In all honesty, I had every intention of making sure this would get posted a few days after it broadcast. But you know what happens to our best laid plans. In some ways it’s fitting that it took me a fair amount of time to get this show up, it’s a microcosm of my entire five years at KPFK, and as a final show on the station, that seems very fitting indeed. The decision to leave KPFK had been brewing over the last several months. I could write a book on my feelings about what is currently happening to KPFK and the wider Pacifica network, but the easiest way of saying why I am leaving is to simply say that I do not have the time to invest in KPFK that I would like and no longer feel that the station is a place where I can do the kind of show that I want to do. This choice does not have anything to do with anyone placing any restrictions on my work as a programmer. During my five years I’ve enjoyed the confidence of the music director Maggie LePique and interim Program Director Alan Minsky and they have been extremely supportive of my vision for Melting Pot. My choice is more connected to the ongoing crisis and the entrenched dysfunction that seems likely to end in the dismantling of the network and the possible loss of multiple stations.
For years there was an acceptable amount of dysfunction and crisis that I could tolerate, after all, within the first month of being on the air, I had 3 weeks of fundraising sandwiched between 2 weeks of “regular” programming. But my show was never given a full chance to build an audience that would have supported it through thick and thin, and as the years have gone by, the pace of fundraising has increased on pace with the problems at the station and the network. As our financial issues have balloned due to mismanagement on many different levels, the ability to produce a quality show, has become more and more difficult. As a programmer at a station without a functional music department and with no music library, you are responsible for 100% of what you play. The constant disruptions to programming, the lack of organization or basic planning has made it impossible to do my show in the way that I feel it should be done. When long-time programmers Derek Rath, Yatrika Shah-Rais and Betto Acros resigned en masse from the Global Village over many of these issues, I was close to just resigning right then and there at the beginning of October. The final straw for me was connected to the Dungen interview that takes up the second hour of this last program. In order to make this interview happen, I had to book and pay out of my own pocket for rehearsal space. The lack of a dedicated performance space and a dedicated engineer, meant that even though I was able to get the band into a studio, our recording wasn’t suitable for broadcast and the inability to do something, that should be taken for granted at a radio station with KPFK’s legacy and space, only confirmed that this was the right time to leave the station.
This was not a choice that I made lightly or without difficulty. I strongly believe in the mission of KPFK and Pacifica. Within a week of moving to California back in 1999, I was on the streets of Berkeley, protesting with other concerned parties what we viewed as overreach by the Pacific board in the firing of KPFA GM Nicole Sawaya. That protest eventually led to the very structure of governance that has become Pacifica’s undoing, a hard lesson in unintended consequences for sure. I’m not sure there is enough collective will to create another movement right now that would right the ship and bring KPFK and the other Pacifica stations into the future. I hope that there is, but I don’t see any of that positive change on the horizon. Were I that 25 year old man of the past, just beginning graduate school with few responsibilities outside of himself, I would likely still be in this fight. But as a 40-year old, recently divorced man, who is primarily responsible to the 400-550 students he teaches each year at CSU-Long Beach, I have to choose my battles more wisely. And so, my time at KPFK (and perhaps terrestrial radio more generally) is done and this chapter is closed. I’m proud of everything I was able to accomplish at KPFK and proud of this final show. While this show below represents the farewell transmission of Melting Pot on KPFK, it is not yet a grand finale for my work as a DJ. I will continue to share music here on the blog, occasionally in local spaces and perhaps, if I’m lucky, on an online radio station. As a final word, I’d like to thank listeners of the program, it was a privilege to have hosted this show for you on your airwaves. Thank you for listening…
Melting Pot on KPFK #211: First Hour
Melting Pot on KPFK #211: Second Hour
Playlist: 11-6-2015
{opening theme) Booker T & the Mgs – Melting Pot – 7” (Stax)
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Songs: Ohia – Farewell Transmission – Magnolia Electric Co. (Secretly Canadian)
Rotary Connection – Life Could – Aladdin (Cadet Concept)
Erasmo Carlos – Minha Gente – Sonhos E Memorias (Polydor)
Alice Coltrane & Charlie Haden – For Turiya – Closeness (Horizon)
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Josh Haden & Spain – I Do – Single (Self-Released)
Janis Joplin – To Love Somebody – I Got Dem Ol Kozmic Blues Again Mama! (Columbia)
Orchestre Poly-Rythmo Cotonou – Min We Tun So – The Skeletal Essence Of Afro-Funk 1969-1980 (Analog Africa)
Rodrigo Amarante – The Ribbon – Recorded Live At KPFK (KPFK Archives)
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Gloria Ann Taylor – World That’s Not Real – Love Is A Hurtin’ Thing (Ubiquity/Luv’n’Haight)
Phonte feat. Evidence, Big Krit & 9th Wonder – Life Of Kings – Charity Starts At Home (Foreign Exchange)
Funkadelic – The Promentalshitbackwashpsychosisenema Squad (the Doo Doo Chasers) – One Nation Under A Groove (WB)
Mulatu Astatke & The Heliocentrics – Blue Nile – Inspiration Information (Strut)
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Dungen – Interview – Recorded Live At Bedrock LA (Melting Pot Archives)
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Dungen – En Gang Om Aret – Allas Sak (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – Satt Att Se – 4 (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – Soda – Skit I Allt (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – Akt Dit – Allas Sak (Mexican Summer)
Dungen – C. Visar Vagen – Tio Bitar (Kemado)
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{closing song} Johnny Hartman – We’ll Be Together Again – Songs From The Heart (Bethlehem)