The Day the Music Died: The End of Indie 103.1

Some of the specialty shows, including Paul V’s “Neon Noise” and Full Metal Jackie’s “Chaos,” will continue on the webstream. Rollins, too, was asked by management whether he would be interested in continuing.

“Knowing that I have a lot of listeners who listen abroad,” explains Rollins, “the Internet is their connection to me; I said yes. I asked, ‘I get to play more songs because there’s no commercials?’ They said yes. ‘And no FCC so I can finally play N.W.A?’ And they said yeah.” This past weekend Rollins put together broadcasts for the next three Saturdays, “and they all have 30 minutes more of music, and zero restraint.”

But, he adds, “You see the abruptness with which the terrestrial version of this show ended. The online version? You never know. It could be all over by lunchtime today. But I was told that there are so many online listeners that it’s making them want to keep the station online to try it out. So the future of this little station — I don’t know. I did these three shows. I wonder if they’ll air.”

If online Indie fizzles, says Sovel, it’ll be no big deal to him. “Nobody cries when a web stream goes silent. It’s not the same thing. There’s an intangible experience of listening to the radio that can’t be duplicated on the Internet. And there’s an emotional attachment to it because everybody felt part ownership in it as part of our community. Which is why people are calling and crying and are sad about it.”

Not that everyone’s surprised, he confesses.

“From the day we went on the air, people didn’t expect us to last, but it kept going and going, and even when we were doing well, people would say, ‘Are you going to stay on? Please don’t go away.’ There was this collective sense that nothing good like this could last.”

Editor's note: This story has been updated to correct two factual 
errors. First, Tedd Romann was Twittering his layoff, not TK. We have 
changed the passage in the story to reflect this. Also, the Black 
Flag song that Indie looped in its rotation after the station went 
off the air was "Gimme Gimme Gimme," not "Jealous Again." We 
apologize for the errors.