7 Non-Musicians Who Changed Pop Music Forever

5. Tom Donahue

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5bINGkdTH4 Those of us who grew up in the post-vinyl-record era are too young to remember this, but there was a time when the kinds of records you owned were a social symbol. If you primarily owned albums, you were hip and smart. On the other hand, if your music collection was made up of singles, you were mocked and teased. We can argue all day over whether singles or albums are more important to the pop-music scene, but there's no denying that albums dominate the way we think about music. Tom Donahue did a lot to instil this way of thinking among us. Donahue started his radio career working at Top-40 radio stations on the East Coast. In 1961, Donahue moved to San Francisco, having received a job from an old boss, Les Crane, who had taken over the radio station KOIT. During this time, Donahue formed a record label, Autumn Records, with his friend and co-worker Bobby Mitchell (who later became the famous L.A. DJ Bobby Tripp). Autumn Records was fairly successful, having at least one consistently charting group (The Beau Brummels) under their label. The two also owned a nightclub and were concert promoters. Donahue's work cutting records and promoting concerts influenced the way he felt about jockeying at KOIT. He felt frustrated that he couldn't play deeper album cuts. Instead, he was restricted to top-40 hits. In 1967, Donahue wrote a Rolling Stone article titled "AM Radio Is Dead and its Rotting Corpse is Stinking Up the Airwaves." Around this same time, Donahue took over the FM station KMPX. He encouraged KMPX jockeys to choose the songs they played from deeper album cuts and to provide commentary on the music. The station gained a cult following; in fact, KMPX is now considered to be the first "underground radio" station. Donahue and his wife, Rachael, went on to form three similar radio stations: KSAN, KMET, and KPPC. Up until Donahue hit FM airwaves, the only kind of pop music one was exposed to on the radio were singles and top-40 hits. There's nothing wrong with such songs, of course (as you probably gleaned from my gushing about American Top 40, I love chart hits), but there's more to music than the Billboard Hot 100. Tom Donahue helped us discover the power that deep tracks can hold. As a result, he changed the way we think about albums.