WPRB: The View from Outside
[Words: Mike Appelstein. Photos: Rob Schuman]
In the summer of 1986, I was a student at Rutgers University and a DJ at the campus radio station, WRSU-FM. I had grown up in the area, and listened to both WRSU and WPRB as a teenager. In those days before the Internet and streaming audio, you had to seek out cultural avenues by yourself, and I was very fortunate to have resources like these to light the way.
I’d heard my friends Gene and Bryan, both Rutgers students and WRSU DJs, on WPRB as well. One day I asked Bryan how he managed to get on WPRB. I assumed you had to be a Princeton student to qualify for airtime. “Call Ken Katkin,” he suggested.
After leaving a few messages, I got through to Ken. He was resistant at first. As a busy student as well as WPRB program director, he didn’t have the time to show me, a random non-student whom he’d never met, how to use the boards and take transmitter levels. I must have been quite persistent, assuring him that I’d done it for a year at WRSU and could handle WPRB as well. Finally – whether to call my bluff or just shut me up – he said, “OK. I need a fill-in tomorrow morning at noon after the jazz show. Can you come in at 11?” Later, Ken told me that Gene and Bryan had vouched for me.
I did a 6-10 fill-in show at WRSU that morning, hopped into my car, and sped down to Holder Hall, halfway in disbelief that this was actually happening. As an impressionable young person, I looked up to college radio DJs as if they were minor celebrities themselves. Ken wasn’t there, so I picked out records, amazed at the breadth and depth of WPRB’s record library. At noon, Ken still wasn’t there. I wondered if this was some kind of initiation, but no problem: I had the classical DJ show me the board and the phone, and I started the show.
After some early clumsy segues, I entered the zone where the segues went smoothly, there was little or no dead air, and I was able to balance playing records with answering the phone. I had access to all kinds of records that I’d heard on the air but had never seen in person. I got about 40 requests and phone calls, which was about 38 more than what I was used to on my usual program. It was an amazing feeling to know that people were actually listening and reacting. Ken finally did show up at quarter to one, relieved that he hadn’t approved a complete fiasco. Later he admitted that he checked with Gene and Bryan, both of whom had vouched for me. I never did a better radio show before or since.
Between 1986 and 1988, I came back for maybe two dozen fill-ins at WPRB. These usually occurred during the summer and on holidays (just like the Feelies’ performance schedule!). I met people whom I’d been listening to in the car and in the evening: Chris Mohr, Sally Jacob, Eric Weisbard, Giselle Price. All of them were welcoming. OK, Eric used to make fun of my Throwing Muses fandom, but we still got along well.
I returned to WPRB around 1992. I’d moved home for awhile in between jobs, and passed the time listening to WPRB, going to shows, and making weekly trips to the Princeton Record Exchange. I met Sean Murphy and Matthew Robb through the indiepop scene of the time, as typified by the Simple Machines, Slumberland and Teen Beat labels. We’d carpooled to the Providence Indie-Rock Explosion, an amazing three-day music festival, and shared a hotel room at the Church House Inn. We got along well and kept in touch. I started seeing them at shows: Velocity Girl at Maxwell’s, Small Factory and Pitchblende at Jon Solomon’s house, the Indie 500 at Brandon Stosuy’s parents’ farm. Through these events, I met other DJs, including Ashley Salisbury, Corey Magnell, Jen Moyse and Mike Lupica. I think it was Sean who invited me to do summer fill-ins. I took him up on it, and just kept going through 1995 or 1996. By then I was living in Manhattan. I’d pack a crate of records, hop on NJ Transit, transfer at Princeton Junction, and ride the Dinky to the Princeton U campus. Sometimes I’d stay over at my mom’s house, especially if there was also a Terrace Club show happening. I remember visiting Jon Solomon on his first or second 24-hour Christmas show on my way back to the train.
I always treasured the chance to do those radio shows, as well as the actual process of taking the train down to Princeton for them. I even worked it into a song. For awhile I fancied myself a four-track recording artist, oblivious to the fact that my songs were mediocre at best and I had an off-putting nasal voice. One effort was called “Princeton Train.” Basically a rewrite of Edinburgh band Jesse Garon and the Desperados’ “The Rain Came Down,” “Princeton Train” was about missing the last NJ Transit train and finding myself stuck at the Princeton Junction station. This never actually happened – my fill-ins were usually in the morning or afternoon – but that’s how the lyric came out. “I can’t pick up PRB/Nothing but static at 103.3,” I sang.
Since then I’ve moved twice, eventually settling in the Midwest. Sometimes I listen to WPRB on live stream, and I’m happy to hear that it’s kept its freeform spirit. It’s a privilege to have played a minuscule part in WPRB history.