35000 Watts :: The Story of College Radio
A film about a radio revolution
Our second LA interview was our first trip to a working college radio station, and it was a real treat. Erica Tyron has been the adviser for KSPC for thirty years, so she has an amazing depth of knowledge that we really only scratched the surface of during our one-hour interview.…
When you are making a music-related documentary, one of the first questions many people will ask you is “what is your favorite music doc?”. And, of course, you can never give a short, simple answer because there are so many amazing documentaries out there and choosing just one is impossible.…
Our first interview during our LA shoot was a big one, as I had the opportunity to sit down with Joey Santiago, lead guitarist and founding member of the Pixies. If you are reading this, then you likely need no introduction to the Pixies, one of the most influential bands of the late ’80s and early ’90s and an iconic band in the history of college radio.…
When radio stations refer to wattage (as in “100,000 watts of rock ‘n’ roll!”), they are referring to the broadcast “power” of an FM or AM radio station. More specifically, they are referencing the effective radiated power of the station, and it generally represents the station’s signal strength.…
First, this is only true in the United States, as other countries have different systems for assigning call letters (also known as call signs) to broadcast stations. When the US government began regulating the radio airwaves by licensing stations, they chose to assign each station west of the Mississippi River a four-letter combination beginning with K, while east of the Mississippi, the call letters would start with a W.
We’re excited to announce that our next round of interviews will be shot next week in Los Angeles, and we have a pretty impressive line-up scheduled. We will be talking to experts on college radio history, as well as several artists who were pioneers of the college radio movement.…
As we dive into the world of college radio broadcasting, one term which comes up over and over is “carrier current”. What exactly is carrier current and why is it important to college radio history? Let’s take a look.
Carrier current broadcasting is a way to transmit a radio signal through the electrical wiring of a building (or in the case of a college campus, several connected buildings).…
Today is World College Radio Day, so it is the perfect time to reflect on college radio and its importance in the media landscape. It might seem as though radio is an antiquated medium, but there is a reason every automobile still comes with one installed.…
When talking about college radio history, one of the first (and most common) questions is: what was the first college radio station in the United States? And while that may seem like a relatively straightforward, easy-to-answer question, it turns out that it isn’t that simple.…
The final interview of our three-day shoot in Dallas, TX was with three gentlemen from the band Tabula Rasa: lead vocalist Robert E. Boggs, bassist Owen Kinser and drummer Jason LaMarca. I really enjoyed interviewing all three at once, because the interplay and camaraderie between them was still very evident.…