In our Midst…

Some traditions also hold that a vampire cannot enter a house unless invited by the owner, although after the first invitation they can come and go as they please.
~ An Encyclopaedia of Occultism - Lewis Spence

Hanging out on or around the fringes of any music scene (music venues, record and/or instrument stores, radio stations, etc…) one can meet some really strange flakes. You meet people who recorded with so-and-so on an album you can never find info on, people who claim some past fame or connection to fame and so on and so on…

But this one takes the cake.

We had an incident down at the station that has sent ripples through our little community. Someone gained access through the front door, misrepresented their role there by namedropping the right names to some unsuspecting volunteers - myself being one of them - and apparently stole some expensive equipment.
I say apparently because no one can be 100% sure, even though it’s pretty clear what went down that night and the following day. Out of the 1 or 2 percent chance of us being wrong, I’m not going to divulge the who and where of this particular individual.
I actually witnessed what I am now convinced was a first attempt by this individual.

Let me rewind for a moment.

I arrived for my duties sometime after five in the afternoon. I always try to be there by at least five so I can touch base with a few folks, as most of the staff in charge goes home by then and there’s also a (then) loosely enforced lockdown after business hours that slows ones entry into the building as the air-room programmer is then responsible for letting people in at that time.
When I landed, there was a considerable crowd of people waiting in the reception area/break room. Not unusual, as there often is a class or some on-air guests waiting for the cue to come on in. I did my usual hobnobbing and went to work in the newsroom. After a while, there was a considerable amount of feedback wailing from the smaller production room designated Production Two (P2) and myself and newsperson L went to check it out. There was a young man that I had never seen before attempting to put the group I spotted earlier who were in what we call Studio One into the mixing board of P2, a tricky task that involves much knowledge of patch bays and the switching thereof. We sorted him out and moved him into a more appropriate recording environment and also inquired about who he was and what he was doing. He said he was a volunteer and that Volunteer Coordinator A said he could bring this country band in for an interview and also that he was with a radio show on the ABC Radio Network called B___ P____ M____.
I noticed that Mr. ABC Radio had not signed in for either of the rooms he was using and pointed it out to him, to which he pleaded to newbie ignorance, thanked me and not only signed in, but also reserved a room for the following day, saying he needed to come in to edit the interview.

I thought that the whole exchange was odd and told newsperson L about it, as well as one of the assistant radio engineers, D, who is sort of a ubiquitous, unofficial caretaker. I later heard that when one of our audio engineer gurus who happened by and tried to not only help this strange group out, but also ascertain what it was they are doing, the young man in question was short with her and somewhat evasive.
But I was more or less oblivious to this as I was already deep into my task. When I got to the recording portion of my gig, I made sure that P2 was clear and that no one was using it. I recorded my script and cut it for airplay.
All the studios have large windows in them so you can see all the way through them. One can sit in P2 and see the air-room two rooms down through Studio One. As I was transferring it to the air-room, I noticed the group was breaking up. Pictures were being snapped - not unusual, as big groups such as visiting bands or radio theater people tend to like to take pictures of their interviews or readings.

For some reason, I started watching Mr. ABC, as he was the last to leave. He gathered some of his things and placed them in his large rolling backpack. He moved the backpack towards the large table with microphones on arms and headphones all around and grabbed an expensive pair of AKG headphones and started winding the cord around them but suddenly noticed that the headphones were permanently mounted to the underside of the table with a screw, which he fidgeted with for a bit.
I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, so I turned the lights out in my room, thinking it would make it difficult for him to see me watching him. That got his attention and he immediately ran around the hall to my room to explain how he was simply trying to put the headphones back the way that they were. I asked again what he was doing and he told me more about the band interview and his show.
He thanked me for my assistance earlier and left.
I told D about what I though I witnessed and to also be on the lookout for him on Saturday and more or less forgot about it. At that time, I thought he was another flakey character and perhaps he wasn’t actually trying to steal and his over-explaining and perhaps fabricated credentials were perhaps due to anxiety or insecurity on his part. He seemed a pleasant enough young man, otherwise.

I didn’t think to report it further but it nagged at me all weekend.

The following Monday, a bulletin went down on the email list about a recent theft and the need to strictly enforce the security access list that many felt was demonizing the late night programmers and the perception of their contempt for the protocol. The debate continues to this day.

So the following Friday, I talked to the Programming Director C about what I witnessed and he said that they now suspect that person or persons of coming in Saturday and stealing an expensive microphone and possibly more. C asked if I could describe him, which I did. He then asked if I could identify him in a photograph. C then showed my a website for a country radio station called B___ P____ M____. On the banner is a picture of the young man who I saw try to stuff a pair of headphones into his pack. He even uses the name that he signed to book studio time, which he promptly erased before leaving with his new gear.
C told me he even uses pictures taken that Friday night on a separate MySpace page that seem to show ‘his’ studio - with him at the board of P1.

I was both amazed and disgusted. I Iooked at both sites while trying to edit my work. There were lots of pictures of him with some country mega stars, a staff directory with photos, some streamable content and some very obviously faked interviews - done using those industry-standard canned interview-minus-interviewer type recordings (i.e.: Willie Nelson’s answers on a CD with a script for a local radio guy to plug in his reading of the questions. Yes, they still do that!). Mr. ABC’s voice was unmistakably on them, although in a surreal, robotic and perhaps radio-industry trained fashion, so that his inflection was bizarre and stilted. I had to listen to a lot of it to make sure it wasn’t some kind of sophisticated speech synthesis.

I am still floored that someone would go through all that to steal microphones. What else is this guy up to?
I’m also mad that someone would take such advantage of such a ragtag, shoestring community resource such as KBOO. We all feel violated by this intrusion. If everything is as we think it is, this guy (or guys) is like a vampire who came into our midst and left us all feeling bad and distrustful.

I love KBOO and that it allows me a place to hang out and express my creativity and use my skills to help contribute to something positive. I also love that musicians feel like they can land there and cool their jets after a gig and hang out on the air on some of the better late night shows. One of the lingering effects of our brush with this bloodsucker is that now some of that freedom is being questioned and is possibly in jeopardy.

As much as I hope that that guy doesn’t victimize anyone else, I hope we can pull together as a community and learn something from it without becoming too paranoid or closed off.