This series of posts covers my long, beloved history interacting with the medium of radio, including the music that flowed through the airwaves.

Every Sunday night of my first year of college ended the same way. I and a handful of likeminded neighbors gathered the weekend homework that had been neglected to that point and shuffled downstairs to the TV room in the basement of Thomson Hall, the pallid edifice that was our place of residence. We often toted along some newly acquired refreshments — crackers and smeary cheese, Kool Aid shook into being inside of an old juice jug — and maybe had some nonacademic distractions, such as the latest issue of Rolling Stone or Musician. We were hunkering down for two full hours, after all. The name of the show that was appointment viewing made that timeframe clear. We were there to watch 120 Minutes.

This ritual began in the fall of 1988, so the MTV program in question was just about two years old at that point. At a time when the cable network was arguably at the long-plateau peak of its influence, 120 Minutes was its outpost of alternative music. This was where MTV slotted in the artists and videos that were too offbeat or obscure to exist comfortably next to the latest clips from Whitney Houston and Bon Jovi during daytime hours. Crossover artists had a home there, to be sure. R.E.M. still got reverential treatment on the show after they’d graduated to being a proper MTV mainstay. Still, the main purpose of 120 Minutes was to champion acts that would otherwise be heard only on the college radio stations at the left end of the dial.

Although we didn’t know it at the time, 120 Minutes was created by Dave Kendall. Not long after he was hired into MTV as a producer, Kendall advocated for a series that was focused on bands and performers who were creating daring, inventive music outside of the mainstream. When my crew started watching 120 Minutes, Kendall regularly cameoed in episodes delivering genially snarky record reviews while being shot through a rudimentary effects filter. At a certain point, Kendall moved into the official host slot. Those duties had previously been handled by a rotating set of marginally interested VJs, capped off by Kevin Seal, who delivered information with a semi-smarmy tone that held these odd musicians at a distance, as if expressing appreciation for them might get him stuffed in a locker. When Kendall took over as host, 120 Minutes was finally fully in the hands of someone who was as committed to this music as those of us watching. Even as he maintained a slightly withering sense of humor about the affectations of these aspiring rock stars, Kendall was a true believer. I think we could sense that, whether he was laying the groundwork for the world premiere of Sinead O’Connor’s “Nothing Compares 2 U” music video (“…be prepared for your spine to tingle,” he accurately says) or asking XTC’s Andy Partridge about the Dukes of Stratosphear.

Every Monday night of my first year of college ended the same way. I went to the student-run radio station that occupied the northwest corner of the first floor of the Communication Arts Center on the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point campus. I was on the air from 10:00 p.m. until 2:00 a.m., presiding over the first episode of Soundstreams of the week. Soundstreams was largely freeform, but we were encouraged to play plenty of selections from the new music rotation. I was happy to oblige, and 120 Minutes absolutely provided a guide as to which recent releases I should seek out. Sometimes 120 Minutes fortified my adoration for songs I’m confident I had already glancingly encountered at the radio station (the Feelies’ “Away,” the Primitives’ “Crash,” and Voice of the Beehive’s “I Say Nothing,”) and the show often took me straight to tracks I might not have discovered otherwise (Christmas’s “Stupid Kids,” Dreams So Real’s “Rough Night in Jericho,” and Hunters & Collectors’ “Back on the Breadline”). Because I was multitasking with school assignments, I had my notebook with me. I could take notes.

It’s probably accurate to say that all of my Monday night Soundstreams playlists were partial, unmistakable echoes of what Kendall and his cohorts had sent out nationally some twenty-four hours earlier. That was especially true during that first year when I was still keenly aware that I was traveling along a steep learning curve in building my music knowledge. Kendall was one of my teachers, and I was an eager, grateful student.

Previous entries in this series can be found by clicking on the “Radio Days” tag.