'80s at 8:30 starts on April 1 showgram

No foolin, it's a new (old) feature on the Rich Mars Wednesday night City Rock Shogram -- the '80s at 8:30! It won't be the warmed-over Tears for Fears and Roxette you get on commercial radio. We're talking old favorites and obscurities from my collection and the WMSE library. A fun way to traverse the final 30 minutes of the show. Feel free to email me your requests -- or call during the show at 414-799-1917. If I don't get to them this week, I'll dig them up for a future show. I'll keep doing my usual mix of current, and not so current, Mars music from 6 pm. to 8:30 p.m. this coming Wednesday night April 1 on WMSE 91.7/ wmse.org

mp3 of ZMF's last hour

This is a link to a site with mp3 of last hour on WZMF. Check it out..

http://93qfm.blogspot.com/2007/01/wzmf-final-hour.html

ZMF RIP -- 30th!

I can't believe it's been this long, but the folks on the Brew City Radio discussion board reminded me that: " on March 24, 1979 WZMF / Menomonee Falls signed off (to morph to EZ Listening),
and progressive rock radio in Milwaukee (and the Midwest) ended. Sigh."

Man, it was a big sigh for me, too. My UWM pal Roger and I drove out to the station Shady Lane, where it seemed there were hundreds of other young adults milling about, sitting in vans and whatnot. Inside the studio, Downstairs Dan, Bob Reitman and numerous other ZMF DJs from over the years created a great show with some fine -- and self-indulgent -- commentary. Roger and I headed back to the east side totally dejected to soak our sorrows at Hooligan's. I still have cassette tapes of the last four hours that my younger brother Robb made for me that night.

My radio hopes, of course, were renewed when WMSE launched in March 1981, a few days less than two years after the demise of ZMF. WMSE was/ is a totally different animal than ZMF but in the same creative musical spirit.

New trax 3/18/09

I had much fun last night playing the retro late 70s/ early 80s music from the earliest days of WMSE in celebration of our 28th anniversary. A trip back to my own start in radio and a fun and fertile time on the local, national and international music scene. Thanks for the calls and requests.
I did play newer material the first half of this week's City Rock Showgram, and here's the list:
Superdrag -- Filthy and Afraid
Bob Mould -- MM17
Heartless Bastards -- The Mountain
Eleni Mandel -- Artificial Love
Jim Noir -- Don't You Worry
Black Lips -- Again and Again
Sons & Daughters -- track on Halam Foe soundtrack
Handsome Furs -- Legal Tender
Hot Panda -- Sexual Frustration
Vivian Girls -- Such a Joke

I also played one "recurrent" track
The Section Quartet -- Heartbreaker

Retro Mars/ Today Mars

In observance of WMSE's 28th anniversary (officially celebrated on air and at Turner Hall Ballroom Tuesday, March 17), I will bring you a special Rich Mars Now/ Rich Mars Then showgram Wednesday night, March 18. The first half of the showgram from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. will be current tracks and other material no more than a decade old. The second half, from 7:30 to 9, will be tunes from the wayy-backk machine of WMSE's first couple years, as I remember them. I have room for a couple requests, too. I will refrain from playing actual tapes of myself (they exist) because they are incredibly embarrassing.

As always, if you can't catch it live, do the stream via wmse.org, click on schedule (I'm listed with Richard/ Alt Farm Rock).

How I started at WMSE/ WSOE

This appears in the current WMSE email newsletter. The station asked some of its "old timer" DJs to tell the story of how they became involved in the station. Here's mine .....

Rich Mars: Wednesdays, 6 p.m. - 9 p.m. City Rock Showgram

The station known as WSOE at the time (supposedly a campus-only station) you could sorta pick up as far north as UWM and as far west as my Sherman Park flat...

I read in the Xpress or some predecessor of the Shepherd Express, about this station at MSOE playing cool, new music you couldn't hear anywhere else with plans to go to 1,000 watts.

As a reporter for the UWM Post, I decided to do a story and tell UWM students about the station. Chris Jacobsen, who was president of the student club that ran the station, didn't want another story to appear, so I asked if I could be a DJ. He said 'sure' (I'm oversimplifying, here), but I had to attend a meeting of the MSOE Radio Broadcasters Club and get accepted. There was a power struggle at the time among club members about letting 'outsiders' (non MSOE students/alums/staff) be DJs.

The 'outsider' DJs generally were more likely to play punk and new wave (I was guilty as charged) and we were supported by Radio Club members who wanted more 'alternative' music on the station. I did my best to be friendly and not punk-y and the club let me in. I did a few hours of off-air training in the old studio which was in the basement of the old MSOE bookstore, which in turn, was an old church.

I believe my first show on WSOE was in May or June of 1980 and I was on right before or after Jules. I also was with WMSE when it launched in March of 1981, doing an afternoon 'drive time' shift with the air name 'Rich'. In the meantime, I made many new friends who love music as much as I did, hung out at The Starship and Zak's nightclubs and held impromptu after-hours parties at the station."

-Rich Mars

New tracks 3-4-09

New and recently released tracks I played on the Showgram of March 4, listed chronologically by the hour.

6:00
New (Released in last 3-4 months)
Dan Auerbach -- Mean Monsoon
School of Seven Bells -- I Am Under No Disguise
Robyn Hitchcock and the Venus 3 -- What You Is
Eleni Mandell -- Artificial Fire
Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts -- Winter Blades

Recurrent (last 4-12 months)
Man Man -- Hurly Burly
Drive By Truckers -- You and Your Crystal Meth

7:00
New
Neko Case -- Fever
Animal Collective -- Lion in a Coma
Wooldridge Bros. -- Does She Love Me Loud
Morrissey -- All You Need Is Me
A.C. Newman -- Submarines of Stockholm

Recurrent
King Khan and the Shrines -- Outta Harm's Way
The Kills -- URA Fever
Dressy Bessy -- Simple Girlz
Benji Hughes -- Why Do These Parties Always End the Same Way?

8:00
New
Sholi -- November Through June
Charles Spearin/ The Happiness Project -- Mrs. Morris (Reprise)
Minus the Bear -- Guns & Ammo
Vivian Girls -- Tell the World
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum -- Ossuary

Recurrent
Adam Green -- You Get So Lucky
High Places -- The Tree with Lights In It

Mars back on sked March 4

I'll be back to my reg-U-lar every other Wednesday night City Rock Showgram (!) gig this week on March 4 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. on WMSE/ 91.7/ wmse.org.
And, especially for you because YOU visited my blog, I've also soft-launched a Facebook page under Rich Mars. Not much there yet, but check it out and we'll get the thing going.