Celebrating the live and times of 101.7 FM, Boston's only true alternative radio station
MARCH 3, 1993
WFNX DECLARES GUERILLA WAR ON CORPORATE INTERLOPERS
"Boston rock stations WBCN and WFNX are feuding again — and this time a boycott is involved. WFNX is livid that WBCN aired a recent live broadcast of the currently popular band Soul Asylum from the Middle East Cafe in Cambridge. Soul Asylum was in town to open for Keith Richards at the Orpheum, but found time to do the broadcast even though WFNX, which had championed the band, felt it deserved it. WFNX then tried to get the band to play its March 31 awards show, but was told the group had a prior engagement. The result: WFNX is boycotting the band's label, Columbia Records, and not playing anything by their related bands such as Sunscreem, Alice in Chains, and Ned's Atomic Dustbin. 'It's a long and complicated story,' WFNX program director Mad Max Tolkoff said yesterday. 'Stations all around the country do this all the time.' "
-- Boston Globe, 1993
MARCH 31, 1993
Perry Farrell's brand-new post-Jane's band, Porno for Pyros, play one of their first live gigs at the Best Music Poll, headlining an insane Lansdowne Street lineup that also featured Robyn Hitchcock, Gin Blossoms, Helmet, Grant Lee Buffalo, 808 State, Supreme Love Gods, School of Fish, Seka, Therapy?, and the God Machine. Meanwhile, Social Distortion headlined the Orpheum with the Bosstones, Tanya Donelly's Belly, and Black 47.
PLAY WFNX: Listen to Porno for Pyros's BMP set.
APRIL 8, 1994
Kurt Cobain is found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. In tribute, WFNX suspends normal programming and plays every Nirvana song ever recorded.
LISTEN: Listen to the announcement on WFNX, news reports, interviews, and more from WFNX's two-hour radio special in the "Best of 2004" playlist at wfnx.net/ondemand.
APRIL 17, 1994
FUTURE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE MITT ROMNEY VISITS WFNX
In the tradition of President Clinton appearing on MTV to reveal his innermost sartorial secrets, US Senate candidate Mitt Romney, scion of the Michigan Romneys, was a guest last week on WFNX "cutting edge" radio, trying to prove that Republicans — and Mormon Republicans, at that — can rock. He gamely tried to discuss his campaign against Ted Kennedy, but all the morning deejay wanted to know was where he got a name like Mitt, anyway.
So here's the deep dark truth: Romney's got an eponymous cousin, a fine athlete in the 1920s who eventually became a football player with the Chicago Bears. Romney's father, George — the three-time Michigan governor who ran for president in 1968 — was perhaps hoping for his son to make a career in sports rather than politics when he bestowed the name.
But it could have been worse: Mitt's two brothers were named Att and Ott, not exactly stage names. Imagine, said the deejay, running for Senate named Att or Ott.
"Or 'It,' " said Mitt.
-- Boston Globe, April 1994
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