A Pleasure, and Not a Guilty One

In July 1985 I met a woman named Loretta (real name, too) at a New York dance place called Visage, way out on West 56th Street. "I'm a reporter -- I write on computer stuff," I shouted into her ear over the thumping beat, and that caught her attention.

We kept talking. Before long she yelled, "I've taken the EST training and I'm also in therapy." Knowing my interest in Russia, she told me about the great possibilities of EST moving into the USSR.

I think about Loretta and our screwdrivers- and disco-driven night at Visage when I cruise Fairfield County in my fabulous 2004 Hyundai Elantra, radio tuned in to my new fave station, The New Mix 102.7 (technically WNEW, but nobody calls it that) in New York. The concept is simple: disco and dance classics, with long blocks of ad-free music. Over the past two months or so, I have found myself returning again and again to the station as a listening pleasure. To my surprise, I recognize only about half the music, compared to the 100% recognition rate on classic rock stations. "Coming up another big block of the Stones, Billy Joel, Elton John, Bruce, the Eagles, Madonna, Chicago, Cher" zzzzzzzzz. (I dazzle my son, Schmoikel, with my ability to name almost any song on a classic rock station within 5 seconds.)

The music on 102.7 is so compulsively fun, fresh and emotionally connected that I don't mind hearing stuff I know well. For the same reason, I never get tired of listening to the soundtrack to the movie "Carlito's Way," which sure beats listening to the soundtrack of "Schindler's List" (just some of the primo swag I got as a reporter in the home video industry).

Besides reminding me of Loretta, the music takes me back to parties, events, and those intimate moments in life where Barry White or Marvin Gaye were just what the love doctor ordered. Call me a hopeless romantic, but when I hear Tavares singing . . .

Now winter's gonna turn to spring
And you haven't accomplished a thing
So baby can't you make me just a little time
Cause you never know what's on my mind

It only takes a minute girl
To fall in love, to fall in love
It only takes a minute girl
To fall in love, let's fall in love

. . . then I feel a nerve in my brain getting strummed like a guitar string. And I like that feeling. Not to overanalyze dance music, but it connects both musically and lyrically to intense parts of my life.

Even the numbers 102.7 are magic. Mix is the latest incarnation for a station that's struggled to find a workable format for years. Classic rock, talk, one flop after another. After I moved to NYC in 1980, I quickly came to favor 102.7 in its identity as WNEW-FM, "The Place Where Rock Lives." With a great line-up of DJs like Richard Near and Pete Fornatele, it marked the last time I listened to a rock station with any sense of real identification. I even had an 'NEW gym bag and attended a listener event at the Bottom Line. Then tastes changed, ratings tanked, and the search for a winning format began. The DJs adapted, then scattered. I gave up on the station as my own interests moved toward jazz, blues and Latin genres.

But now, the format wheel has spun again and Mix 102.7 is a winner, at least for me. It goes beyond nostalgia to deliver a likable and vibrant sound and message. Maybe Loretta's listening to it right now and remembering that kooky reporter with the Russia fixation. And all I have to do is turn the beat on to remind myself that, really, it only takes a minute.

Here's hoping the special minute has arrived for my new 'NEW friends at 102.7, the sound of the past and the future.