The World According To Chris Brewer

I’m sitting here listening to Spyro Gyra’s album The Deep End. In case you don’t know, Spyro Gyra is a jazz band that I first heard of while listening to KKJZ, a now-defunct Portland, Oregon smooth jazz radio station. I like to listen to some smooth jazz on some nights to help myself relax and unwind…I’ve done it since I had a small Sony portable radio/cassette player during my early teenage years.

A little bit of personal history follows.

Every now and then, after our obligatory 10 PM bedtime, I’d turn the radio on and get KKJZ in pretty clearly even though we lived 50 miles west of Portland. I’d hear tunes such as The Apostles’ cover of Marvin Gaye’s “Mercy Mercy Me,” The Rippingtons’ “She Likes To Watch,” The Yellowjackets’ “Local Hero” and so much more. Some of my favorite tracks (and they were station faves too as they played them over and over) were “Vest Pocket” by Fourplay, “Eastside” by Four80East, and for some reason, “Captain of Her Heart” by Double. I miss that station…it went off the air my junior year of high school, 2001, and became Lite Rock 106.7 and things were never the same. But it was about that same time I tuned into Longview’s KLYK “Magic 105.5″ at late nights and fall asleep to tunes such as “Sunset Grill” by Don Henley and “Someday” by Sugar Ray. I know it was somewhat against my parents’ policy to have the radio on late at night, but still I enjoyed listening to all the jazz and hits of the day that I could.

It was during one of these late night listening sessions that I first heard the Pet Shop Boys’ track “West End Girls.” I remember quickly grabbing a cassette tape to record it, and I only caught the bridge and the final chorus. I ended up hearing it a few more times, and when Napster (the original, accept no substitutes) became popular, I downloaded every remix of the song imaginable. That’s about the time I started getting into electronic music, because in 2001 I was listening to Rick Dees’ Weekly Top 40 and this new tune from a French duo who called themselves Daft Punk (I misheard it as Deaf Punk) was playing over and over, “One more time, we’re gonna celebrate….one more time…” and it was backed by this cheesy disco sample in the background. I think it hit #8. Unreal.

“One More Time” sounded like nothing I’d ever heard before. It had a nice beat, it looped over and over, which I was very fond of, and it just sounded cool. Time passed and my parents bought me both Daft Punk CDs, Discovery and Homework, for Christmas in 2001. I listened to them over and over…and Daft Punk is directly responsible for my love of house, electronic and retro music. Ever since I first listened to Daft Punk and the Pet Shop Boys, most of my music collection centers around electronic music. Felix Da Housecat, Alan Braxe, Kings Of Tomorrow, Lemon Jelly, Cassius, Air, just to name a few. I love house music….

Suffice it to say that my late night KKJZ and KLYK listening sessions were the sole inspiration for my love of music today. Before I listened to those two stations, I had been hooked on some old CCM music and didn’t know too much else outside that, except for what some of my friends listened to. But thanks to that small radio that I held close to my ear at night, I dove into a whole new world of good music.