Worth noting that’s a best-of for one host, who has been on the air for three hours over a couple weeks. Her name is Darlene Jackson; she’s a club DJ as well as a “writer, producer, record label owner and creative director.” She kicked off her best-of by talking to someone about her vacation home in Beverly Shores, Indiana, asking the sorts of questions that would be of value to a club DJ. “I can see you having crazy parties . . . do you have crazy, crazy parties there?” The answer was yes, fortunately. So, Darlene concluded, “For the longest time I wondered why Indiana was part of Chicagoland. What does Indiana have to do with Chicago? Now I know it’s a great getaway.”
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This is a frequent problem on Vocalo, not knowing or caring to tell the listeners what they’re listening to. During the previous set, Darlene played an interesting, brief interview with a Nigerian immigrant discussing the differences between African immigrants and African-Americans. She described it as “a conversation that one of my colleagues had.” I went to the site to see if there was more information, but I only found the previously mentioned “playlist.”
I can’t help but think that the desperation for “nontraditional talent” must stem from the overwhelming success of This American Life, a program that has introduced defiantly nonradio voices like hypersqueaky Sarah Vowell to the medium. But TAL orbits around Ira Glass, a man who’s been in the business since he was in college and had done practically everything that can be done on the radio before he started his masterwork.
