When I sat down in sunny Storke Plaza to talk to Ted Coe, advisor for KCSB, UC Santa Barbara’s radio station, I thought I would just be interviewing him about his 25th anniversary at the radio station. As Isla Vista’s B-Side Band was setting up to play a Storke Show and I was getting increasingly anxious over the fact that live music would drown out Coe’s voice, the interview morphed from Coe’s time with KCSB to the history of the rich independent music scene sewn into the fabric of Santa Barbara County and Coe’s life. Over my three years at UCSB, my friends have continually tried to get me to listen to MJ Lenderman and Wednesday. Coe was the only one who actually succeeded.

Growing up in Northern California and after graduating from St. Mary’s College of California, Coe made his way to UCSB to pursue graduate studies within the English department. Although he eventually decided to go ABD (“All but dissertation”), he spent a good amount of time researching the punk music subculture, his nose in zines, books, music and just the philosophy of the music, alongside his involvement in a union movement. 

Ted Coe has been in many positions at KCSB, currently he is the station’s advisor. (Courtesy of Ted Coe)

While Coe was at UCSB, he was also working at a record store downtown with KCSB DJs. It seems as though any chance of him not working at the university station in his future was slim. During his time at the store, he and a group of coworkers nominated Elizabeth Robinson, the station advisor at the time, for a local hero award through the Santa Barbara Independent, which she and her husband ended up winning. If that was not enough to push him through the KCSB doors splattered in artistic posters, his then-girlfriend dropping out of UCSB was. 

In 2000, Coe’s girlfriend at the time dropped out of graduate school and was looking for work. To help, Coe kept an eye on the university job board, where he stumbled upon an administrative job at KCSB, but she had no interest. Coe decided to apply. 

“I was thinking about Elizabeth’s nomination and working around these cool people who were involved at KCSB and local music, and I thought I should try for it. It was almost an accident. So the rest is history in a weird way. I’ve been here this whole century in a sense,” Coe said. “I’ve challenged a lot of that intellectual part of my life into being on the air. But that came a little later.”

Coe joined KCSB in 2000, first doing administrative work and helping to run the yearly fundraiser before having his own show. A couple years later, “The Freak Power Ticket” went on the air.

“It was an expectation [to have a show] in order to understand what’s needed. I went through the curriculum myself. It was more fleshed out than anything I experienced at St. Mary’s. It’s a pretty robust quarter to learn how to be on the air,” Coe said. 

KCSB has a central focus: no commercial music. 

“College radio has always positioned itself as an antidote to MTV or commercial radio,” Coe said. At any given moment, a listener can be thrown into a very niche, eclectic musical genre that may not even be on streaming platforms. KCSB takes the underground to a whole new (basement) level. If you have ever had the chance to be inside the station, the rows and rows of vinyls, CDs and cassettes are hard to miss. 

“There’s definitely stuff in our collection that you can’t get on streaming. That’s something I regularly point out to people. If you’re doing your research and there’s something you want to spin and you can’t find it on a streaming platform, there’s a good chance it’s in our collection here,” Coe said. 

Between researching his punk dissertation, working at the record store and a quarter-century at KCSB, it’s no surprise that Coe is deeply involved with the local music scene. 

“I got more and more interested in the local music scene. It was always kind of local, that’s the whole point. In that period too, in the 1990s and then in the 2000s, there have been periods when the music scene’s very vibrant …” Coe said. 

Some of Coe’s favorite musicians — local or not, but definitely independent — include Madib and his brother, Oh No, Anderson .Paak, Farmer Dave Scher and Wizards of the West (who he recently got to see live at SOhO Restaurant & Music Club in downtown Santa Barbara), the Rival Colts and Rich Kids on LSD, on par with his punk music history. He also loves Iggy Pop, the Dead Kennedys and Love, a 1960s Los Angeles psychedelic rock band who were a fixture at the Whisky a Go Go nightclub and now a fixture on Coe’s forearm — he pulled up his sleeve to show the tattoo. 

“I definitely get exposed to a lot of stuff from here … constantly being introduced to artists who are younger and emerging. It’s a cool, creative environment to be in. I heard about Wednesday way before they blew up,” Coe said. 

Having 25 years worth of KCSB history under his belt, Coe mentioned getting to share this with new DJs. Orientations give him the opportunity to share the research he has done and all of the rich music history the Santa Barbara area has to offer. More than anything, he encourages all future KCSB DJs to get outside of their bubbles.

“If you really want to know where cool touring acts are coming from, or what local bands are worth checking out, the information about that is more likely to come from an organization like KCSB than it would be through your social stream,” Coe said. 

Halfway through the interview, a turtle began to climb out of the koi pod in Storke Plaza. Without hesitation, and while still answering my questions, Coe turned the turtle around and back into the water. He mentioned saving another turtle years prior, when it attempted to lay eggs in a tree. While simply chatting with Coe was enough to prove he is a KCSB staple, his turtle-saving expertise proved he is a UCSB staple. Storke Plaza, KCSB’s stomping grounds, is Coe’s second home. 

“The local [coverage] is a big part of what we do. You can be pretty conversant in a lot of independent music or niche stuff, but you’re in a community where there’s a whole I.V. scene, all these creative people who live throughout this region. This is a community center that we try to invite people into because it’s a way of giving them a platform and a chance to have their art heard.”

Coe has always been a strong advocate for keeping stories local to the Santa Barbara community. (Courtesy of Ted Coe)

One of his favorite local musicians is Cola Boyy (Matthew Urango), who passed away in March 2024 at 34 years old. Described by Coe as a “disabled disco innovator,” guitarist of the Sea Lions — which hail from Oxnard — and a collaborator with MGMT, KCSB gave Cola Boyy a platform, although he never played a solo show in Santa Barbara. 

“He’d been in our studio … He was an amazing person. KCSB gave him a platform on one of our shows and my dream was to maybe help him find a gig in town. It’s always hopping around here,” Coe said. “There’s a lot of figures who come from this region in different subcultures who are recognized as being artistic geniuses. It’s cool to share that with people in this and how the backstory of how the radio station is interfaced with those figures.”

Although KCSB started in 1962 and radio listening has now been largely replaced by streaming platforms such as Apple Music and Spotify, Coe has yet to see a waning of DJ interest. Fall orientation saw 200 eager-to-join students. 

“I never really felt like it’s waned in interest … there’s new media and new avenues to pursue those interests. It hasn’t changed, but maybe the incentives have changed. We’re still a forum just like a campus newspaper,” Coe said.

KCSB not only offers eclectic music (although that might be one of its most interesting features), but also podcasts, news radio, campus coverage and hosts its own events. In 2009, when the Dalai Lama visited UCSB, KCSB broadcasted his speech for the public. In 2016, KCSB partnered with the Queer Art Collective to host a 1950s-style sock hop dance, headlined by Shannon and the Clams. When asked about his favorite memory with KCSB, this was the first story Coe told. 

“I was proud of that; it wasn’t strictly a KCSB thing but it was something we were a big part of. I think we helped fund the guarantee for Shannon and the Clams … that was pretty memorable,” Coe said. 

After my interview was over, and as I made my way to my next class and Coe went back through KCSB’s big red doors, my phone dinged. An email from Coe that read the following:

“Our radio station is the oldest in the UC; KCSB was the first licensed radio station in the entire system. Not only are we at one of the most prestigious public universities in the world, but KCSB has a storied history, it’s a super-dynamic student and community media resource, and that keeps me engaged here too. I’ve had opportunities to expand my role here over the years, and have grown into the current professional position I now hold (as staff advisor).

My dad was a schoolteacher himself, and KCSB has provided me with a career space in which to continue on in that pedagogical tradition. I help to teach folks how to do radio, behind the mic and also in so many other ways, behind the scenes, while also focusing on media literacy. Finally, my weekly radio show is likewise an outlet for my own creativity also, in all the ways I mentioned while we talked.”

Tune in to KCSB at 91.9 or kcsb.org to get a feel for the past 25 years of independent music love that Coe has weaved into the station.

A version of this article appeared on p. 9 of the Oct. 23 print edition of the Daily Nexus.