5 Questions: WKNC

For those of you who don't know, N.C. State's excellent radio station 88.1 WKNC can be picked up in Chapel Hill. But that's not the only presence the station has had in Orange County this year. The first release party for Hear Here, a collection of local music made in collaboration with Terpsichore Records and Raleigh's Flying Tiger Sound recording studio, was held at Cat's Cradle in August. Adding this new pursuit and such events as a free local concert series on State's lawn to flourishing evens such as the annual Double Barrel benefit show, WKNC is pushing to be a physical as well as radio presence in the local community. Saturday the station will continue this push with the second release party for Hear Here as The Love Language, Inflowential and Motor Skills play Raleigh's Pour House. Earlier this week Diversions Editor Jordan Lawrence sat down with General Manager Mike Alston and Mikey Perros, a graduated DJ and the main catalyst behind the Hear Here effort, in the WKNC office for a talk about the station's ambitious pursuits. Click above to check out the interview.

Diversions: What is your mission at WKNC?

Mike Alston: The official mission at WKNC is to provide students with an education to equip them to be in the radio industry. But I think once you get involved with WKNC you realize that the mission is pretty much to make people aware of who we are and, for Mikey and me, to make people aware of the scene, the local music.

Mikey Perros: Different people have different missions for KNC. Mine was to cultivate the local music scene, I've always been a part of it. I grew up here. Steve O, who started here about three or four years ago, started officially pumping local music through KNC. Kelly Reed started Local Beer Local Band night. We started Local Lunch every day. It has just sort of been snowballing to where we are just a cultivator of local music, kind of a big supporter.

Mike: Kelly was the music director and Steve-O was the local music director. I think they would both tell you that they worked really hard. I think they would both tell you that there's a lot of great college stations out there, and the thing that makes us different is that we're in the Triangle in North Carolina. We might as well embrace that. So that's what we try to do with pretty much everything we do.

Dive: You were talking about where with Steve-O and how he started it with the Local Beat and the Friday show. I know you guys expanded that to also have Local Lunch. How would you say that your coverage or your immersion into the local scene has progressed since that beginning with Steve?

Mike: At the time when Steve-O took over, the previous local music director had called the local music section "Smash Hits" sarcastically because a large majority of the bands were bands that people would never hear about. I think there was sort of a sarcastic view of like, "There's Superchunk, and then there's a bunch of crap." He came from Delaware, so he didn't have the intro that Mikey did of growing up in the area. But he came from Delaware and was completely overwhelmed. And so it starts with daytime DJs playing The Rosebuds, and then it expands into focusing on local music and sort of extrapolating that into our daytime rotation to the point where now if you listen for 20 minutes or half an hour there's going to be a local band at some point.

Mikey: It's become sort of cool if you're a DJ to play some local music in there. When Steve-O started it no one really knew much about local music. We had the local section, like "Smash Hits," which became the local section (large collection of local music) which you saw. It took a while, and I feel like now the whole staff is really rallying behind it. So it wasn't just like one day we just started supporting local music. I think it started with one person and then grew and grew, and now it's the cool thing to do here.

Mike: The other thing was Sam McGuire, DJ Big Fat Sack, he's retired now. He started the Double Barrel benefit, god, I don't know, seven years ago. That's pretty much been bands that are in the area. That's what it's focused on. So it's another thing that every year we have our benefit concert, and you can look down the line (points to a row of posters on the wall). There's a couple that are from like the area but not North Carolina, but for the most part they are N.C. bands. And that's what is our bread and butter. We support them, and they help us exist.

Dive: We were talking about Local Bands Local Beers. And with things like Hear Here and the Double Barrel, what do you think is important about having a physical presence in the local community while you're also trying to have a radio presence?

Mikey: It makes it rewarding. It's fun.

Mike: To me, so many of the bands in the area, they're not the product of a studio recording. They are live bands. You look at like Red Collar, if you listen to the album, you're not getting the whole experience. That's what we tell people: "We have a Thursday night show that's free. Go to it. We have Friday night shows in Raleigh and Chapel Hill. Go and wear your KNC t-shirt." And the thing that's cool is it doesn't matter if you're a local music director, or a DJ or just a fan, if you're wearing a KNC shirt and you go to the show. You can pretty much hang out and talk to the band, and they'll be like, "Oh man, WKNC's awesome!" It's a rewarding experience to go as a representative.

Mikey: I feel like bands around here aren't really in it for the money. They're just sort of in it for the love of music. That's what we're here for to, so it's awesome to help them out by supporting them. It's all about the love, the music and the community.

Dive: You were talking earlier when we were walking in the stacks about the freedom of expression at WKNC and how you can pretty much come to the station with almost any idea and it will fly. How do you balance that kind of freedom of expression with a clear vision of keeping the station local music focused? How do you keep that from getting out of hand to a side of, "Well, I don't care about local music"? How do you keep those sort of emotions from building?

Mike: It's tough. There are some people who don't really ever quite embrace it. You might have a couple songs that you really want to focus on, and they'll play those songs. But beyond that they might not branch into the local stuff. Really it's just a community focus. Our daytime music director Jenna St. Pierre pretty much dictates what our station sounds like and keeps individual DJs in check, but there's really no way that we can make people play local music. I mean, we don't.

Mikey: They just do.

Mike. Yeah, so to really answer that question, I don't think it's a phenomenon, but it just sort of happens. We don't tell people what to play more than two songs an hour.

Mikey: It starts with having good people. Jenna St. Pierre is the music director, and she does a good job making sure that we're playing the best, the newest. We have people that regulate what goes out on WKNC. We have a large staff, and everybody has their role.

Mike: Adam Kincaid is the local music director. For us he's the guy that's heard all the local music, and he's the guy who tells you what's the best. He also runs the local show. He'll interview people. He'll put stuff on the blog from live in-studio performances. Our DJs listen to the station, so they are definitely looking to him for what to play from the local music. Depending on what he plays, that's what you'll hear when people go to local music, and he plays good stuff.

Mikey: Mike was the local music director before Adam. He passed him the local music torch.

Mike: I'm really glad I went from local music director to GM because it keeps the station focused on my personal focus. That's my angle when I came into GM. I was from local music, might as well embrace it. I think we've completely immersed our DJs. From day one when they walk into the training class, we say "WKNC stands for 'We Know North Carolina', so you tell me."

Mikey: It's just awesome to provide people out there in radio land with something that no other radio station can do. It's a good feeling.

Mike: It's fun too. You have people on staff who have only just heard local music, like the Bowerbirds, and then they come in to perform in-studio. You actually have like fanboys standing in the hall. This is just a guy who works in a restaurant downtown, but you have legitimate local music fanboys. And I'm one of them. I think Kyle Rob said, "I love all music, but local music loves me back." That's the thing.

Dive: With that "loves you back" thing, this is the Triangle. You can't exactly go up to like bumf--k Maine and try to local music. What's unique about the situation here?

Mike: The cost of living is such that you can support yourself in a band. You can work at a restaurant, and you don't have to spend half your money on an apartment. You can shack up with your bandmates, live in a house and actually afford to go play shows that don't make any money. And I'm glad that's the case. And I think a good arts scene breeds more creative ability. The more good music is being made, the more people want to come there and make good music.

Mikey: That's kind of why I like to support local music, to hope that it will get better. It's good right now, but maybe if we focus on it, it will get better. Maybe we can inspire more kids to participate in the community.

Mike: And honestly we're doing things that can help make that happen. With our "Sessions," we have Eric Shoals who provides free recording for bands. So come in and play in a room on N.C. State's campus, have this guy who is just incredibly talented record you for free, mix your stuff, and three days later you have get a CD back. Now there you go, that's an opportunity.

Mikey: It's three cities. Three universities.

Mike: Yeah, that's the other thing. There's so many colleges that there's this constant 18 to 25, they just keep coming. It just keeps cycling in and out. We're not getting older. It's just the same age different people, so there's always a new audience to play to.

Mikey: Definitely universities bring a lot of young people in.

Mike: Good venues, places for people to actually work and be artists, be starving artists, and they don't actually go broke.

Dive: You were talking about that notion of "There's Superchunk, and then there's everything else." I love Superchunk. And I love Polvo. And I love all these bands that have been around this area for a while, but that's last decade's music. That was the music of the people who came through here before. What is identifiable about our music, about this time in this area?

Mike: The thing that I think is identifiable about it is, well, right here (gestures to three CDs on his desk) I have The Beast, I have The Curtains Of Night and I have Jenks Miller. What is the same about all these is that there are no bounds to what they're making. (Lifts up The Beast) These guys are making like jazz-lounge, amazing hip-hop, amazing stuff that doesn't sound like anything else. (Holds up Curtains) These are two girls who play screamo-metal. (Lifts up Jenks Miller) This is an instrumental soft guitar album. And they all get played on our radio station. I think that the thing that characterizes today's local music scene is that everybody is willing to listen to everything, and there are no creative bounds. There's no restrictions. You look at the show that we're about to have: Motor Skills, Inflowential and The Love Language, and they're all playing together. And they all listen to each other's music. It's not Superchunk and then fake-Superchunk. Though, there are the bands that listen to them growing up too.

Mikey: And it's 2009. Recording your music, producing your music is much more accessible than it used to be. That allows for a lot more people to get involved and make it more diverse.

Mike: You don't have to impress someone to get recorded. You can record and then impress.

Mikey: Like Love Language. Terrible, terrible production, but it's good, and people love it.

Mike: They didn't have to get the good production first. They put this thing out that he made on an eight track, and then they were playing South By Southwest. That's a good point Mikey, the fact that people are able to make music without sucking up to somebody.

We've been really successful with local beer local bands. And yeah we sold out Double Barrel a couple years in a row. But so many people on State's campus, some of them wouldn't like the music, but some of them just don't know it exists. So we're just doing this free on-campus show, trying to go though the traditional venues.