![Stuart, Big Country at KROQ, Pasadena](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/IMG_2108.jpg)
One of the bands I had forgotten I interviewed, Big Country, except for this Debbie Leavitt photo. The Scottish must find it oppressive in the US these days, particularly if they smoke.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | 80s, All |
Taken | March 27, 2019 |
Uploaded | March 30, 2019 |
![Dave Alvin at a gig](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/IMG_2107.jpg)
photo by Debbie Leavitt
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | 80s, All |
Taken | March 27, 2019 |
Uploaded | March 30, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish's Depeche Mode 'Music For The Masses' gold record](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_23.jpg)
DMode I began playing on KROQ because the producer was Daniel Miller, of The Normal (TVOD, Warm Leatherette, 1978). Mike Zampelli from Zed Records/LBC brought the single New Life to Pasadena with a dozen or so other records he wanted me to play on the Jed The Fish import show. Not a huge response but the band showed promise. Once Speak and Spell arrived, everyone on KROQ was playing it.
![Jed The Fish's Tone Loc platinum disk](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_22.jpg)
This is the most concrete example of Jed The Fish having an impact on an artist's success. My Catch of the Day feature allowed me to choose one song per day. One Tuesday in 1988 Anthony Smith and Matt Dyke talked their way past reception and brought me Wild Thing. I spent most of my shift talking with them and sent them off expecting to hear the single at 4:40 pm. The phones blew up, and I made the rare decision to play it again the next day. The day after that it was a mid-week add to KROQ (most radio stations do their music meetings on a Tuesday, where they decide what is 'added' to the playlist). By Thursday it was on KIIS-FM. A most memorable instance of watching a piece of vinyl setting the radio waves ablaze in a matter of hours.
![Jed The Fish's signed Duran Duran Patrick Nagel poster](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_20.jpg)
One of the few distinguished examples of Duran Duran ephemera signed by the entire band, Capitol Records gave me this for my support of the first two albums. Funny thing, the label actually had unpaid interns promoting the band. I think his name was Danny, and he brought me my first copy of 'Duran Duran' in the summer of 1981. Money well spent?
![Jed's Oingo Boingo 'Farewell' plaque, signed by the band](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_19.jpg)
There was nothing left to say when your band leader, after 10 years of scoring movies, is calling it quits. No more gold records to be had, hearing going bad, and bandmates so sad, they all autographed this poster from the site of the departure, the once-heralded Universal Amphitheater. Music and movies have never been the same since.
![Jed The Fish's autographed Tom Morello Fender Telecaster Squire](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_17.jpg)
Although this is the bitty Fender model -- and I doubt Tom ever played it -- to have this in my studio still making sound is amazing. Sadly, the 'soul power,' written in silver Sharpie, rubs right off with very little effort, you get the idea. Rock's best guitar player of the 90s? Come on! That's why KROQ even bothered to call it 'Roq of the 90's.' I haven't been gentle with it.
![Jed The Fish's Van's special edition KROQ shoes](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_10.jpg)
Right about the time the world was getting busted for counterfeit shoes, Van's did a promotion with KROQ, and all the Joqs got free shoes. Deese are dem. Cir.1989
![Jed the Fish's Rolling Stones Badge, 1978](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_09.jpg)
This was the night I was hired at KROQ. It was the first time I had seen the band, and I was sitting in my Ball Road apartment GLOWING because I had finally seen the greatest Rock and Roll band in the world. The phone rings at 1:15 a.m., it's Darrell Wayne asking if I could get to Pasadena by two. "Sure," I said. And later I climbed those back stairs for the first time.
![David Byrne with Jed The Fish in November 1989](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/djjedthefish.com_0058_a.jpg)
Don't be fooled by the smile. This was torture for David Byrne, and he's only smiling because the interview was over. He is one of the truly fascinating artists I have ever spoken with, and I am a huge fan. Not necessarily of the Red Momo album, which he was there to promote, but his work continues. I can't say that about all the greats. Sometimes being a fan does not serve the discussion.
![Vince Gilligan, Peter Gould, Jed The Fish Gould, and Alice](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/063B72E6-EE3C-4F01-AA72-DED21127BD94.jpeg)
Here is an example of hunting down your heroes, and they turn out to be wonderful. Armed with a Strawberry pie, I got the security guard to call them up and come down to the lobby. The creator of Beaking Bad, Vince said he would have me up but for all the notes on the wall for Better Call Saul. Which is a show he created with Peter Gould, whom Alice immediately liked. If you work in this building, you know immediately where it is. KROQ used to be in the neighborhood.
Album | Everything Album |
Category | All |
Taken | May 10, 2016 |
Uploaded | February 10, 2019 |
![jed the fish and sarah silverman](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/JedTheFishandSarahSilverman.jpg)
Sarah and I having an intense conversation backstage at the old KROQ Acoustic Christmas. She has more teeth than I do. Funny girl.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Events |
Taken | April 2, 2009 |
Uploaded | January 21, 2019 |
![KROQ air staff at Acoustic Christmas](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/IMG_0271_4.jpg)
Moments before Bean fell off the stage, all of the joqs gathered. Just after Bean fell, I thought I heard someone sarcastically say "Bean fell off the stage." Absurd, right?. I laughed my ass off. But he really fell, as they introduced No Doubt. Sorry Bean.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Events |
Taken | December 14, 2014 |
Uploaded | January 21, 2019 |
![Foster the People with Jed The Fish](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/foster_the_people_being_interviewed_by_jed_the_fish.jpg)
Locked in a cheesy trailer at the KROQ Weenie Roast with then-newcomers Foster the People, I do my best to scramble their name. They were in a good mood.
Album | Everything Album |
Category | All |
Uploaded | January 16, 2019 |
![Jed in NYC](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_greenscreen_2018-12-18_75_.jpg)
My wonderful visit to NYC with hosts Allegravita. This young lad made it a funny shoot. Very cold and I forgot my gloves on a train.
Album | Everything Album |
Category | All |
Taken | December 18, 2018 |
Uploaded | January 16, 2019 |
![Jed doing Out of Order](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed_the_Fish_being_Jed_the_Fish.jpg)
Off-the-cuff fizzlebutt sound effects for Out of Order, my Westwood One syndicated radio show. Ron Harris thought to give you a behind-the-scenes video.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![91X DJ Mike Halloran, Prodigy concert](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/91X-personality-Mike-Halloran-cir97.jpg)
91X personality and smoker Mike Halloran at a 1997 Prodigy concert at the Spruce Goose in Long Beach, Ca.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![CD players with blue black door intercom, Pasadena cir. 1985](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/CD-players-cir85-with-blue-back-door-intercom-Pasadena.jpg)
The dawn of professional CD players. You cued them up by hand, almost like vinyl. Sony “Digital.”
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed and QE2 captain](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Cure-Atlantic-crossing-w2FQE2-Captain-cir92.jpg)
I got to meet the captain of the QE2. People said, "Oh, Jed, you're going on a cruise!" An Atlantic crossing is no cruise. Waves the size of hills made it feel as though we were sleeping on Viper. Robert Smith of The Cure at that time refused to fly to America.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | 90s, All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish and Dusty Street](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Dusty-and-Jed-Debbie-Leavitt-photo-cir80.jpg)
Jed The Fish and Dusty Street at a party in Santa Monica. Photo Debbie Leavitt.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | 80s, All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed’s First Class License](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/FCC-1st-Class-Radiotelephone-endorsement-noted-for-cocaine-use-cir72.jpg)
As you see, Fish is my real middle name. I was 17 when I took and passed the exam for the First Class Radiotelephone Certificate. Issued in Long Beach. This enables one to do technical work on TV and radio transmitters. I just got it to exceed the requirement for a Third Class license. As I had no interest in this, I allowed it to expire. I framed the license, and it became a chopping surface for nasty drugs in the KROQ control room in Pasadena on Los Robles Blvd.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![New KROQ studio in 1996](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Initiation-of-Burbank-KROQ-studios-cir95.jpg)
This photo was taken as we were initiating the new studios in 1996. I believe that is Cynthia Takahashi with me in the control room, moving the equipment from the Pasadena studio. As you can see we had already begun to decorate. The filled cabinet was CDs, the empty ones for tape cartridges, or carts.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed as KROQ Music Director](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-as-KROQ-Music-Director-cir79.jpg)
For a short time in 1978-79, I was actually the KROQ Music Director. I had only heard about the station less than a year before. It was my responsibility to gain the trust of the record company promotion people, wary of giving us product because so much of it had been stolen by former KROQ DJs. Four scoundrels stealing albums meant I needed twenty meetings with promotion people. One of my first “adds” as MD was to begin playing Dire Straits, which I hated but knew would be successful. Devo’s first album was a no brainer.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish in Pasadena control room](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-as-KROQ-Music-Director-cir79-2.jpg)
Working at KROQ was fun, and I’m sure it sounded like it on the air. In back of me, albums, below my right elbow 7” 45rpm singles, the rest hundreds of carts, to my right and in front of me, shelved and stacked. The Grace Jones poster, seen in many photos, was directly to my right. We had creepy green carpet and awful green and red curtains which were never open. This control room had soul, the walls were covered with notes, flyers and photos. Ask me about Sly Stone.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish in the Burbank KROQ control room](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-in-Burbank-studio-cir87.jpg)
The ancient Sony CD players on the right, the ponytail — up — and the visor. It was amazing that we had an extra oscilloscope at all, and that it was in the control room a miracle. It told us if the signal was in phase, important to avoid cancellation (bad sound). As in most control rooms, a music log and a program log to keep track of played commercials. Koss headphones. Turntables to the left.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Vandalized KROQ billboard, Jed in foreground](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-in-front-of-vandalized-billboard-1989.jpg)
My very funny girlfriend in 1989 had Calvary Baptist parents, who once had a sermon villainizing KROQ. Coincidentally, we had the first and only billboard campaign. (KROQ has never advertised since) But my billboard, located near her parents’ house was vandalized. By Jesus Freaks. One of them risked life and limb to remove my name from it. It was a dumbass campaign anyway.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed in medical scrubs, cir82](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-in-medical-scrubs-cir82.jpg)
Debbie Leavitt contact sheet from 1982, KROQ control room in Pasadena. Never a fashion trendsetter, somehow the DJs picked up on the medical scrubs look.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish in the KROQ Control Room, Pasadena](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-in-Pasadena-cir82.jpg)
Jed The Fish in the KROQ Control Room, Pasadena, 1983. The ubiquitous Sennheiser 421 microphones.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish, Pasadena KROQ control room.](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-in-Pasadena-studios-1980.jpg)
Baseball shirts were a thing. Jed The Fish, Pasadena KROQ control room. There were carts everywhere. Similar to the old 8-track cartridges, these had a continuous loop with a stop tone (to stop the machine the last time someone played it) just before the beginning of each recording. So when you plugged it in to play it, it was always ready. It was quite a reliable system, which is why the cart machines such as ITC existed for 50 years. Hassle recording the cart in the first place, but I did it for the Go-Gos, who gave me a demo lacquer of “Cool Jerk.”
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed in the KROQ Pasadena control room, cir83](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-KROQ-Pasdadena-studios-on-coke-cir83.jpg)
Silly grin. Jed The Fish, Pasadena KROQ control room. Turntables!
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish producer Rick Rippey](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Jed-the-fish-producer-Ricky-Rippey-95.jpg)
Rick Rippey was my producer for 12 years, in my opinion my best years. He encouraged diabolical ideas. Suggests things in just the right way to inspire me. Burbank KROQ control room. Now THIS guy could fix any piece of equipment put in front of him. Note the overbridge, which he and Scott Mason installed. It allowed the cart machines to be places directly over the control board for smoother workflow.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![John Frost and Jed The Fish](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/John.jpg)
John Frost was a legendary promotional announcement producer and sound designer. There’s another photo of him floating around here somewhere. Here we are mugging in front of a giant cart rack. He called me Jed The Pudding Fish.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![KROQ cart machines](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/KROQ-cart-machines-and-CD-player-cir85.jpg)
Here was the evolution of the Fishface Outline font adorning this site. The taped on numbers on the KROQ control room cart machines. ITC was our choice of cart machines. Certain songs came from private collectors such as Freddy Snakeskin. If it weren’t for these manually-recorded records, many songs would not have made it on KROQ. You would have done without Barbie and the Kens
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Kevin Weatherly KROQ hourly clock](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/KROQ-clock-music-key-cir94.jpg)
KROQ clock. An hourly guide for when to play commercials (green areas), play jingles, and most importantly, talk. They don’t remain the same for long. Circa 1994. Kevin Weatherly, program director.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![KROQ Music director Lewis Largent](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Lewis-Largent-cir92.jpg)
KROQ Music director Lewis Largent. He was a very funny guy and a treasure to work next door to. I need people like him around me to perform. This is Lewis goofing off at an radio station event. My photo.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Events |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish KROQ control room 1982](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Pasadena-studio-cir82.jpg)
Jed The Fish Pasadena KROQ control room. Various radio station stickers were everywhere.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Around the Station |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Tami Heidi cheerfully signing a KROQ shirt](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Tami-Heidisigning-a-tee-shirt-.jpg)
KROQ DJ Tami Heide, signing a tee shirt at an event.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Events |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![The Prodigy concert at the Spruce Goose](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/The-Prodigy-concert-at-the-Spruce-Goose-cir97.jpg)
The Prodigy concert at the Spuce Goose, Long Beach in 1997. Very loud and ravey.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Events |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Jed The Fish in Solana Beach, 1985](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Appearance-Solana-Beach-cir85.jpg)
DJ appearance at Sandpiper Square, Solana Beach. The chic facing me is so very 80s. Me? I look like I just went to see a dealer.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Events |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |
![Outdoor event in Pasadena KROQ](https://7m00cd.p3cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/grand-media/image/Appearance-cir92.jpg)
Outdoor event in Pasadena. Our crowd was so loyal back then.
Album | Everything Album |
Categories | All, Events |
Uploaded | January 15, 2019 |