News Team Boulder

Issue date: 4/2/09 Section: Entertainment

Media Credit: Adam Ladwig

The phones are ringing. Volunteers are manning the stations. The mission is underway. That mission: to raise $50,000 to keep independent radio alive in Boulder.

Radio 1190 is the radio station here at CU. The station is affiliated with the University, but covers its entire operating budget by itself through bi-annual pledge drives.

Membership Director George Plaven, who is in charge of collecting pledges from the public, understands fully the reliance Radio 1190 has on its listeners. "It is the livelihood of the station," Plaven said. "Without the pledge drive there would be no Radio 1190 because we don't receive any of out operating funds through the university. It all comes from listener-supported donation, so without those, we couldn't operate."

Raising that kind of money seems like a daunting task for the volunteer base of 1190. But they can rely on listeners so heavily because their product is so unique in today's watered-down radio landscape.

DJ Alyssa Detert was already hard at work yesterday, the first day of the drive. She was on air, proclaiming the positives of Radio 1190 over the airwaves. She relishes the ability to share a differing style of music. "It's really a great community, and it's a really positive thing to be putting out there when everyone's been hearing the same old crap," she said. "You have the opportunity to create something that's completely your own and really promote amazing independent music."

Radio 1190 specializes in indie rock, hip hop and other artists from independent labels that don't gain recognition on other station.

General Manager Mike Flanagan loves the variety. "There's not a lot of places on the radio, locally, that you can hear Bollywood, that you can hear 50's classics, that you can hear classic punk, that you can hear honky tonk," he said.

Radio 1190's music library includes a staggering nearly 20,000 CDs, as well as on of the few vinyl record collections left at a radio station. Thus uniqueness creates the passion that keeps volunteers working furiously during the ten day long event.

They do it for the music.

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