A Month of Somedays

Well, that didn’t work.

No more “A Month of Somedays.”  Clearly.

So eventually, when I figure out what, there’ll be something else here.

The more I listen to Candle 88, and its increasingly-repetitive rotation of a few songs, the more I realize just how accurate the television show South Park is.  In the episode where perennial troublemaker Eric Cartman creates his own Christian rock band, Faith + 1, he comes to the conclusion that the only thing needed to be successful at it is to replace the word “baby” with the word “Jesus” in most pop songs.  This gives us such memorable lyrics as, “Lord you are my savior, you know I miss you so much when you are gone,” and, “I wanna’ get down on my knees and start pleasing Jesus, I wanna’ feel his salvation all over my face.”

It never gets quite that extreme with Candle 88, but most of the time that I’m listening I do feel that I’m hearing a mediocre song that wouldn’t make it into Top 40, but which has been slightly altered to fit a Christian rock market instead.  Now, this is a pretty cynical view, I admit, and certainly it isn’t the case for all of these artists . . . but it definitely says to me that the South Park guys did their homework.

(Pre-apologies if there’s an even bigger lag between posts in the coming days, but February is turning out to be a pretty rough month, and real life may get in the way of blogging.)

Last time, I spoke a little of the amateurish nature of Candle 88, and in the past two days I’ve seen that kind of slap-dash radio continue to be the dominant tone for the station.  For instance, I’ve heard the same song played twice in a fifteen minute span, and a moment of dead air that’s lasted almost a minute.  This is clearly not megalithic, corporate Christian radio, but more a do-it-yourself operation, and that actually gives it a bit of charm.  Though I personally can’t identify with their motivation, I find it somewhat endearing that the people putting this station together really do want to reach the “world” with Christian music, and they don’t care if they end up looking a little unprofessional as they do it.

Goofy people, like this one.

As a result of this, though, the station does seem to have a kind of freedom that you don’t get with commercial radio, or even something like NPR.  I can’t seem to find a solid, regular schedule that they stick to, nor definitive on-air “personalities.”  The station is just kind of . . . there, and it presents music plus occasional preaching.  One has to wonder if similar stations of a secular bent might be possible.  I would love to listen to a small, local station, not pretending to be professional or hide its slap-dash nature, just putting out music and/or talk that its personnel find interesting.

I suppose what I’m ultimately saying here is that Candle 88 is like a Christian version of PUMP UP THE VOLUME.

"No, I'M the Christian version of PUMP UP THE VOLUME. Get it?"

More soon, looking at some of the actual songs that the station plays in its tiny rotation (seven days in and, today, I didn’t hear a single new song).

Well, so much for “updating every day.”  Oops.  But I suppose if I’m going to slip, then it’s best to get that out of the way early on.  So this blog wil be one that’s “updated frequently,” but not every day.

Now back to the topic at hand – Candle 88.  According to the station’s web-site, Candle 88 is “Local Non-Profit Listener Supported Christian Radio.”  What this seems to work out as, in practice, is that in between every few songs you hear the same pre-recorded message, akin to the PBS “begathons,” asking for you to call in and donate money  (I have yet to hear an offer of a tote bag, though).

This will only cost you a pledge of $150. A month.

What is quite different from any PBS advertisement I’ve ever heard, though, is that Candle 88 asks for its listeners to pray to God for money to come their way . . . so that they can send money to Candle 88.

I find this rather curious.  On their “About” page, Candle 88 notes that:

Management at KNLE is proud to bring the Lord’s music to the airwaves.

KNLE 88.1 FM is proud to feature Independent Artists.

These are seemingly noble goals, as far as the radio industry goes and inasmuch as “spreading the Lord’s word” via music is an aspect of Christian evangelicism (and a relatively harmless one, at that), but I can’t help but wonder, ultimately, if it’s not somewhat trite to ask listeners to beg for money to give to a radio station rather than to, say, starving children in Africa.

"This worked far more literally than I'd imagined..."

I also wonder just how many listeners actually do call in to pledge their support of the station, and how the station otherwise finances itself if it doesn’t have many people calling in for a given month.  It seems there’s a tiny bit of advertising on the web-site, and sometimes a spare ad or two on the radio, but otherwise I wonder how much money they receive directly from the congregations on their “Church Honor Roll” of supporters.

It’s certainly a curious business model, even if it is a nonprofit station.  However, it seems in keeping with the somewhat amateurish nature of the station as a whole, a topic which I’ll come back to next time.

I think if I’m to have any hope of writing something on here daily, then it’s got to be with the understanding that “daily” just means “during my day,” because I certainly didn’t actually get around to posting this until after midnight.  So, I guess that’s just how it’ll be.

A general observation that I’ve been able to make about Candle 88 so far is how it manages to be both extremely narrowly focused and yet extremely diverse at the same time.  In regards to the former, every song is ultimately about the same subject – they all come down to the glory of God/Jesus and how G/J is the most important thing there is and the only solution for all problems.  However, in one song this may be expressed as a folk ballad, in the next as pretty heavy hip-hop, the next as reggatone, and so on.  This is certainly unlike most radio stations, as even Top 40 is the top 40 pop/rock songs, along with the crossover hits that we accept as falling within those bounds.

It reminds me, in many ways, of my favorite radio show as a kid, which exposed me to at least half of the music that’s still my favorite these days – Vin Scelsa’s “Idiot’s Delight,” which currently runs on satellite radio, actually.

Why a photo of Vin Scelsa? Because Googling "clashing of musical genres" doesn't give you any usable pictures.

There really is something very compelling about such a clashing of genres and styles from one song to the next, and I wonder if that has more than a bit to do with my fascination with Candle 88.  Now, clearly I’ve never listened to many Christian music stations before – does anybody know if this is par the course for such a station, or do most of them stick with Christian music within a certain genre?

More “tomorrow”!

Before I get started on this, my first “Month of Somedays,” I highly recommend you check out the About section, which will give you an idea as to what this blog is all about.  Most importantly, please either leave a comment or e-mail me at AndrewFriedenthal@gmail.com with ideas for future months!  (And, yes, it is possible I got some of the idea for this blog from this gentleman…)

This first month, February 2012, is called “A Month of Candle 88.”  This is not a month dedicated to some esoteric art film or hipster band (though “Candle 88″ would be a great name for either), but rather a look at a local radio station in my current home of Austin, Texas.  I came across Candle 88 – KNLE FM 88.1, to be precise – when it basically forced its way into my life, bleeding into the 88.3 frequency which I have my satellite radio set to.  I was curious enough about what I was hearing that I turned the frequency down to actually hear the station, and discovered it was a contemporary Christian music station, which is not exactly my cup of tea (or, seeing as I’m Jewish, not my cup of matzoh ball soup).  However, a few weeks later, as the station was yet again bleeding through, I heard what sounded suspiciously like Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Freebird.”  I clicked down and found that I was listening to some kind of religious parody of the song, which was immediately followed by some kind of norteño song which, from what little I was able to translate of the chorus, was about “dancing in the name of the Lord.”  There was certainly something fascinating going on here, so when I started this new blog I figured I would allow myself to fall down the rabbit hole of Candle 88, try to figure out what it’s all about, and perhaps learn a bit about the world of Christian music in the process.

The rule I am following is that for this entire month I am only allowed to listen to this one radio station when I am driving in my car (which I tend to do at least once a day, if only for short errand or two), and I can’t change the station no matter what.  I’ll be writing about what I hear, what thoughts the music brings to mind, and the tangential things I learn through my curiosity about the station (such as my new favorite Christian parody band , ApologetiX, who will certainly get a post dedicated to them sometime this month).

Since I’m trying to keep these posts short-but-frequent, I think I’ve perhaps said enough for today, and tomorrow I’ll relate my initial thoughts and findings about just what kind of a station Candle 88 is.  I’ll see you then!