The Key Players behind KMEL Summer Jam w/Ice Cube circa 1990
For the San Francisco Bay Area, it all began in the summer of 1987, but fifteen years later in 2002 it would all come to an end. It was the 106 KMEL Summer Jam, a Hip-Hop and R&B concert series that at one point was the largest radio concert taking place on the west coast, if not the entire country. No official word has been released regarding the end of KMEL Summer Jam – the death of the concert occurred peacefully, going largely unnoticed.
However, the concert series that KMEL started has become a grand tradition elsewhere. Every year, Hip-Hop and R&B radio stations around the country such as Hot 97 in New York and 100.3 The Beat in Los Angeles invite some the hottest acts in the music biz to perform at their respective all-day, mostly outdoor concerts known as the “Summer Jam”. Typically, a Summer Jam show can sell out within hours – if not minutes – once tickets go on sale. And with crowds that can get as large as 22,000 attendees, Summer Jam is often the biggest musical event of the year for both radio stations and their listeners.
In 2002 however, bad press and/or violence marred three of the nation’s biggest summer jams. At the Nassau Coliseum in New York, Hot 97’s event was cut short when Nas (who was the headliner) refused to go on after he being told he couldn’t stage a mock lynching of his arch-rival Jay-Z. At the 100.3 The Beat Summer Jam, violence between rival gangs spilled onstage at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre in Irvine, CA, ending that show and making headlines around the world. And just several hours after the Seattle-based KUBE Summer Jam concluded at the world-famous Gorge Amphitheatre, a festival vendor was shot and killed in the campgrounds adjacent to the venue.
The threat of violence and other problems have been plaguing Summer Jam concerts for years, perhaps dating back to 1995 when Mountain View police had to shut down San Francisco’s 106 KMEL Summer Jam at the Shoreline Amphitheatre after a melee broke out backstage. But for several years prior to that occurrence, KMEL had been able to stage wildly successful showcases that would usually start around mid-morning, and sometimes run past midnight.
It should be noted that the first radio station to regularly schedule an all-day, superstar concert was Boston’s mainstream pop station Kiss 108 FM, beginning in 1980. It should also be noted that the first concert to be named “Summer Jam” was a 1973 rock festival that drew over 600,000 at Watkins Glen, New York. However, the Hip-Hop/R&B Summer Jam that has become so popular these days was born in the summer of 1987 when KMEL Program Director (at the time) Keith Naftaly put together the first show. Lisa Lisa & The Cult Jam headlined at KMEL Summer Jam #1 and two short years later, the KMEL Summer Jam had become the largest radio concert in the country, lasting for two days at a time and raising over a million dollars for local charities.
The following Q&A features the insights of two individuals who were 106 KMEL staff members at the time: Davey D and Michael Erickson. Currently, Davey D is an accomplished journalist running the popular Hip-Hop news site www.daveyd.com. Joining KMEL in the early ‘90s, Davey D produced a newsletter, co-hosted the morning show, and eventually became the station’s Community Affairs Director until late 2001. Michael Erickson started with KMEL as an air personality and mixer, and was named Assitant Program Director during the mid-‘90s before leaving in 1997. Erickson is currently Program Director at Adult Contemporary R&B station 98.1 Kiss-FM in San Francisco.