KLC Radio gears up for the new year

September 25, 2009

by Caitlin McCarthy

Though the fall semester is still young, KLC’s on-campus radio programming has begun. The two new general managers, Will Haine (’10) and Reed Kelly (’11), aim to legitimize the station by breathing new life into the studio, bringing bigger and better acts to campus and repairing the station’s bad rap. “We’re tired of fucking fighting everyone all the time,” Haine said.

Pioneer Log: What do you plan to do differently this year? What improvements are you putting into effect?
Reed Kelly: Already the station looks quite different than it has in previous years. We’ve reorganized the cave, where we have our music collection, CDs and vinyl. So we switched the cave with the office, so our office has windows and is more of a workable space and the cave now holds all of the music.
Will Haine: Those are the official movements, it is sort of an unofficial task that we have to undertake to somewhat legitimize KLC’s position on campus. For a long time KLC was a place where students just went and got drunk in Templeton. There was a lot of tension around that, Campus Safety was constantly coming around and busting DJs and in turn it made the station look really bad.

PL: What do you think these changes will lead to?
RK: So we have an opportunity to change our image, to change our image to accurately reflect who uses KLC.
WH: In turn we would hope we would let the administration know that we’re making an effort so [they] will support some of what we’re trying to do, putting on concerts and stuff like that. Whereas before, we’d have resistance because they thought, “Oh you’re just the fuckups” or whatever. We’re trying to be a real college radio station, not just some crazy failed experiment.
RK: Then we have the opportunity to use our money, instead of [for] fixing equipment people break, to put on more concerts and put on more shows and bring in bigger-name acts.

PL: So what does your job entail exactly?
RK: The biggest part is running the rest of the board and we have over 16 people on the board this year. I think that’s more than in past years.
WH: And on top of that there’s also the important task of running information from the higher-ups in the administration down to us.
RK: That’s the probably the most important [thing] we do actually, yeah. We used to have a separate budget for KLC and Sunburn but a couple years ago they were pushed together so we’ve been, just like every other group, running with way less money.

PL: Last year, how did Sunburn successfully happen?
RK: It only happened because we took some of our money, we used some GAB or other student funds money and we partnered with the LCMC, which we will probably have to do again this year.
WH: Yeah, I was hoping that we could work with them this year again.

PL: What future events or shows do you have planned?
WH: This semester we’re going to have a big a battle of the bands, which should happen later in the semester. We’re not sure exactly sure when. We’re hoping to make it a little bigger than other fall events that have happened in the past, by having some actual rewards for the winners, including being able to open at Sunburn in the spring and pay for 5 or 6 hours of studio time downtown, to actually have a song or couple songs recorded.
RK: Apart from that we’re hoping to work with LCMC. They’ve normally been putting on a show in the fall for the past couple years so we’re hoping to get on board with that.
WH: They already had Helio Sequence here before school started. We’ll be able to draw in bigger bands. While last year Sunburn was huge and long, there weren’t a ton of really huge name bands. This year we are hoping to bring in fewer bands but bigger bands. So opening at Sunburn for the winners of the battle of the bands would be a bigger deal than last year, when they’d be playing at noon in the courtyard.

PL: How often are ticket giveaways happening?
WH: They’ll be happening soon and they’ll be happening all the time.
RK: Ticket giveaways are run by our DJs. Our promotions manager collects tickets from all the different big venues in town, like the Roseland, the Wonder Ballroom, the Crystal, the Doug Fir—lots of places for really good shows. To win tickets as a non-DJ, you need to find out what shows are giving them away. You could do that just by coming into the station or seeing posters up around town.
WH: We should have a calendar up soon.

PL: How widely do the radio shows’ genres range?
RK: We have an old time jazz show that plays jazz from the ’20s and ’30s and there’s modern rap, hip hop, reggaeton.
WH: There’s a noise show that does mostly noise. There’s a super loud rock metal show.
RK: There are just some talking shows. The Dean of Students, Celestino, has a radio show.
WH: Pauls Toutonghi, professor of English, is getting his own show on Wednesdays.

PL: Should listeners be aware of any technical issues?
RK: We just got new turntables. As far as our actual broadcasting abilities, it’s been off and on for the past couple years. We like to try to keep it on as much as possible. Right now it looks like it’s on and its hopefully going to stay on. We are working with [the] administration to find our what we need to make our stream better.
WH: We put in a request to get a new broadcasting system. Our stream before would only be available to a certain number of people; ideally, by the end of the semester, we’ll have a system that won’t have a limit or will have a more realistic limit.
RK: Just something more reliable and user-friendly. It’s something that’s an ongoing process every year.

PL: How will you get more listeners?
RK: Something that’s been thrown around for the past couple years, that’s something I’d like to make headway on, is playing KLC elsewhere in Templeton. There’s been talk about having it played in just a corner of the Bon. Certainly not everyone would have to listen to it all the time, but there would be a little area that people could listen if they wanted to. Also if students go to Maggie’s, those people who work there pick the music so if you request they play KLC, maybe they will.