KVMR takes a look back… Joel Sotelo

Originally published KVMR Listeners’ Guide Aug./Sep. 2003

It’s been over 20 years now since my experience as a KVMR DJ. My friend is a part of the new breed at KVMR and has been pestering me to tell my tale.

I wasn’t anyone famous, just a journeyman grunt who, like so many people in those days, thought it might be a hoot to trudge on up to the foothills once a week or so and put on a radio show. The best shows back then were Phil Givant’s blues show and the various programs hosted by Mikail Graham and George Parsons. Together, George and Mikail did a show called Mr. Filter’s Unusual Music on Thursday nights that I was particularly devoted to and it was that show specifically that made me want to try my hand at being a DJ myself.

My buddy and I dutifully schlepped up to the station for six Thurs days in a row to get our “training,” which consisted mostly of long, highly technical lectures about the history of radio. About the only functional thing we learned was how to properly capture one of those Emergency Broadcast tests and they didn’t even teach us that until the final class when all the posers’ had been weeded out.

After our on-air check, we were immediately given a show slot. Seven hours overnight every other Friday, alternating with a guy named Dave Trowbridge, doing a show called New Wave Plus. SEVEN Hours! We must have been out of our minds. Naturally, within a very few weeks, we had exhausted everything we ever knew or wanted to know about New Wave music and quickly took to raiding the KVMR archives. This was where my musical education really began. Program Rock and Polka Music? Sure. 30 Minutes of shortwave static from some 20th Century ‘Composer’? You bet! We got into a little trouble at first for not adhering to our proposed format, but we were also filling a substantial chunk of air time, so after awhile, we were pretty much left to our own devices. Who was listening anyway? Not even our own mothers were willing to stay up that late! What audience we did have quickly established themselves as a motley but loyal collection of speed freaks, drunks and insomniacs that was pretty much game for anything.

There was one listener in particular, a German flight attendant with an incredibly sexy voice, who used to listen to many of the late night DJs and had us all salivating like Pavlov’s dog whenever she would call in for requests. Ah, but I digress…

George Parsons started showing up on a regular basis and became our unofficial mentor, steering us down some very strange musical paths and joining us in many beer and coffee fueled rants covering all manner of topics. As I recall, George lived close to the station in those days, because he was pretty much always there. I ended up having a few adventures with George and felt lucky enough to call him a friend. He encouraged all of my baser artistic instincts and I’ll always be grateful.

Another semi-regular was the local guru, a guy who called himself Sadashiv and who usually dropped by around 3 or 4 in the morning to dispense a little transcendental wisdom to the listeners and to try and sell us some Mexican ponchos out of his trunk. Sadashiv had his own show, all about mystical enlightenment, and was rumored to live in his car. I always wondered whether he ever made it to that next level.

There are 100 stories I’d like to tell about my time on the air, doing ‘radio theater’ interpretations of the Public Service Announcements with our crass, vulgar friends, or the time I passed out drunk in the control booth while Jonathan Richman was telling me a story, but I’m guessing that there are a lot of things that went on in those days that the station managers today would just as soon not know about. Like I said, you can get away with murder when there aren’t many people listening, and that certainly isn’t the case anymore. Why, KVMR is downright respectable these days! I do look back on those early days with a certain fondness though. It was fun to get in on the ground floor of something so special. Cheers to all you folks who have kept it going ever since.

by Joel Sotelo, DJ
formally hosted, New Wave Plus (1981) and Dangerous Rhythms (1982)