20 Years of CJUC

I’m 34. On cusp of being a millennial and whatever came before that. I remember floppy disks and windows 97 being the pinnacle of technology. I remember leaving the VHS player on record as i went to bed- only to find that my Dad had changed the channel half way through WWF Royal Rumble. I remember the constant battles i had with my sister for the DSL line; the dial-up  screech which beckoned a whole new world. I was perhaps the last generation brought up without a mobile phone in their pocket, without hashtags, without selfies, without likes and shares.

I loved the radio. Chris Moyles on BBC Radio 1, the top 40 on a Sunday evening before school.

I was amazed one day to find that if i pressed RECORD and PLAY at the same with a cassette tape in the tray, it would act as a microphone; picking up the sounds from my room and indeed the live radio-feed being played from my Hitachi boombox. 

This discovery grew into a fairly consistent hobby of over time- I would record my voice on a fake radio station – “hellooooo youre listening to Sunshine FM, stay tuned for more awesome music”.

Tape record songs live from the radio feed of BBC. Then back announce them with a recording of my voice- “That was Blur with the songgggg Parklife”. On and on i did this, amassing numerous cassette tapes full of recordings from my fake radio station.

FAST FOWARD >> 25 years. I see Myspace as platform for discovering new bands, MSN messenger for idle chat with my friends and girls that i liked into the wee hours, online gaming with people on the other side of the world, my Nokia 3210, Bit-torrent, the ipod, DVDS, USBs… and the then, slow but quickening disappearance of an analog life. I think i spent the vast majority of adult life actually avoiding the radio. As i grew, so did my tastes; i just couldn’t stomach the overly commercial music, Ads every 10 minutes, presenters presenting with a way of being unremorsefully inauthentic.

It wasn’t until i moved to Whitehorse, Yukon, that the static of the radio drew me back in. 

Whitehorse has multiple radio stations; Canada’s national broadcaster CBC, the indigenous station CHON FM and the commercially run – RUSH. Like many towns and cities with a vibrancy of community, it also has a local community radio station- CJUC.

Built as a log cabin with timbre and oakum, nestled in downtown Whitehorse, along the Yukon River, it’s hard to find a more picturesque looking radio station. Known locally as ‘The Juice’, it is entirely volunteer run and has no restrictions on the music that gets played and , best of all- no Ads.
Through Bill Polonsky – the Station Manager- there is a constant appetite for more live shows put on from all corners of the community. “If you have an idea for show, come down, we’ll have a chat, and we’ll get you on air.”  Ensures Polonsky.

It was through meeting Bill, that my boyhood afternoons of tape-recording “Im blue daba dee dabba dye” came rushing back- the feeling of creativity rushing to my head. The potential of a radio station such as CJUC for representing and fostering community are enormous. There are no rights and no wrongs; just space and dead air… to fill with your favorite bands, your thoughts, or your ideas. There is no mandate on how many times you have to play Cardi-B per-hour or how to sound inhuman whilst reading the 6 o’clock news. It is engaging and highly rewarding.

In 2023, CJUC reached its 20th year anniversary. With it the station is going through a resurgence and a re-branding. It now has more regular live broadcasts than ever before; hosting shows around the local music scene, promoting queer & BIPOC art, examining world history,  holding space for youth voices and spinning records you wouldn’t hear on your everyday commercial radio station. It has been described as a pillar of the community here in Whitehorse and an indispensable entity in the local arts scene.

“I think if we werent here, Whitehorse would be a little less..”

If you have an idea for a radio show you would like to get off the ground
fill out this form
https://www.jotform.com/form/212176979260059