Remembering "Idiot's Delight"

I was obsessed with radio as a teenager -- my childhood dream was to become a hotshot DJ/personality who was as funny and wild as Howard Stern, as thoughtful and smart as an NPR host, and as souful as Allison Steele. Oh, and I wanted to play music -- lots of different kinds of music, from the Beastie Boys to Led Zepplin to James Taylor to King Missile to Mozart to Bing Crosby, whatever I thought was good or funky at the time.

Basically I wanted to be a free form radio host.

I tried my hand at it in college -- I had a short-lived free form radio show that was on at 6 AM every Tuesday. No one listened to it and, after one semester, I didn't have any more time for it (although I still have tapes -- yes, cassette tapes, remember those? -- of my old shows).

But it made me appreciate just how hard it is to do a good, entertaining radio program, free form or no. Sitting behind that microphone, talking into the ether, trying to entertain everyone and no one, might seem really easy but it's not. It's hard, brutal work, it demands everything of your brains and emotions. And knowing what kind of music to play takes some skill -- fortunately I had a friend who gave me all sorts of weird music (like Shonan Knife!) that gave my show some hipster cred. Otherwise, I was an awful DJ, a blithering, unfunny mess. It was an acid test of my total lack of natural performative talent. In part, that's why I started this blog -- it allowed me to do something creatively free form that more suited by meagre skills. 

Free form radio barely exists anymore, if it ever really did. College and non-profit radio are the only places it ever really thrived. Even 25 years ago it was a strange offbeat thing. In these days of consolidated corporate ownership and public radio mega-organizations, the idea of free form radio is more unthinkable than ever. It doesn't really exist at all.

But there used to be one huge, great exception.

For roughly forty years a guy named Vin Scelsa hosted the ultimate free form radio show in NYC -- "Idiot's Delight." This show bounced around the NYC airwaves for decades, starting at non-commercial WFMU, migrating to commercial radio at WNEW and K-ROCK, then to its natural habitat on college radio at WFUV where it ended its long run in 2015. It was the ultimate free form show -- a quiet, well-spoken, very informed guy, Vin would play lots of different kinds of music and interview singers, musicians, filmmakers, writers, cultural leaders of all stripes. The show was never about Vin -- in fact, he was very unassuming. Instead, his focus was always on the music or his guests, and that made it wonderfully rich.

I started listening to "Idiot's Delight" on K-ROCK back in high school. I remember it was through this show that I first discovered the filmmaker Kevin Smith who was promoting his first ever movie, Clerks (I didn't understand why "37" was so funny until I saw the movie!). I remember it being such a great, relaxed, extremely interesting conversation -- the kind you hear on every podcast today but was unusual to hear on the radio, or anywhere, back in 1994. In fact, the show was basically the forerunner to podcasts with long form, intelligent, in-depth interviews. 

Vin was a great host and always featured interesting guests and topics -- and he had the time to do it. On K-ROCK, the show was on Sunday nights from 8 PM until 2 AM so he had lots of time. This show was a miracle and it's unbelievable that it was ever on commercial radio -- then or now. I miss it to this day. 

I never understood, but always loved, Vin's intro to the show. He would state, simply, at the start of every show:

Respect the elders.
Embrace the new.
Encourage the impracticable and improbable.
Without bias.
This ... is "Idiot's Delight."

P.S. I actually tried to interview Vin for this blog but he never answered my emails. Maybe, if he sees this post, he'll change his mind.