ABSTRACT
R.E.M., The Replacements, Camper Van Beethoven: by the end of the 1980s it was not uncommon to find alternative bands like these lumped together under the generic label of “college rock.” As one can surmise from the following excerpts from Gina Arnold’s book Route 666, this association reflected not only the popularity of these bands among college-aged audiences, but also the crucial exposure they had received from college radio airplay. Arnold, a prominent rock critic whose work has appeared everywhere from the Los Angeles Times to Rolling Stone, approaches the topic from a personal perspective, beginning her narrative as a teenager listening to KSAN-FM, San Francisco’s legendary, progressive station. KSAN, however, would eventually be swallowed up by Metromedia Inc., an act which prompts Arnold to symbolically pass the “progressive” torch along to the numerous college stations that since the late 1970s have represented one of the last bastions of free-form radio. Arnold portrays college radio as a social setting populated by outcasts and adventurous souls, unrestricted by formatting concerns and rigid playlists. Reflecting on her own experiences as a DJ during the 1980s, she describes the typical college station record library as a vast reservoir filled with the latest American underground bands, all of them connected in some way to a thriving network of regional scenes spread across the entire country.
