Completely Conspicuous 618: You Say It's Your Birthday

Completely Conspicuous

Celebrating the podcast's 17th birthday by talking to Amanda Guest about the 10th birthday of the radio station she founded, BFF.fm.

Show notes:

• Amanda was last on the podcast 10 years ago talking about moving to SF and launching BFF.fm
• Plenty of surprises along the way
• She was a DJ at the Salem State College (now University) station for 18 years
• Commercial radio was already being automated in the mid-'90s
• Built a studio in the Secret Alley in SF
• A lot of the DJs at BFF now weren't alive when Amanda was DJing in the '90s
• Shorter attention spans: Newer DJs are doing one-hour shows
• Jay has been doing a show for BFF since the station started
• "Where's Koomdogg?"
• Building exposure through a crazy boat DJing gig
• Became a nonprofit in 2015
• Amanda was hired as the GM of the station, now doing it full-time
• Went from dues-based organization to nonprofit
• Allows BFF to fundraise and get grants
• Celebrating the station's 10th birthday with events throughout the city
• Amanda plans to stay involved but wants to retire at some point
• SF went into COVID lockdown early and stayed in it the longest
• Studio had to shut down so BFF enabled DJs to broadcast from home
• Found free space in the SF Ferry Building so were able to broadcast from there
• The future of radio won't get less corporate
• Not a lot of commercial stations for indie music, except for college stations
• Amanda: Big electronic music movement happening in SF
• Looking for new music
• The DJ as curator
• BFF has 120 shows on the schedule, most done live in the studio
• Different approaches to show construction
• Great achievements in song segues
• Jay: Coming up on 500 episodes of the radio show

Completely Conspicuous is available through Apple Podcasts. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.