Memory dump 1: KZEW

Today I tripped down memory lane when I heard The Ramones' "I Wanna Be Sedated" playing in the improbable venue of Walgreens. Here's the trippy thing it reminded me of:

I was a disk jockey on KZEW-FM in Dallas. It was a huge deal for me at the time, and I still love the memory.

Getting on the air at the Zoo was the dream of my radio career (many thanks to Ken Rundel for pointing me that direction), and I managed to be there at the tender age of 21, soon after I graduated from college. While I was in school I had worked briefly at some other interesting stations -- notably, KEXL in San Antonio and KLIF (the Mighty 1190, home of Top 40 radio a few decades before I arrived) -- but the Zoo was where I wanted to end up. And that I did: At the end of my tenure I left both KZEW and radio behind forever, thinking I should put my newly earned college degree to better use. Still wondering whether that was the right call.

What a great station -- you still find diehard Zoo Freaks, even though its AOR format we knew and loved went quiet more than a few decades ago. People still want to buy Zooloo window stickers (see here), and I'm still kicking myself for not keeping one of the satin bomber jackets that the station had made for the staff that year.

I had the great fortune to work with the amazing LaBella & Rody & Rhyner, the adorable Jon Dillon, John B. ("Viacom.") Wells, sweet Beverly Beesley, Michael Brown and Charley Jones. It was the Zoo's sixth year on air, and to commemorate it, some of the on-air staff posed for a publicity shot in our birthday suits ... with strategically placed birthday cake and sound board.

I wasn't there long, and my presence was hardly a dimple in the station's big ol' public face, but being there meant enough to me that I still smile thinking about it. I loved giving the station ID ("You're listening to the Zoo [sound effect: synthesized elephant roar] ... KZEW, Dallas Fort Worth") and coming up with great sets and segues, and in a weird way even the jerkoff who phoned in and, well, jerked off while I gave some long, involved answer to a stupid question he asked -- took me awhile to figure out what he was up to because I had the call on noise-cancelling speakerphone so I didn't hear his, um, utterances until I finally shut up myself. (Beverly later congratulated me on getting my first beat-off call ... with many more to look forward to, she predicted.) Of course there are better, more interesting, celebrity-laced stories but I've saved those for my other, anonymous blog.

Good luck finding that.

The movie Almost Famous weirded me out when I first saw it because Cameron Crowe's kid-in-the-bigtime story felt so familiar. Not that I was as young at the time as Crowe was or could hold a candle to him in talent then or now ... but I felt every bit as awed to be in my situation as he did in his and that movie brought it all back for me.

Fixing John LaBella's mic

Even so, I didn't realize just how big an impression these folks had made on me until years later when I learned about the untimely death of John LaBella -- I cried as though I'd left the station only the week before.

So Beverly, guys, others I didn't mention, and even you, Jeff and Tom -- your faces and especially your voices are permanently embossed on my memory. Maybe one of you remembers mine. Hint: There were two cute young redheads on the air around that time -- I was the one who didn't marry Jones...