It's something I've awaited for 25 years. I had promised myself that, if by some chance I got myself affiliated with a school or college with a radio station, I would get myself an air shift!
And that one-class certificate course I'm taking at Illinois Institute of Technology is my ticket.
Once I knew I would be going to the downtown campus for a class, I signed up to do a radio shift on WIIT-FM, broadcasting from the campus center on State St.
The orientation was pretty quick and easy. Now mind you, the last time I played music on the radio was before the station at Bowling Green U. had any CD players installed. Now at orientation, the Tech Director asks "so, is anyone going to be bringing CDs?" Turns out most people just bring a laptop with DJ software installed. And they have turntables, but due to the problem of theft, I would have to provide head shell and needle for two Technics 1200 turntables. The guy says they've got a grant for new equipment that will be installed starting in March, but for now we're "stuck" using a board from the 1970s. All right by me, I started out on boards from the 1950s.
For a while, I've highlighting my favorite obscure, silly or otherwise annoying old songs when I hear them on iTunes, and tagging them as "Musical Cheese." So that's the title of my new show. Featuring the stuff your parents forgot about when they said music was so much better in their time. So watch for my show to contain bad 70s earworms, unusual or obscure tunes from through recording history, and some of the comedy stuff that we played the crap out of back in the 70s. Hey, everything old is new again.
