Barry Smolin

From 1995 to 2012, Smolin was the host of The Music Never Stops, a psychedelic radio show on KPFK in Los Angeles, California{{cite web|url=http://www.kpfk.org/programs/130-musicneverstops.html|title=The Music Never Stops with Barry Smolin|access-date=September 14, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080922022628/http://www.kpfk.org/programs/130-musicneverstops.html|archive-date=September 22, 2008|url-status=dead}} for which Smolin won the first ever Jammy Award for "Best Radio Show" in 2000.Jammy Award#Award Winners Smolin's program was also nominated for an LA Weekly Music Award in 2004 in the "Best Radio Show" category.{{Cite web|url=http://www.laweekly.com/2004-05-27/music/lawma-2004/|title=LAWMA 2004|access-date=July 29, 2023}} The Music Never Stops began as a program featuring live recordings of the Grateful Dead, but after the death of Jerry Garcia; Smolin expanded the scope of the show to include contemporary jam-rock and miscellaneous psychedelia, paying special attention to music being made by musicians in Los Angeles. The program has been covered in Relix magazine{{Cite web|url=http://www.arthoward.com/archives/features/radiorebels.htm|title=Art Howard -- Radio Rebels: 6 Shows that Bring Jambands to the Airwaves|website=Arthoward.com|access-date=September 14, 2008|archive-date=October 24, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081024042521/http://www.arthoward.com/archives/features/radiorebels.htm|url-status=dead}} and Jambands.com.

Smolin was host of the program Head Room on KPFK,{{Cite web|url=http://www.mrsmolin.com/radio.php|title=mr. smolin - radio - head room kpfk 90.7fm|website=Mrsmolin.com|access-date=June 18, 2012|archive-date=June 30, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120630164557/http://www.mrsmolin.com/radio.php|url-status=dead}} heard on Sunday nights from 8–10. His last show on KPFK aired on April 25, 2021.

Smolin's teaching career has been featured in articles in Time{{Cite magazine|date=June 11, 2015|title=Education: Who's Teaching Our Children? |magazine=Time|url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,968904-1,00.html|access-date=May 3, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150611175553/http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,968904-1,00.html|archive-date=June 11, 2015|last1=Tifft|first1=Susan}} and the Los Angeles Times,{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2006-jun-09-me-smolin9-story.html|title=Yes, He Does Digress | work=Los Angeles Times | first=James | last=Ricci | date=June 9, 2006}} as well as in the Larchmont Chronicle,{{cite web|url=http://www.larchmontchronicle.com/ArchiveDetail.asp?ArchiveID=392|title=Barry Smolin |work=Larchmont Chronicle|access-date=September 14, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070425084803/http://www.larchmontchronicle.com/ArchiveDetail.asp?ArchiveID=392|archive-date=April 25, 2007|url-status=dead}} and the Library Foundation of L.A.'s "My Moby-Dick" tribute.{{Cite web|url=https://vimeo.com/77179421|title=My Moby Dick - Voice of Ishmael|first=Library Foundation of|last=LA|date=October 17, 2013|via=Vimeo}}{{Cite web|url=https://vimeo.com/77179420|title=My Moby Dick - In the Beginning|first=Library Foundation of|last=LA|date=October 17, 2013|via=Vimeo}} From 1987 to 1992, Smolin taught English at Fairfax High School (the school Smolin himself graduated from in 1978) in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Since leaving Fairfax in 1992, he was on the faculty at Alexander Hamilton High School, teaching English in the Hamilton Humanities Magnet program until 2021. His teaching credential was revoked in July of 2022 due to misconduct.{{cite web |url=https://educator.ctc.ca.gov/siebel/app/esales/enu/?SWECmd=GotoView&SWEView=CTC+Person+Adverse+Action+Public+View+Web&SWERF=1&SWEHo=&SWEBU=1&SWEApplet0=CTC+Public+Person+Detail+Form+Applet+Web&SWERowId0=1-2M7-1362&SWEApplet1=CTC+Adverse+Action+Applet+Web&SWERowId1=2-6YBEIZ |title=Adverse and Commission Actions |website=Commission on Teacher Credentialing website |publisher=California Commission on Teacher Credentialing |access-date=October 24, 2024 |quote=Activity Type: REVOKE 44421; Activity Description: CTC revoked educator's credentials because of misconduct. Effective Date: 07/24/2022}}

As a songwriter, Smolin has composed music for the Showtime television series Weeds, with his song "The Earth Keeps Turning On" appearing in Season 3's Episode 7, entitled "He Taught Me How to Drive By"{{cite web|url=http://www.sho.com/site/weeds/music.sho|title=Showtime – Weeds Music|access-date=June 26, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110615040441/http://www.sho.com/site/weeds/music.sho|archive-date=June 15, 2011|url-status=dead}} as well as on the Weeds Season 3 soundtrack album. Under the performance moniker Mr. Smolin he has released four albums, At Apogee (2004) and The Crumbling Empire of White People (2007) (both produced by Tony Award-winning composer/dramatist Stew), a Los Angeles song cycle entitled Bring Back The Real Don Steele (2009),{{cite web|url=http://www.laweekly.com/2009-12-10/music/mr-smolin/ | work=L.A. Weekly | title=The Real Don Steele is Alive! Alive!}} and a collaboration with Double Naught Spy Car entitled Heaven's Not High (2013). In 2015, Smolin released two singles: "Fairfax High School", about his alma mater, and "The Man I Met Once".

Since 2016, Smolin has primarily composed experimental pieces, both instrumental and spoken word. With Double Naught Spy Car, he set chapter 1 of James Joyce's Finnegans Wake to music as part of the Waywords and Meansigns project,{{Cite web|url=http://www.waywordsandmeansigns.com/|title=Waywords and Meansigns - Joyce's Finnegans Wake Set to Music|website=Waywordsandmeansigns.com}} which was released in 2016 as was an album of the project's instrumental tracks called That Tragoady Thundersday. In September 2017, he released an instrumental album entitled The Sooterkin Library, a trio project that Smolin describes as "12-tone avant-freak mongrel psycho-tonk".{{Cite web|url=https://mrsmolin.bandcamp.com/album/the-sooterkin-library|title=The Sooterkin Library, by Mr. Smolin|website=Mr. Smolin}}

Smolin is the author of two novellas: Narcissus in the Dark (2012),{{cite book|title=Narcissus In The Dark|isbn=978-1478217602|last1=Smolin|first1=Barry|date=July 17, 2012|publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform }} whose narrator is God sentenced to eternity in a dungeon and whose consciousness thinks new universes into being while sorting through the detritus of his troubled past, and the experimental prose project Wake Up in the Dreamhouse,{{cite book|title=Wake Up In The Dreamhouse|isbn=978-1460927120|last1=Smolin|first1=Barry|date=March 9, 2011|publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform }} composed one sentence at a time on Twitter. In May 2011, Smolin released a volume of selected poetry covering 1988 to 2010 entitled Always Be Madly in Love.{{cite book|title=Always Be Madly In Love|isbn=978-1461190400|last1=Smolin|first1=Barry|date=May 28, 2011|publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform }} His most recent fiction project is a trilogy entitled The Miranda Complex, Volume 1 of which was published in 2016{{cite book|title=The Miranda Complex Volume 1|isbn=978-0692614204|last1=Smolin|first1=Barry|date=January 26, 2016|publisher=Anomaly Press }} with Volume 2 following in 2017,{{cite book|title=The Miranda Complex Volume 2|isbn=978-0692797228|last1=Smolin|first1=Barry|year=2017|publisher=Anomaly Press }} and the concluding Volume 3 in 2018.{{Cite book|title=The Miranda Complex Volume 3: The Man Behind The Curtain|last=Smolin|first=Barry|date=January 16, 2018|publisher=Anomaly Press|isbn=9780692973769|edition= 1st|language=English}} The Miranda Complex chronicles the unconsummated romantic relationship between Lance Atlas and Miranda Savitch, two teenagers in 1970s Los Angeles.

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• At Apogee (2004), produced by Stew
• The Crumbling Empire Of White People (2007), produced by Stew
• Bring Back The Real Don Steele (2009)
• Heaven's Not High (2013)
• Fairfax High School (single, 2015)
• The Man I Met Once (single, 2015)
• Mutt and Jute (single, 2016)
• Finnegans Wake Chapter 1 (Waywords and Meansigns, 2016)
• That Tragoady Thundersday (2016)
• The Sooterkin Library (2017)
• The Mookse & The Gripes (2018)
• Mysterium Fidei (2018)
• The Mole With A Hole In The Whole Of Him (2018)
• The Five Decades (2018)
• The Four Mysteries (2018)
• My Lunch With Lautréamont (2018)
• Baby Methuselah (2019)
• Ancients Link With Presents As The Human Chain Extends (2019)
• Always Be Madly In Love (2019)
• unspoken (2019)
• The Age of Endarkenment (2019)
• Before You Know It (2019)
• Water Signs (2019)
• The Day I Met Blassie & Tolos (2019)
• The Humpback of Nostradamus (2019)
• Play Free (2019), with Vince Meghrouni
• The Fantastic Catch (2020)
• Eyelid Movies (2020)
• Outside Norms (2020)
• Say No More (2020)
• Antediluvian Future (2020)
• Lurch (2020)
• Smoke on the Altar (2020)
• The Minerva Syndrome (2020)
• Remember My Chains (2020)
• Doo-Dads (2020)
• The God Paradox (2020)
• Havdalah Sonata (2020)
• That's What They All Say (2020)
• Pretend To Play (2020)
• In the Name of Zarking Fardwarks (2020)
• Slide Down My Rainbow (2020)
• Hypostasy (2020), with Vince Meghrouni
• Strange Fire (2020)
• Great Seizure's Ghost (2020)
• Radio Andromeda (2020)
• Frenching (2021)
• Ode To Billy Jack (2021)
• Maps To Stars Homes (2021)
• A Jew In Space (2021)
• Underworld Orchestra (2021)
• We Are The Ancestors (2021)
• When A Weasel Steals Your Chumetz (2021)
• I Knew It By The River (2021)
• A Trespass Offering (2021)
• Tender Buttons (2021)
• A Pocketful of Poesies (2021)
• Deep In The Sea-Meant Pond (2021)
• We Hear Voices (2021)

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• Wake Up In The Dreamhouse (2011)
• Always Be Madly In Love (2011)
• Narcissus In The Dark (2012)
• The Miranda Complex Volume 1: Munchkinland (2016)
• The Miranda Complex Volume 2: Poppies (2017)
• The Miranda Complex Volume 3: The Man Behind The Curtain (2018)

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• {{Official website|http://www.mrsmolin.com/}}
• [http://www.kpfk.org/on-air/headroom/ Head Room website] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180113150233/http://www.kpfk.org/on-air/headroom/ |date=January 13, 2018 }}

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Category:American male singer-songwriters

Category:American rock songwriters

Category:American rock singers

Category:Schoolteachers from California

Category:California State University, Northridge alumni

Category:Radio personalities from Los Angeles

Category:Writers from Los Angeles

Category:University of California, Los Angeles alumni

Category:1961 births

Category:Living people