Radio Days . . .

                                    "FM . . . No static at all"
                                                                        --Steely Dan
 

There was a time, many years ago, when I reached for the Brass Ring, and felt its icy contours briefly, only to be cancelled brutally, like Star-Trek, after a few lackluster seasons.

In 1978, I approached the producer of public affairs on radio station K-ROQ in Pasadena, California. Her name was Laura Quinn, and at that time, K-ROQ 106.7 FM was a struggling avant-garde Los Angeles station with dismal Arbitron ratings. I asked Laura if there was room for a Pasadena high school student to talk about education within a public-affairs format. Our discussion led me to Jim Hight (sp?), a community activist who was then producing a one-hour show called Education, For a Change, broadcast from 8 to 9am on Sunday mornings. It seemed Jim was having a hard time programming his full hour, and he offered me a half-hour of airtime, within his show, to address the issues as they related to high school kids in Southern California.

Shortly after a full season, Jim determined that Education, For a Change was placing unreasonable demands upon him, and he relinquished his airtime. Laura kept me on, however, and my own show was given a 30-minute block from 8:30 to 9am each Sunday.
I titled the show Our Time Is Now,  and for reasons that remain inexplicable, my name became The Wild Child.  The show premiered, in its own right, on May 14th, 1978, and ran through early 1979, in various incarnations.
 

The Pasadena Unified School District was gripped by controversy in the late 70's.  The school board held a narrow majority of members who espoused a "fundamental" approach to education. It was a reactionary and right-wing approach, and eschewed all gains made by the Pasadena Plan for integrating Pasadena schools, as well as all "relevant" concepts for revitalizing public education. There's hardly space here to elucidate, but my show succeeded in drawing the parameters of the debate, and I interviewed some of the significant players. I talked with Marge Wyatt, Ray Cortines, John Crowley and Henry Myers. I also interviewed Bill Adrian, of the Adrian Teen Modeling Agency, along with a bevy of his clients, which had virtually nothing to do with public education, but made for a hell of a fun show. Such were the contrasts.

The show was formatted around interviews, interrupted regularly by my diatribes, which spouted a Thomas Dewey line of progressive themes that emphasized relevant education, and pointedly de-emphasized the back-to-basics, fundamental approach to education propounded by former California Superintendent of Public Instruction, Max Rafferty. Interspersed were album tracks of an eclectic nature that fitted K-ROQ rather perfectly back then. I played acts like Devo, The Kinks, Wings, The Who, Supertramp, and David Bowie.  The show's theme song was the Henry Mancini version of the Tommy Overture. 

And there was also much nonsense and incompetence. I took callers, read my polemics, and with the exception of a few pre-recorded interviews, did the entire show live. There were horrible moments of dead-air, un-deleted expletives and horseplay that would hardly be tolerated now. At that time, K-ROQ was, was best, a free-form broadcaster, and the air-talent was, at least occasionally, blindingly drunk or stoned during their shifts.  This was at the cusp of the station's success as the The ROQ Of the Eighties, when Rodney on the Roqs  represented the beginning of the alternative music sensation that would later sweep the market.  There was always, beneath the surface, a simmering of the radical spirit pioneered by Tom and Rachel Donahue on the stations's precursor, K-PPC.  This was progressive (if distinctly undisciplined) broadcasting, at a raw and creative height never to be seen again.

I was there when the station went broke in 1978 and the jocks walked.  I did my show in a post-apocalyptic studio, and played albums for several hours after the show closed because there were no disc-jockeys coming to work that day.  Even after the strike ended and the station resumed its payroll, I would routinely blow marijuana shake and coke powder off the cart machine before inserting a tape.   Empty Wild Turkey bottles and condoms littered the studio floor.  Not that Our Time Is Now raised the bar, as one of my guests vomited over the turntable, live, after one of my intro's. The chaos increased markedly after my producer, Laura Quinn, departed the station. She was replaced by Jerry Delauney, of Delauney Services Assist.  This company was contracted to produce public-affairs programming for the station, and was composed of physically handicapped people who were training for positions in various broadcast media. My producer and engineer, Jerry Delauney, was legally blind.  And a blind engineer is a unique thing.  Albums must be cued, inputs potted, carts inserted, tapes played, mics switched . . . Jerry was a fine producer, but his engineering gave Our Time Is Now a raw sound that was unlike any other radio show in L.A., even on K-ROQ.

During this time, I acquired a sponsor; the Pure Food and Drink Act restaurant in Pasadena, which paid a nominal sum for mention as a sponsor at the intro and extro of each show. For a short period of time, I engaged a co-host on the show. Elise Snyder joined me during the second "season," as an experiment in enlivening the format. Elise was the daughter of the principal at my high school, (John Muir in Pasadena) and her father neither embraced my philosophy, nor found it amusing in the least. The experiment was ill-founded, and ended a few months later. We did some great sketches together, however, and her comedic sense was well-developed indeed.

Speaking of comic sensibility, Our Time Is Now relied upon humor a great deal. Joe Cornet (as the inimitable Virgil Starkwell) and I did some terrific business during a "Farrah Fawcett" call-in. We told the audience that Farrah was a live guest, and invited phone calls. Joe interviewed me doing a Farrah-impersonation (which was unkind, actually) and the switchboard flashed wildly. This had nothing to do with progressive education, of course, but was most amusing, and seemed to entertain my listeners.  My girl-friend at the time (Kris Kelley) recruited her father as a guest once, and he spent twenty minutes explaining how he'd constructed a scale model of Sierra Madre out of toothpicks.

The Emmys:

Being a radio show host has perks. I got press passes to the Emmy Awards from 1978 to 1984.  During those seven years, the awards ceremony was held in my hometown at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium, so it was most convenient for me.  I interviewed and rubbed shoulders with Walter Cronkite, Norman Lear, Lucille Ball, William Shatner, Grant Tinker, Andy Griffith, and many more. Virtually none of this material was ultimately broadcast, but I arrived in a limousine and walked the red carpet with the other attendees and had a fine time. There was a hosted bar for the press, to which I availed myself, and consequently, I conducted interviews in a partially stewed state that rendered the tapes unusable. I smacked Lily Tomlin in the face with my microphone, made a drunken fool of myself with Bill Shatner, and pissed-off a number of celebrities. Sure, I can laugh about it now.

In 1980, the FCC deregulated public affairs on broadcast stations, and K-ROQ was no longer required to allot time for PA shows. Our Time Is Now, along with all DSA-produced programming, was cancelled.

At some time that year, my theme song, the Henry Mancini version of Overture to Tommy, played for the last time, and faded out.

Rick Carroll became GM of K-ROQ, and shortly after, the station began its meteoric rise to the top of Los Angeles radio ratings. I had conversations with Rick, (who popularized the alternative-rock format that's made broadcast history) and he ordered new programming from me. I produced a series of 90-second spots called Doubletake, with JoAnn Robinson, that focused on historical fact and fancy and served a quasi-public affairs purpose for the late morning hours. A handful of segments were aired, and then I suspended taping while I hunted for a sponsor. I spent far too long in the endeavor, and Rick cancelled Doubletake. To this day, I regret my short-sightedness. Rick left K-ROQ a few years later, and became a format consultant, and the station itself has stayed in the top five in L.A. Arbitrons ever since.  I,  however, never returned to radio.

For a short period, a teenager had the mic at K-ROQ in Pasadena, and produced much gibberish and a few moments of magic.   I welcome return visits as this paean to Our Time Is Now develops. If you have any recollections of The Wild Child, I'd be delighted to hear from you. Write me at denisarian@verizon.net 

Thanks for visiting.

--The Wild Child