The following is reproduced from the Metrotimes web site.

IN ONE EAR


By Chris Handyside and Greg Baise

6/9/99

LEFT OF THE DIAL

Dave Dixon – the Culture Czar – broadcasting from the "Tesla Center in beautiful downtown Southfield" has abdicated this mortal coil. He was found dead in his Royal Oak home over Memorial Day weekend of an apparent heart attack. He was 60. The legacy of his reign: a continuing undercurrent of radio that can be heard across college and (the few remaining) underground radio frequencies that defies the now firmly entrenched corporate hold on the radio dial. As lead pilot of the legendary "Air Aces" on Detroit’s freeform rock station WABX (once heard at 99.5 FM where now "Young Country" rules), Dixon played an integral role in Detroit’s FM revolution in the late 1960s. He was to Detroit’s underground rock movement what the Electrifying Mojo is to Detroit’s techno world – that is, a touchstone among those who locked into his frequency as he unveiled the revolutionary sounds of Jimi Hendrix, Cream, Iron Butterfly, the Grateful Dead and many other artists now taken for granted in pop culture that, then, couldn’t find a radio home. (He, incidentally, shared co-writing credit on Peter, Paul and Mary’s hit tune "I Dig Rock & Roll Music" with friend and fellow native Birmingham-er Paul Stookey.)

Dixon left WABX in 1974 as the station was beginning the inevitable turn toward commercialization. By all accounts, Dixon was never one to back down from his often-adversarial relationship to authority. This certainly didn’t win him any warm fuzzy feelings from program directors and co-workers with whom he didn’t see eye-to-eye. He had just such a tempestuous stint at WDET – after a 10-year gig hosting an overnight movie program on Miami, Fla., TV. Dixon landed at the Detroit public radio station where his wildly diverse playlist and trademark gruff, cynical radio persona won him a loyal audience but, coupled with frequent confrontations with management, didn’t score him any points with the station’s brass. He was fired amid a storm of controversy.

It was soon after that, in 1996, AM talk station WXYT hired him, warts and all, to host "Dave Dixon’s Radio Magazine" where, though flying without music, he opened the airwaves to Detroit’s arts community, tempering his cynicism – but not his gruff, no-bullshit ’tude – with a good-vibes community forum, often sharing the air with friends, fellow former-Air Ace Jerry Lubin and acclaimed rock scribe Ben Edmonds.

So – whether or not the demographic masses realize it, between spoon-fed bits of musical pabulum – there’s another path to finding musical connections and cultural nuggets on the dial. Dave Dixon lived to prove it, damn the Mr. Popularity award. –Chris Handyside