On the Air

Ever had a craving for a tune called "Go Mental," by The Ramones? Some evening, would you really get into "Don't Jump Me Mother," by a group called DMZ? Does your taste in rock 'n roll incline toward groups like The Shirts or Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes?

If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then perhaps you ought to be listening to WHRB, Harvard's radio station, at 93.5 FM.

A bit kinky, you say? Kind of off-the-wall? Well, maybe. But WHRB sees its role as just that--giving airtime to avant-garde groups and offering parallel fare to that played on the large, popular radio stations.

"We try to offer an alternative to the top 40," says rock programming director Rob Falk '79. Clad in a black leather jacket and omnipresent t-shirt, Falk is a self-confessed punk rock aficionado. "You're not going to hear The Shirts on just any station," he insists.

Stewart Kagan '80, head of classical programming, echoes Falk in defending the originality of selections played on the station. "We avoid playing the classical 'warhorses' of WCRB--the popular classical music station." Beethoven's Fifth, Tchaikovsky's "Romeo and Juliet" and Mussorgsky's "Night On Bald Mountain" all qualify as warhorses, says Kagan.

Rather than concentrate on the romantic period of the late 18th and 19th cenutries, like the usual classical music station, Kagan says WHRB focuses on that great body of "other stuff": chamber music, baroque, pre-baroque and modern classical.

Some may cry "cacophony": WHRB dj's, however, point to the advantages of this off-beat programming.

"Most radio stations won't experiment. They only play what sells," comments Falk. One of the station's nine rock dj's, Falk says WHRB has helped launch the careers of many local groups by giving them airtime. As examples, he cites The Tweeds and Private Lightning.

The latter group, which has not yet produced a record, was booked last month at month at The Paradise in Boston--in part, certainly, because of favorable audience reaction to songs aired on WHRB.

"We discovered Private Lightning," Falk smiles proudly. "And the first time The Talking Heads were heard on the radio was here." Their song "Psychokiller" has gained them acclaim in punk rock circles.

From a small carrier-current station started in the '40's, WHRB has grown impressively in wattage and facilities. Privately run, WHRB has an annual budget of over $15,000 and a broadcast range of 3000 watts--ten times that of the average college radio station, says station manager Bill Barol '79. Completely self-supporting, WHRB finances itself through advertising revenues, though Barol notes ruefully, "We haven't seen any profits in a long time." The station generally breaks even.

Housed in a basement office underneath Sanders Theater, WHRB boasts a collection of some 30,000 record albums and a total staff of about 100 people. It is one of only seven college stations in the country that owns its own licence. (The FCC, says Barol, is rather stingy about dispensing licences because it wants to avoid interference between stations operating at frequencies too close to one another.)

WHRB's estimated audience is difficult to gauge. Barol says the station distributes 15,000 program guides every other month, and that that figure represents only about one-third of the actual listenership.

On the other hand, a representative sample of students polled said they "hardly ever" listen to WHRB, and when they do, it is only for the rock orgies (non-stop hours of music) featured twice a year during reading period, or for coverage of Harvard athletic events, like football games.

Whatever its actual audience may be, WHRB has elaborate plans for future projects and expansion of facilities. "We have in the works plans for two new studios," says Barol. The first, a small, approximately six-by-five-foot booth which is near completion, will serve one person acting as both announcer and engineer.

The second studio, a master control room, will "allow great versatility in engineering," says Kagan. To be completed by spring, the new room will house an $11,000 RCA console, new turntables, new tape machines, and will provide space for one or more announcers and an engineer. The $5000 needed for the new equipment was raised by a WHRB fund drive last spring.

"We're even going to replace those big, fat microphones we've been using since the '50s," remarks Kagan.

The big, fat microphones give a notion of what it must have been like back in the '40s, when a couple of electronically-minded Harvard students founded the station. Barol narrates with gusto stories from the station's past.

Some are pretty juicy, like the time back in '69 when Robert Luskin '72, a scared freshman reporter, was on location during the student takeover of University Hall. "He was there for the tear gas and club swinging," Barol recounts.

On the air live, Luskin's voice choked with tear gas as he cried, "Somebody's about to pull my plug!" Somebody did indeed pull his plug--a University policeman--but he was valiantly back on the air within three minutes. The day ended when he and five other WHRB staffers were carted off to prison.

Another incident took place in 1960, shortly after John F. Kennedy's election to the presidency, while he was in Boston giving a press conference. Two intrepid WHRB reporters, at the conclusion of Kennedy's remarks, had the foresight to leap into the back of his cab, ignoring the protests of Secret Service men. The reporters fortunately had one of the early portable tape recorders with them. Kennedy was so taken aback by their pluck that he submitted to an interview all the way to the airport.

These days the scene down in the basement of Mem Hall is bustling. The pigeon-holed mailbox is crammed with as many as 30 to 40 new releases from major record companies each day, to be perused by the programming directors of WHRB's rock, jazz and classical music departments. There is ambitious talk of building a remote-control transmitter in Medford, which would increase the potential listenership by several thousand. WHRB executives themselves exude professionalism and self-confidence.

Impressive? Certainly. But whether WHRB's avant-garde programming is pleasing its audience is still unclear. A female undergraduate commented that one night she couldn't find WHRB on her radio and switched the tuner futilely for several minutes. Suddenly, she said, she came upon some "very strange" rock music.

"I knew it was WHRB," she smiled.