who are my heroes. i have several friends who are also my heroes. kate sullivan is very near the top of that list.
today if you live in los angeles and youre one of the many who pick up the LA Weekly you will see a campy retro portrait of Rodney Bingenheimer, a hollywood icon, wonderfully featured by our very own kate.
rodney has been a fixture in punk alternative and underground music here in southern california since the advent of radio.
in a town of famous radio djs rodney is not only still standing, but rocking out just as hard.
the way things go in la radio are like this: rodney discovers it on kroq on sundays around 11pm, the college station kxlu plays it for months, then when that band comes out on a major label rodney will play it again, then kroq will play it in the daytime, then a video will get made, then mtv will play it, then it will become huge, then the rest of the country’s “modern rock” stations will play it.
rodney has introduced the fine music of the sex pistols, the ramones, the go gos, x, the clash, black flag, depeche mode, the smiths, wham, the bangles, nirvana, blur, elastica, the strokes, the white stripes, and now the donnas.
if you want to see the future of rock go no further than the Rodney on the Roq show.
rodney is a big fan of girl groups. hes a big fan of japanese girls. hes a big fan of brit pop. and he even had tsar headline one of his club dates.
i love rodney and i love kate and i love that they melded minds and got a cover story out of it.
apparently the LA Film Festival will be screening a documentary about rodney which the weekly says is the centerpiece of the festival.
he’s the mayor of the sunset strip, what more would you expect?
i love rodney not just because he has championed new music that i have ended up loving, like Teenage Fanclub and Shonen Knife, but because he does it with a wimpy ass totally real voice that sounds nothing like what you’d expect from a quote unquote dj on la’s most influential radio station..
i love him because he’s loyal to his favorite bands and artists, i love him because hes one freaky dude, and i love him because i have run into him at canter’s, clubs, and the now defunct rocknroll dennys next to guitar center and he was always nice and even once posed with me for a picture.
what more could you want from a legend?
i love kate because shes hot, gives great hugs, and not only meets all my favorite people but gets paid to write down what they say to her.
long live kate and long live rodney.