The 97X Rumblings from the Big Bush podcast recently hit the 5,000 downloads mark on Podbean, our podcasting host site.
That’s not too shabby for a ragtag duo that started out a year and a half ago with ZERO expectations.
97X era… and now
We’re flying by the seat of our pants (provided Dave remembers to wear them), and working on a shoestring budget, with gear that would make a Mr. Microphone seem high-tech.
Since November of 2018, Dave and I have posted more than 40 episodes, and have interviewed dozens of station staffers and quite a few listeners from back in the day. It’s been a blast reconnecting with all the cool kids.
We’re not setting the podcasting world on fire, but we’re bringing back fond memories for a small squad of dedicated 97X fans (and having a blast in the process).
Hmm, we probably should read that someday…
97X station co-owner Doug Balogh had a list of “Balogh-ages” – simple suggestions for business success. #23 was “Remember to say THANK YOU.”
“The Falcon”
So THANK YOU for listening!
And if you have a friend or three that might enjoy some “Rumblings from the Big Bush,” tell ’em to click the 5K button below to get to our Podbean page. They can also catch episodes on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
Geography, fate — and a cool dad — turned David on to 97X in his preteen years. He never stopped listening, through high school (he and his dad went to a PiL show at Bogart’s together!), his college years at Miami University and afterward when he moved back to Cincinnati. We chat with David about how he got hooked, and his 97X memories of college concerts, Oxford bars, local bands and dorm room hijinks.
David in his home office with the old school 97X logo
On our podcast, we’ve talked to a lot of college professors who have Masters and PhDs, but David might have them beat in the “letters after your name” category:
What, no REM, KMFDM or UB40?
After he graduated from Miami U., David got a job at a local insurance company as an actuary… and he’s never left. Actuary is consistently ranked as one of the best jobs in the U.S. (David blogs about it here.) We’d like to think that listening to 97X for all those years made David a lot cooler than Ben Stiller’s character in Along Came Polly:
Mike “Stead” Winstead grew up in Oxford, Ohio and dreamed of working at 97X. When he got out of the Army in 1994, he “bugged” (his word) the station until he finally landed a job as Director of First Impressions (“Mike the Modern Rock Receptionist”). He also did weekend and fill-in shifts, and helped out at nearly every on-location promotional event that 97X did during his time there. We chat with Stead about singing the Miami U. alma mater (without knowing the words), pizza payola, his first time on the air, and the sweaty mass of humanity at Lollapalooza.
Stead with Bob Pollard (in the time it took you to read this caption, Bob wrote 3 songs)With Gwen Stefani, back when a relatively unknown No Doubt opened for 311. Stead’s favorite bandMike (standing) “doin’ the claw” in tribute to the King at a Rock & BowlStead or Giovanni Ribisi? You decide.
The snippet above is from the most recent Facebook live stream from John Doe (of the 97X “house band” X). The gig is great – he even does a Replacements cover. You can watch the whole thing here.
John Doe totally gets it… “put a freakin’ mask on!” That way we can all have more fun in the new world.
Billy Zoom’s mask is not CDC-compliant… in his defense, it was in 1983.
Bill Douglas (a.k.a. “Billy D the Fresh MC”) spent most of the 90s working at 97X, starting out as a weekender back in 1990 when he was still in school at Miami University, and continuing on (in two stints) through December of 1998. We chat with Bill about the Free Music Break that gave him his 97X break, as well as his current radio gig(s) and his longtime side hustle with the Cincinnati Reds (trust us, you’ve heard him).
Billy D. cited the 97X 10th Anniversary Show at Bogart’s (Barenaked Ladies, Too Much Joy, Royal Crescent Mob and Love Cowboys) as one of his favorite live shows. Here’s a shot from that evening:
L to R: Mike Taylor, Dave Tellmann, Damian Dotterweich, Brian Ewing, Bill Douglas, Phil Manning (manning the microphone), Julie Maxwell, Rictile, Laura Kim, Jae Forman and… Kristin Smallwood perhaps?
Billy D. also has fond memories of playing softball for the 97X squad.
Front row: Rictile, Julie Maxwell and Jae Forman Back Row: Steve Baker, Bill Douglas, Phil Manning… and two ringers.
Here’s a shot of Bill as part of some sort of Scentiments/Rock City fashion show. Note Dave giving his best “Blue Steel” look.
L to R: Laura Kim, Dave Tellmann, Julie Maxwell, Bill Douglas, Phil Manning and Jae Forman
Corona-cooking with Billy D… coming soon to The Food Network.
Craig Snyder grew up in Oxford, Ohio, listening to 97X and making mixtapes for his friends. That love of music stayed with him as he interned at EMI, worked as a producer at Little Steven’s Underground Garage, managed and promoted indie bands, and in his current role at Lyte.com helping venues and festivals get more music fans to shows. We chat with Craig about his how his love of 97X and his mixtape mastery led to his future music gigs, and why human recommendations will always be better than algorithms.
We’re overly reliant on algorithms and while they are good, we’re missing the human element. We’re missing an opportunity to connect. We’re eliminating the social piece from music and no — social media isn’t a replacement. So what can you do? Think about the best song or album you’ve heard recently and call or text a friend about it. Tell them why you think they’d dig it.
Where Craig spent his lawn-mowing income as a kid.
Below is Craig’s 30-song Spotify playlist, which he updates frequently. You can follow Craig on Instagram and Twitter, too.
Ali Castellini got her 97X gig by accident, when a fellow Miami student phoned her early one Friday morning and asked her to do the weather forecast on the Breakfast Club. She wound up spending a few years on the air at 97X in the early-to-mid 90s before moving on to a station in Virginia Beach, VA, then hosting the nationally syndicated radio show “Today’s Women” and later working as an on-air host and producer for WXPN/World Cafe in Philly. Now she’s “corrupting minds” (her words) as a communications professor at Temple University. We chat with Ali about all the lessons she learned during her radio days… as well as Matchbox cars, Dick Clark and Lenny Kravitz.
Professor Ali, or “Prof C” as her students call her.
Back in the day, 97X staffers had Matchbox cars as their “in/out” indicators (upside down = out of the office). Ali still has hers, on a shelf in her office.
Ali said: I still turn it upside down from time to time when I leave! #97XhabitsDieHard
If you listen to the “97X Rumblings from the Big Bush” podcast (available on Spotify, Apple podcasts and Podbean), you are in rare company. You’re part of the elite. Not just the 1%, but the top 1% of the 1%. You’re special.
So does Chrissie Hynde
And if you’ve ever found yourself wondering “How do Dave and Damian pack so much genius into an episode that’s never* longer than the playing time of two spins of Bauhaus’ ‘Bela Lugosi’s Dead’?” then this post is just for you.
*OK, sometimes we go over a tad.
Scheduling
Dave and I try to get together once every couple of months to record a new batch of 4-6 interviews, usually on a Sunday afternoon. Once we agree upon a date, we start emailing potential guests and locking down 30-minute slots for each guest. In the Before Times, Dave would drive to my house. He’d often bring his magical machine that can transfer cassette tape recordings into digital files. Now, in the coronavirus End Times, we “meet” via Google Hangouts.
Recording
We use a strange combination of equipment and programs to make the magic happen. Yeti mic on my end (when Dave came over we’d use a headphone jack splitter so both of us could put on headphones just like the old radio days).
When Dave joined me in my basement (“The Party Dungeon”) we’d use Google Voice to call our guests. Now, ideally they join via Google Meet. We use a program called VoiceMeeter (a virtual audio mixer) to balance the volume of the caller with our volume, and Audacity (freeware) to record the interview. [Zoom is a new wild card – when you record a meeting, it creates an audio-only file – we plan to test this soon as an alternative to the Google Voice/VoiceMeeter/Audacity trifecta. If you’re a gearhead and have other suggestions, we’re all ears.]
Editing
Editing is really a two-step process. First comes the content editing, then the actual audio edits.
After Dave drives back to Mars (I’m assuming that’s where he lives), I’ll listen to the interviews and take notes (scribbles really) about the content. Then I listen again, marking up “keeper” sections and figuring out what we can cut to get the episode down to our desired “2 Belas” length (this is the toughest part… “kill your darlings”).
My edit notes for our chat with Howard Cohen of The Cereal Killers. Dot = keeper, brackets = cut.
Once I have a good feel for overall flow, I’ll save a copy of the raw recording in Audacity and start slicing and dicing. Dave’s “flashback” intro usually mentions a song, so I’ll track down that video on YouTube, record the ending via SnagIt, and convert it to an mp3 audio file via VLC Media Player (freeware). I also can throw in “liners” from the old days (liners = short station promos, usually with Bake’s voice, that identify the station… “97X, the future of rock and roll”) to break up the interview between topics, and to wrap up the episode. Dave had a bunch of liners on cassette, and Bill Douglas also sent us several. (Thanks Billy D!)
Audacity: It slices, it dices, it even makes julienne fries!
Publishing
Podbean is the site we use to host our podcast. We’re on the Unlimited Audio Annual Plan for $108 a year. I try to post on Podbean and 97Xbam.com nearly simultaneously, and add “bonus content” (photos, links, more text) on 97Xbam. I’ve set up links/connections/RSS feeds to our podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts as well, so when a new episode goes live on Podbean, it will also appear on those sites. (It’s really only a matter of time until Spotify starts throwing “Joe Rogan money” at us for an exclusive deal.)
Dave and I will settle for a 50/50 (million) split
Ideally we’d publish a new episode every two weeks, but I can only do editing over the weekends, and it’s rather time-consuming.
Listening
As 97X station owner Doug Balogh liked to say, “without the listener, we’re like one hand clapping.” We’re not setting the podcasting world on fire, but I’d like to think we’ve made a small yet enthusiastic group of dedicated, discerning listeners pretty happy. Hmm, much like 97X as a radio station.
We are NOT big in Japan, but it looks like 3/4ths of the band ABBA enjoys our show. (Thanks Agnetha, Bjorn and Anni-Frid… and screw you, Benny!)
If you like the podcast, please tell a friend about it. If you don’t like it, tell an enemy.
A labor of love
So there you have it, 97XRFTBB from soup to nuts. Actually, considering the co-hosts, it’s more like from nuts to nuts.
Dave and Farrah
Damian and… Conway Twitty?
It’s been a real treat to reconnect with the 97X/woxy.com community through our podcast. Thanks so much for listening!
Hola, amigos, how’s it going? I know it’s been a while since I rapped at ya… (that’s my tribute to one of my favorite columnists in The Onion.) I know I’ve been pretty dour lately, so I’ll try to keep a PMA (positive mental attitude) today, just like Jesse Malin encourages everyone to do during his brilliant weekly live stream concerts.
There is nothing like the energy and atmosphere of live music. It is the most life-affirming experience, to see your favorite performer onstage, in the flesh, rather than as a one-dimensional image glowing in your lap as you spiral down a midnight YouTube wormhole.
Speaking of energy and atmosphere, yesterday’s live stream from Dropkick Murphys at Fenway Paahhrk is pretty lively:
https://youtu.be/VzkMA_1NbfY
And here’s some pure joy for you, marimba style:
As mentioned previously, the Broken Record podcast is a great listen. Their last two episodes have been superb: Jason Isbell and Nick Lowe
Under the covers
Speaking of Nick Lowe, here’s a cool cover of his most famous (and most covered) tune, from Sharon Van Etten and Josh Homme:
Several local luminaries got together to do Bill Withers’ “Lean on Me” for Cincinnati Children’s (HT to list member Keith Neltner for the link)
Tanya Donnelly (founding member of Throwing Muses, Belly and the Breeders… can anyone top that?) covers this great song from Yazoo
Here’s Whitney and Waxahatchee doing classic John Denver
And Caroline Spence (whose album Mint Condition was one of my faves from last year) puts her own spin on a Jimmy Eat World tune:
Great news for Americana fans
Kathleen Edwards (to whom Caroline Spence has been compared) is back! Her 1st album in eight years is due out in August. Read more in this Rolling Stone article and check out a new tune here:
The Jayhawks have a new album XOXO due out July 10. A couple of tunes from it are below, and hat tip to list member Bruce Frasure for tipping us off to the fun quarantine series from Jayhawks’ leader Gary Louris called “The Sh*t Show.”
Quaran-tunes
DBT created a new song for these times:
And Wilco created a song that made its debut on Colbert:
https://youtu.be/ZxnVYd3TpJs
Jeff Tweedy played Jesus, Etc. too!
https://youtu.be/MJF6BunIdF0
Calling all vinylheads: to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Yo La Tengo album Electr-O-Pura, Matador is releasing it on two LPs. Here’s the original video of a tune from that album, as well as a nice cover from Lucy Dacus.
Wha’ happened?
I know I wanted to stay positive, but I have to mention the passing of comedy genius Fred Willard, whose 75-second appearance in This is Spinal Tap is one of the most memorable scenes ever.
Harry Shearer worked with Fred on the woefully underappreciated Fernwood 2 Night TV show and in several movies (including Spinal Tap). Listen to the three-minute opening of Harry’s Le Show podcast from 5/17 for this heartfelt tribute.
Jesse Malin’s newest live streams are multi-camera gigs done in an NYC basement bar, with Rob Clores adding great licks on piano… and the first episode of “Season Two” also features a long interview with Lucinda Williams.
Here’s Jason Isbell and Amanda Shires playing his new album in its entirety.
Shameless self-promotion
The latest episode of the “97X Rumblings from the Big Bush” podcast features Joe Long, an early music blogger (Each Note Secure, The Futurist) who joined the station during the woxy.com era.
