KUCI Radio Ready for Power Boost

Tune your radio to 88.9 FM Monday at noon and you may hear something different.

Capping a four-year push to boost its signal, KUCI, the student-run station at UC Irvine, will flick on its new transmitter at that appointed hour, raising its broadcasting power from 24 watts to 200--enough, the station hopes, to transform it from little more than a rumor to a significant presence on the Orange County airwaves.

Kevin Stockdale, who started out at KUCI during his undergraduate days and is now the station’s paid adviser, said he will be the one making the first announcements over the air when the new equipment kicks in.

“No one’s going to stop me after I’ve worked on this so long,” Stockdale said Thursday. “I’ll mull over (what to say) over the weekend, but it will be brief and concise and tell people what (the station) is about, and that we think they’ll like it.”

Tradition may dictate what the first song played over the new transmitter will be. Stockdale said tentative plans call for spinning “Sugar, Sugar” by the Archies, the first song played when KUCI originally went on the air on Oct. 16, 1969. Then, to bring everything up to date, the station will play another version of “Sugar, Sugar”--by one of the contemporary alternative rock bands that today account for a large share of the station’s broadcasting schedule.

After that brief opening salvo, KUCI will settle into its programming routine with a regularly scheduled World Beat show.

According to engineering studies done about three years ago to support the station’s application to the Federal Communications Commission for a power boost, a 200-watt signal should give KUCI steady coverage of a substantial swath of the county, an arc starting in southeastern Huntington Beach, moving inland to Anaheim Hills, then swooping through El Toro and back to the coast south of Laguna Beach.

But Stockdale said that is based on a computer projection. Only after the transmitter is fired up will staffers and listeners in search of radio alternatives really know how much the boost will do for KUCI’s signal, which is now faint to nonexistent in most of the county.

KUCI’s next order of business will be to pay for its higher profile. The new transmitter and related equipment will cost about $75,000, to be paid off over three years. Stockdale said the university will kick in $72,000 during that period, and KUCI is expected to raise money from listeners to cover the remainder as well as the station’s operating costs.

“We need money anywhere and any way,” Stockdale said. A new, expanded audience will be hearing all about it.

If you’ve always had a yen to see where The End really came for Jim Morrison, Costa Mesa resident Gail Burns is organizing a “Break On Through Tour of Jim Morrison’s Paris” this summer in conjunction with the anniversary of the dead Door’s demise.

Morrison expired in his bathtub on July 3, 1971, in the original City of Light. The tour will include a visit to his graveside on the anniversary day. Information: (714) 642-4222.

Stab You in the Back Records, an independent/alternative rock label based in Costa Mesa, is organizing three benefit concerts to collect canned food for the homeless this month.

The Muffs, the Goods, Fluf and the Women will play an all-ages show March 20 from noon to 5 p.m. at the record company’s warehouse office space at 1926 Placentia Ave. ((714) 631-5486). Concert-goers should park in the lot at nearby Club Mesa, 843 W. 19th St., at corner of Placentia Avenue.

Outdoor shows are set for March 27 and March 28 from noon to 4 p.m. in the parking lot of the Electric Chair clothing store, 410 Main St. in Huntington Beach ((714) 536-0784). The Red Aunts, the Goods, Pinch, Inch, I Own the Sky, the Ballistics and Thirteen will perform on March 27; bands on March 28 will be Fluf, the Women, Fu Manchu, the Getbacks, 16, Evergreen and Further.

Concert-goers at each show are asked to contribute at least three canned food items, which will be donated to the Costa Mesa charity Share Our Selves. Those who donate the food items will get free pizza at the March 20 show and will receive free raffle tickets for various prizes at the Electric Chair concerts.

The American Music Showcase, a monthly event that gives novice and professional songwriters a chance to perform original work, will take place Monday evening at Centerfield, 17296 Beach Blvd., Huntington Beach. (714) 848-0113.

Amateurs are invited to perform during an open-mike session from 6 to 9 p.m. After 9, performers will be John Ford Coley (who wrote and performed a series of hits in the ‘70s with his then-partner “England Dan” Seals), Steve McClintock, Mark Wood, Dan Yablonka, Sonny Dalton, Alan Whitney and the Darlin’s. Admission is free. For information on the showcase, call Mark Wood at (714) 675-0370.

It’s fitting that a band whose debut album is called “Now I Eat Them” will be playing two dinner-hour concerts in restaurants next week. Xtra Large, the local band whose album is out on Giant Records, plays Tuesday at 6 p.m. at the Hard Rock Cafe, 451 Newport Center Drive, Newport Beach. The band plays at the Hard Rock Cafe in Los Angeles on Monday at 6 p.m. Both shows will be free.

The Orange County Musicians Foundation, launched a year ago to provide grants to help uninsured local musicians cope with their bills in medical emergencies, has qualified for federal tax-exempt status as a nonprofit organization, according to the foundation’s president, Greg Topper.

Topper, who has been raising grant money with periodic concerts, says he now will seek donations from corporations as well.

In a recently released financial statement, the foundation reported that it raised a total of $26,170 during 15 months of operations ending Feb. 28, spent $10,102 on overhead (the major expenses were $6,872 in staging costs) and issued three medical grants totaling $1,755.

The foundation, which has no paid employees, had $14,314 in its coffers available for future use as of Feb. 28.

Another fund-raising show is scheduled for May 16 at Bill Medley’s Music City in Fountain Valley, with Medley booked to headline.

Musicians interested in assisting at the benefit show, or in applying for help from the foundation, can call (714) 362-4200.

If you think you have what it takes to touch some perfect (or imperfect) bodies with your mind (or your vocal cords), you may be interested in the Leonard Cohen Open Mike Contest at Bogart’s Bohemian Cafe in Long Beach on March 31 at 8 p.m. Organized by Cohen’s label, Sony Music, the event will allow the Canadian folk-bard’s admirers to take a shot at performing one of his songs before a panel of judges.

The winner (for the best version of a Cohen song, not the best imitation of Cohen’s baleful singing style) will get $200 worth of recording studio time. For those who’d rather sing a song of their own, or a song by somebody other than Cohen, there’s always the weekly open-mike night at the Bohemian Cafe, every Wednesday from 8 p.m. to midnight. Admission is $4 for the Cohen contest and on regular open-mike nights; performers get in free. (310) 594-8975.