel's KIIS FM) assign a rigid playlist for their disc jockeys, WSUM DJs can air whatever songs they desire. To fulfill such a childhood fantasy would be totally ""gnarly"", as I would have put it as a pizza-faced high school senior.
My friends would say things like: ""Dude! You're doing radio at…. Wisconsin? Isn't that, like, really cold?"", ""Wisconsin! Bring a jacket!"", and ""West-consin, huh? You're gonna get fucking frostbite."" Sure, I wasn't too concerned about going from a pleasant So-Cal climate to the Midwestern tundra. The very prospect of being on the air far outweighed any personal grievances about freezing my ass off for the next four years.
Flash forward Fall 2008, and I'm an enrolled freshman at the UW training to be a DJ at 91.7. All of the sessions took place in the DJ booth under the guidance of a broadcasting host. This room is a music junkie's paradise: there's a slew of volume controls, massive speakers, mics, a couple of turntables, and an array of mixing gear. The booth's walls are lined with posters for all kinds of music, from Elvis to the Chili Peppers to Mozart. However, after the training I soon learned that putting on a weekly show isn't always so invigorating. I can vividly recall having to wake up at the butt-crack of dawn on Tuesday mornings and walking cross the frigid cold campus to do my first show, the aptly titled ""Funk My Life"". It was a daunting challenge hosting a high-energy hour of funk so early in the day, but I like to think ""FML"" was a lively broadcast. Hopefully, all four of my listeners felt the same.
During one broadcast my sophomore year, I decided to air a lounge-esque cover of 2 Live Crew's ""Me So Horny"". I was well aware that I was playing with fire here; the FCC would never allow such a lewd song to be aired before 10 p.m. Considering that a portion of my audience was older folks, I should have known better than to play a tune with the lines ""Won't your mama be so sad if she knew I got that ass?"" Admittedly, this is probably the most G-rated lyric of the song. In all seriousness though, who is going to make the effort to actually call the FCC and report some small-time college DJ for a decency violation?
The next week‘s broadcast saw management bust into the DJ booth mid-show, just as I was about to cut to a voice break. Dave Black-the General Manager of WSUM and founding father of the station-is a guy known to always have a hearty grin and positive attitude. At this moment, however, he was giving me an ice-cold death stare. I should have been wearing a diaper.
""Matt, I have to speak to you about a couple of on-air incidents that have occurred within the past couple of weeks. Do you know why we need to have this chat?""
""Erm, no, Dave.""
""Well, listeners have been calling in complaints about your broadcasts. Your, uh, ‘Me So Horny ' broke multiple FCC decency codes and you said ‘shit' during one of your voice breaks recently. That kind of stuff really just doesn't fly. Consider this your warning.""
""Right. Sorry. Really. I won't do it again.""
""We want to keep you around. Anyway, really enjoy the show, Matt. Funny stuff. Keep it up.""
I consider myself lucky to have not had my DJing privileges revoked due to my crude shenanigans. Cursing on the air just doesn't happen any more; neither does the airing of bawdy gangsta rap. Thus, there is no Ice Cube or Biggie in my broadcasts, though I would love so much to play them. Radio-edits are an option, but come on, who the hell wants to hear a radio edit? I'm still reeling over the FCC-friendly version of Cee-Lo Green's ""Fuck You.""
After finishing up in Madison, who knows where the career hunt is going to take me. Unquestionably, There's going to be a gaping hole in my life without the weekly presence of WSUM. Somehow, I will find a way to hold on to my hobby of broadcasting music, but I seriously doubt anything I come upon will be as exciting and personally liberating as WSUM FM. Until my swan song on 91.7, I'll be happily funking any takers every Tuesday evening from 9 p.m. to 10 p.m.
Ever dropped profanities live on the radio? Been chased down by the FCC? Drop Matt a line or three at mhonig@wisc.edu.
