COLUMN
FROM THE MUSIC DESK
FCC Crackdown Kiboshes KBOO Hip-Hop Show/"Honey, I'm Afraid We Had to Put Poor Little Napster to Sleep."

by ZACH DUNDAS
zdundas@wweek.com


Jammin' 95.5, "Portland's Party Station," revolutionized the local airwaves about two years ago.

A switch to a so-called "urban" (and is there a more mindless euphemism in American racial semantics?) format worked worst-to-first magic on the Paul Allen-owned station's Arbitron ratings. It also forced some other radio stations to reconsider their beige-toned playlists. Previously, hip-hop was seldom heard on Portland radio, except for the rare "accessible" (i.e., performed by the Beastie Boys) track.

Unfortunately, the station's aggressively dull playlist could convince hip-hop's most partisan supporters that the genre is as dead as Dante (the Italian poet, not the Jammin' on-air personality). Mostly, it consists of whichever jewelry jockey happens to rule the charts describing colorful permutations of the Act of Love.

Surprise, surprise, then, that it's another Portland station that's in trouble with the G-men for playing "indecent" hip-hop. On Feb. 13, KBOO, the nonprofit station on the far left of the dial, received a letter from those lovable guardians of public decency at the Federal Communications Commission. The letter warned that the station's weekly hip-hop show, hosted by Deana Barnwell, could be considered indecent. The station has suspended the show pending further investigation by the feds.

"We are cooperating with the FCC, as we say in the business," says Chris Merrick, KBOO's acting station director and program manager.

According to Merrick, the FCC letter made reference to a number of complaints about Barnwell's show, long an oasis where hip-hop fans could hear tracks by local groups and innovative national artists frozen out of commercial radio. Naturally, that kind of adventurous fare sometimes pushes the boundaries.

"It's not like I'm playing unedited
2 Live Crew songs," says Barnwell. "I'm playing stuff that enlightens people's heads."

The FCC long ago decided that American ears must be protected from naughty talk on the airwaves. However, Merrick fears that the timing of the FCC complaint against Barnwell and George "Dubya" Bush's ascension to the White House aren't entirely coincidental. The Clinton-era FCC never made a peep about Barnwell's show. Merrick worries that our fake President, a man known to drop a major-league A-word now and again himself, has ordered a new moral hygiene campaign at the FCC.

"Have they changed the definition of indecency since January 20?" Merrick wonders. "I wish they'd tell us these things. Like a lot of stations, we'll program material because we think we can. If they're changing the standards, we need to be informed."

Elsewhere in the wonderful world of music, it seems that the immortal Napster Uproar may be on the verge of settling itself. Hope so--the furor over the Internet music-file sharing software long ago became the most tiresome debate this side of the Mid-Town Park Blocks. (And not to digress too much, but did you read Steve "The Iron Mustache" Duin's rousing treatise on Neil "Tear the Bastard Down!" Goldschmidt in last Sunday's O? Stirring stuff.)

There's no denying the revolutionary impact of teen genius Shawn Fanning's little invention. However, the most notable facet of the whole battle has been the utter self-serving fatuousness on both sides.

You have Napster's partisans. Americans are very good at inventing rights for themselves; who knew we had the right to sling copyrighted material for free, and that all those who might oppose such a practice were square Nazi tools of the Main Cop?

Then there are the artists--or rather, the handful of multimillionaire pop stars most vocal on the issue. Small surprise that the likes of Metallica are eager to preserve the status quo, in which they and a small minority of randomly selected superstars live fat off inflated CD prices, gouging concert tickets and all manner of corporate largess.

And finally, there's the Industry, rightfully quaking in its Kenneth Coles. Don't you realize that God Himself decreed that four companies should own the entire music business forever (until they decide to merge)? Anything else would be...inconceivable! And, of course, the Companies only have the best interests of the artist and consumer at heart. As always.