As we lead up to “Floydian Slip” Show #1,000 the week of June 8, we’re digging into the archives to share relics from the show’s past.
By summer 1994, I was on my second job out of college. In June of that year, I started as overnight announcer at a brand new Adult Album Alternative (Triple- A) station in Burlington, Vt. — WEXP “Experience 105.1.”
By December, I’d resurrected “Floydian Slip” as a once-a-month offering on the station, whenever there was a new moon.
Here’s a skim of that first WEXP show, which aired 11 p.m. EST Friday, Dec. 2, 1994.
While I started the show six years earlier at Ithaca College’s 106-VIC, this show is actually show “number one,” because this is when I started counting.
By the time I’d started doing “Floydian Slip” for WEXP, I’d moved from overnights to evenings, arriving at the station mid-afternoon, and working on-air from 7 to midnight.
I have fond memories of being in my mid-20s, living in downtown Burlington, and taking the short walk from my efficiency apartment over to the station, where every jock enjoyed creative freedom regarding what we played and what we said.
It was working in radio like I’d imagined it would be growing up listening to my FM Walkman: Something akin to Donald Fagen’s “The Nightfly.”
WEXP was something special. It had the vibe of underground FM radio from the ’70s … or so I was told. Unconventional, eclectic, very democratic and down-to-earth — one potential sponsor complained all us air people sounded stoned — I’m glad I had the experience, as short-lived as it was.
WEXP went dark within a year, and I was out of a job by Summer ’95. More on that later.
A couple of notes: Yes, I mispronounced “Astronomy Domine,” which I continued to do for years later. And we hadn’t yet registered the floydianslip.com domain, but were using the show’s original email address: floydshow@aol.com.
AOL also gave WEXP a complimentary account, in exchange for on-air mentions. The account remained active for years after the station went off the air. Apparently no one from the station ever told AOL, and the company didn’t require proof of performance for its on-air plugs. No good deed …
