Audio By Carbonatix
I was twelve years old and up way past my bedtime.
The headphones were on and I was hiding underneath the blankets. The stereo was tuned to a Dallas radio station called “The Zoo”. A DJ named JD was playing a track from The Beatles’ White Album called “Revolution #9”, which had no guitars, drums, verses or choruses–just ten minutes of psychedelic backwards tape loops and abstract sound collage.
In 1974, Dallas rock radio was a truly subversive phenomenon. Program directors and DJs had the guts to try some new shit. It wasn’t uncommon to hear songs that you were long enough to lose your virginity to: “Kashmir” by Led Zeppelin, “Stranglehold” by Ted Nugent, and Peter Frampton’s “Do You Feel Like We Do?” were all like sex on the radio. Fringe artists like Funkadelic, Frank Zappa and Little Feat were getting regular spins at night. An experimental instrumental record like the Edgar Winter Group’s “Frankenstein” even registered as a hit single. Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon was on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart for over five years straight.
For a twerp kid in Richardson, The Zoo was the analog portal into a bizarre subversive counterculture. A mysterious black vacuum where men wore earrings, women smoked pot and all of the lyrics were profoundly poetic. (What was a stairway to heaven, anyway? And just how much did it cost? Have you seen the wheel in the sky? I hear it keeps on turnin’.)
Bands like Yes and Iron Butterfly sang half-hour-long songs about
nothing in particular. Nature or the Bible, I think. Humanity.
Something kooky like that.
When you’re young, everything is way more
important than it should be. I actually made my Dad go see the Led
Zeppelin movie The Song Remains the Same. His response: “People your
age don’t need to be thinking about stuff like this. Just go out and
have some fun. Be a kid while you still can.”
But it was back to the world in my headphones: David Bowie’s “Golden
Years” and Roxy Music’s “Love is the Drug” sounded sophisticated and
European; while Lou Reed’s “Take A Walk On The Wild Side”, David
Essex’s “Rock On” and 10cc’s “I’m Not in Love” were narcotic and
minimalist.
All of it was the essence of cool.
The Apple 7″ single of John Lennon’s “Instant Karma” brought tears to
my eyes, even if I was ignorantly oblivious to the subject matter. It
just sounded urgent and important. “And we all shine on… like the moon
and the stars and the sun…” Again with the Humanity; the ever-expanding
universe.
You never knew what you were gonna hear next on The Zoo.
Even the
commercials were pretty weird. It was perfect if you were a teenager
getting baked in the basement. The sound of Doc Morgan announcing the
KZEW-FM call letters was like a message from God, or the Freak voice of
authority. FM radio was like outer space, an almost empty frequency
with a handful of stations operating under the radar.
It wasn’t easy to
sell advertising in this unproven format. The DJs played records–real
records, not CDs or carts. If you listened to the station daily, you
became familiar with the individual pops and scratches on your favorite
songs. I can still hear the needle noise during the intro to The Who’s
“Baba O’Reilly” coming out of my car stereo speakers. It’s etched in my
mind forever.
Mike Rhyner (The Ticket/KZEW): “Bizarre but true: There was a time when
there wasn’t much of anything on the FM radio band. That seems beyond
belief today. Several of the bigger AM stations in the early ’60’s
owned FM frequencies; if they did anything at all with them, they ran
what was known as ‘soft music’. Think slightly more ambitious Muzak.
KRLD-FM had an overnight show called ‘Music ’til Dawn’. How that
differed from what they did during the daylight hours is anybody’s
guess.”
George Geurin (producer/recording engineer): “I was able
to witness the birth of Dallas FM rock radio–KFAD-FM 94.9 and KNUS-FM
98.7. I’m pretty sure KFAD was the first progressive FM station in
Texas. When it first fired up, it was only on for about half a day and
Jon Dillon was the DJ. They would broadcast from Arlington part of the
day and Cleburne the other. It was obvious when Dillon was on the air;
he played a lot of blues and progressive rock. They were the definition
of underground radio: KFAD was a little more structured, while KNUS was
a totally open format, non-commercial station. I don’t remember if KFAD
had commercials, but KNUS definitely didn’t. When the music ended it
might be 15 seconds before the DJ said anything. The news segments
featured music stuff, youth counterculture updates on peace marches and
rallies, and unfair arrests by ‘the Pigs’.”
Mike Rhyner: “It took the greatness of KNUS to shock the FM band to
life; I don’t mean the Top 40 KNUS, which we know today as KLUV; I mean
the underground KNUS. Same frequency, 98.7, but the similarities come
to a rather abrupt end at that point. KNUS was the FM sister of the
all-powerful KLIF, the Mighty 1190 AM, totally dominant in this market
and one of the most groundbreaking, imitated radio stations you would
find anywhere. But look at the landscape of the day–things were
blowing up everywhere, including here in ultra-conservative Big
D-Little A-Double L-A-S. Everything was changing, and what we now know
today as ‘demographics’ were splintering faster than anybody could keep
up with.”
Bucks Burnett (record collector): “I loved KLIF 1190 AM because it was
a happy, zany Top 40 station broadcasting in that cool corner building
on Commerce Street downtown (where the Observer was later located.)
They had great, colorful DJs–Cousin Lenny was their number one dude–and they put out vinyl LPs of various artists in the ’60s. I think WBAP
was all news; not sure. And there was KBOX for a while, in early/mid
’60s. They played rock music.”
Mike Rhyner: “I suspect–and somebody out there can confirm or refute
this–the real change came from inside KLIF/ KNUS. They got the signal
thing figured out and discovered they were sitting on an FM blowtorch.
That golden light bulb went off and they got to thinking they might be
able to make a buck off this FM thing, if they just took what they were
doing on KLIF over to the other frequency. So they did it. And that was
the end of real, raw, underground,
‘hey-man-play-whatever-record-you-feel-like’ rock radio in our fair
burg.”
George Geurin: “KNUS changed to its progressive format around
1967. I was aware of its pending birth because teens in Nocona listened
to KLIF-AM, also owned by Gordon McLendon. The station aggressively
promoted the start of KNUS for a couple of weeks before it went on the
air. (I was a KNUS P1, for you Ticketheads.) The station was actually
an experiment by McLendon; word was that he was actually just stalling
until he would eventually change it to an all-news station, hence the
DJs pronouncing it ‘K-News’.”
Mike Rhyner: “Some thought there was a sizable market for the more
radical music of the time, and KLIF had little to lose by giving it a
shot on their FM. They tried to push the envelope at night on the AM
side but that wasn’t what they were about. You could barely hear it
anyway. For technical reasons beyond my comprehension, the FM signal
sounded like it was powered by a disposable lighter. Out in southwest
Oak Cliff, you had to position the tuner just right on the best radio
in the house, and still had to fight through static and fading. You
actually had to sit still because if you wandered six feet away from
the radio, you couldn’t hear it at all. I was willing to do that to get
to hear records like Ultimate Spinach’s ‘Your Head Is Reeling’,
Spirit’s ‘Mechanical World’, Clear Light’s ‘Mr. Blue’, Country Joe and
the Fish’s ‘Not So Sweet Martha Lorraine’.”
George Geurin: “The music
was unbelievable. It was totally up to the DJ, and these guys had
excellent taste. On KNUS, you might hear a Jimi Hendrix record, some
old Muddy Waters, then maybe a whole side of a Mothers of Invention
album. It would be no shock to hear Mozart after that. It was so
exciting and influential; the DJ’s would often play music for 30
minutes without talking; if you were lucky, they told you what you had
just heard. The DJs were so good at blending records that even the
hip-hop guys would’ve been impressed.”
Mike Rhyner: “No matter what anyone says, nothing that came after it
was really close to what KNUS was. The cliche holds that if you can
remember it, you weren’t there. Well, I was there. I remember it. It
was greatness. And the times were good.”
It was 1973 when a program
director named Ira Lipson and a handful of transplants from Detroit
rolled out KZEW-FM 97.9–aka “The Zoo”. If you were a ninth-grader who
snuck out of the house to make the scene on Monday night at the Gemini
Drive-In “Dollar Night”, then you were a faithful listener of the Zoo.
It was far more influential than anything I ever learned at home or in
school; these people were shaping our perspective, and the DJs became like local rock stars. Every kid in my neighborhood
had a poster featuring all of the on-air personalities hanging on their
wall. The back of my bedroom door was literally covered from top to
bottom with “Zoo Freak” bumper stickers.
People from all over the South
were well aware of what was happening at this rebel radio station in
Dallas.
Randee Smith Prez (former buyer for Hastings Music): “Growing
up in Amarillo during the ’70s, the only decent radio we could get was
via cable. KZEW was the one station that we all listened to. Everyone I
knew up there had a ZooLoo sticker on the car. Bobby Harper, who
managed the Cooper and Mellin record store there, introduced me to The
Zoo. We both went on to work for Hastings and it was our exposure to
that diversity from cable radio that eventually helped us as music
buyers. And I’ve actually worked with Jon Dillon on a number of charity
events over the years; the man has always been there for the community.
Good people, good times!”
Paul Quigg (Decadent Dub Team/Vibrolux): “During the early ’70s, FM
radio here was mostly classical music and highbrow jazz. And these two
radio stations, KNUS and The Zoo, kind of came out of nowhere and were
doing something that was really diverse. The Zoo freaks could hear
King Crimson’s ’21st century Schizoid Man’–or Peter Frampton and his
talking guitar–but the straight kids were all still listening to
KBOX, KLIF and KVIL. Those stations were playing 45 rpm singles by The
Beatles and The Carpenters. KNUS was different because it just sounded
intelligent; I mean the announcers sounded like they were on drugs, but
the subject matter seemed important and otherworldly. The DJs on KNUS
would play records by Otis Redding and Muddy Waters. The black stations
on AM wouldn’t play Sly and the Family Stone, but they got played on
KNUS all the time.”
Having a KZEW sticker on your car was a statement
of lifestyle. It meant that you smoked pot, had long hair and skipped
school. The Zoo was like The Matrix for the Zig-Zag crew; lots of late
night commercials for head shops and massage parlors. Back when people
still camped out to buy concert tickets, there was the Texxas Jam: 80,000 sun-burned
freaks listening to Aerosmith in the Cotton Bowl. We knew what time it
was.
Need a visual? Revisit the movie Dazed and Confused. That’s what
Dallas, Texas, looked like from my POV. The Zoo was the soundtrack to
our lives. Shit was happening in real time. A DJ would make an
announcement about a peace rally at Lee Park, then play Black Sabbath’s
“War Pigs” or the Rolling Stones’ “Sympathy For the Devil”.
Lynyrd
Skynyrd released a record with a cover that shows the band members
standing in a fire, and a week later their plane crashes and singer
Ronnie Van Zant dies.
You noticed stuff like that… finding profound revelation in matters
of coincidence.
Seems like there were a lot of bands named after fake people back then,
too: Captain Beefheart, Molly Hatchet, Uriah Heep, Max Webster, Steely
Dan, etc. It was hard enough just to sort out the solo artists and
their real names. Brutal.
Frank Campagna (Studio D/Kettle Gallery):
“KZEW used to have ‘Zoo Free Sundays’ at the Texas Electric Ballroom.
Every weekend, acts like AC/DC, The Ramones, or jazz violinist Jean Luc
Ponty would play for free. They also held a yearly ‘lifestyle’ event
called Zoo World at the Dallas Convention Center. This was a huge trade
show with cars, guitars, live music and all of the KZEW DJs. I recall
shouting over towards the DJ booth, ‘Hey, Beverly Beasley! Play some
Ramones!’ because they never got airplay. She politely responded, ‘I
can’t, they won’t let me’. But they did love Ted Nugent. He played the
event several times, but that night the Motor City Madman got snowed in
and couldn’t make it. Due to some local critical acclaim, somebody
asked Dallas punk pioneers the Nervebreakers to play instead. Two songs
into their set, they pulled the plug on them (supposedly) because they
were out of time. There were 20 or so ‘punks’ there, and we threw
folding chairs around, shouted ‘No Fun, No Fun, No Fun’ and got chased
out by the police as we laughed our asses off.
Katie Barber (KZEW volunteer): “We loved all things KZEW and had ZooLoo
stickers plastered all over everything we owned. The first concert I
ever went to was Texxas Jam, which was sponsored by KZEW; I was 13
years old at the time. The station held a big annual event called Zoo
World. I jumped at the chance to work for a vendor there in ’81. My
employer that day was Evelyn Wood Speed Reading, probably the only
vendor there that wasn’t music-related. I walked around with a
clipboard, signing people up for a drawing at the end of the day. We
were giving away T-shirts, Frisbees and speed-reading courses. My
clipboard was crammed with names of rock enthusiasts–all men–trying
to win the free lessons. I was wearing a T-shirt that day read, ‘I Can
DO IT Three Times Faster.'”
George Gimarc (The Rock and Roll Alternative): “I did the Rock &
Roll Alternative on KZEW from May of 1980, up through the big layoffs at
Christmas of 1986. I came to the station straight out of college; I was
about 10 years younger than most of the staff–and, boy, did they treat
me like the kid for the first several years. At the time, there was no
outlet for fringe music on the airwaves in DFW. Even records by safe
artists like Elvis Costello, Blondie, and Devo were considered pretty
doggone weird. So that’s where the comfort level was when the show
first launched.”
Jeff K (The Edge/Dallas Stars): “I moved to Dallas in 1982 to attend
UTA, and quickly realized my quest for alternative or even decent
college radio would indeed be challenging. My like-minded friends from
the area quickly pointed me in the direction of 98 KZEW; on Sunday
nights a virtually unknown (but extremely eloquent) DJ named George
Gimarc delivered the goods! Many years before any format would ever be
labeled ‘Alternative’, George had already branded his show The Rock And
Roll Alternative. It was an amazing: Sundays were devoted to gathering
round the radio to hear him preach the gospel of XTC, Cocteau Twins,
Smiths, The Cure. We looked forward to entire album previews, Christmas
specials, and the rare occasion we might meet him at the Hot Klub or
Bronco Bowl.”
George Gimarc: “The audience was always the best–and I would go to
any lengths to try to meet requests, answer the phones, and sneak
people backstage. Ultimately, when the show was pulled from the air for
a little while, it was the audience that got it put back on through
their phone calls and letters. It was astounding. That sort of thing
just didn’t happen. After a few years, I became quite close to many in
the Zoo family–yeah, it really was like a family around there. Some
20-plus years later, there’s still about a half-dozen of them that I
regularly stay in contact with. The only other station staff like that
was the group that Wendy and I assembled for the Edge 1.0.”
Hal Samples (photographer): “Growing up out in Mesquite, I used to love
Sunday nights on the Zoo. Rock and Roll Alternative was great, and I
totally loved the Dr. Demento Show, which came on right after it. That
whole night was always weird. I was into all kinds of crazy shit back
then; Monty Python’s Flying Circus, The Benny Hill Show… Sunday night
was always great because you could hear punk rock freaks on the radio
and see real tits on TV on Channel 13.”
In 1978, Q102 emerged and the
Dallas rock audience had a new Album Oriented Rock station on the menu.
The two were almost too close for comfort; The Zoo had established a
template, and the guys at Q102 kinda “borrowed” the proven formula.
Most listeners split time between stations. Within three months of
taking them head on, Q102 was pulling higher ratings numbers than The
Zoo. There was division in the ranks, and our loyalty as listeners was
now up for grabs.
Mike Rhyner: “The Zoo, Q102–what was the
difference? As I saw it back then, very little. As I see it now, it’s
the reason why neither exists today. Each had its own quirks that made
it slightly different, but neither dared venture so far off the path
that it would make a diversion as, say, George Gimarc’s show, as part
of its everyday fabric. Each tried to convince itself that its DJs were
better than the others; in fact, both were good, and neither allowed
their talent to develop much in the way of a real definable
personality. Had they done so, the real tipping point might have lurked
therein. By then, this business of radio had long since driven past
that exit. It was, ‘Play what you’re told, read the liners, tell ’em
what ‘s coming up, and make sure you don’t say anything to piss anyone
off’. And for God’s sake, never, ever lose sight of the fact that no
one cares what you think about anything.”
Gary Shaw (DJ): “Having been on the original Zoo Crew, and then later
at Q102, the first thing I would mention is that, as competitive as the
two stations were, I believe they really needed each other. It was good
to have two very good ‘Album Rock’ stations in Dallas because it made
each station work harder at being the best they could be. It also gave
me an opportunity to work with some of the best radio people in the
country. People like Ira Lipson, Ken Rundel, Mark Addy, Mark
Christopher, Mike Taylor, and Jon Dillon at the Zoo; and Tim Spencer,
Tempie Lindsay, Randy Davis, John Michaels, and Bud Stiker at Q-102.”
Mike Rhyner: “The DJs of this time period were the pioneers of radio.
They were cool, smart, they loved the music, they would play whatever
records they wanted, say whatever they wanted. If they felt like going
off on a ten-minute-long rap about something, they did it. It was their
show and they could and did do whatever they wanted. So what happened?
Over time, they inspired competitors and the market fragmented. 92.5
jumped into the fray; then KAMC; neither of which was quite as radical
as KNUS. Today, that happens all the time in the business–just look at
the Ticket. You just roll with it.”
George Gimarc: “There was a time when the program director restricted
my guest bands in the station to a very narrow area. They didn’t look
‘right’ to him. I think the one that caused the policy to start was The
Damned. They showed up for their interview in complete stage makeup. A
few years later, that same PD wanted me to get him backstage to meet U2–one of those bands that he had restricted.”
Gary Shaw: “I really enjoyed those years at both stations, and in
particular, producing The Texas Music Hour at Q-102. I had a chance
to record over 50 of Texas’ best bands for the show. I still have the
master tape of the first public performance by Pantera, back when
‘Dimebag’ Darrell Abbott was only 16 years old.”
K.O. Saltsman (KZEW volunteer): “It was odd that The Zoo was owned and
operated by ultra-conservative Belo Broadcasting when their target
audience was anything but. I loved working with George Gimarc on the
Rock and Roll Alternative. I was almost fired from the show one night
while doing it solo (George was in England buying records) for playing
‘Mutiny in Heaven’ by The Birthday Party, in which Nick Cave screams
the word ‘fuck’ a dozen times. The phones lit up with callers telling
me that was the coolest song they’d ever heard on the radio. Well,
management got lit up too… but I played it again the next time George
went out of town.”
Bucks Burnett: “My favorite radio moment ever in Dallas was hearing
‘And Your Bird Can Sing’ on the Zoo one night at 3 a.m. and freaking out–a great Beatles song I had never heard! Ran out and bought the record
the next day; and, to this day, still a top favorite. That’s the true
value of radio right there–turning people onto something they didn’t
have heard before.”
By the time both stations were done jamming Pink
Floyd’s “Welcome to the Machine”, AOR radio had become a demo-specific
goldmine. Analysts from KZEW’s parent company started dissecting the
template and tweaking the presentation. Meanwhile, Q102 had
successfully hijacked The Zoo’s core audience. The freaks had jumped
ship and embraced “Texas’ Best Rock”.
Now there were lots of bands named
after places: Chicago, Boston, Alabama, Kansas, Asia and Europe… it was
like you needed an atlas just to walk through a record store. But I had
always loved the politics of the Zoo: One minute, they would play Neil
Young’s “Southern Man”, then the next song up would be Lynyrd Skynyrd’s
“Sweet Home Alabama”, which had lyrics that called Young out by name.
It was hard not to dig it, no matter which side you were on; down deep
we were all just freaks with long hair and jean jackets.
Gary Shaw: “I
think that Q102 outlasted the Zoo mostly because they managed to keep
the corporate suits out of programming. Once the Zoo became a Monster
station, the Board of Directors at Belo got dollar signs in their eyes,
and, over time, really screwed up the station. Dallas radio was great in
those days. It’s a shame that it sucks so bad today.”
Mike Rhyner: “Don’t misunderstand–I value my time at the Zoo greatly.
Though, I was a low-level operative, I watched and listened, made mental
notes on what worked and what didn’t. Mainly, I was grateful beyond
belief that I was somehow allowed to slip in and see the thing at very
close range. I made many friends with all who passed through there
during my seven years, and I still consider those people friends today.
And talent–man, at the Zoo, we had it! I equate that bunch to the crew
at The Ticket. It would have really been neat to see what it might have
turned into had they been allowed to apply their creativity and
personality in a larger sense. Just wasn’t the right time, or the right
place. And that’s too bad.”
The closest thing we’ve got to free-form
radio now is KNON 89.3: The Voice of the People. I did a two-year bid
right around the time The Zoo went dark; the show was called Life Is
Hard. I cringe when listening to old air check tapes; Man, that guy
sounded like a little kid! Rap music was starting filter in from each
coast, and no commercial soul stations were ready to put it on the
airwaves. It was the middle of the night, so I played stuff like
Beastie Boys, Slayer, Motorhead and NWA. In the summer of ’86, I was
terminated for playing an unedited pre-release cassette tape of “Boyz N
Tha Hood”.
In retrospect, losing my gig was really a small price to pay
for us to be able to say that a tiny station broadcasting out of a
house in East Dallas played Eazy E on the radio before anyone in his
hometown of Los Angeles ever did. And though my time spent on the air
was short, I’m still part of a tiny fraternal brotherhood: strictly
improvisational DJs who played real vinyl records on the radio.
Trust
me when I say there is no feeling like it in the world. Alone in a room
with two turntables, a microphone, a wall full of records and an
invisible audience… nobody telling you what to play or sell.
For a hardcore underground music head, it just doesn’t get any heavier
than that.
