Tuesday Night, Favorite Songs, and Following the Music Wherever It Goes
It’s Tuesday again, and that means another edition of Off the Beaten Track tonight at 6 PM ET on Jedi Council Radio.
I’ve been spending the last several shows digging into favorite songs and favorite artists, and I’m finding that I really like where that has taken the show.
Calling something a “favorite” sounds simple until you actually start looking through years and years of music.
There are the songs that immediately come to mind—the ones you’ve heard hundreds of times and somehow still want to hear again. But then there are the others. The album tracks you forgot how much you loved. The songs attached to a particular time in your life. The weird little deep cut that somehow stuck with you harder than the big single everybody knows.
Those are the songs that make Off the Beaten Track fun for me.
I’ve never wanted this show to become one of those programs where you can predict exactly what you’re going to hear before I even turn the microphone on. There are enough places where somebody—or increasingly, some algorithm—has already decided what you’re supposed to listen to.
That really isn’t what I’m interested in doing.
The Playlist Is Allowed to Wander
One of the things I love most about radio is the possibility of surprise.
We might start with classic rock, wander into alternative, stumble into something from the ’80s, take a left turn into something newer, and suddenly end up listening to a song I haven’t thought about in fifteen years.
And somehow it works.
Or at least I think it works.
If it doesn’t, I suppose you can blame the DJ. 😂
But that freedom is really the whole point of Off the Beaten Track.
This show isn’t built around staying neatly inside one genre. It’s built around finding music worth hearing.
Sometimes that means a huge song everybody knows.
Sometimes it means a deep cut from a favorite band.
Sometimes it means somebody sends me a request and completely changes the direction of the show.
And I absolutely love when that happens.
Requests Are Part of the Show
I say this often, but I mean it: requests are always welcome.
If there’s a song you want to hear, let me know.
If I have it—or if it’s reasonably easy for me to get—I’ll do my best to work it into the show.
Some of my favorite moments behind the decks happen because somebody listening suddenly throws a song at me that I hadn’t even considered playing.
That’s when radio stops being somebody broadcasting at people and starts feeling like people are actually hanging out together around music.
That’s much more interesting to me.
A Lot Is Happening Behind the Music, Too
Jedi Council Radio has always been the place where I get to share the music I love, but lately there has been a lot happening beyond the weekly shows as well.
Staticworks continues to grow as the creative home for the things I’m building—radio, audio, design, production, and the projects that seem to keep appearing whenever I think I’m finished starting new projects.
Apparently I am very bad at not creating things.
I can live with that.
And then there’s DV8R.
What started as one creative project has turned into something much bigger than I expected. The first DV8R album, What Comes Through the Static, established what that project could be, and now the second album, When It All Clears, has taken the idea somewhere new.
The title feels especially appropriate.
There’s a lot of noise when you’re creating something. Ideas, mistakes, second guesses,
revisions, things that work immediately and things that absolutely do not.
But eventually the static clears.
And something is standing there.
That feeling has become a pretty important part of what I’m doing creatively these days.
Music I Actually Want to Share
One of the coolest developments with the website has been realizing that I can actually put some of the music there for people to hear.
I’ve started uploading newer DV8R songs to the Links page on djjediradio.com, which gives me a place to share the music outside the normal radio show.
And if you only listen to one of them, go find “When It Hits the Fan.”
Seriously.
Turn it up.
Then come back and tell me that song doesn’t rock.
I’ll wait. 😄
There’s something incredibly satisfying about being able to take an idea from a conversation or a scribbled thought, turn it into a song, develop the artwork and identity around it, and eventually put the finished thing somewhere people can actually experience it.
That’s the direction I want all of this to keep moving.
Radio.
Music.
Design.
Stories.
Original projects.
A little weirdness.
Probably a lot of purple.
And hopefully something worth listening to at the end of it.
Tonight, We Get Back Behind the Decks
But before I disappear completely into albums, artwork, websites, and whatever other rabbit hole I manage to find...
Tonight we have radio to do.
Off the Beaten Track: Tuesday Edition goes live tonight at 6 PM ET on Jedi Council Radio.
I’ll be digging into more favorites, more songs that deserve another spin, probably a few things I haven’t played in a long time, and whatever requests arrive along the way.
As usual, I don’t completely know where the playlist is going.
That’s half the fun.
Come hang out.
Turn it up.
Request something.
Maybe rediscover an old favorite.
Maybe find a new one.
And wherever tonight’s playlist decides to wander, we’ll follow it.
Off the Beaten Track: Tuesday Edition
Tonight at 6 PM ET
Jedi Council Radio
Welcome to the frequency.
May the Music Be with You!
—DJ Jedi
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