Good morning, Lyttelton
A relaxing semi-retirement to a seaside village didn’t quite work out the way Ray Blake planned. He shares his story of early mornings as a volunteer voice on community radio

Welcome to Lyttelton Harbour, Banks Peninsula, Aotearoa; the home of Volcano Radio. Volcano Radio went to air on 6 February 2008 – Waitangi Day and Bob Marley’s birthday. The first song played was “Love Is A Beautiful Thing”, a beautiful number by Max Maxwell and one of the station’s co-founders, Carmel Courtney. Volcano Radio hit the airwaves flying, broadcasting 24/7 with 35 volunteer DJs on the roster, presenting as diverse a collection of musical genres, philosophical ideas, artistic approaches, and downright wacky personalities as you’re likely to hear anywhere in the weird, wide world of radio.

This approach has seen the original crew of 35 swell to nearer 100 DJs, techies, sound engineers, hosts, and helpers, with several local businesses stepping up to offer sponsorship. After all, Volcano Radio is commercial-free, and nothing runs for nothing.

Having resigned from the Wanaka partnership of Blake Horder Gowing (now Gallaway Cook Allan), I arrived in Lyttelton in October 2008 proposing to work two or three locum stints a year, while relaxing in the amazingly self-contained village and harbour atmosphere that epitomises the Lyttelton township. Two things changed this. First, I wandered over to Freeman’s Restaurant to listen to Carmel (with accompanying base and drums) singing and playing stunningly entertaining and professional music on a sunny deck with harbour views. My later compliments to her resulted in our discussing her co-founding of Volcano Radio with Simon Riley, and (later over a glass or two of wine) their need for a breakfast DJ for the 7-10 am slot on Monday mornings.

My agreement to do this was followed by the second leg of my eventual show – namely, me accepting an offer from my friends/foes from across the Crown Range in Queenstown, MACTODD, to open a Lyttelton office for them as an adjunct to their recently opened Christchurch office.

By the time I opened MACTODD’s office here in October 2009, I was well involved with my weekly breakfast slot on Volcano Radio. As the chaps from the station will well attest, technical stuff is not my thing, so I needed to learn by “doing”, rather than them “telling”. I’ve appeared in many jurisdictions including the Court of Appeal, but fronting the microphone on Volcano Radio that first Monday morning was another experience altogether! Remember, this is volunteer radio. Although Carmel and Simon were around to help if needed for the first few weeks, it’s now just me and the wide wonderful world of radio waves from start-up time at about 6.20 am. This can be daunting to say the least.

Overlaying all of this was MACTODD’s generous agreement to sponsor my show, thereafter known as MACTODD Monday. This has the twin-pronged advantage of enabling me to put the word out to the listeners that MACTODD now has offices in Lyttelton and Christchurch, while also providing valuable funding for Volcano Radio’s operation.

So my normal Monday morning starts with me at home, going online before 6 am to pick up the Met Service report for Christchurch and Lyttelton plus other useful stuff like tides, sunrise, and sunset times, ski reports (obviously seasonal), surf reports, and anything else that takes my fancy, such as travellers’ weather from Auckland to Queenstown.

As well, I pick up on any overnight sport, especially if New Zealand has been involved in an overnight international match. I weave this into a reasonably brief sports report at about 7.30 am. At this time of the year, my affection for the Highlanders makes a weekly appearance on the show.

The station has provision for getting music, interviews, YouTube videos, and live shows to air through the station computer (on which thousands of tracks are stored), by vinyl, CD, and, as is my preference, through my own computer. Having relatively recently been dragged into the world of iPods and iTunes, I rather laboriously transferred my entire CD collection onto my computer through iTunes, and thereafter, have added further hard copy purchases, or simply bought via iTunes and loaded them into my system. This currently gives me about 6,000 tracks on my own computer, from which I preload about 40 onto a special playlist for each three-hour show. The playlist is usually somewhat eclectic, although I do consider the time of day that the track is likely to be played by me when putting it on the playlist. For example, I am likely to eschew the heavy guitar of Jimmy Page and Led Zeppelin during that first hour in favour of something a little easier to breakfast with.

As well, during the week, if any music genre or artist or other musical inspiration takes my fancy, I jot it down and check on YouTube for any likely clips that I can play to air. I normally end up with about three that provide something quite different from what I have in my own collection, or would normally access from the station collection. For example, on a recent Monday morning, I played a clip of an Obama pre-election speech, over which several well-known artists (think Bruce Springsteen, Scarlett Johansson etcetera) over-dubbed the same words to music.

My intention is not just to play wall-to wall music for three hours (even with a smattering of sport and other news snippets as well), but to inform and enlighten on matters of interest surrounding the artists and/or the tracks I am playing. This information is normally gleaned through websites such as Wikipedia, and either summarised by me under the artist’s name and track details in my playlist, or occasionally printed out for a longer discussion on air. The latter more so if I choose to feature an album – and that might be something fresh out of the blocks, or as recently, a remastered 40-year-old live Rolling Stones concert, “Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out” (showing my age here).

I mentioned earlier the diverse talents and likely presentations of the various DJs on Volcano Radio. Apart from particularly the breakfast DJs, many of them have set music interests and tend to devote all of their time, whether it be an hour or two or more, to that genre, eg jazz, country, or rap, through to a programme such as “Lava Links” where James links each of the songs and the artists with the next track that he will play, over the 90 minutes for his show. Carmel has an acclaimed show called “The First XV” during which she somewhat open-endedly (on the time scale) chats to a guest who picks his or her top 15 songs – chosen for such diverse reasons as chronological events in the interviewee’s life, or just songs which have had a major impact. For me, I have complete freedom as to what I play. There have been one or two occasions when I have suddenly thought that someone like John Lennon or Marianne Faithfull is about to let me down with some language which is not meant to go to air, but otherwise I am pretty much free to play anything I like.

Picking the playlist each week and preparing for my three-hour stint was, at least in my early days on the station, the easy part. The breakfast announcer is the first one into the station each day and has the job of unlocking Shadbolt House (a six-storey building with stunning views over the surrounding township and harbour), making their way up to the fourth floor, and cranking the station up for the day. At that stage, there will be music playing through the station computer, and this continues as I prepare to get my show to air. Although not so much now, this has caused me many anxious moments due to the aforementioned lack of technical knowledge and skill. I tend to get in about 6.20 am, when I am confronted with blue-lit windows but otherwise (as winter approaches) darkness. My computer gets plugged into the system, followed by a sound check to make sure that it is actually going to get to air when I hit the go button.

At the same time, I line up BBC news, my YouTube clips, and a wad of music on the station computer – which for me is mainly a backstop in case my computer (as has happened on a couple of occasions before I replaced it) decides to go walkabout. At least then, I have the safety net of the station music which enables me to get the music out through that machine merely by hitting the space bar on the computer.

You have to realise this is nothing like commercial radio. When you see a photograph of the DJs and support staff in the commercial environment, you are likely to see not only the DJs, but also a couple of people in production and support roles. Not so Volcano. Although some shows including breakfast shows have two or even three DJs at a time, I have preferred to run MACTODD Monday on my own. Maybe there is a selfish element to this, but the idea of setting up all of the music, news, weather, and anything else that takes my fancy appeals to me. I know though that if I wander in on, say, Friday mornings when a couple of Scottish lads and a Scottish lass are beaming out the Scots Report, one person can be sitting on the mike while the others are researching stuff on other computers or generally preparing for other aspects of the show. The downside of my autonomy is that when the proverbial hits the fan (as it surely does and will from time to time), there’s immediately the continuity thing to keep in mind, while another part of the brain and one or more hands hopefully tracks down the problem. If all else fails, there’s still the station computer backup. 

Feeling comfortable behind the microphone is very much a part of it. I’m sure in my early days, when silence unexpectedly invaded the airwaves, I was left sitting there wondering how to get the mike turned on and keep some continuity of talk going while getting the programme back on air. Now, I DJ the whole three hours standing up, which I think gives me a greater feeling of control and ease of movement along the various control panels, CD and vinyl players, and computers, while, if necessary, literally tipping the microphone with me as I move to keep the chatter going. Luckily, Volcano listeners are a very indulgent lot, and they seem to understand if something goes awry.

The Volcano Radio family comprises a particularly diverse range of age groups, outside interests, and musical tastes, which all seem to knit together to form what I’m sure must be one of the most progressive and well-respected community radio stations in the country. This is mainly down to the energies and input from a small number of people like Carmel, Simon, Emma, and the modestly numbered production team around them who allow us to indulge ourselves, and hopefully something of an audience, with our music, comment, and idiosyncrasies, which I think become the hallmark of each DJ. I’m no different. Occasionally, I hit on a wee hobby horse, such as the time when I mulled over on air the correctness or otherwise of describing Iraqis attempting to defend their country against the invader as “insurgents”. I recall wondering if in World War II, the Germans referred to the French Resistance as insurgents?

The station had its second birthday in February. In the nine months that I have been actively involved as a DJ, the station is going from strength to strength both in terms of equipment and content. Long may it continue, and long may I be let loose on my MACTODD Monday morning session.

NZLawyer, issue 132, 19 March 2010