Just starting COLLEGE RADIO...
Artifactor
887 Posts
Soon I will be starting a class at my local J.C in radio production. Any tips and help will be of great use and of course they have a huge record library like I bet most do. Thanks in advance.
Comments
I was entertaining the notion of doing that until I hung around the college station with a friend of mine and it made me want to puke.
Of course, there were plenty of people there who loved it, so what do i know...
Yup. I can play anything that doesn't cuss or offend. Gave me a whole booklet that explained some words not to say. Should be fun.
dunno what your teacher has planned, but you may want to suggest some commercial radio station tours. they can be pretty interesting...although it also makes you look at your own school's setup like
i'd say have as much fun as possible. and promote your show
That might actually be cool. The college station here has/had a director who decided he was a smart, cool guy and change the format to "top 40" and has a playlist - he said it was to attract "young listeners" (read: 12 year olds) to the University. Riiiight, I'm basing my higher education institutional choice from the fact that the radio station played Britney Spears when I was in 6th grade. Riiiight.
2- Don't say that every song from every band you play is "amazing" or "your total favorite".
3- Dont answer the phones yourself or take requests.
4- Lock yourself in the studio and play a Buddy Holly tune over and over for like 24 hours...
5- Dont get too caught up in the politics of the station. And when it gets to be toomuch stress, a drag or you're just not having fun anymore, for god sakes quit.
6- Have fun.
Hope it doesn't come out on anything I play. Thanks for all the tips everyone.
All of which is good advice, except I think #4 should have read "M.O.P."
I've been doing college radio for twelve years and I love it. DJing there gives me an outlet to play styles of music or combinations of styles of music that I wouldn't be able to get away with in a club or party. (My station pushes DJs hard to be eclectic.) Also, having to put together two and a half or three hours of fresh music each week keeps me scrambling to discover new things, both revisiting my own records and listening to things at the station that I probably wouldn't check for otherwise.
Don't know how you got away with this, at the station I was at you were the only one in the whole building during your show and had to answer the phone... if someone gives a request you don't like you can always evade by saying "I'll see what I can do" or just say you don't have it...
I'd recommend taping or digitizing your show early on to see what you sound like... I was a bit mumbly at first (who isn't at 4am?) but then overcompensated and was practically yelling at my listeners...
And beware of turntables/needles... although there were 3 TTs at the station I was at you often had one working one, a few times none... and the cartridges were absolute shit, I really hate thinking about what they did to some of my favorite raers...
But absolutely have fun and discover music... your enthusiasm will likely be infectious...
I don't know about that... I'd prefer the college radio studio to a top 40 one... the latter is almost built entirely on electronic cues/sound efx and digital tunes already loaded, you do almost nothing... no turntables I'm sure...
Engineering is easy, and depending on the studio & equipment, over a very short time you will be completely confident. Always check levels and think about cool filler stuff you might want to bring in, besides music, to give your show an identity. I like movie quotes, and there are tons of radio spots and artist drop-ins out there on the net and promo/anthology CD's and such.
Expect to do things like take off the record that just started instead of the one that just finished, etc - but most of these things will only happen once - the shock of each one makes sure you never make the same mistake twice. My best one so far was leaving the mic on as I started the next set, and answering the phone and carrying on an entire conversation about Super K records over the top of the music playing, until 3 lines lit up at once with people calling to say, "turn off the mic, knucklehead!" Luckily I wasn't talking about anything ill..."yeah, dude, meet me outside the station after the show with that ounce of kind..."
Your biggest problem will be talking, and the only advice I can offer is to turn up the mic volume almost all the way, far past the level they set for you, and talk in a normal voice, directly into it. My first shows were very mumbly, but after I listened to them, cranked the mic up, and stopped saying "obviously" and "of course" all the time, I felt much better and loose on the air. My mantra is: say everything I want, in as few words as possible.
I still have a long way to go with this shit too, I've only been at it a year, but I think you'll have a blast. Good luck.