WORD
ON THE STREET
by Holiday Dmitri
The Booster - Wicker Park
June 26, 2002
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WORD
ON THE STREET |
I have something somewhat embarrassing I'd like to admit. It's a bad habit I haven't yet been able to break: I always go with the boy in the band. Maybe it's because I enjoy the music. Maybe it's because I have a predisposition for skinny, white indie rock boys (and previous to that, heroin-chic international DJs). Or maybe, as a friend suggested, it's because I'm just daft and like looking for trouble in all the right forms. I'd like to believe it's about the music though. So does James VanOsdol, 94.7 FM The Zone's music director, DJ and host of the station's local music showcase, "The Local Zone." "I like music," he says. "But I never wanted to be in the musician's shoes. I'm just not an artist in that sense. I don't think as an artist and I don't exist like a musician. Being a DJ seemed like a way for me to be immersed in music on a daily basis." VanOsdol, shortened "JVO," is 32, and he jokes, "too old for rock." Nevertheless, he has for almost a decade, submerged himself in the noise and has become one of the city's most respected authorities on new and local music. Immediately graduating from college, he began working at Q101, which had just changed their music programming to their current "alternative" sound. After seven years there, he quit, then did a quick stint as music director and night jock at WXRT, before finding his home at "The New Alternative" 94.7 FM. "What I play is not about me or my personal taste," he says, when I asked him about his on-air choices for "The Local Zone." "My role as a DJ is to present music, and I try to be balanced. It's not about what I personally like. I play stuff I don't enjoy sometimes." Today, JVO has become for the Windy City, commercial radio's local voice -- getting the songs of Chicago bands heard on the mainstream airwaves. For six years he did his local music show for Q101, "Local 101." Now, with "The Local Zone," which started this January, he's doing the same thing, only for a different station. "I'm a big music fan," JVO says. "But rock criticism isn't what I do. I don't see value in degrading bands. I try not to show bias. My local show is a specialty show. I have free reign and I play stuff as is appropriate. I try to provide a good representation of what goes on in Chicago." A local band JVO cites as up-and-coming and "everything indie rock should be" is the Detachment Kit. A young quartet (with band members ranging in age from 21-23) less than three years together as a band, the Detachment Kit recently signed on to the popular New York indie label Self-Starter Foundation and have since toured the country, opening for bands like Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and Thursday. "They're nice dissonant post-rock" describes VanOsdol. In April 2001, the Detachment Kit -- consisting of singer/guitarist Ian Menard, guitarist Charlie Davis, drummer Toddrick Spalding and bassist Josh Hight -- scraped enough money to record their debut effort, 'They Raging. Quiet Army' -- an album that effortlessly climbed to the CMJ college radio Top 40 chart. "It wasn't easy though," remembers drummer Spalding, 22. "We sent our demo to nearly 150 labels, but only heard back from a couple." "As a young band -- well any band really -- it's difficult to break into the Chicago scene," says front man Menard, 23, who moved to the Windy City from Nashville in 1998. "The scene here is relatively established and has been for quite some time." Spalding agrees, adding, "When I first moved to Chicago, my friends were like, 'Oh you're moving to Indie Rock Capital.'" The foursome got their first break from Chicago's Empty Bottle. "We've realized that the media can make or break a band," says Hight, 23. "The Bottle built us up, but also the music reviews we've gotten have played a big part. It means someone is paying attention, and really even a bad review is better than no review." "But the bad reviews are the ones we remember," jokes Davis, 21, who says he can recall a paltry three. JVO, however, doesn't like to consider his influence as an on-air personality affecting a band's future. "Sure the media can make a band," says the radio jockey. "They help, but they don't get the band signed. There are, of course, exceptions." Beginning his radio career around the time of the Smashing Pumpkins explosion, VanOsdol recalls the effect of Billy Corgan and Company in placing Chicago on the rock music map. "Around 1994 - 1995, lots of bands were getting signed like Fig Dish, Triple Fast Action and the Smoking Popes, and there was a lot of pettiness going around. Bands were rooting for other bands to fail, and there was this perceived pressure to get signed." "But now things are better," he says. "It was a lot more cliquish in the past. Today, it's more supportive here than it used to be. There's a lot less focus on the city on a national level, which is a good thing, because what we had before just wasn't healthy." And as far as making it on the radio, JVO offers this advice: "Production is important. When I hear a local band's CD and it sounds as good as anything that goes through the commercial ringer -- the big bucks, big marketing -- it impresses me. I hear a lot of good demos, song-wise, but if the production is bad, I can't play it on the radio." "Oh and I don't think there's an easy formula for making it," he adds. "I can cite more examples of dumb luck than I can of good bands doing the right thing." Side
Note: The Detachment Kit will be playing at Schuba's at 9 pm.
Wednesday, July 3 . $8 cover. For more information, go to http://www.detachmentkit.com.
To be a part of The Local Zone, send a CD and bio to: The Local Zone,
c/o 94.7 The Zone, 190 N. State Street, 8th Floor, Chicago, IL 60601. |
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