Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska
Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska is a love letter to the state of Nebraska and all the fine people of this amazing place Dave calls home!
Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska
EP #5 - Slacker Dave Loves Carter Van Pelt
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This is episode number 5 of the Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska podcast!
On this episode Dave and Carter Van Pelt sit in the beer garden of O'Rourke's Tavern and we learn all about Carter, topics include: how a kid from Nebraska becomes a world famous DJ, broadcaster, author, reggae historian, curator, promoter and we talk about his yearly outdoor sound system events that are held all around New York City, his beginnings at KZUM, Carter should really do his own podcast and with his suggestions on things you should do in Nebraska!
Thank you all for listening!
Elliotton Ema, Hardington to roll Slecker Day, loves Nebraska. Stamping Baron, Roger Welsh and Willie Captain too sucker day. Loves Nebraska. He'll have a runs up on the pool. Some private few please. He's the one who loves it all of us put through and through Slacker Day. Loves Nebraska. Slacker day. Loves Nebraska. Slacker Day loves Nebraska. And now, Slacker Dave.
SPEAKER_02Hey, thank you. Uh thanks, uh, sweet basil for the uh theme music. Thanks, Jeremiah, for recording it. Uh, yes, you are listening to the Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska or watching, either way, the Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska podcast. Uh, thank you for all your support so far. Um, don't forget to uh do all the things with the like button and subscribe and follow, comment. There's a Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska Facebook page. Uh go ahead and comment on there or on the YouTube channel. Um getting pretty excited. Got some um good interviews lined up in the future. Um, such as today, uh, I have Mr. Carter Van Pelt on the uh podcast today. Uh I'm gonna say uh world famous DJ, author, historian, uh uh curator, uh promoter, um uh heck of a good guy, a KZUM alum, uh all those things. Uh and uh somebody who uh uh influenced my musical taste abundantly. Uh right here, Inner Orks, we're we are recording Inner Oorks today. Uh and I used to work Saturday afternoons at the bar, and I would turn the Dubucks on, and we would listen to Carter's show every Saturday. Uh got in trouble a few times, but you know, it is what are you doing, Carter?
SPEAKER_00I'm doing great. Thanks for that. Thanks for the introduction. I'm really glad to join you on the podcast. I love um visiting you on Slacker Morning Show on KZUM. Love it. And what you just mentioned about you listening to the show here, the the 400 Years show um when you were working here, um, is always something that I appreciated because when you're on the radio, you kind of imagine where people are or what they're doing. But you until somebody says, I listen to you at such and such location, you don't fully, you don't specifically visualize it. And when I hear would hear about people listening in a in a public place like this, um, I just thought that was awesome.
SPEAKER_02So it was an awesome show. A long line of uh great KZUM reggae shows that uh influenced my life, you know.
SPEAKER_00Glad to know that. I love doing it.
SPEAKER_02Uh so the uh did I miss anything there? I got author, I got historian, uh curator. Uh what's what are you doing these days?
SPEAKER_00Okay, so sure, we can jump right into that. So um about eight years ago, I had been, I I left Nebraska for New York City in 2003, lived there from 2003 to 2014. I came back here for three and a half years um to take care of my dad. He passed away in 2017. I moved back to New York in 2018. Um I was on KZM in the middle there for a minute. But I I I moved back to New York to work for VP Records as the director of catalog development. VP Records, for those who don't know, is the largest um independent reggae and Caribbean music label in the industry with a catalog of in excess of 40,000 master recordings. And which is a good a good size. I mean, if you compare it to other indie labels like your like 4AD or or whosoever is out there from 20, 30, 40 odd years ago, it's a pr it's a it's not the largest catalog, but it's a substantial catalog for an independent. And because of smartphones and digital streaming platforms, in this era, the company with the large catalogs, the companies with large catalogs started seeing passive revenue from people listening to music on their phones. But a lot of times that music wasn't really organized. It was put up kind of like just to get it up in the in the MP3 era or whatever, and however it was it was, and these streaming platforms started to grow and grow and grow. So by mid by 2015-16, they saw the need for a catalog development position. And I I uh they didn't hire anyone until they hired me in 2018 as the first catalog director, which was a combination of a marketing function and a and a what you would call an AR function, which would be like curating releases. So I did that for six and a half years until the end of 2024, and then there was a brief break, but I I left and I came back in my current role as a consultant, where I do only what we call AR, but it's really curating releases. So I don't do the marketing anymore, I just create releases. So a lot of what I do, you would never even really notice it, except if you're streaming reggae on your phone. Um, like those updates I used to send out that you'd receive. I don't send them, I don't do those. I still get them. Yeah, you get them from the label. Yep. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you you would see my releases come across your, you probably play some of them, but you wouldn't know that I was the one behind the scenes who put them together. Me and a couple other people do that. Anyway, I'm giving you too long of an answer, but but that's what I'm doing presently. Um, I just had a record store day essentials release with um the Congo's Congo Ashanti. And um I've got a whole bunch of projects upcoming 2026 and 27, and a bunch of digital singles that were out in the last year, um, and and some other bigger projects on the horizon, but it's it's it's been it's been good. My hobby became my job. I listened to reggae for a living.
SPEAKER_02That's uh yeah, yeah, yeah. Crazy. I hope, you know, I just hope it doesn't uh taint you.
SPEAKER_00Because, you know, things you love that sometimes become a very wise friend of mine once said, beware of a hobby that becomes a job. And I can see that I know the downside risk of that. And in a way, that's why I wanted to change the nature of the the full-time position I had and work as a consultant so that I could kind of focus on the thing that that was most meaningful to me and that I could make sure the passion was there. Because I found it more difficult, sometimes very difficult, to be handed somebody else's project that I had nothing to, I had no creative input into it, but now I have to to convince people to listen to it or find the marketing rationale for it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. Your heart's not your it's not it's it's not a want to be or have to because you you want to, it's a have to because somebody else needs to do it. Somebody has to. Somebody else needs you to do that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And it's important because the company can't just put something out and then not and not put any energy behind promoting it. Um, but a lot of times those things also they worked out just fine. Like I was involved with a project called We Remember Bob Andy that I had nothing to do with creatively, but because of who the artist was and the artists on the project, I was able to get behind it. Um, in that capacity, I also worked on a number of projects with the producer King Jamie. Um, and I uh you know, I I think getting to know him was really cool. Yeah, I'll hail King Jammy. Getting to know him and you know, visit him at his studio in Jamaica and work on his projects, and I still do catalog curation of his back catalog, which VP manages. Um yeah.
SPEAKER_02Now I don't know, I mean, not a lot of people are gonna know this, but you dropped just like a serious legend name, like it was nothing. You just did King Jammy, you work with King Jamie like it's nothing. To me, he's put out some of the best music, you know, some of my favorite. Uh when I had the reggae show on, every I would have a segment, it was just King Jamming King Tubby. So it was, you know, 20 minutes of King Jamie and King Tubby, you know. I mean, I mean, I it's it's weird that somebody I know knows somebody that famous. And so that's yeah, that's what I'm I'm you know what I mean.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, I think that in it at a distance, as as fans of music, it's easy to like you you you listen to this music that comes from another place and another time, and it and you you elevate the stature of it in your mind because it's so it seems so like unreachable. But you find out people like that are just like everyday people in their own neighborhood and very down to earth. Um and he's not and like why you know who he is, he's not enough of a household name, household name that it ever went to his head as a as like he's a you know the ego, the ego is there, but it's not like out of control, like some performers, right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so he's very, very approachable and you know genuinely appreciates when people know who he is. So he'd be he'd be he'd be thrilled with your enthusiasm uh for him. And um he's a great storyteller, and just being around his studio, you just pick up so many little nuggets.
SPEAKER_02So, you know, like we were talking, you were talking before we got on. Uh all you need is a gosh darn smartphone and some mics, and you should get these stories down on tape. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00I know, I know. You know, I used to do it a lot when back in the days of I used to be a magazine writer. I have a degree in journalism from the University of Nebraska.
SPEAKER_02It's just like a new magazine, you know?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's the new yeah, it's the new magazine. And I like, I prefer longer form, if not long form content. I don't love short, short form and the way we've we carve this stuff up for social media into these little tiny snippets. The clips and the real. Yeah, yeah. It's it's a little bit shallow. Um so the idea, I like the the podcast format is is is great to me. It's just like the you know, the interview, the the the conversation is is great. And and back in the day, back in the in the day, when I say in the day, it in the 90s, when I was on KZUM, I had access by virtue of going to a lot of reggae festivals here in the States, and I go to Jamaica too, I just had access to artists in a way that I could gather a lot of interviews. And you know, I've done a good chunk of interviews. And over the years, yeah, I still do them from time to time as I'm able to catch people, but it's even harder now. Like a lot of the artists would prefer to do um take five minutes with an influencer than spend an hour with me, you know, going over something in depth. They get more bounce for their project by by talking to some hype young person who's a like a big time influencer, but and usually somebody who who's better looking than I am, too.
SPEAKER_02So yeah, I mean uh I mean all that makes sense, but I mean, I do love a good interview with uh, you know, if I hear a devo on a podcast, I'm gonna probably listen to that podcast. And and I because I love listening to all the long stories, you know.
SPEAKER_00None of what I just said is a reason why I wouldn't or shouldn't or won't do it. I'm gonna do it. Yeah, and even for me, one of the things that that's appealing is the idea of taking some of those interviews with people who are no longer alive, who are very important. Like I was the last person to interview Dennis Brown before he died. I would love to, I'm and I'm very I have good um relations with his daughter and his widow, and just to get permission from them to animate the interview. Oh, right, so that I could create a new visual out of the interview that I did back then.
SPEAKER_02I love animation. Uh there's um a bunch of hip-hop ones that are really good, like history kind of thing, and they do the animation. Uh and then, of course, the famous Doc Ellis. Uh they tell the uh that Doc Ellis tells the story of Doc Ellis when he uh pitched a World Series uh shutout. No, not a World Series, it was just a perfect game on tripping on acid, and the whole story is done with this, you know, animation, and it makes the story better. Like that's a brilliant idea. You should be there, that okay.
SPEAKER_00Well, sometimes you have to speak these things into existence, yeah, and and then you can help hold me accountable. So how's that coming?
SPEAKER_02Shame shame me into doing it. No, no, because that's just I do I like to sometimes not I have an idea, I want to do something, and I can't tell anybody because if I don't do it, then I said I was gonna do it and I didn't do it. Right. So I failed, you know. But if I didn't tell anybody what I was gonna do and I don't do it, I didn't fail because I didn't say I was gonna do it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, if I don't tell anyone, then I then it then it probably won't happen. But I am sitting on a on a on a pretty decent size archive of things that are no longer really easily accessible. Yeah. And that's my legacy, so I've got to make sure that it's all exists, it's all out there in some form. That's my that's it's a lot of it's on a cassette tapes right now.
SPEAKER_02Oh my god.
SPEAKER_00Oh, so you have audio. Oh yeah, I have original audio of of almost everything I've ever done.
SPEAKER_02So any interview you've done where you've written an article, you've it came from a tape. Oh my god, that's brilliant. Oh god, you got you got some gold.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I've got some good stuff, but it's also not necessarily the most it wasn't if it wasn't intended for broadcast, if it wasn't recorded in a studio, yeah, it might be like you know, a cassette recorder sitting on a table and kind of at a distance and a little bit echoey and not not so not so great. But you know, I've digressed. There's plenty of things that can be done to make those things um listenable. But the the you know, the original content is is there.
SPEAKER_02And then, you know, also the uh the authenticity of the the what you just described. Yeah, you know, the like there's sunhouse recordings, you know, that are just they're just scratchy and you can hardly, but still, those are like original recordings when you're listening to it. And I mean, sure it doesn't sound as good as one that's been digitally cleaned up, but I mean that's real, you know. Kind of like the scratch on the record, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Or the and I'm happy to say too that that a lot of what I was able to do happened by virtue of K ZUM or at KZUM or at some, you know, outside some show here in Lincoln. I remember I interviewed Lloyd Nibb, the drummer of the Scatolites, when they played at Knickerbocker's in, I want to say 1999, and I got a depth interview with him that's really one of the few, like really deep interviews with with the person who created what we know as ska in Jamaica in the early 60s. And that interview happened right down the street here. And um, you know, that stuff is um, and it's just in you know, zine form now, paper. You'd have to find that. Well, maybe you'd find that online, but I can't remember if it is or not. But yeah, it exists as a transcript at least, but there's a tape, yeah, and and there's a lot can be done with it. But that's that's a next next project that I gotta think about.
SPEAKER_02Oh wow, you got a lot of a lot of you got a lot of work.
SPEAKER_00A lot of work. Yeah. But uh in the meantime, I am I am trying to continue to you know do the uh the regular release schedule for VP. Um, and like I said, I'm in the middle of a kind of a catalog series on the congos. VP owns the Masters to the Lee Scratch Perry production heart of the congos, but hasn't really focused a lot of attention on the follow-up albums that came after that, which are really good. Yeah. Some some like super fans like a couple of those as much or better. So um I'm focusing on getting some of that cleaned up. A lot of times the stuff that's on the DSPs, like on your Spotify or Apple or whatever, the audio, the audio maybe could use, you know, another uh upload just to make it sound better, a remaster, or the cover art needs to be re-digitized to make it look cleaner. A lot has happened over the years in a rush to get stuff online that maybe wasn't handled with as much detail management. And so one of the things I do is to try and always be listening and looking at the catalog and how it comes across and say, okay, we need to go revisit X, Y, and Z. And then also digging around in the real-to-real tape archives of the company, which is a joy to me because real-to-reel tape, real to real tape is the ultimate high fidelity. Oh, I'll arm wrestle anyone who wants to try and tell me that there's a better format than real-to-reel tape. I work. Real to real tape.
SPEAKER_02I'm not gonna argue with that one. No, no.
SPEAKER_00I I bought one of KZOM's reels when they were getting rid of them, the big task cams. And those those when you have a real to reel mix from a studio session, put it on a 15 inches per second. High fidelity.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's always been the unreachable, like for the for normal people. Like nobody had the real to real.
SPEAKER_00You had in the seven sixties and seventies, it got to the consumer level. So there was a moment, I think it was probably a little bit pricey.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00But it was there. So like most from the from the early 60s to the early middle seventies, most albums had a tape, a reel-to-reel tape, seven in seven inch. Can you still get those? They're they're expensive. There people are going after them like crazy on on eBay.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Like there's certain um, I collect certain types of classic rock, and and I used to buy them from Recycled Sounds for five to ten bucks a tape, and the same albums, like to get an original Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin album on real-to-reel tape is a two to four hundred dollar proposition. Yeah. Wow. Because the sound fiends and the hi-fi fiends are are are gobbling those up.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, when they those people, they uh they love their sound. I mean, those people have interconnects worth more than my house.
SPEAKER_00Right, yeah, no. You know, I mean they got Bill Jones if you're out there.
SPEAKER_02Like, let alone the speakers. I mean, just the cable.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but you don't have to spend fifty thousand dollars to have good audio. You can have, you can have, if you match up, if you match components correctly, it's like certain things pair well with other things. And then you go back to that era, let's say the same time I'm talking about from the 60s to the 70s, yeah. Hi-fi, at a consumer level, like everybody was buying equipment, and so the manufacturing standards, like it was really the industry was like really chugging along at a healthy pace. Yeah, so that the stuff that was coming out, everything was pretty good. You know, if you buy a turntable from the it's hard to buy a bad turntable from the early 70s.
SPEAKER_02They're all pretty good.
SPEAKER_00They're all pretty good.
SPEAKER_02Kind of like uh those big block uh VCRs were pretty much all the same company, just different names. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh early CD players were a lot of the I'm not very expert on early CD players.
SPEAKER_02Like Phillips that they made, that you could see it in a seven different names and it was the same one. You know, yeah. Branding it out.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. That's stuff's that stuff's fun. But at the end of the day, I also have a high, high level of tolerant tolerance for things that most that some people would say don't sound good. As long as the music's good, it'll shine through the bad uh format. We get my my hearing Oh man.
SPEAKER_02I have tinnitus in my left ear. I mean, I really sometimes I'm like, wow, I didn't know that didn't sound right because it sounded good to me. Yeah. But you know, I'm I'm uh I I don't know. I'm a feelings listening guy. I'm a big bass and drums. Yeah. Uh it moves when it moves me, it moves me. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not a big lyric guy. Uh melodies and stuff are are great in in their, you know, but they're like 1% lower than the bass and the drums. Yeah. You know. Uh the beat.
SPEAKER_00Which is why you like reggae.
SPEAKER_02Yes, probably, yes, yes.
SPEAKER_00It's bass, it's bass music.
SPEAKER_02Yes. And especially the uh dub reggae.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah. And incidentally, I'm running the projects I'm so excited about right now, and and I I hope to be able to sneak preview a track or two on your show on this week. Oh, yeah. Which is um a follow-up to Prince Fatty Meets the Gorgon, which was a a project that I I um produced in curated executive produce, whatever you want to call it, in 2023 with the British engineer Prince Fatty, who's Mike Pelinconi, who is he produced Holly Cook and works a lot with uh MC Horseman, and he's just a he's a um a stalwart of the British reggae scene. And I picked um 10 multi-track real-to-reel masters to get from the Bunny Stryker League catalog for him to do new new dub mixes of. And he's a he's a dub purist from the King Tubby Jamies tradition of analog, all analog outboard gear and and pure mixing to tape. So all this stuff, it's kind of corollary to everything I was just talking about, but in the in the sense where he's creating new mixes the way the masters did it back then. Yeah. Because you can do all of this stuff, you can create dub mixes on a laptop, what's called in the box, using plugins that are in the digital audio workstation, but he's doing it all analog with two two amplifiers, what they call valve amps, um, and and analog processing, the way Tubby's studio is set up. And he's incredible. So anyway, I did one of these in 2023, and right now he's delivered nine of the ten tracks for volume two. And I wanna I'm gonna run them by you this week and tell me what you think.
SPEAKER_02That'll be that'll be really interesting. Um but uh so wait, I uh I Googled, I just googled your name just to see what would come up. And uh uh one of the things they were talking about, you curated a music at a resort.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah, yeah, so that that was um about five years ago, um through um an engineer, a prominent engineer, Tom Elmhurst, who I met, who was friends with um Chris Blackwell, the founder of Island Records, who owns a resort in Jamaica called Goldeneye, which is where Ian Fleming wrote the James Bond books. It's now a resort property. And I I was um I was hired along with Leon Michaels, if you know um L. Michaels Affair. Never heard of them? No, okay. Some of some of the some of your listeners, if they're if they're into kind of retro soul, they might know L. Michaels. He's he's had like really prominent um artist credits, including like work with the Carters and Hudospan. Whatever, whatever.
SPEAKER_02I'm sure they're played on K WM.
SPEAKER_00Anyone who knows who Claro is, he's produced he produced Claro's last album. Um and anyway, he's a giant. He was in the Dapkings, you know, early Dapkings with Sharon Jones. Anyway, he's a superstar. Okay. Producer.
SPEAKER_02I know that that whole crew is the prominent. They have a different name, don't they? No, no, I'm thinking of uh Charles Bradley.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, that that's so Charles Bradley is part of the the Dap Tone label. And and and Leon Michaels comes out of that whole that camp from this is going back 20 years ago. And a lot of these people they were part of the Afro-beat group Antibalis, that I I've been close friends with and um kind of steered them to Lincoln a couple times. I brought them here once before while I was still living here, and then they came back. But anyway, I know I'm digressing. Leon Michaels and I, I mean, really Leon only did, I think he only did two playlists. He did two jazz playlists for Goldeneye, and I did I did 18 to 20 reggae, soul, and kind of global sounds playlists.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, those are all still on my Spotify page. Goldeneye uses some of them still, but adapt I I'm not even sure because I haven't been to Goldeneye in a few years to know like what's the status of the work that I did for them. But to be, you know, given the stamp of approval by Chris Blackwell, who basically is like the produced producer who brought Bob Holly to the world to say create music playlists for my venues at my my resort. That was a pretty amazing opportunity. But it also was cool for me too, because it helped me continue to organize my music in the digital space. Oh, whereas I'm like, I'm a I'm a regular I'm a record collector, yeah, but I'm also somebody who's open to digital formats and streaming, and it's just relevant, it's with us, it's here. Um, and it helped me, that whole process helped me continue to organize my uh music in the in the digital space. I also did playlists for editorial playlists for Apple Music for Gary Stewart when they transitioned from beats to Apple Music. Yeah. So a lot of my work is on Apple Music editorial, like classic reggae deep cuts on Apple Music is my playlist. All the Bob Marley, all the Felicuti, Gregory Isaacs, Barrett Hammond, Dennis Brown, yada yada yada. I think I did like 50 or 60. Did you do like dub essentials? I can't remember if I did dub essentials, but that's like that was done at the same time that I was. I did like Lee Sc the Lee Scratch Perry Essentials and Lee Scratch Perry behind the boards.
SPEAKER_02Oh wow, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I listen to Dub Essentials a lot.
SPEAKER_00I don't think I did, I don't think I did dub essentials. Bummer, bummer. Is it good?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's really good. Really good. I mean, uh it yeah, really good. And sometimes I feel good uh when I listen to stuff like that that I'm hearing songs that I play. I'm like, oh cool. Yeah, I'm not the only one.
SPEAKER_00You know, so Apple, Apple's Apple's edit Apple's editorial playlist I look for reggae, I like them a zillion times better than Spotify's. In fact, they I think not because I contributed to them, but because Gary Stewart was this who was a giant in the music industry, used to work for Rhino, and he's like the the ultimate kind of box set catalog guy. Uh he was the one who was in charge of that transition. So Apple was more oriented towards human playlist creation. Spotify was always trying to go in the direction of algorithmic playlist curation, and you can see the difference.
SPEAKER_02I've never had a Spotify account, I've never done Spotify. When it started out by just friends who were in the industry would just talk about how bad it was. Like they we don't make any money.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. You know, you the the the m money, I see the kind of the the way money is made, but it's it's such a you have to be at a a pretty high threshold of followers for it to happen. And it's not about like what's a great song, yeah, it's about what's a what's popular. So like the legacy tracks, for me, like right now, if I was gonna put out a digital catalog single, I would gravitate towards looking first at the artists that have the big following, whether that's Ika Mouse or Barrington Levy or Gregory or Dennis Brown, and then try to look and see do we have any alternate or unreleased mixes of any of the more popular tunes? Because I know if I can reintroduce those into the digital space, it will naturally do better than if I say, Oh, I've got this unreleased, super obscure track by this artist. The obscurity of it, where it would maybe help you if it was a record for record heads in the digital algorithmic place, it's not as helpful.
SPEAKER_02I see that.
SPEAKER_00No justice, man. I see that.
SPEAKER_02Well, hey, uh, we're gonna take a quick break uh and get a quick word in from our sponsors, um, such as a Rourke's Tavern, where we're uh filming a team. Uh and then uh the zoo bar and uh Rick Peters. So uh be right back. Hey y'all, I just want to thank uh Aurorks Tavern for sponsoring Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska. Aurorks Tavern, it's Lincoln's downtown. It's like a neighborhood bar right in the middle of downtown. We're at 1329 O Street, and uh you know Rourke's I've always described as kind of like the backstage to the Lincoln uh musical community. They do fun things all year round, they got specials every day, they got two pool tables, they do dance parties, they got a chili cook-off every year. So if you just want a nice, relaxing time, come on down, see Jordy and the whole family down here at O'Rourke. Thank you. Hey, want to give a big thank you to Rick Peters for sponsoring the Slacker Dave Love Nebraska podcast. Rick is an independent insurance agent, uh, AMS Insurance Center. The phone number is 402-476-3599. He's a great guy, great personal service. Amanda and I have been uh customers of his for years. He just a real good guy. You just you want to come see him. But the most important thing about Rick is he is a host of not one but two shows on KZUM 89.3 FM. Uh he hosts Rockin' Bones on Friday nights from 6 to 7.30. Rockabilly and all that kind of related fun music. And then Tuesday mornings from uh 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. It's the Sugar Frosted Chocolate Bomb Diggity Good Time Show. And you never know what you're gonna hear on there, but you know, they call him Rickabilly. I like to call him Rickopedia. He knows a lot, great shows. Thank you very much. Hey, uh, I just want to thank uh Pete and Amanda from the Zoobar for sponsoring the Slacker Dave Loves Nebraska podcast. Zoobar, wonderful place. Uh live music almost every single night, sometimes most the weekends, twice a night. Uh Zoo Fest, July 10th and 11th. Put that on your calendars. But thanks, Pete, you rule. Alright, hey, uh, welcome back. Uh thank you uh once again to uh Aurorx, uh uh the Zoobar and Rick Peters um Wikipedia. Uh once again, uh I am with Carter Van Pelt. Uh we are at the uh lovely uh and famous uh Aurorx Tavern. Uh just talking uh the life of Carter Van Pelt. Um dreamy life, but a lot of hard work.
SPEAKER_00Well, yeah, I mean, and uh I also um it's been I've tried to find the north star of my my passion, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I've been I've been very fortunate that I've been um I've been able to continue to do things that are meaningful uh over the years. I've I mean the luxury probably, the you know, not having children is a mixed blessing, but the positive side of it for me has been that I've been able to uh um you know pursue those passions at sometimes uh you know with financial risk or whatever you want to call it. Yeah, you know, not big financial upside, but um just try to do things that I feel strongly about. So I'm grateful for that.
SPEAKER_02But you know, I always I always I I love being from Nebraska and Lincoln specifically, and just the uh the sort of humility and and opportunities that are unique to being from here and that to have access to the artists I've had access to because you know people would tour through here necessarily on their way from Chicago or Minneapolis to Denver, wherever they were going, and we would see shows in the middle of the week, and I would be able to so how how once again, how does uh a kid, how old were you, and how does a kid from Lincoln, Nebraska uh start his journey uh to where you where you were at so far in your life of being a reggae historian and author and curator and yeah, so there there were a couple of there are a couple of moments along the way that were important.
SPEAKER_00I was born in 1970, so I'm 56 now. Um when I was give or take, 10 in somewhere between 10 and 12, around the time that either Bob Marley was at near the end of his life or at right after he had passed. I really don't know when this was. I saw a um a film clip of him on TV, and I don't even know what channel it was on. It wouldn't have necessarily been MTV or some video music something. Yeah. And he was performing Get Up Stand Up, and that was my first exposure to him to reggae, and it just left an imprint on me that I didn't know what to do with it at the time, other than it resonated in my head what he was singing. I remember him in All Denham. You see these photographs, yeah, yeah. You know, the Canadian tuxedo, and he was there singing get up, stand up, stand up for your rights, which was just to to my young person mind, was just a simple, powerful articulation of a fundamental kind of truth. Like, what do you what are you gonna argue with that? No, sit down, shut up, and acquiesce to my domination? Is that the counter argument to that? Yeah. Um anyway, so there was that. And then I remember um, you know, in in the popular music culture of the time, that's when artists who were pop artists, rock artists who are influenced by Bob Marley and the other Harder They Come generation, uh, you know, first generation reggae artists were incorporating reggae into their sound, whether it was um Joe Walsh or or Blondie or Elvis Costello or or in my case the police, I would say, because I I really love the police.
SPEAKER_02I love the police, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so what I didn't know why I liked the police, but then when I started to zero in on what it was about them, it was sort of the uh an aspect of reggae that was in their music. I wouldn't say they ever played reggae in a strict sense, but it was heavily present in as a, you know, whether you're talking about walking on the moon or one world or those kinds of songs, it was there. And um, and then that just caused me to to to be curious. And so I went and bought a Steel Pulse album at uh at Dirt Cheap and you know, and was off to the races kind of from there, sometime in high school. Steel Pulse, your first album. Yeah, that was my first reggae album, Earth Crisis. Nice, yeah. Nice.
SPEAKER_02That's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00Still sounds good to my ears today, I'm glad to say.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I saw Steel Pulse open for In Excess.
SPEAKER_00Kansas City.
SPEAKER_02Okay. The Civic Auditorium had to be 88? Yeah, someplace 86.
SPEAKER_00So I saw them in, if it was the same tour, I saw Steel Pulse open for in excess at Kemper in Kansas City in '88. And I probably it might have been the the night adjacent.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, probably, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I remember uh I was only one of a handful of people up in the at the front. There was we were right up front, you know. There was probably a, you know, there was a good little crowd of people right up front. But you turned around and then, you know, 98% of the people are just hanging out talking, waiting for the other band to come on. Like, I don't know, that's pretty good. You're missing out, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. They were they were a special band. I wish I could have seen them um, you know, uh five years prior to that when they were touring like true true democracy, that era, when they were first like really on the scene in the United States, because all the recordings of those shows are are incredibly powerful, impressive. And they were they because they were working alongside um the post-punk bands, they got a taste of like the stage presence, the energy that you needed to present to make it click with those audiences. So I know the Stranglers were a big influence on Steel Pulse. Oh, yeah, yeah. Um and they obviously were around the they were around the police.
SPEAKER_02Golden Brown is one of the top songs in my, you know, uh in my top 100 songs, which is probably 700? Minimum, minimum. Yeah, okay, I gotcha. Uh Golden Browns right up in there, you know. I would say that. Yeah, the Stranglers are a good band. That's a whole different podcast. But uh so uh So Steel Pulse, yeah.
SPEAKER_00That was transitional. And and and and from there, from there on, I just started digging. Like, I remember again, it all it's funny, it goes goes back to what you would have access. What back then, what did you have access to in the record store if you were barely hearing it? Where were you hearing this music? It was gonna be a cassette tape that somebody made for you. You taped something off of KZOM, yes, and big up, big up Greggae and reggae got soul and Dan at Dan and Patsy, or otherwise known as Batman and Pete. Like Batman, Batman's a big reggae mentor for me.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I you know, he I mean, not like friend reggae mentor, but like Batman, like those shows were my, you know, I giving birth. I mean, I liked reggae before, you know, whatever I heard, I liked, but once I heard those shows on K2M, I was hooked. I mean, someplace in my house I have to have like 72 tapes of every show that I, you know, every time they're on, I had to make sure I was home to get on the cassette player and tape their show, you know. Because I you weren't gonna get that anywhere else.
SPEAKER_00No. It's really incre it was incredible what what um Dan and Patsy did with just keeping current, like they they were buying, they were getting all this up-to-date dance hall from Jamaica in the early 90s. That it was crazy that Lincoln had access to that back then.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, the reggae collection in KGM used to be quite impressive.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. But but just thinking about um going to Dirt Cheap, Twisters, Pickles, those stores, and looking through my education was just flipping through a rack of reggae albums that was not that deep. But that was like, okay, I'm looking at it, I'm like, what's this? What's this? What's this? And that's how I um so whoever it was who was ordering for those stores, like they they had a an impact on my um oh yeah, I've talked about knowledge.
SPEAKER_02Well, I remember uh I I uh inducted uh Forganson, a Nebraska performance arts hall of fame, and I wanted you know, I wanted to do a really good job. So I talked to a lot of people, and one of the things I was uh like Joel Lamson, I was like, Where where were you guys getting this music? You know, this 4AD, and he was like, Oh, they're cheap, and he mentioned some guy's name. He was the guy that brought it in, and you know, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Well, I mean, between you know John Nanos, Jeff, Jeffrey Runnings, Terry Moore, those those names kind of come to mind, and I'm not sure who else was on the inside. um of the like the real heads who were ordering. I'm probably missing some like key key names of people. Yeah, I'm sure we are. Whoever you are out there, um, just know that your your uh your your legacy is appreciated. Because I think Lincoln had a lot of really good, like amazing tastemakers. Oh yeah. If you come from here and you were really paying attention via those channels and you you know you find yourself in conversation with whoever from wherever in the United States talking about music, you could, you know, probably you probably had a chance of having decent taste and knowing a few things about music. And it's not like just because you were from Nebraska you were completely in in a desert. You did have the opportunity to learn things here.
SPEAKER_02And this is a weird conversation to have for people who only know music discovery in the digital era because now you you have access to everything but back then it was like the the the the record store clerk you know I mean they made a whole movie the Empire Records kind of you know but the Record Store Clerk was was uh a pinnacle you know feature in in the in the you know yeah you know they could tell I told the story before like John Anotes I could you know didn't really know him that well I know him really well now but you know back when I first met him I tell him I said hey he was working at Pickles and like I could walk in and and be looking at he was like hey try this and it was the perfect thing you know he didn't he I don't know did he just pay attention to what everybody bought and then just went you know with it or did he just know when he went into real estate one time uh a years later a few years later he told me I hadn't seen him for a while and he told me that um you know finding people a house is is is just the same thing as finding people music they would like that is brilliant yeah I yeah I've never thought of any i yeah that's a great line you just have to understand the client right yeah and he was he he obviously was paying attention to what people liked and and and could say is that just what you're just what you experienced but then there was always the people that just worked at him like the Janet Frostizers and you know and and they all you just knew these people you just trusted their tastes you know it's kind of like the reviewer where you the reviewer doesn't like something for a reason you're like I need to listen to this now because he hates what I like.
SPEAKER_00Right right right right big up Janet too I'm glad you called her out i she and I went to high school together she's a few years older.
SPEAKER_02She's uh been all over the internet in the last couple uh weeks her and John and Bernie uh standing in at the Nirvana show there's been the there's been the one picture that yeah big up John big up Bernie this post this uh post has been shared like about uh it was like the reunion day of the May 13th which was the anniversary and there's some somebody made a post and it just got shared all over the internet so she's been everywhere she's famous now she's internet famous she went viral she went yeah she went viral uh and then Bernie is already famous but you know I know Bernie's been been going through his uh his photos oh yeah that's pretty cool that's a great project yeah that's a huge project that is that is publicly publicly holding yourself accountable to your your stated project goal like you know what I mean he's showing everyone the process as he as he puts it out there so you can't stop he's on the on the hook now so I love Bernie McGinn they got Bernie and Tammy and Stella great people they were great great Lincoln friends um so books what books have you written I haven't written any books I've just written book chapters book chapters a whole book one no no how many no I've used to publish a zine maybe but nope I mean I I probab I I'm sure that somewhere if I were if I got organized with all of this stuff I could put it there's definitely enough for a book but I haven't that book has not been written. But you know what you've done that most people haven't put together the giantest box set of music ever.
SPEAKER_00That's a big leg that was a big legacy project for me. Yeah it's it's it was called uh Down in Jamaica 40 years of VP Records and same company I was talking about at the outset um my first project that I worked on when I started there as director of catalog in 2018 was uh their 40th anniversary retrospective box set and it's a multi-format box with um four CDs four 12-inch singles four seven inch singles um a book and some like collector cards of prominent artists but the pull the point of it is to show 40 years of the progression of the label from 1977 basically to to 2018 um and yeah it can it came together really well I mean I'm I would say for a hundred track retrospective it was 95% of what I envisioned or wanted it to be. Always with a project like that you're gonna run into some barriers on licensing like some stuff that they had early on or that they distributed. But now we couldn't get it back. You know to two and there were some key pieces like One Blood by Junior Reed was a huge track for him and a big track that the label distributed but Junior was not willing to license that at the time I think Ragamuffin by Coffee which was a breakout track for her career it happened right before that and they had just like moved that whole um that that track was licensed onto Coffee's like whatever made RCA or whatever major label she ended up on so we couldn't get that one back. There were a couple others an Anthony B track whatever I don't why am I even saying that I'm like being self-critical of something that was otherwise like you know pretty near the mark. Yeah you know nothing's ever going to be perfect. But uh I think about those yeah yeah yeah if only I could have gotten those but it was cool like when you look at it when you step back and look at it as a whole you say wow this label did all of this it's like wow that's a good body of work. So the the they were they were happy with it I was happy with it it was ambitious in terms of its size and the expense to have a you know project like that. But it's done well both in terms of the physical sales and on streaming um it's streamed really well. So you can stream it now afford it's called Down in Jamaica 40 years of VP Records and listen to most of it. There's certain the way we did it though the vinyl part is strictly vinyl and so there's tracks there that don't stream and the CD part is the part that streams. That makes sense that makes sense the the idea at the time I was I was very much of the mindset of let's keep some stuff out of the digital realm.
SPEAKER_02Yeah you can bring them back any later it can happen anytime. 10 years from now like hey we just added these right now so are you still doing the uh boardwalk the summer series what's it now yeah so it's called the it's called the Summer Sound System series.
SPEAKER_00It started as Coney Island reggae on the boardwalk in 2010 which is now 16 years ago June of 2010 so it's 16 years next month and you know through through the years that has grown this is a this is an outdoor sounds Jamaican style sound system where we set up big speaker boxes and it's vinyl only DJ thing like they do in Jamaica and over the years it's grown to be like a really um well loved I'm happy to say a part of the summer uh you know the summer cultural life of New York City and definitely the the the reggae community in New York and has spawned some kind of similar events and helped keep vinyl DJ culture alive even though I didn't even think of it as like I'm not trying to do this because it's vinyl. I just did it because vinyl was natural format to me. And and now I realize I was way ahead of of the the vinyl revival in doing it. It also it's a it's a it's a it's a uh uh uh what's the word I'm looking for uh a a barrier you know like a if you're not vinyl yeah you know no I mean a lot of people want to play the event and and it's so oh I would be to my laptop yeah right that that's the way that's kind of my filter is that I've got so many vinyl DJs who want to play it and then a zillion laptop DJs on top of that. So I in order to keep myself sane I've kept it vinyl only.
SPEAKER_02But it that's still still challenging.
SPEAKER_00But anyway now it's called the Summer Sound System series which is the umbrella for Coney Island reggae for reggae on the boardwalk Rockaways and reggae under the bridge. Reggae under the bridge has now become like the central pillars of it I do three of those at the K Bridge Park which is under the the Brooklyn Queens Expressway that connects those two boroughs in from Greenpoint Brooklyn so it's on in Greenpoint Brooklyn under the the Kosciusko Bridge and I do those three times um you can uh find the the details on Instagram if you're gonna be in New York City um it's on Instagram and Facebook Summer Sound System series you can search for that or Coney Island reggae um and yeah June 14th is the first one and there's a total of five events across the summer and it's been amazing. I mean the number of people who have just kind of dropped in and been a part of it who I mean I couldn't be even not even have been able to orchestrate booking certain people they've just come. They just show up and like yeah I want to can I do half an hour or whatever yeah well yeah I mean like an Or just hang out it just hang out you know um or or or more than anything those who have come and just like picked up the microphone and sang one of their songs or two of their songs that's been remarkable. But the most one of the most regular attendees of the event is Johnny Osburn. Also to to to to a similar extent is Sister Carol. They live in the New York City area um two years ago but Johnny comes to almost all of them. Johnny loves the event yeah so he's been I've I've booked him to be a participant he's participated just out of feeling the vibes and he just comes and hangs out and listens to music. That's like that's the best thing. It's like I don't need Johnny Osbourne to I mean I'd love to have Johnny part like be a part of every event on the mic because he's one of the best to ever do it. But just to look out and see Johnny just vibing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah yeah that's that's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00It's amazing to me yeah you got anybody big uh lined up for their I'm lining I'm lining them but I can't I can't I can't announce anything ahead of time because yeah I don't have I don't have that stuff fully locked in but one of the beauties and and maybe it's this the the slacker in me if you'll forgive the term um is that I've I've I've deliberately never tried to build headliners on it I've tried to make the the the events so consistent that nobody everybody they just come no matter what. It's like hey it's Reggae on the board block do you want to go? Who's DJing? Oh maybe so and so but I'm not sure let's just go.
SPEAKER_02It's it's not who it's it's about the music. Yeah it's about the music.
SPEAKER_00And I've been able to m make it work that way so that that way if any D any one DJ cancels the rest the rest can cover the bases and you never know who's going to show up I mean we've had some amazing um spontaneous performances by by people who I didn't plan on on having there and that's that's been remarkable.
SPEAKER_02I like uh Lincoln we're coming up on June here in Lincoln which uh Tuesday nights is jazz in June.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So free jazz at the uh sheld in and that's just an event it doesn't matter that place people come that's they're just coming to it. Yeah it doesn't matter who's playing somebody's gonna be good. You know I'm sure you know you're up and down. Stransky Park same way up and down you know but I mean people just come because it's what they do on Thursdays you know communities and then there's the hub series and then uh the mill in the telephone district has something on once a one Friday every month or something like that. It just there's so much free exciting arts to do in the city of Lincoln on uh and I'm just talking about Lincoln I mean I'm not even knowledgeable what goes on in Omaha you know they have similar kind of things and even bigger things but I I just love uh the arts I think more more people need to just listen just come and listen to music you know dance or just stand there or just stand there just go and talk to another human being yeah while we can so uh a couple things yeah you uh born in Lincoln yeah Brian Hospital Brian Hospital or or not Lincoln General but actual Brian yeah yeah okay yeah yeah now it's Brian East and Brian West right okay Brian East then yeah uh uh yep I was born out there um son of Samuel and and Nancy Van Peltz and uh brother to Alison now Alison Nesper and Bob Van Peltz and um yeah I'm a Lincolnite my my grandparents lived their lives here and um I'm I'm proud to be from here.
SPEAKER_00I really I really am it's it's given me a good perspective to uh you know navigate yeah the rest so uh this is my uh question yeah that I've been uh trying to ask everybody if I don't forget someone's coming to Nebraska for a vacation I'm not very specific on length all that blah blah blah where are you sending them what is the essential thing to do and see you know this is according to you yeah um do you you're talking about like a like a a a site or a cuisine or a site somebody could say go to the football game John Taylor said you gotta go to Omaha to the bin uh bin thrift store or whatever oh okay yeah yeah yeah well um okay like I I'll I'll try and skip past the state capital because that seems like the most obvious thing to say but that really is a the more more time goes by the more I appreciate what a what a amazing piece of architecture and and history I hope to do a podcast all on the state capital. Yeah it's like you grow up next to it and it it's almost like you surely take it for granted and and but you in until you you see you see comparable buildings of the time period or other capital buildings that all look the same um you you form an appreciation for the the the intellect that went into that the thoughtfulness the respect for indigenous culture that's there alongside everything else it's just an incredible document of like who we are um as a city and as a state so yeah I'm pretty fond of it um but in terms of like you know so much has changed and there are a lot of things that have come and gone over the years. I would say still like I'm gonna say that Tung Tao Vietnamese restaurant on Vine Street is captures something of a that I think is really special to Lincoln because it's it's excellent family authentic Vietnamese restaurant and and and a and direct expression of the the Vietnamese community here that's that's it's been a constant here and I just love that because I can't find a Vietnam I love Vietnamese cuisine because of living being from here. I can't find anything I like as much in New York in New York yeah oh yeah well I mean you know uh Lincoln and Nebraska took in a lot of Vietnamese refugees uh Catholic social services being the welcoming community capital we are uh city and state we are uh I could yeah that's crazy that's crazy so that's a shout out to that I think I'll I'll give you a curveball I think because of the the weather that that I experienced over the last week being here I'd have to say if I could if I could have anyone experience a prop a proper spring thunderstorm. Oh oh yeah I think that that's a a a uniquely uh midwestern plains kind of experience that there's something like power powerful majestic about that that I'll I never I'll never get over the uh giant thunderheads rolling yeah and you're just watching that storm on Sunday like I after it passed being out as it had moved on to the east and the sun was setting and pushing light back up under the clouds it was incredible. Yeah the sunsets in the Midwest uh yeah beautiful yeah beautiful yeah um rises another another thing that I used to be really fond of when um when I was living here were the um off-road bike trails at Wilderness Park spent a lot of time riding out there and I think that was as good a uh you know bike experience as I could have ever hoped to have had um those are kind of the top of mind things you know If you if you have a chance Branchoke is a pretty cool one yeah Branch Stoke is a is a good spot when I used to do a lot of road biking I would ride out to Branchtoke and ride around the lake and back to Lincoln. I mean they have a good yeah off yeah which I haven't which I haven't talked about I like to walk it myself and I used to be I used to be I mean I'm still a you know a Cornhusker football fan and going to the games was very important experience in my in my upbringing I'd have to say that experience has kind of fundamentally changed for me and is not like what I what I loved when I was young um and um but you know what that's that is for those who for those who can can take that in and and and enjoy it so let them enjoy it and for those who want to be left alone and let them be left alone.
SPEAKER_02Well you know I miss I miss the 90s uh downtown Lincoln football saturday that was a scene because it was just the just the crowds just run walking down the street were amazing and now everything's so spread out yeah and you know people park go to the game leave you know uh that's a that's one of those experiences like I'm gonna say like a Grateful Dead uh parking lot you don't have to go to the show go to the parking lot you're gonna have just as much fun one last Lincoln thing that I love uh a cuisine item um the uh the oatmeal cookie oatmeal raisin cookies at Eileen's colossal cookies awesome awesome well thank you Carter thanks for uh being my friend and coming in and uh uh telling me uh dropping knowledge on me I always I always uh take the uh uh professor student hey there's knowledge droppings everywhere I go yeah that's that's a trail of knowledge droppings you're a good Nebraskan you're uh uh and uh you know that's what I'm gonna say and big up all my New York Nebraska friends who uh we get together we had a great time watching the the basketball oh tournament this year and and yeah there's a lot of good uh good Nebraskans in Brooklyn so yeah yeah there's a yeah yeah it's been a good time yeah played some shows there one time yeah it was it was cool to see people that you knew yeah yeah yeah yeah Pat and Joe and Chris all you guys are awesome so right on all right kids uh until next time uh be excellent each other uh and uh party on