Goodnight and Farewell, Reverend Ron

Earlier today I heard that Calgary community radio station CJSW (my good friends and family), lost one of their most iconic voices in the Reverend Ron, long-running host of The Blues Witness. Reverend Ron was a fixture during my time at the Station, from 1994-2003, and for the last few years I had the good pleasure of of hosting on Wednesday evenings from 4:00 - 6:00 PM, just prior to the Blues Witness. Ron and I saw eye to eye on a lot theories about radio, despite some of the curmudgeonly airs he would sometimes put on. At heart, Ron believed in music and he believed in people. He believed in both very strongly, and would often aggravate people who wanted the one without the other. But that was the point. Radio and music ought to be of the people, and Ron was never afraid to remind us of that.

Somewhere tonight, we know that the Reverend Ron has his own spot in the Church of Get Down Choir he so often celebrated.

Walter Cronkite, The Most Trusted Man In America

Walter Cronkite passed away yesterday at the age of 92. As a student of American History I saw clips of many of his news clips from the sixties. As a former News Director of CJSW 90.9 FM, I was marvelled at his signature sign-off - the ability to state, and believe clearly "That's the way it was on (whatever date it was)." As a reporter I never had that sense of certainty. Too much Foucault and Derrida, perhaps, but also the sixties themselves ended the notions of consensus that Cronkite too for granted. I don't know how many people took him at face value by the 1980s, even though he was still referred to by many as "The Most Trusted Man In America".

Even if he seemed a kindly grandfather, and his personal politics often questioned the government, his was, by then, the voice of the establishment. That otherside of the consensus, the side that refused to believe him when he said "That's the way it was", after Nixon they just stopped watching and reading the news. The Daily Wenzel has article on Obama healing the wounds of the 1960s, and I still maintain, as we did then, that 1968 was a year of great schism in the United States and a significant proportion of American society dropped out. From my perspective, 1968 was also the last year that any singular perspective could be uttered as a certainty, and perhaps like many, when I think of the voice of certainty, I still think of Walter Cronkite.

Father, Daughter, Rock n' Roll

Last night I took my daughter to her first rock n' roll show. It was part of the CJSW Outdoor Summer Concert Series at Olympic Plaza and featured The Stables, Gunther, Jay Crocker, Hot Little Rocket, and Dojo Workhorse. She was very excited about going to the show and didn't want to miss a single song, even though she could barely keep her eyes open during Dojo Workhorse's set. One of the reasons I thought about taking her to this particular concert was the opportunity to introduce her to Andrew Wedderburn of Hot Little Rocket who I knew well from our days together at CJSW. The other reason I brought her was that I want her to grow up thinking that music, regardless of whether it's rock n' roll or whatever, is made by regular people, singing about stuff that happens to them in their daily lives. It's not made by fantastical celebrities who live in mythical modern castles, but normal people like Andrew Wedderburn, Dojo Workhorse's Dan Vacon who I went to high school with, or Woodpigeon's Mark Hamilton who lives down my street.

One of the odd moments of the evening came between sets. Those of you not from Calgary may not be aware that the Olympic Plaza is made from bricks, and people could pay to have their names engraved on the bricks as part of the project's attempts to raise funds. Looking around, I saw that my daughter and I were standing on this particular brick:

While I have no idea if this brick actually belongs to Kara Keith, ex-of Calgary's Falconhawk, Earthquake Pills, and many other local bands I grew up on in the 1990s, but it was certainly fun to think that maybe, ten years from now, my daughter will feel comfortable being the next Kara Keith (if she feels like it).

(For the record, Kara Keith is now living in Montreal and her latest project Your Dignity was recently listed on the Polaris Prize's Extra-Long List).