schoenfe
kxl_board
WKXL-FM Control Room Circa 1990. I was such a lousy DJ. Most of the library was still vinyl, but I was lazy so usually stuck to the CD's which were conveniently under the desk.
Recording (like phone calls and promos) was still done on reel-to-reel, which is off camera to the left, and edited with a grease pencil, razor blade, and adhesive tape! This blows my mind when I think how much easier and more powerful even the simplest digital audio editor is to use.
Just to the left of the control board is the cart players for commercials etc. These were like 8-tracks in size, but usually only had one track and were about 30 secs long.
Like an 8-track, you just popped it in and pressed play - no rewinding. You would edit your commercials on the reel to reel and then dub them down to a cart when it was done.
The commercial scheduling was a pain in the ass, because you had to play different ads on different schedules and during different parts of the hour. I would always screw it up. Most of the reason I would screw stuff up is that I worked in the studio alone on Saturdays, so I never during my whole time there could just ask a question.
If I asked the program manager a question, she would usually look at me like I had two heads.
Another pain in the butt was trying to time music to finish up next to a live broadcast, like network news or UNH football. I would actually hand off to the UNH football announcer in Durham just using the clock - he could'nt hear me, he just knew when to start and we would sync clocks. This was especially a big problem with 'artsy' CD's which did stuff like list the tracks and their length in tiny cursef in circles around the edge of the CD.
I think a large part of Joe Jackson's success is that you can easily read all of his liners, his music is widely popular from rock to comtemporary and he has lots of short hits for filling tight time slots. Joe Jackson is a DJ's best friend.
On the other hand, long Led Zeppelin songs are good when you need to poop. Being a DJ means pooping with a stopwatch - not fun.
Stuff I would get in trouble for:
1. Playing Boogie Wonderland.
2. Playing 'Cocaine Sex' by Renegade Soundwave.
3. Missing spots (ads).
4. Crossfading (the girl who had the shift after me worked at Venus De Milo in Boston and showed me how to match BPM for crossfading and scratching)
5. Mispronouncing 'Terrance Trent D'Arby' (DEE-ARBY).
6. Mispronouncing Bruce Cockburn (its inexplicably pronounced CO-BURN.
7. Actually being in the presense of the program manager (thankfully rare).
8. Screwing up the UNH football remote hookup.
9. Dead air.
10. Screwing up a REALLY IMPORTANT live CBS special news bulletin during Iraq War I.
kxl_board
WKXL-FM Control Room Circa 1990. I was such a lousy DJ. Most of the library was still vinyl, but I was lazy so usually stuck to the CD's which were conveniently under the desk.
Recording (like phone calls and promos) was still done on reel-to-reel, which is off camera to the left, and edited with a grease pencil, razor blade, and adhesive tape! This blows my mind when I think how much easier and more powerful even the simplest digital audio editor is to use.
Just to the left of the control board is the cart players for commercials etc. These were like 8-tracks in size, but usually only had one track and were about 30 secs long.
Like an 8-track, you just popped it in and pressed play - no rewinding. You would edit your commercials on the reel to reel and then dub them down to a cart when it was done.
The commercial scheduling was a pain in the ass, because you had to play different ads on different schedules and during different parts of the hour. I would always screw it up. Most of the reason I would screw stuff up is that I worked in the studio alone on Saturdays, so I never during my whole time there could just ask a question.
If I asked the program manager a question, she would usually look at me like I had two heads.
Another pain in the butt was trying to time music to finish up next to a live broadcast, like network news or UNH football. I would actually hand off to the UNH football announcer in Durham just using the clock - he could'nt hear me, he just knew when to start and we would sync clocks. This was especially a big problem with 'artsy' CD's which did stuff like list the tracks and their length in tiny cursef in circles around the edge of the CD.
I think a large part of Joe Jackson's success is that you can easily read all of his liners, his music is widely popular from rock to comtemporary and he has lots of short hits for filling tight time slots. Joe Jackson is a DJ's best friend.
On the other hand, long Led Zeppelin songs are good when you need to poop. Being a DJ means pooping with a stopwatch - not fun.
Stuff I would get in trouble for:
1. Playing Boogie Wonderland.
2. Playing 'Cocaine Sex' by Renegade Soundwave.
3. Missing spots (ads).
4. Crossfading (the girl who had the shift after me worked at Venus De Milo in Boston and showed me how to match BPM for crossfading and scratching)
5. Mispronouncing 'Terrance Trent D'Arby' (DEE-ARBY).
6. Mispronouncing Bruce Cockburn (its inexplicably pronounced CO-BURN.
7. Actually being in the presense of the program manager (thankfully rare).
8. Screwing up the UNH football remote hookup.
9. Dead air.
10. Screwing up a REALLY IMPORTANT live CBS special news bulletin during Iraq War I.