Dear great comrade Ken Freed-mang Ill, general secretary of Seven Seconds Delay, chairman of the public benefit corporation Congera, and supreme commander of WFMU,
In memoriam Kim Jong-Il: Here is a youtube clip of our beloved North Korean news anchor announcing a Hydrogen Bomb test:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7J2Nnl7Ano
Please VoiGods, excuse me for mispelling Voivod as Voivoid. But to my defense let me tell you that the very first video I searched for on the internet back in the mid 90's was one of Voivod. Obviously I couldn't find it and had to wait like a decade to watch it again.
"Oh Baby this town will rip the bones off your back...it's a death trap...a suicide rap...WE GOTTA GET OUT WHILE WE'RE YOUNG!" or Listen to W****F****M****U!!!
Leapin' flyin' lizards, what sounds this AM. Yep, give us Knuckles, give no quarter. Mornin', Ken, and Ken people.
Lookin' for missing "gs", btw. You've seen?
Interesting choice of word, Mr. Freedman, calling WBAI the "parent station" of WFMU. Aunt or uncle, maybe, to describe the influence and the tendency of cousins to "stay over".
9:54am
DaveinPA:
I missed something- what's the scoop on the Sleestak premium?
I'd be interested to know for how many the Hebrew & Jewish Program was a gateway to other WFMU programming. I can say that other WFMU programming was for me a gateway to Nachum & his predecessor; I think I learned more Yiddishkeit from there than from anywhere else.
Once you had a station preset on the car radio, driving at another time of day could lead to all sorts of interesting stuff. That's certainly how I got into listening to the morning Jewish block -- including Radio Kol Torah when that was a segment. Ditto later "Aerial Vew" & "TMI", things I would not have looked for on their own.
10:03am
F$F$ (:
If someone pledges here, in this very moment, he or she will get the FOFO premium: Since I am 2 degrees of separation to a Nobel Prize winner I will give you full license to say to your friends or relatives you know me personally. That way you can brag to them you are just 3 degrees of separation from such great personality!
Ken your show quickly became a gateway for me at FMU in the mornings at my Brewing Supply Warehouse job- along with Scott W, Brian T, Bryce, Joe B, and then when we about to taste freedom in the evenings, 7SD and SUW!!! That was more than 7 years ago and now I'M A LIFER!!!
Found FMU thru Arts and Letters Daily, under *Diversions*
Tuned into a runaway train phone conversation, recorded in maybe the 50's in my home province of New Brunswick, in an area where I had fished for salmon. Hooked hard, and I couldn't throw it.
10:16am
DaveinPA:
So, mouse pledge = a chance at Sleestak? I'm getting slipperier now...
Back in 1998, I read an article in Magnet, and it mentioned you could listen to WFMU online. Since my internet sucked at home, I waited until I was the last person in the office, and lo and behold, I found a tinny stream of amazing music, I believe it was Monica(?).
My gateway show was Terre T's. I found out about WFMU reading a TV program in a dentist's waiting room. Funny thing is I didn't have a TV then (still don't). I think mind control was involved
man.. can't think of what my gateway was. Its a toss up between The Best Show, Shut Up Weirdo (back when it was with Andy), and Douglas Rushkoff's (short lived show) - 'Media Squat' .
I'm confused as all hell about that, fred. You mean there were TV listings in some print publication in the dentist's waiting room, & it either contained an article mentioning WFMU or someone left a WFMU sticker in there? Or there was a TV playing with a text scroll such as FM stations listed, as for cable radio?
A few sentences about a web station playing unusual music, in a column next to TV listings. If you're not confused enough, I live in France, so figure how unlikely that was. I might have hallucinated the whole thing and randomly typed the right URL. That sounds more likely
Oh, I got an Amazon Dot thingy for Christmas. I thought it was something I'd never use, but it makes it REALLY easy to listen to WFMU. "Alexa, play WFMU". Boom.
My gateway as Give the Drummer Some on Fridays -- and from there, it was Bryce, Michael Shelley, and Rex's shows. There was no looking back after that!
My gateway show was the "Hour of Slack". Then, Bronwyn's show, whatever it was called then, particularly "News of the Dead". Then, it was the "Seven Second Delay" CD, back from when Breckman kept his 'most irritating human' schtick a little more in line—and the Turnpike <i>Afikomen</i> segment was truly funny and unique.
I think Ken discontinued the mind control program because a side effect was that subjects would leave good jobs for poor to not paying ones, defeating the purpose
i listened to frank o'toole and bob brainen and greasy kid stuff and nick hill and margaret harris back in the 80s; i think i first listened in 1985, while turning the dial. how lucky i was. oh, and al watts too - he was one great tawker.
10:40am
Marie:
My gateway was The Hound and Dave the Spazz; Bronwyn, Pseu, and Fabio came in quickly after that. I totally remember Alan Watts being on the air. I thought that was so cool.
Two cents here: Why not have a lecture show or two? I mean Hearty and CC speak an hour each week but maybe something slightly more edumacational? I shut up now.
I eventually got to like an enormous amount of the programming here. Odd lacunae, though, in that I have no memory of The Hound by that name; I'm sure I listened some to him, because how could I have missed that slot? My housemate, whose WFMU listening goes back to the 1970s, was surprised at that gap in my memory.
These days, though, it'd be practically impossible to listen to most of what can be called "WFMU" between the alternate streams & the hosted podcasts. There's so much out there being added to all the time, and it never goes away.
Okay, just got to the office and plugged in (they forgot to block off the Internet at our desks today)...and the first thing I see is Kim Jong Il and a sleestak. I LOVE YOU!!!
A coworker once asked me what I was listening to, and to put it on loud in the office. It happened to be a Kenny G show. Nobody ever requested that of me since
Holy crap I am so happy they forgot to reset the firewall at my temp gig today! I feel so subversive listening and seeing a guy's flank tat at my desk...yes this is a very sad statement on the state of my career...
Well, Ken, at least they'll never just yawn, say "derivative", and then turn away to talk to somebody else.
11:11am
grace gold way:
Dr. Ruth once said, "And please people, don't do anything silly like going outside during blizzard to have sex. Tell your friends you did it, but don't do it."
Golly... My first experience with 'FMU was on a car radio on my way to work in Englewood Cliffs in 1989. It was Ken's show (natch) and I could not get out of the car once I got to work, I was laughing so hard. My mind blown, I moved on to discover the joys of Wild Girl, Bronwyn C's 'News of the Dead" on the Truck Stop Tea Party, and oh so many great shows throughout the years!! These days I listen mostly from the app on my phone just like a transistor radio with slightly better fidelity. I use the archives all the time. Love Ken! Love Clay Pigeon! Love Hearty White! Love Shut-up Weirdo! Love Liz Berg! Love Three Chord Monte! Love Morriconey Island! Love the Honky Tonk Radio Girl! Love Sportsy Talk! Love Seven Second Delay! Love Sophisticated Boom-Boom!
My, my, I do go on...
I am very happy to give up what I can to keep this most essential resource going. I upped my Swag-for-Life pledge this year by 20% -AND SO SHOULD YOU!! Long Live and HAIL, WFMU!!!!
11:21am
phat:
I can only imagine how much Lou Reed would hate this.
WFMU was one of the very first online radio stations I ever listened to. In fact, I think it was this very show, Ken's.
I didn't have broadband at home but at work, I would find online stations to listen to during long drawn out projects. I was searching for Halloween shows and found Ken's Halloween show, I don't recall what year, but also realized many DJs were doing Halloween themed shows most of the day.
It hasn't been the same since you stopped TrueSpeech service.
(Early streaming memory: Setting a VCR to record a cron'd player on a desktop system, I think it was BSD.
11:34am
Rendak:
I'd be interested in hearing a frank, serious State of the Station update from Ken right about now. I've doubled my swag for life and I think more listeners should too.
They didnt' say my comment about Ken's show - he alternately makes me laugh and wince. That's why I love him.
11:36am
F$F$ (:
I started listening to WFMU before the Internet when they used to send us the song's music sheets and DJs mic break scripts via post. Then we had to play the music and DJ on our own. Those were the times!
Fun fact about American Gothic. It was actually supposed to be a promotional poster for the ACME farm implement contest. Participants wrote a short essay about their favorite gardening tools and winners would win a new one and have their portrait featured in the catalog. In the painting, Edgar is disappointed because his wife made him trade in the new hoe he'd won for a pitch fork.