If you’re in the mood for fashion advice, playful debates, interesting banter and a playlist that could satisfy even the most finicky of music connoisseurs, then Diversity University could be the radio show for you.
Freshmen Nicholas Holder and Austin Thomas, the hosts of Diversity University, weren’t expecting to get a show on KCOU, but now the humorous duo invades the airways from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. every Saturday. The show is devoted to musical diversity – if the title hasn’t given it away yet.
“We have a real emphasis on playing different stuff that you wouldn’t normally pair (together),” Thomas said. “We wanted a place where we could play anything, because collectively we just have a lot of cool music.”
The pair wanted to do it just for fun. Not to mention; they do everything together. Thomas and Holder have known each other since high school and are clearly in sync on and off the radio.
They have the same fashion style (sweaters and skinny jeans), sense of humor and love for music.
“We live together in the same room,” said Holder and Thomas, picking up where the other left off. “We also have a shared blog: the Team Sunshine blog. We don’t even have individual Twitter accounts.”
Thomas and Holder said the radio show could help them achieve one of their life long goals.
“Our goal has always been to get famous by our sophomore year of college and then drop out,” Holder said.
Aside from the joking nature of the show, they have a real goal: to entertain and educate the listeners by mixing popular and obscure music with wacky and mundane news stories.
KCOU DJ Taylor Grimes thinks it’s working.
“I think (the show) is really good,” Grimes said. “They’re really personal guys and very good DJs to listen to. A lot of times new DJs are very meek and understated, but they aren’t. And it’s clear that they put a lot of time and effort into their production.”
When it comes to the little details of the show, Thomas and Holder divide up the work to make sure both of them can contribute evenly. Thomas takes care of making the playlists and discovering music that listeners will enjoy.
“We try very hard on the playlists,” Thomas said. “We try to incorporate all kinds of music there so people can really engage. Then I slip some stuff in there that maybe don’t know so they pick up some cool songs along the way.”
Holder is responsible for figuring out what they’re going to talk about during the show.
“We’ll spend hours upon hours surfing the Internet and most of (what we find) is completely useless,” Holder said. “One of the most interesting sources for things to talk about is Yahoo News.”
They also have weekly segments they hope to keep up with. One of which is about fashion, or more specifically, their fashion.
“We talk about our fashion, which is somewhat questionable,” Thomas said. “As long as you wear sweaters and skinny jeans and socks. It’s just really sweater heavy. All we ever talk about is sweaters.”
Thomas and Holder said they hope to continue doing their radio show for as long as KCOU will have them. Until then they’re just having fun with the extra work they have added to their life.
“It’s stuff we would probably be doing anyways,” Holder said. “We’d probably be on the Internet for hours and listening to music. Now we’re just compiling it.”