INTERVIEW: Dan Zilber, FBi Radio

Our favourite Sydney radio station FBi is turning 10! Hooray!! We sought an interview with the group's General Music Manager DAN ZILBER to discuss how they intend to celebrate this momentous occasion and explore some of their history.

What have been some of the high points throughout FBi Radio's 10 year existence?

We've had so much fun creating FBi and there are many high points. Almost all of them came from communities coming together to not only support the station, but Sydney's music, art and culture more broadly.

Changing Lanes was a mini festival we held and was a great success. The first one took place in Eliza Lane, Newtown headlined by Tame Impala and the following year we shut down Devonshire St in Surry Hills for Gareth from The Drones, PVT and more. It was an amazing experience with both events sold out and a huge amount of support from our listeners and all the bands who played (and waived their fee to raise cash for FBi).

Our Still Life art auction was a pretty special event. The visual art community really came together to support the station. Some of Sydney's best known (and FBi's most loved) artists donated pieces for the station to auction at an event at the MCA.

FBi's SMAC (Sydney, Music, Art and Culture) Awards are a regular fixture on our calendar now and are something we're all very proud of. We recognise Sydney's best every single day on FBi, but The SMAC Awards are an opportunity to recognise them in real life (and get them drunk).

There are dozens more examples, but none of them would have happened without the support of the artistic communities of Sydney and some very specific FBi volunteers in each case, who take on huge workloads for no pay, all for the love of the station and Sydney's creativity.

FBi Social launched at Kings Cross Hotel a couple of years ago and is now a popular venue for upcoming Australian artists. Do you have any memorable moments from the venue you can share with us since it began?

All the landmark events have been "memorable". From launch, through to our first birthday - both of those events were steep learning curves in what you can and can't do with a 200 capacity room. In each case (Dappled Cities and Hermitude headlining), we got slammed. The support was amazing, but the rooms were too full. I guess we could have worse problems than parties that are fun and well attended. But it's gigs like those that let you know you're alive!

Over the years, FBi have been known to include secret headliners at their parties. Last year Dappled Cities filled the role, how difficult is it keeping these special guests under wraps?

It's pretty hard, to be honest. A certain number of people need to know the details and anything can slip. We've got a couple of secret headliners for the All Our Friends gigs too. Klaxons have just been announced for our party with Modular on July 27 at Oxford Art Factory and as for the secret headliner for Friday June 21 at Oxford Art Factory, all will be revealed soon. All I'll say is that they're from interstate (SCOOP!) and we're big fans of their live show.

Out of the artists who've just been announced to play at these 'All Our Friends' gigs, which act are you most excited to see perform live?

You can't make me choose! Palms are playing June 21 at OAF and are coming along in leaps and bounds. They're developing their own sound and their songwriting skills are very strong. I have a soft spot for Rainbow Chan and Moon Holiday (playing a special set together at the Astral People & Future Classic gig, June 14 at Goodgod) as they won FBi's Northern Lights competition in 2011 and 2012 respectively. I travelled to Iceland Airwaves festival with them where they played some gigs, recorded some music which we released digitally and generally hung out and watched some amazing bands. It was a very special experience and both of those artists have a fan for life in me.

For the party on 21st June at Oxford Art Factory, yourselves and Broken Stone Records have managed to curate an impressive indie rock bill made up of Step-Panther, Palms, Bloods, Melodie Nelson and Magnetic Heads among others. How did FBi form a relationship with Broken Stone Records?

The same way we form a relationship with any label. It goes a bit like this:

• Label is passionate about music.
• Puts balls on the line to release said music.
• FBi likes said music and plays it on the radio.
• Label supports the station and station supports the label and it's artists.
• Hey Presto! It's a relationship!

It's important to remember that all of us are quite similar, so doing fun things together is very natural and makes sense for everyone. We're looking to make a contribution and something different from the mainstream, offering variety and the sort of thing you wouldn't get everywhere else. We're not looking for a mainstream audience, we're looking for OUR audience.

I've noticed that all of the labels and touring agencies you've got putting on the 'All Our Friends' parties are known for signing artists which they love, rather than ones which are already popular. Would you say this is something FBi make an effort to do when they decide what to play on the radio?

Absolutely. I always say that artists don't need hype, a publicist or even a back story. They just need a great song on a shiny disc (or bits and bytes if it's an mp3) and for someone at FBi to connect with it. It could be a specialist show, someone on daytime radio or one of the volunteers in the music department. These labels are kindred spirits with the station. We approach things in a very similar way and each of them are a very important part of what we do at FBi.

Excluding your secret headliners, do you have any other surprises in store for us at these 10 year anniversary parties?

There's a free Coopers if you turn up early. SURPRISE!

Turning 10 is a big deal for a community radio station. How is the studio celebrating on air?

[Dan's colleague Caroline Gates answers this one] We're planning plenty of partying on air. We'll turn the station over to our listeners, invite some old friends back on air and dig out old musical favourites too. How do you give thousands of people cake over the radio? We'll do that.

Words by Tony Kingston

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