| Barry Smolin | |
|---|---|
Barry Smolin in master control at KPFK |
|
| Background information | |
| Also known as | Mr. Smolin |
| Born | April 20, 1961 |
| Origin | Los Angeles, California |
Barry Smolin (born April 20, 1961 in Los Angeles, California) is an American radio host, teacher, composer, and writer.
He is best known as the longtime host (since 1995) of The Music Never Stops, a psychedelic radio show on KPFK in Los Angeles, California[1] for which Smolin won the first ever Jammy Award for "Best Radio Show" in 2000.[2] Smolin's program was also nominated for an LA Weekly Music Award in 2004 in the "Best Radio Show" category.[3] The Music Never Stops began as a program featuring live recordings of the Grateful Dead, but after the death of Jerry Garcia Smolin expanded the scope of the show to include contemporary jam-rock and miscellaneous psychedelia, paying special attention to music being made by musicians in Los Angeles. The program has been covered in Relix magazine[4] and Jambands.com.
Smolin is also a noted teacher who has been featured in articles in Time[5] and the Los Angeles Times.[6] as well as in the Larchmont Chronicle.[7] From 1987-1992, Smolin taught English at Fairfax High School (the school Smolin himself graduated from in 1978) in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Since leaving Fairfax in 1992, he has been on the faculty at Hamilton High School, teaching English in the Hamilton Humanities Magnet program.
As a songwriter, Smolin has composed music featured in the Showtime television series Weeds, with his song "The Earth Keeps Turning On" appearing in Season 3's Episode 7, entitled "He Taught Me How To Drive By."[8] as well as on the Weeds Season 3 Soundtrack album. Under the performance moniker Mr. Smolin he has released three albums, At Apogee (2004) and The Crumbling Empire Of White People (2007) (both produced by Tony Award winning composer/dramatist Stew, best known for his musical Passing Strange), as well as a Los Angeles song-cycle entitled Bring Back The Real Don Steele (2009).[9] Smolin's songs typically feature complex lyrics set to catchy pop melodies. He is also known for his postmodern explorations of historical/cultural incidents and figures, such as World War I espionage legend Mata Hari[10] and Hollywood actress Veronica Lake,[11] as well as the fictional The Guns of Navarone.[12]
Smolin's journalism work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times,[13] as well as in Rhino Entertainment's online journal Rhino.com,[14][15] and Jambands.com.[16][17][18] In 2004, Smolin wrote the foreword to the book Dumb Luck, a retrospective of the work of artist Gary Baseman published by Chronicle Books.[19]
On May 28, 2011, Smolin released a volume of selected poetry covering the years 1988-2010 entitled Always Be Madly In Love.[20] Earlier in 2011, he published the experimental prose project Wake Up In The Dreamhouse,[21] composed one sentence at a time on Twitter. Currently, Smolin is working on a story-cycle entitled The Miranda Complex,[22] a series of episodes that follow the romantic misfires of two teenagers in 1970s Los Angeles.