After a month-long hiatus from radio, it was my pleasure to guest host Danny Holloway’s show, Heads Up, on Dublab.com. While I was familiar with Dublab’s work in LA and beyond, this was my first time actually stopping by at the internet radio station. Along for the ride was Music Man Miles, who dropped a fantastic and eclectic hour-plus set of music. Once I sorted out the technology after his set, we close the show with a little chat about some of the things that Miles has on the calendar and a points about collecting trends and music. Not sure when I’ll be hosting a show, though I do know in the near future I’ll be dropping in on Anthony Valadez & Novena Carmel’s Champion City podcast. Other than that, you can likely look for a return of the “Melting Pot Radio Hour” late this month as I do my traditional rundowns of the best vinyl I dug up over the year and my Best of 2015 shows (y’all didn’t think I was gonna just NOT do those, did ya?). For the time being enjoy the show!

Heads Up: 12-09-15 – Set 1
Heads Up: 12-09-15 – Set 2

Playlist – Guest Hosting Dublab’s Heads Up: 12-09-2015
{opening theme} The Skatalites – Ceiling Bud – 7” (Ximeno Records)

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The Special AKA – Racist Friend – In The Studio (Chrysalis)
Eddie Palmieri – Caminando – Vamanos Pal Monte (Tico)
Gloria Ann Taylor – Deep Inside Of You – 7” Selector Sound
Paulo Diniz – Felicidade – Quero Voltar Pra Bahia (Odeon)
Warm Dust – Blood Of My Fathers – Peace In Our Time (Uni)
Ame Son – Reborn This Morning On The Way Of… – Catalyse (BYG / Metronome)
Jackson Heights – Since I Last Saw You – King Progress (Mercury)
Hansson & Karlsson – Tax Free – Monument (Polydor)

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Music Man Miles Guest Set:
Fred Neil – The Dolphins – Fred Neil (Capitol)
Funk Inc. – Message From The Meters – Superfunk (Prestige)
The Meters – Wichita Lineman – Struttin’ (Josie)
The Byrds – Everybody’s Been Burned – Younger Than Yesterday (Columbia)
Doris – You Never Come Closer – Did You Give The World Some Love Today (EMI / Odeon)
Ocho – Undress My Mind – Ocho (Soul Jazz)
Duke Pearson – Stormy – It Could Only Happen With You (Blue Note)
Cal Tjader – Mambero – Tjader (Fantasy)
The James Gang – Collage – 16 Greatest Hits (ABC)
Terry Reid – The Frame – Seed Of Memory (ABC)
Little Feat – Two Trains – Dixie Chicken (Warner Bros.)
Syl Johnson – Trying To Get To You – Goodie Goodie Good Times (Shama)
Paul Weller – Amongst Butterflies – Paul Weller (Go! Discs)
Steve Parks – Movin In The Right Direction – Movin In The Right Direction (Solid Smoke)
Cheyenne’s Comin’ – Come Back To Me – Cheyenne’s Comin’ (Shady Brook)
The Three Pieces – Shortnin’ Bread – Vibes Of Truth (Fantasy)
Bobby Valentin – Berebicua – 7” (Fania)
ET Mensah & His Tempos Band – Save Me – Mensah’s African Rhythms (EMI)
Quantic & Alice Russell – Boogaloo 33 – Quantic & His Combo Barbaro with Alice Russell (Tru Thoughts)

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{closing theme} Achim Reichel – Vita – AR4 (Zebra)

Here is our interview with the Swedish Psychedelic band Dungen. This interview, years in the making, almost didn’t happen. I had been in talks to bring the band in for an interview & performance, but the situation at KPFK made it virtually impossible to do the interview at the station. After a suggestion from a friend, I decided to do something I’ve never done before and I booked a couple of hours at Bedrock LA rehearsal space, paying for the time, space and equipment out of my own pocket. In order to understand why I went through so much to make sure this interview would happen, I have to take you back a few years.

I began my career in radio at WRAS, Album 88, and while I did a number of amazing interviews while there (particularly of my heroes Max Roach and Bobby Seale), when I left the station I was really turned off from interviewing artists after a few bad experiences towards the end of my time in Atlanta. At WORT & KALX, I did exactly two interviews (one at each station) and had no real desire to do any others. But in 2007, as I was driving around Berkeley, I heard Matthew Africa play “C. Visar Vagen” from Dungen and later walked into Amoeba as “C. Visar Vagen” was playing and for the first time in years, I really wanted to not only know more about this band, but to have a conversation with them about their music. That spark is what eventually led me to not only return to radio at KCRW, but to eventually land at KPFK where I could produce my own show and book my own interviews. During my time at KPFK, I had around 60 guests into the station for interviews, guest DJ sets and performances. I’m proud of all of them, but for all the reasons mentioned above, this one holds a special place in my heart.

During our interview, we talk about the earliest years of the band, how the core quartet, featuring Gustav Ejstes, Reine Fiske, Mattias Gustavsson and Johan Holmegard, came together organically over the course of the band’s history, the latest release Allas Sak, which translates roughly to “Everyone’s Thing” and what that phrase means to the band and we spend quite a lot of time talking about the process of making music for this band, including some fascinating insight into how the band visualizes their music through images (such as “this is more like a gentle stream” or “more like the morning dew”) and the precious influence of Gustav’s mother. The interview also features music from the band, “Flickor Och Pojkar,” “Allas Sak,” and “En Gång Om Året” from the new record, as well as a couple of older songs that are personal favorites (including the much discussed “C. Visar Vagen”). Big thanks to Jessica Weber, Mark O’Donnell and Rachel Barnhart for their help setting this up, Mark Maxwell for helping with the sound, Bedrock LA for the space and most importantly thank you to the band for being so gracious with their time and so exemplary with their music. While it is a shame that the recording of their performance ended up being unusable for airplay, I am so very thankful to have been able to spend that time with the band and very proud of the interview that we were able to record and broadcast and share with you here.

Dungen Interview on Melting Pot: 10-25-2015

In all honesty, I had every intention of making sure this would get posted a few days after it broadcast. But you know what happens to our best laid plans. In some ways it’s fitting that it took me a fair amount of time to get this show up, it’s a microcosm of my entire five years at KPFK, and as a final show on the station, that seems very fitting indeed. The decision to leave KPFK had been brewing over the last several months. I could write a book on my feelings about what is currently happening to KPFK and the wider Pacifica network, but the easiest way of saying why I am leaving is to simply say that I do not have the time to invest in KPFK that I would like and no longer feel that the station is a place where I can do the kind of show that I want to do. This choice does not have anything to do with anyone placing any restrictions on my work as a programmer. During my five years I’ve enjoyed the confidence of the music director Maggie LePique and interim Program Director Alan Minsky and they have been extremely supportive of my vision for Melting Pot. My choice is more connected to the ongoing crisis and the entrenched dysfunction that seems likely to end in the dismantling of the network and the possible loss of multiple stations.

For years there was an acceptable amount of dysfunction and crisis that I could tolerate, after all, within the first month of being on the air, I had 3 weeks of fundraising sandwiched between 2 weeks of “regular” programming. But my show was never given a full chance to build an audience that would have supported it through thick and thin, and as the years have gone by, the pace of fundraising has increased on pace with the problems at the station and the network. As our financial issues have balloned due to mismanagement on many different levels, the ability to produce a quality show, has become more and more difficult. As a programmer at a station without a functional music department and with no music library, you are responsible for 100% of what you play. The constant disruptions to programming, the lack of organization or basic planning has made it impossible to do my show in the way that I feel it should be done. When long-time programmers Derek Rath, Yatrika Shah-Rais and Betto Acros resigned en masse from the Global Village over many of these issues, I was close to just resigning right then and there at the beginning of October. The final straw for me was connected to the Dungen interview that takes up the second hour of this last program. In order to make this interview happen, I had to book and pay out of my own pocket for rehearsal space. The lack of a dedicated performance space and a dedicated engineer, meant that even though I was able to get the band into a studio, our recording wasn’t suitable for broadcast and the inability to do something, that should be taken for granted at a radio station with KPFK’s legacy and space, only confirmed that this was the right time to leave the station.

This was not a choice that I made lightly or without difficulty. I strongly believe in the mission of KPFK and Pacifica. Within a week of moving to California back in 1999, I was on the streets of Berkeley, protesting with other concerned parties what we viewed as overreach by the Pacific board in the firing of KPFA GM Nicole Sawaya. That protest eventually led to the very structure of governance that has become Pacifica’s undoing, a hard lesson in unintended consequences for sure. I’m not sure there is enough collective will to create another movement right now that would right the ship and bring KPFK and the other Pacifica stations into the future. I hope that there is, but I don’t see any of that positive change on the horizon. Were I that 25 year old man of the past, just beginning graduate school with few responsibilities outside of himself, I would likely still be in this fight. But as a 40-year old, recently divorced man, who is primarily responsible to the 400-550 students he teaches each year at CSU-Long Beach, I have to choose my battles more wisely. And so, my time at KPFK (and perhaps terrestrial radio more generally) is done and this chapter is closed. I’m proud of everything I was able to accomplish at KPFK and proud of this final show. While this show below represents the farewell transmission of Melting Pot on KPFK, it is not yet a grand finale for my work as a DJ. I will continue to share music here on the blog, occasionally in local spaces and perhaps, if I’m lucky, on an online radio station. As a final word, I’d like to thank listeners of the program, it was a privilege to have hosted this show for you on your airwaves. Thank you for listening…

Melting Pot on KPFK #211: First Hour
Melting Pot on KPFK #211: Second Hour

Playlist: 11-6-2015
{opening theme) Booker T & the Mgs – Melting Pot – 7” (Stax)

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Songs: Ohia – Farewell Transmission – Magnolia Electric Co. (Secretly Canadian)
Rotary Connection – Life Could – Aladdin (Cadet Concept)
Erasmo Carlos – Minha Gente – Sonhos E Memorias (Polydor)
Alice Coltrane & Charlie Haden – For Turiya – Closeness (Horizon)

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Josh Haden & Spain – I Do – Single (Self-Released)
Janis Joplin – To Love Somebody – I Got Dem Ol Kozmic Blues Again Mama! (Columbia)
Orchestre Poly-Rythmo Cotonou – Min We Tun So – The Skeletal Essence Of Afro-Funk 1969-1980 (Analog Africa)
Rodrigo Amarante – The Ribbon – Recorded Live At KPFK (KPFK Archives)

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Gloria Ann Taylor – World That’s Not Real – Love Is A Hurtin’ Thing (Ubiquity/Luv’n’Haight)
Phonte feat. Evidence, Big Krit & 9th Wonder – Life Of Kings – Charity Starts At Home (Foreign Exchange)
Funkadelic – The Promentalshitbackwashpsychosisenema Squad (the Doo Doo Chasers) – One Nation Under A Groove (WB)
Mulatu Astatke & The Heliocentrics – Blue Nile – Inspiration Information (Strut)

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Dungen – Interview – Recorded Live At Bedrock LA (Melting Pot Archives)

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Dungen – En Gang Om Aret – Allas Sak (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – Satt Att Se – 4 (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – Soda – Skit I Allt (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – Akt Dit – Allas Sak (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – C. Visar Vagen – Tio Bitar (Kemado)

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{closing song} Johnny Hartman – We’ll Be Together Again – Songs From The Heart (Bethlehem)