College Radio Tidbits: Musical Gems from the Promo Pile, Ratings, and Public Radio Takeover of Jazz Station?

Here's a little recap of some random college radio-related tidbits from the web this week.

Forgotten College Radio Promo is Floor Pie's New Obsession

I love this story. While watching an episode of the Simpsons with a reference to a cheesy music demo tape, the author's husband dug through some old college radio promo tapes and found a gem from Ken DeFeudis called "Run for Cover Lover." Floor Pie writes:

"Mr. Black had been music director of his college radio station back in the day, a job whose benefits apparently included first dibs on midlife-crisis-guys’ demo tapes. We popped it into the tape player and . . . oh, how to describe it? Playful Casio keyboard chords, all two of them, bounced back and forth. And then, about a beat or two behind the electric drum from the get-go, in sailed the low, nasal, heavily Boston-accented goodness of Ken’s incomparable voice..."

Definitely keep reading Floor Pie's post to learn more about this forgotten musical genius and how he had a bit of a resurgence on the old WFMU show "Incorrect Music."


College Radio (KALX, KOHL) Gets Ratings Nod in Radio Waves Yesterday

I dug the fact that in Sunday's Radio Waves column, Ben Fong-Torres mentioned some college station ratings in his recap of the latest Arbitron scores. He writes,

"Now, what about a bunch of popular stations that just haven't been popular enough to reach the upper ranks and get written up? Like, say, the other NPR station, KALW? It's at 0.8, in 33rd place, along with KKGN (Green 960) and KKIQ. How about KPIG? Its local AM (1510) outlet emits a weak squeak, at 0.1, in the same pen as KRSH (the Crush in Santa Rosa), KALX (at Cal), KOHL (from Ohlone College in Fremont), and KTRB, the talk station (and, now, home of the Oakland A's)."

After reading this, I poked around and found that some other SF Bay Area college, high school, and community radio stations also appear in these ratings, including KKUP, KVHS, and KSJS.


Mt. Hood Community College Jazz Station May Come Under Control of Oregon Public Broadcasting

Mt. Hood Community College issued a press release stating that for budgetary reasons, they may switch control of their jazz station (and public radio affiliate) KMHD to Oregon Public Broadcasting. According to the press release:

"Under the proposal, MHCC would continue to own the station, while OPB would take over programming, operational and fundraising responsibilities. MHCC President John J. 'Ski' Sygielski said the board of education will give serious consideration at its April 8 meeting to this proposed partnership with OPB. A decision is expected at the May 13 board meeting."

Mt. Hood Community College also owns student radio station The Quarry and an article in The Advocate Online mentions that the student station may gain access to an HD channel if the proposal goes through.