KPIG – Michael Pellegrini

Sirs:

I’m a regular KPIG listener. I live in Tacoma, WA, and listen to the internet stream. I’ve been a regular listener pretty much since KPIG went live online. In the 70’s, I lived in the Santa Cruz area and was a big fan of KFAT.

I’d like to register a protest concerning Mapleton’s decision to do away with live DJ’s at KPIG on the overnight shift.
KPIG is the last of what sadly is a dying breed – a radio station run by actual human beings, rather than programmed by computer-generated playlists with voice-over’s from talent located on the East Coast or wherever.

The reason KPIG has been so successful is that it fills a unique niche – there really aren’t any other stations where the DJ’s actually choose much of what gets played. This is the last living remnant of “Free-Form FM” radio, a style popularized in the 60’s and 70’s which has since faded.

I particularly like the fact that the DJ’s often play a lot of cross-genre music, not always sticking to a pure Americana format. Perhaps Laura Ellen deliberately designed the Americana genre loose to accommodate DJ choices? If so, that was a brilliant stroke.

But the balance of radio is a ClearChannel wasteland.

It seems the majority of radio today is mainly of the “satellite radio,” variety – which is sanitized, homogenized, filtered, and re-packaged – to the point where every station, regardless of genre, sounds almost completely the same. All playing the same 40 songs (of whatever genre) over and over and over and over…

I abhor that kind of radio. I refuse to listen.

If you do away with live DJ’s, then you’ve destroyed the one element that makes KPIG unique. KPIG would become just another radio station. It would lose that quirky, eccentric, unpredictable goodness that makes KPIG what it is.

I am aware of the realities of running a business. Perhaps you could cut executive/clerical/administrative staff, instead? Have everyone in management tighten their belts?

Or, another possibility might be offering a live, CD quality stream on a subscription basis. NOT Real Player. If that venture failed in the past, it was because of the bloatware/spyware/malware that Real builds into all their products – I refuse to install any Real product on all of my computers. The period when the internet stream was offered only on Real was the only time I have stopped listening to KPIG.

But surely there are other stream-casters that you could work with? Put up a CD quality stream with a company other than Real and I’ll buy a monthly subscription – and I’m sure many others will as well.

Thanks for bringing KPIG to the world. Please don’t tear down what Laura built!

Sincerely,

Mike Pellegrini
Tacoma, WA

Laura with Jay Boy Adams at KFAT

At right, Laura Ellen With Jay Boy Adams at KFAT.

On Memorial Day, Laura Ellen Hopper passed away due to complications from cancer.

This truly is the week the music died.
Laura Ellen was the Program Director of KPIG radio – 107 oink 5, in Freedom, California. Before that, she was the Program Director of the legendary and infamous KFAT radio, located in Gilroy, California, the garlic capital of the world, from 1975 through 1983.

KPIG I didn’t find out Laura Ellen had passed away until today, because in a fit of nostalgia, I’d been listening to the KFAT stream for the past few days.

Laura Ellen has been in my life for over 30 years.
I started listening to her in the mid-70’s on KFAT. I was staying in Aptos, living a counter-culture lifestyle.

One of my friends suggested I ditch KLRB and try listening to this strange new hippie station that’d started-up in Gilroy (Garlic capital of the world!). The station played all sorts of weird shit – country and western, blues, rock, bluegrass, zydeco, reggae, folk – they played damned near everything, except top-40.

I tried it.

I loved KFAT. It was completely unpredictable. In one half-hour, you might hear Randy Newman, Frank Wakefield, Jimi Hendrix, Merle Haggard, Joan Baez, Clifton Chenier, Larry Hosford, and The Allman Brothers Band. All chased with some Hawaiian Cowboy music.

From that point on, KFAT was all I listened to.

Through KFAT and Laura Ellen, my musical vistas were expanded greatly. I broke out of the rock and roll mode I’d been in for too many years, and started listening to country and to bluegrass and all sorts of the other music that she and KFAT played.

There were the Fat Frys and Le Club Fat. KFAT became an institution in the Monterey Bay area.
In 1982, I moved up to the city, so I actually missed the very end.
But for the years afterwards, I remained a Fat Head to the bone. It was hard being Fat Free – I hadn’t had the foresight to record any KFAT off the air. But I existed.

Then in the late 90’s living up in the Seattle area, I found KPIG online, and rejoiced! Because the Fat One was reborn!

I’ve been a faithful listener ever since (minus a couple years when Real Player was the only stream option). I don’t know what I would do without the Pig.

I think it’s only been in the last year or so that I came to understand exactly how important Laura Ellen was to KPIG and KFAT; came to understand how much of the stations were her.

It’s against all odds that KPIG lives. In this era of Satellite Radio and Clear Channel, KPIG should not be allowed to exist. It’s an anachronism; but more than that, it’s seditious – the last true free-form radio that exists, at least in this country. It shows exactly how good radio can be.

And with the advent of the web stream, KPIG has oinked its way into the lives of people all over the world – reaching a tremendous audience. An audience far beyond anything she ever envisioned, I’m sure, when she started out with KFAT.

My sincere hope is that KPIG will live long and prosper in Laura Ellen’s absence. That more than anything would be a wonderful monument to her – a fitting tribute to the enormous 30-year musical legacy she has left us.
Listen to KFAT

She affected my life greatly. She made me a better, more well-rounded person.
Thanks, Laura Ellen.
We’ll miss you a helluva lot.

Sincerely,
Mike Pellegrini
Tacoma, Washington
A Fattie Forever
Peace.

Tag: KPIG

Save KPIG! – An Open Letter To Mapleton Communications

RIP – Laura Ellen Hopper