After the FCC opened up the nation’s airwaves to what the law calls “low power broadcast radio stations” in 2013, all sorts of groups jumped at the chance to apply—among them the folks behind Chicago’s Public Media Institute, who include Ed Marszewski, mastermind behind long-running political freak rag Lumpen, the annual Version multimedia festival, Marz Community Brewing, and other groovy projects. Early in 2014, PMI received a permit to build an LPFM station in Bridgeport. WLPN (aka Lumpen Radio) is already broadcasting on the Web, and last week it fired up a Kickstarter to help finance the equipment to air an ambitious around-the-clock radio schedule at 105.5 FM, which will include DJ sets and “live talk and documentary programming” from “podcasters, record labels, ham operators, musicians, librarians, and art critics.” Among the campaign’s pledge rewards are pins and T-shirts, a “YouTube Karaoke Freak Out Party” hosted by Marszewski at Maria’s, and control of a full day of WLPN programming.
Sadly, pop revivalists the Ye-Ye’s are breaking up, and this wolf will miss their charming covers of 60s favorites—which they translated into French if they weren’t written that way. Bassist-vocalist Heather Perry is moving to Berlin (not Paris), and the Ye-Ye’s play a farewell show at Subterranean on Fri 5/22. Perry says they’ll also release a couple new songs soon! Make sure to get your paws on a Ye-Ye’s button—and get there early for openers Rachele Eve, Rambos, and Fee Lion. The show starts at 8:30 PM and costs $5.
Last week Jim Magas, Gossip Wolf’s favorite one-man electro army who’s also scored an Asia Argento movie, announced the launch of his label Midwich. He aims to release a broad spectrum of electronic music digitally and on vinyl. The first two records—Moon Pool and Dead Band’s MEQ and Magas’s EP Heads Plus—drop Tue 7/14. v
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