Every now and then an album comes out that immediately goes into high rotation on my personal playlist. Such was the case when I heard the eponymous debut from Ben Folds Five.
The poppy melodies and three-part harmonies won me over on my very first listen.
When they came to play LA for the first time, they made their Los Angeles radio debut on the air with me at fm101.9.
The date was October 18, 1995
Sadly, that radio station went off the air in February of 1997, a victim of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 and the new relaxed ownership rules that led to massive consolidation in the industry. We were sold for a whopping $60+ million!
I wound up joining the (now-defunct trade magazine, The Album Network, as Rock editor. But I guess I also did some work on the side. It was November 30, 1997, when I sat with Ben Folds for an interview at the El Rey Theater in Los Angeles. It was on video, and streamed live on something called “LA Live”. It was the first such video webcast for both of us!
Go back to the index for more of Nicole Sandler’s classic music interviews.
