The Coup @ FreeKY Fest

some video of The Coup's hot show at WRFL's FreeKY Festival.

Lots of pictures at http://www.flickr.com/groups/freeky

please post yours, too!

FreeKY Fest Set-up

Holmes and Lloyd made WRFL's FreeKY Fest bright and loud.

If you took pix (or video) please join/post to the festival's Flickr Group.

How happy am I to have Kakie Urch on my radio show today? So very happy.

This week on Trivial Thursdays, I'm delighted to have as my guest, my old friend and WRFL's patron saint, Kakie Urch. Kakie is the one who set the wheel's a-turning with her 1985 Kentucky Kernel column and then was the station's 1st Music Director.

This is a don't-misser this Thursday from 7-9 am. Tune in at 88.1 FM or listen online. We're gonna have a lot of coffee and talk a whole bunch.

Pictured: The original RFL dames: Amy Boucher, Kakie Urch, Rhea Perkins, Diane Pipes. Circa 1987.

WRFL's 20th Anniversary: It's All Around You

Are you staying abreast of one of lex's most show-filled weeks, happening right now? It's WRFL's 20th Anniversary celebration and there are shows in town EVERY NIGHT commemorating 20 years of alternative student-operated radio.

The culmination of all this is FreeKY Festival, THIS SATURDAY, an all-day music festival downtown on top of the transit center, High and MLK streets.

Full details can be found at www.freekyfest.com and www.wrfl.fm

TONIGHT!

WRFL & The Void Skateshop (518 E. High St) present a benefit featuring performances by some of Lextown's lately heros Jason Zavala, Ben Allen, and Eyes and Arms of Smoke.

Expect some deeply-thunk DIY balladry, crunch and drone.

Show starts at 8pm. Cover charge: $3

HOPE YOU CAN MAKE IT OUT, ALL WEEK LONG!

Celebrate 20 years of alternative radio all week long with WRFL!

PS: Please share this info with all your social network friends
Check back for daily updates!

WRFL 20th Anniversary in FULL EFFECT

WRFL Window shot
Originally uploaded by jacktastic

It's game time, folks — Amazingly, Radio Free Lexington has been on the air since 1988, 24 hours a day, non-stop. In celebration of that, please join us all week long for WRFL Alternative Music Week featuring all kinds of bands, shows, art and so forth. And especially come out, come out for FreeKY Fest, which happens all day long this saturday, April 26.

For my part, this week on Trivial Thursdays, I'm delighted to have as my guest, my old friend and WRFL's patron saint, Kakie Urch. Kakie is the one who set the wheel's a-turning with her 1987 Kentucky Kernel column and then was the station's 1st Music Director.

This is a don't-misser this Thursday from 7-9 am. Tune in at 88.1 FM or listen online.

As we celebrate this wonderful occasion, old-school WRFL deejays are pouring into town, some having been away for 20 years. You can catch some wonderful sets by these WRFL originals, too. Here's the schedule (verbage courtesy of Unca Bill Widener):

• 
  Monday, April 21
• Eli Riveire and Kakie Urch 2-4pm..the soft-spoken Sweetheart of the Airwaves takes on the Mouth of the South!
• Chuck Clenney and David King 6-8pm - the Poet of the Streets faces off with the "King" of Pop!
  
  Tuesday, April 22
  
• Ben Allen and JJ Haws 2-4pm - pretty boys make graves! Dig, Lazarus, dig!
• Brian Manke and Dave Schatz 8-10pm...uh...dang, I dunno WHAT to say about this one!
  
  Wednesday, Apr. 23
  
• Jack Kirk 6-9am - the Ripper flies SOLO!
• Shanna Sanders, Patrick Smith and Mark Tarter 8-10pm - I can hear it now: "Children, have you heard the Good News about CHARLIE?"
  
  Thursday, Apr. 24
  
• Kakie Urch on Trivial Thursdays with Mick, 7-9am...more jaw-jackin' than the last Flair vs. Funk bout! It'll be a SLOBBERKNOCKER!
  
• Dave Condra and John Clark 4-6pm - Seventies Reviver vs. Seventies Survivor! There's gonna be BLOOD ON THE TRACKS!
• Ross Compton and Will Burchard - "to all the dj's i've loved before" tribute to the lost/middle-generation of RFL djs (early/mid/late-90's folks).
  
• Larry Sykes and Matt Dacey 10pm-Midnight - will mettle be proven by METAL?
  
  Friday, Apr. 25
• Jeremy Russell and Scott Abraham-Lakes 10pm-Midnight - forget the music: just listening to these two TALK will melt your bubbling fudge mind!
  
• Subbing on The Trip - Heather Kennedy and Tom McMurdo 6-8pm - the Love Nest Killers bring their crusade of carnage to the heart of the Bluegrass!
  
• Robert Beatty and "Mad" Mike Connolly subbing for "The Uncle Bill Show" 8-10pm - the Sons of the Pioneer show the Old Man how it's done!
  
  Saturday Apr. 26
  
• Amberly Warnke, Neil Glass and Ian Christy 6-9am - it's a Three-Way Dance for the cartoon crown!

As a lead-up, here's some photos from those heady, silly days in the late 80's of the 20th Century, before the Internet, at the dawn of college radio in Lexington. Fond memories…

WRFL original Jack Kirk on Trivial Thursdays this week

WRFL - Jack Kirk 1988
Originally uploaded by jacktastic

Well, folks, it's comin' right up: WRFL's 20th Anniversary, that is.

Amazingly, Radio Free Lexington has been on the air since 1988, 24 hours a day, non-stop. In celebration of that, we're having a week of fabulousness featuring all kinds of bands, shows, art and so forth. Please plan on coming out, especially for FreeKY Fest, which happens all day long on April 26.

Leading up to the festivities, I'm delighted to feature a couple of WRFL's original staffers on Trivial Thursdays. First up, Mr. Jack Kirk, WRFL's original Production Director and the creator of some of the station's most beloved promos.

Jack is in town from his home base of Chicago, and will be my guest this Thursday from 7-9 am. Tune in at 88.1 FM or listen online.

Let sleeping ponies lie

Let sleeping ponies lie
Originally uploaded by mrtoastey

Ponies are lazy today at kentucky horse park. Hi estrella!

Cool painted rain barrels

Photo_04
Originally uploaded by mrtoastey

Amazingly cool rain barrels in Lexington. Hoses run down into a junction that fans out to assorted watering devices.

IMDB, no way!

Well, I don't do it hardly ever, but I googled myself. Actually, I've been reading assorted A.J. Jacobs pieces and he talks about being obsessed with googling himself, and between that and procrastinating my taxes, I googled myself. And by and large, got what I expected; nothing much in the way of surprises, except--

A listing in the Internet Movie Database! Huh? How's that?? It was due to working on a documentary about horse genetics for National Geographic Television. It's not much but it kind of made my day! Extra thanks to producer Susan Steinberg!

Note to little-people friends of mine: I will still talk to you.

Knob Creek Machine Gun Shoot

Knob Creek Machine Gun Shoot - Spring 2007 - 168
Originally uploaded by pixestential

I was in Winchester a few months ago and struck up a conversation with these two women at a diner who were fondly reminescing about the annual Knob Creek Machine Gun Shoot. I apparently added it to my calendar, because, looks like it's about that time. A part of me can't imagine going to something like this but then the photographer in me longs to get some images like this.

Anybody game? It's April 11, 12 & 13 this year. Here's their website.

Photo_03
Originally uploaded by mrtoastey

Springtime at the kentucky horse park. Draft horse pull a trolley full of visitors and I'm as delighted as anybody (partially because i'm also doing design work a couple days a week here)

Photo_03
Originally uploaded by mrtoastey

A little break from exhibit design work at the kentucky horse park. Me and a shetland pony friend

A Stroke of Insight

Please take 18 minutes (yes— 18 minutes) out of your busy life to watch this deeply moving and astonishing lecture by Jill Bolte Taylor, a neuroscientist who had a stroke and came out on the other side to share the incomparable, nearly inconceivable experience in words that any human being can understand. It's 18 minutes and you do have the time to watch this.

Here's a direct link, if you prefer (bigger picture).

Photo_03
Originally uploaded by mrtoastey

Uk ensemble playing the music of frank zappa? yes, and after a lecture by gail zappa. Thank you, ron pen.

Stuff White People Like

Without a doubt, Stuff White People Like is my favorite blog of the moment. Take a moment, click the link, and prepare to laugh, whether you agree or not.

Business Lexington Features Foxfire Hypnotica

Nice little piece on our pals Foxfire Hypnotica. Some pretty cool footage, fire wielders!

Really?!

Really?!
Originally uploaded by mrtoastey

Does this bus really say 'lamers?' that's just embarrassing (at least for the passengers). Seen in the parking lot at the Kentucky Horse Park

Buddy Holly, with The Everly Brothers, in 1958

Buddy Holly, with The Everly Brothers, in 1958
Originally uploaded by rattlingdjs

I love this picture. I've been obsessed, alternately, with Buddy Holly and the Everly Brothers for years. They are the architects of rock'n'roll, and were worshipped by both the Beatles and the Stones. Buddy Holly was from the middle of nowhere (Lubbock), Texas, and the Everlys were from Central City, Kentucky. And they were giants. What a wonderful candid moment. Buddy's career from his first hit "Rave On," until his death "the day the music died:" a year and a half.

Another day at the Kentucky Horse Park

Photo_03
Originally uploaded by mrtoastey

Just a pretty day at the Kentucky Horse Park, where I'm doing some design work. It's a pretty great gig for moments like this, where I'll be sitting at my desk by the window, and suddenly think: "I'm going outside to pet a horse."

It's surprising how irresistable the urge is, even for full-timers there. You look out and see somebody on a horse, and visitors (or in this case, a staff member) smiling and conversing, and you think 'I better go out and pet that horse.'

And then you take a picture with your camera phone and post it to your blog.
:-)

Rappelling in UK Library

One of the coolest things I've ever (not) seen happen at UK, I'm grateful today for youtube, but sorry my pal Jamie is moving to ATL. We both learned about this happening this morning when she was my guest on Trivial Thursdays and she blogged it at It's All About before I could.

Yay, Jamie! Good luck in ATL!