A Jefferson County man has drawn on his longtime love of listening to and collecting music to start his own internet radio station.
James Mullins, 53, operates the Stumble in the Dark radio station, which airs a wide range of music 24 hours a day.
Mullins, who has lived in De Soto for the past 10 years, said he has been collecting records and other recordings since he was a teen.
He estimates he has nearly 2,500 records and more than 5,000 CDs.
“I probably started seriously collecting when I was in high school,” he said. “That would have been ’86-’89. I was visually impaired, so I didn’t do sports or anything like that.”
In addition to the records and CDs, Mullins has two hard drives with several terabytes of digital music.
With that much music, it only makes sense he got into the radio business.
Mullins, who moved to the St. Louis area in 1994 from Roanoke, Va., said he earned an associate degree in radio production in 1992.
“When I moved to (St. Louis), I found out about KDHX (88.1), and (eventually) I started volunteering there,” he said.
KDHX is an independent, commercial-free, listener-supported radio station staffed with volunteers that represents “voices traditionally underrepresented by mainstream media,” according to its website.
“I submitted a demo and they offered me a slot,” he said. “The slot I had originally submitted the demo for was either midnight to 2 or 2 to 4, so I called the show ‘Stumble in the Dark.’ The program director asked me if I wanted to do the Monday afternoon slot instead of the late night show. I said ‘sure.’”
Even though it turned out his music wasn’t going to be played after dark, he decided to stick with the name, since he liked it and it poked “some fun” at his visual impairment.
“I started Stumble in the Dark on KDHX in 1997, and they moved (his time slots) around a couple of times after I started out,” Mullins said. “I did that until 2015.”
James Mullins worked as a volunteer programmer at KDHX in St. Louis for eight years. He believes this picture was taken in 2012.
Mullins said KDHX has struggled with some issues over the past several years and a lot of volunteer programmers left the station.
He said his wife, Nancy (known as Sista Marley) encouraged him to start his internet radio station.
“I tried it before, like back in 2016, and it never went anywhere,” said Mullins, whose day job is a team leader at Colony Brands.
In September, Mullins started the internet radio station, which he calls Stumble in the Dark Radio.
“It’s 24/7 and it’s a mix,” he said. “It’s an eclectic mix.”
According to the Stumble in the Dark Radio Facebook page, the station is dedicated to the programmers, volunteers and listeners of KDHX who believe in real community-powered radio. The station plays rock, jazz, jam bands, country, alternative country, blues, reggae, new releases and more.
What’s the connection to KDHX?
Right now Mullins’ radio station is not a money-making operation.
“I would like to see where it’s going to go,” he said. “I call it a grand experiment. It’s still evolving because there’s no framework for this. It’s on the fly.
“I keep the playlist updated. I have to constantly do work on it – of course the shows that I’m running and then I keep the rotation from getting stale – switching out songs.”
Mullins said eventually he wants the radio station to be aired live rather than preproduced.
“You know, I don’t have the finances to get the equipment that I need at the moment, so everything is preproduced,” he said, adding he is looking into advertising or underwriting options. “It’s a constant work in progress.”
On Stumble in the Dark Radio, Mullins does a weekly two-hour show called Stumble in the Dark Live that airs on his station at 9 p.m. on Thursdays and again at 4 p.m. on Fridays and 8 p.m. on Sundays.
The station offers a few other shows.
Wildman Steve’s Prog Hour, focusing on progressive rock, is at 9 p.m. on Tuesdays. It airs again at midnight on Wednesdays. An archive of one of his older shows plays on Sunday night at midnight.
Mullins has known Wildman Steve Bronson, who is from Auburn, Ala., for a few years.
“When Wildman Steve was program director and did the morning show on a station in Auburn, Ala., I did a four-hour show called ‘The Side Trip’ that I would send down to him each week,” Mullins said. “I did that for a couple of years, and then when he went to the internet, I did a show called ‘Zero to Zappa,’ which was featuring music and musicians who had played with Frank Zappa. I did that for about a year.”
Another show on Stumble in the Dark Radio is Metered Decompression with Mike Manlee, who Mullins knew from KDHX. The show airs on Saturday and Sunday mornings, and Manlee plays a little bit of everything, Mullins said.
A reggae music show, Night Shift with Mr. Roots and Glenda, is currently on hiatus, but it normally airs at 9 p.m. Wednesdays and re-airs at 4 p.m. Saturdays.
Mullins said he also got to know them from KDHX.
James Mullins, holding a boom box, was one of the KDHX programmers who did a live radio broadcast from Schwagstock at the now defunct Camp Zoe.
“Those are the programmers I have right now,” he said. “If anybody is interested and they know how to produce their own show, I’d certainly be interested in bringing them on, especially if it’s a genre that I don’t really feature.”
And if any artist wants to submit music, Mullins said he would be glad to give it consideration. He also takes requests from listeners on his website.
Mullins said his station offers listeners the chance to appreciate music they may have never heard before.
“One of the great things about KDHX was always getting turned on to new music or genres I liked that I had never heard before,” he said. “So that’s one of the things I want to continue with this. And I throw some hits in there, some more familiar songs.”
Mullins boasts that it is the “best radio you never heard in your life,” and it’s never going to be the same station twice.
Stumble in the Dark Radio can be found on Facebook or on many apps, like radio.net or Get Me Radio, or at bit.ly/streamsidradio.