Best Radio Station: KUTX 98.9FM

(Sponsored by BMI)

"Connection."

So resounded Laurie Gallardo's one-word explanation for radio. Graciously coiffed, eyes alight, protective tenor bobbing, weaving, and jabbing same as it transmits Monday-Thursday, 1-5pm, on KUTX 98.9FM, the afternoon deejay sent a depth charge through the early morning UT class this January.

Goosing Zoom constitutes a near miracle in our new day and age, but Gallardo crackled and popped for a journalism course titled Covering Performance, which in-person should've met three floors above where she broadcasts. Most college students can't name more than a couple of Beatles tunes since they're busy standardizing tomorrow's trends today, but they knew her. Via a technological beacon still integral to mankind – particularly in a disaster area – we all do.

Anchoring the days and weeks and now years since KUTX's 2013 musical spinoff from university frequency KUT, Susan Castle and Jody Denberg helped make KGSR "The Sound of Our Town." That transferred with them on-campus where they mix and match with Rick McNulty, Paul Carrubba, Michael Crockett, Jay Trachtenberg, Taylor Wallace-Reigel, Confucius & Fresh, Soundfounder, and many more as the capital's BBC, an all-in-one transmitter. In September, when Wallace took over for local radio superstar John Aielli and Gallardo returned on-air after a pandemic pause, KUTX restored at least one key tributary of the live music capital.

For the latter, winner of Best Radio Personality for five straight years now, "Connection" isn't simply a 1967 Rolling Stones ripper. – Raoul Hernandez