Internet Radio Pigdog

By Flesh

WE WERE THE FIRST

Well, at least one of the very first true independents to completely circumnavigate the corporate and so-called "indie-music" machines, and do it 100% our way. We answered to no one. No quarter was given nor expected. Internet Radio Pigdog (IRP) was 100% outlaw in just about every sense of the word. At the time, there was nothing like it. We were the spark that would light the fuse that would later explode into a million individuals who would then do it their way.

How it began

Like most Pigdog-related ideas, IRP was hatched out of an intensely alcohol-fueled discussion and access to far more technology than we could have afforded or should have had access to.

Myself, and fellow Pigdog conspirator Liqorpig, worked for a Seattle dot com company at the height of the boom. He worked IT, I worked technical support. Liquorpig's IT department partner "Brian" (which may or may not be his real name. Protect the innocent and all that) knew of my previous experience in television and radio production, and gave me a copy of an expensive, recording-studio-quality audio software to play around with, which I took to like a duck to water.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

In order to provide more options to current and potential customers, the Internet Company who employed us purchased the software needed in order to set up a Real Audio server -- then promptly forgot about it.

We, however, did not.

During that particular frame of time, Liquorpig and his then-wife Kat would come over to our rented house in the Maple Leaf district, where we would watch movies and get exceedingly drunk, occasionally wandering from room-to-room in a stupor, and have quite amazing conversations -- most of which drowned in the constant flood of alcoholic beverages.

During one of these sessions we discussed the idea of creating and using the Real Audio server as a juke-box, in which the various nefarious schemers of Pigdog could put their musical choices, and anyone could push a virtual button to listen in. So a list of music was quickly gathered, discarding only the choices made by a worthless fanboy (Hurry up and die of diabetes or a burst artery already you insignificant fuck!), only to discover that the jukebox idea was not only impossible (at that time), but downright stupid.

But do you really think I would waste such an opportunity to give the entire world a golden shower of hits? I think not!

Armed with the assembled songlist, several bottles of Jagermeister (which would later magically transform into Wild Turkey 101 and handfuls of Metabolift), a head full of trivial knowledge of segue soundbites (some contributed by Pigdog swine), along with a obscenely vast music library (my own- this was in the days before mp3 really became popular), the very first IRP show was created.

Well, sorta...

There was a long-lost beta-test show that was done to fix any problems that may have occurred, and was shared only with the other Pigdog ilk. Beta testing with this hoard can be somewhat... brutal. Comments would start off with what may need to be fixed, but then would usually devolve into (but not limited to) blaming the person's mother for allowing the person to escape the womb (if they felt like being nice). Much to my surprise, the returning comments combined could be summed up in one famous phrase: "SEND MORE CHUCK BERRY."

So into the void this screaming, snarling, beast went. Countless nights spent pouring equal parts of a heart burning with a nova-strength inferno lit by Rock and Roll, a bourbon-saturated soul, various music selections raided from the library with all the fury of Genghis Kahn 'just stopping by for a quick meal', and a chaotic, insane web of cables, adapters, and electronic parts running from room to room.

Imagine the Millennium Falcon being piloted by an idiot savant through a mine field, or a young Albert Einstein with a head full of pharmaceutical-grade acid in a '66 Charger doing aught-fifty on Route 66. That is what it was like to make IRP.

Along the way, there were a few casualties. My loving wife's sanity, which suffered through innumerable late night hours of hearing the same songs playing LOUDLY over and over and over, and the hallway wall, which was given an unexpected organic decoration when it was discovered in the uber-dazed wee hours of a rainy spring morning that lukewarm grapefruit juice and gin do not mix well -- just to name a couple. And apologies, to the neighbors at the time, who were regularly subjected to violent, heretical, primal beats which oozed into their nocturnal world to rouse them, punctuated by the mysterious phrase, "Eat a bowl of fuck."

Aftermath

It's 2010, nearly a decade since the very last IRP was unleashed on the world. There are hundreds of thousands of streams and shows, produced by kids of all ages who want to share with the entire world the music they want to hear. It's a beautiful cacophony of the good, the bad and the ugly. And IRP? The server that hosted the show was discovered and terminated. All the sessions, including the infamous "Christmas Special" were thought to be lost in the dust of time.

Not so, Bucky.

As luck would have it, the session masters were saved, and locked away in a desk drawer, sleeping and waiting, for when the stars were right. Rize r0r Rize!

It would be a lovely thing to say that it was all done solo, but that would be untrue. Various contributions from individuals really helped make everything possible and definitely deserve thanks. So thanks (in no particular order, so fuck off you egotistical fucks) to Abby, Liquorpig, Tjames, Baron Earl, Johnny Royale, Master Squid, Splicer and especially you for listening. Continue to ride sp0ck's cock through the interdimensions and weird universes!

r0r-Alucard
Randy "Flesh" Mills
Los Angeles, December 2009