Hello, everyone, an welcome back to Potomac Station Coffee House.

I'm Valerie, that's David, and this is our Gen X Pittsburgh podcast.

Tonight we have Marco Cardamone, entrepreneur of so many cool things.

We'r going to get caught up with him and see what he's up to these days.

Stick around.

We'll be right back.

All right everybody, welcome back to GXP.

My background is radio and Marco is going to talk abou his background in radio right?

I'm excited to talk to him because of Cafe Allegro.

That was one of my favorit places to eat back in the day.

But comes up in conversation all the time with my family.

My brother used to work there and the pate was amazing, so maybe I can score that recipe off him if he still has it.

Im excited to talk about Sinead OConnor.

So am I. Whenever I mention Marco and Cafe Allegro, everybody wants to tal about the Sinead OConnor story.

And I have a Sinead OConnor incident that happened too.

I was doing her makeup one time and can I say, I mean?

She's dead.

I know.

S you can say whatever you want.

No one's going to sue you or me, so feel free.

Okay.

Sinead OConnor farted in my makeup chair one day on the Jon Stewart show.

There we have it.

There we have it.

I don't know where that rate in terms of ripping up picture of the Pope on Saturday Night Live, farting in a chair with Valerie.

I don't know where we are.

Right.

But I don't think anybodys gonna care.

I hope not.

Anyway, she was adorable and so sweet and, you know, she was really cool.

All right, well I think we should take a break.

We need to take a break and w need to regroup here before we bring out Marco.

All right, guys, we'll be right back with Marco Cardamone.

Welcome back to Gen X Pittsburgh.

I'm Dave.

That's Valerie, and we are here with Marco Cardamone and looking forward to really hearing some interesting storie that I don't think other people have had your perspective on some of these things, especially in the digital arts, right, that it's just unique to Pittsburgh.

So I'd love to.

First, though, talk about your background.

Can you talk a little bit about growing up, about your dad, your dad, somebody special?

No, I cannot I will not know.

So yeah, I guess, you know, I was born in Pittsburgh and I went to school here for you know, all the early years.

I left when I was 18, graduated from high school, went to Boston University, studied film and broadcasting for four years, lived in Boston and then moved from Boston to New York Cit and lived there for ten years, and then Boomerang back to Pittsburgh in 1986 and been here ever since.

And your dad?

My dad, my dad had an advertisin agency called Mark Advertising, which was one of the large advertising firms in Pittsburgh.

I neve really worked there, but later when I came back to Pittsburgh, we did some kind of work together.

So.

But growing up, you know, I actually I did work there.

I was a messenger boy when I was in high school, and that was kind of fun because you got to go out and see all the subcontractors that worked for the agency.

So all of the photographers and, you know, I'd pick up photos and deliver them back and, you know, so messenger got to see the external world.

And then the next year I worked at the agency and I worked in the mailroom, and I got to read everybody's mail.

So I kind of got the inside poop on what was going on.

Yeah.

Wow.

So that was my advertising agency experience early on.

Yeah.

I mean, you were a little modest, Mark Advertising was the big stage.

And see, at least as long as fa as I can remember back in day, Heinz was one of the big clients.

Right, I think, and.

Not Heinz.

Okay No, I don't think it was Heinz.

Yeah.

You know, you're going to put me on the spot trying to get their top.

You know, they did.

They did work for Arby's.

They put McDonald's on the map when Donald's was a local franchise.

They kind of introduced the Big Mac back in the 60s I don't know.

They had some some pretty big clients back in the day.

Okay.

Yeah.

Well, so.

Once you were in Boston, I know that you have a kind of interesting story about computers and graphic design, sort of the early, early, early days of this, right?

Yeah.

So, you know, let's go back.

It was like graduated high school in 73.

So I'm 100 years old.

I went to Boston and I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do.

I, you know, played around with film in high school.

My friend Brady Lewis, who's a Pittsburgh sort of well-known filmmaker.

We used to make films in high school.

So I was thinking like, oh, I maybe should study film, but I didn't.

I went to Northeastern University and I wasn't sure what to do, and I was studying philosophy and psychology and I kind of just dropped out after the first quarter because I just wasn't really, you know, excited by what I was doing.

But then I read that you could actually study film and broadcasting and communications over another college called Boston University.

So I transferred I worked a summer, you know, just kind of getting ready for that.

And then, you know, my second year was all in Boston University as I studied film and broadcasting.

But I was really interested in animation, and there wasn't a lot of that going on at the time.

And I remember stumbling around Boston, probably really stumbling and I saw a sign on a telephone pole that said, you know, professor so-and-so was going to teach a course at Harvard on how computers can draw.

And I thought, like, what's that about?

That sounds pretty weird.

So I actually went to that lecture at Harvard University, and it was probably 74.

And this little professor you know, stood up at the room and he was basically showing you how computers can not only process numbers, but they could take numbers in numerical information and draw pictures with them.

So he projected a picture of a cube and it wa like, see what computers can do.

And I was like, oh my God.

And the only way back then that you could actually output that was on like a pen matrix printer, you know, would move a pen around and it would draw the cube for you.

But it sort of thrust me into this world of early computer graphics.

And, you know, a lot of other stuff happened after that but that was sort of a pivotal turning point for me.

And it was a, you know, it was pretty, pretty crazy moment.

It was really early in the cycle of computers starting to come out of the, you know, closet, as it were, and be used more for visualization.

Yeah.

I mean, I think that most people of this generatio and younger up to a certain age, probably don't even understand that when you're talking.

We are in a world where there were no personal computers, there was no dot matrix printers.

This was really I mean, this was almost in the time of punch cards.

That's right.

Yeah.

So just briefly the history of computers, IBM, the 50s, the 60s, big machines, you know, corporate clients.

Nobody ever got to see these things.

They were, you know, as we got into the late 70s, they started moving int what are called mini computers, and they started becoming more prevalen in smaller types of businesses, not just big corporations that could have IBM's, but smaller types of businesse could get into mini computers.

And that's kind of the era that I was exposed to computer graphics.

I went back after watching that seminar, as it were, and at Harvard University, and I sought out the engineering school at Boston University.

And I found a professor who had a mini computer, and he was doing primitive graphics, and I did a cross thing with hi from the communication school.

And I said, I really want to be part of this.

And he goes, oh, we only have engineers here, but you seem crazy, so we're going to let you in.

So that was that was that era.

But then, as you say, David, the industry kept evolving and we get into the mid 80s and, you know, the birth of Apple Computer.

And they were really in the late 70s, but they really kind of came on the screen.

And that started the air of the personal computer.

And the rest is kind of history in many ways.

It kept evolving to the phone and the mobile device and all of that stuff.

That's sort of the three big trajectories of the computer graphics computer.

And didn't you rub shoulders with some of the people who have went on to create sort of Adobe, and maybe I forget the name of the other progra was a paintbrush or something.

That was sort of.

Yeah Was that right?

Yeah, I did, I, I guess when I left.

Valerie, you haven't asked any questions here.

I'm just very intrigued.

I talk so much.

That's okay.

Yeah.

You know, the the trajectory that I got on as I was leaving Boston and graduating college, where I went to New York City, there was a place in New York City called the New York Institute of Technology.

It was a research lab.

It was the first commercial computer graphics facility.

And yes, the people that started that lab, the people I met in 1976 were Ed Catmull, Ed Catmull has been the president of Pixar since Pixar was developed.

Alvy Ray Smith, who was one of the founder and also authors of Photoshop.

So all the early pioneers that were working in computer graphics, all the, you know the heavy software developers, I had an opportunit to meet and work with way back, way back when.

And so before Valerie gets to ask all the fun questions about Pittsburgh, I have one more serious question and that is that you did what I believe is the very first digital billboard at Three Rivers Stadium.

Is that correct?

Yeah, that is correct.

Actually, I don't know if it was the very first, but it was one of the first.

Sounds good.

I say it was okay.

Yeah.

No one's going to fact check this anyway.

Yeah.

So graduatin college, I had had some exposure with one of the people I worked with as a, freelance artist.

He worked at a place called the Center for Advanced Visual Studies.

His name was Ron Hayes.

Ron was a early pioneer in computer graphics, and he was working with computer graphics, and I worked for him for a whil as part of my independent study in my last year of college, and he exposed me, he got a gig from the All Lutheran Youth Adult Church group to go down to the New Orleans Superdome, which had just been built, and they were having like 30,000 youth kids come in for the church, and he was in charg of programing the whole event.

And he they had these little billboards that were electronic, and they were the first electronic billboards in the country because it was a new stadium.

And Ron, Ron Hayes, the producer, not only did the whole show but he kind of put me in charge of doing the graphics on the billboards, which were really strange aspect ratio.

They were like real long and narrow and there were a couple strips, so they weren't like these big billboards, you see.

So I came back from that experience.

I had to leave New Orleans because I had this incredible toothache, and it turned into be this like root canal thing that I needed.

So I had to fly back to Pittsburgh to a dentist that I had.

And when I was in Pittsburgh, Three Rivers Stadium had really just put up this first digital billboard, and they were promoting it, and there were only three advertisers that were on it.

It was Mellon Bank, and it was Gulf Oil.

And it was, I forget the third one.

What was it?

U.S.

Steel, that's what it was.

And I called U.S.

Steel.

And I said, hey, you know, I want to do a computer graphic animation for your billboard.

And they didn't answer the phone.

And then I called Gulf Oil and they said the same thing.

They didn't really answer the phone.

And I went to Mellon Bank and I ran into an ad manager and he said, well, yeah, we could use maybe some new ideas for your graphics.

What do you have in mind?

And one thing led to another, and I did my first 30 second spot, you know, as I was healing from my root canal for Mellon Bank way back in 77, maybe 78.

And that was sort of, so now you're starting to meld the world to between your father' business and what you're doing and maybe a little bit of entrepreneurship.

Yeah, it was my firs entrepreneurial thing, for sure.

You know, I think it was a $5,000 job.

I was like out of my mind.

I couldn't believe it.

And I do remember my dad gave me some coaching and he said, if when I went in to pitch, you know, my idea.

The guy said, yeah, go off and tell m what you think you want to do.

And I went off and spent the whole night, you know, drawing up some stuff.

And here's what we're going to do.

And what they wanted to do was promote their new 24 hour banking.

So they came out with these machines that you could bank on, and no one knew what those machines were.

So he said, I want to do so.

My whole concept was how to tel the people in the stadium, hey, Mellon Bank has 24 hou banking, and here's what it is.

And no matter what time it is or where you are, you can go do some banking.

So that was the creative nature of the spot.

But my dad coached m like when I went in to present the storyboard to the ad manager to see if he would actually buy it and give me the project.

He said if he seems interested, ask him for an advance.

And I said, what's that?

He said, it means, you know, he has to give you some money against the project before you start it.

And I said, okay, so, you know, I made the presentation and the guy said, well, that's great.

I think we can do this.

And I, you know, he asked me how much it would cost and I said $5,000 and said, well I'll have to think about that, but I think we can make that work.

And that meeting came to an end and I said, But I'll need an advance.

And he looked at me like.

The hell are you talking about?

And he went out and got a petty cash.

And I asked for a thousand, and he gave me $500, and he came back with $500.

So I was like, out of my mind.

I'm like, wow.

So it was a very much a first entrepreneurial thing, but I was coached.

So how did that lead into Cafe Allegro?

So I was still living in New York City, so I went and did from Boston 77, moved to New York.

It was in the mid 80s.

So all of that happened in the late 70s.

So I was building my caree in computer graphics in the city of New York, and Cafe Allegro didn't start until 1986.

And the seed for that was, you know, my dad calling up, and he kept trying to recruit me back to Pittsburgh.

He was like, hey, why don't you come back to Pittsburgh?

You know we could do some stuff together.

It's like, dad, I' never coming back to Pittsburgh.

Like, I'm not going to do it.

I left Pittsburgh right.

And ye one thing led to another thing.

And, you know, I got fired from my job in New York, and, you know, it was, you know, wondering with my wife to be, what are we going to do?

And she's there.

Why don't we go to Pittsburgh?

You got some family there.

I'm like, I'm not going to Pittsburgh.

We're not going to go back to Pittsburgh, damn it.

But as it were, Paula and my dad prevailed.

So we came back to Pittsburgh.

And it was during that early formative stage, like I didn't kno really what I was going to do.

And I was really feeling like, why am I here?

What am I going to do?

We had a family meetin that my dad called and he said, let's do some entrepreneurial things.

We've always wanted to do a restaurant.

It's like we.

And he said, well, your brother in law is a che and your mother is a great cook, and I've always wanted to do a restaurant.

Well, that's you guys.

But anyway, we we hatched this idea.

My brother, my sisters, Gina, Antoinette, my brother Dino, Gina's wife Red, who was the chef.

He was the main talent, you know, dad said, look, I'll give you a little bit of seed capital.

Why don't you guys go try to find a building?

Why don't you look for you know, what kind of cuisine does not exist in the marketplace?

And let's see what we can do.

And at the same time they did that, I said, I'm not going to do that.

You know, I want to do a computer graphic thing.

And I did, and but we ran parallel.

So I started another company that worked for him and his agency.

It was a offshoot of his agency.

And that's that's kind of how the restaurant got got born.

And Red, the chef went out and found the building with my sister Antoinette on the Southside.

And next thing I know, we were like, you know, making a menu an rolling in business, you know?

Yeah, no, that wa one of my favorite restaurants.

And Antoinette, you walked in there, Valerie She was the she she was to me, she was the heart and soul because every time I was like 21 going to Cafe Allegro, yo know, to have wine and paté and, you know, it was kind of on a place for somebod young like that to go in there.

Absolutely.

But my first time there, excuse me, was with Philip Pelusi.

Oh, yeah.

Philip was a great friend and guest.

Yes, yes, yes.

He actually gave me my first start as a hair and makeup artist.

So.

So I got to know him really well.

After a big shoot one night, he took us all there and I was like, oh my God I'm fascinated with this place and continue to go there for, you know, dates and then, you know, with my, you know, for like husbands and that kind of stuff.

So it was a very special place to me.

And I'm not kidding about that paté recipe.

Catch up and I'll give it to you afterwards.

Did you say husbands?

Well, no.

My first husband my husband and I would go there.

Get on the record, there.

Second one, my current one.

You know, it's close.

So I've heard that story so many times.

People met there and they, they, you know, kind of proposed to one another there and then.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And that story and there is a good story with two celebrities at Cafe Allegro that I think we should kind of talk about, because it's we kind of mentioned Sinead O'Connor a little bit ago.

Can you just take us through that whole experience there?

Because that was crazy.

And I think a lot of people before you, I want to set the scene a little bit.

Please.

Of how.

I'm sure you could do it better than I can.

I dont think that's right.

But I want to talk about how I was going to Point Par at the time, and my friend Jeff worked for you at Cafe Allegro.

Jeff Ward.

Yes.

Jeff Ward.

And he came in and there was this cafe at Point Park.

Everybody used to sit at in the morning.

And Jeff came in and he wa like, had this look on his face.

You just knew something happened, right?

He was like, I have to tell yo about what happened last night.

And we're like, okay.

And he's like, Sinead OConnor, who's touring the WOMAD Festival Peter Gabriel had, world music festival.

He was dating Sinead OConnor a the time, and they had stopped at Cafe Allegro and take i from there because Jeff's story, you know, it was enough, but you were there.

You're the man was there.

So.

Yeah.

And I don't know, maybe you were there to.

Sean.

Were you there then?

Okay.

So, you know, it was I don't know, mid 90s, early 90s and yes, indeed, they were in town.

They were performing somewhere.

Maybe it was the Civic Arena, I can't remember.

It must have been the Civic Arena.

And they came to Cafe Allegro and it was an entourage of maybe 3 or 4 people.

Sinead and Peter Gabriel and their bass player is one of the greatest bass players on the planet.

Tony, Tony Levin, and they were all upstairs and they were, you know, upstair was a little bit more private.

So they had their own thing.

I don't think they were the only ones up there, but they might have been and they, you know, were doing well and at one point I guess Sinead came downstairs and she was kind of wasted.

And they had had a little bit of a fight between her and Peter.

I guess they were dating, as you say.

And then something went sideways and she came downstairs and my sister Antoinette was like, oh, come on, girl, let' sit at the bar and have a drink.

And, you know, the next thing, we're all kind of watching those two at the bar kind of like chatted out.

And then I remember going upstairs to try to check in on things to see what was going on.

And Peter was coming down the steps and he said.

Have you seen.

And he's like, yeah, she's downstairs.

He goes, oh, okay, good.

So you know, that was that.

And the next thing I knew, my sister said, I'm going t take Sinead over to the hotel.

She's got to go back.

And I said, okay, great.

So she drove her back to the hotel.

Little did I know, my wife and I at the time were writing some music, and we had a cassette and we had one of our songs in the cassette, and, you know we're really excited about it.

My sister gave the cassette to Sinead and said, I really want you to listen to this.

My brother and his wife wrote the song.

She was like, oh God, she practically threw up on her something like yeah, sure, I'll listen to it.

So Antoinette came back to the restaurant and she told me, I gave her your cassette.

I'm like, oh, you just don't do that with.

You know.

I love it.

And the next thing we knew was the next day we were reading the paper and O'Connor, like, tore up her room and, like, se the place on fire practically.

It was like she totally trashed the room.

And it was just a real like, you know, her, you know, practically sets the hotel room on fire.

And that's the story.

But but didn't she also, from what I understand, from what would have been told, she ordered a drink for the express purpose of throwing in Peter Gabriel's face.

Throwing the argument.

That is true.

That's the part I forgot.

Sorry Yeah, well, I didn't see that.

And that was like, indeed that happened.

And that was like, he was pretty, pretty cool with it actually, as I understand, he just he just like brushed it off and left.

But she was pretty violent.

Yeah.

You know, just worked up emotional.

She was much cuter at MTV.

I, I only know that story is true because, you know, Valerie knows everybody in the city.

I know nobody.

And we were at an art gallery, and she introduced me to somebody, and we were talking.

I don't know how we go on the subject, but he said, oh, yeah, no, that's a true story because I was the one that handed Peter Gabriel the towel So one of your former employees, you know, when we met at the Gallery.

Do you remember?

It wa Rick Bachs opening, wasn't it?

It must have been.

Yeah.

That feels right.

Yes, it could have been Rick.

Actually.

Yes.

He worked there for a brief.

Oh, did he really?

I thin so.

For a brief time, maybe not.

Did he really?

Rick Bach.

Rick Bach, did you work at Café Allegro?

Rick' going to be on in a few weeks.

Yeah.

Probably not.

We'll ask.

We'll ask that question for sure, I never, ever.

That'll be the last question.

What is the Gen X Pittsburgh Podcast?

Let me take you back.

Remember when coffee was king and pizza bagels ruled on the corner of 14th and Carson at The Beehive?

Or how about that tim you stumbled upon art all night?

How cool was that?

Or when you're evening started instead of any at 10 p.m.?

Yeah, we miss those days, too.

So we're bringing them back.

One Gen-X story at a time.

Joining David Rullo and I, Valerie Christofel, as we sit down with the movers and shakers, the artists and the voices who helped shape Pittsburgh back in the early 90s.

Subscrib to the Gen X Pittsburgh Podcast.

Welcome back to Gen X Pittsburgh Marco Cardamone, Club Cafe.

Wow, wow wow.

Not just a place to go see bands, but you had a recording studio upstairs as well.

We did.

Yeah.

And you had Norah Jones.

Jones.

You had The Fixx.

You had John Mayer.

You had some big names there before.

They were like really into their own.

Yeah, that's pretty cool.

Yeah.

So it was kind of an interesting story.

It came from Cafe Allegro.

My wife and I were there on night and we were having dinner, and we were looking across the street and the neon sign was out, and the place had been shuttered for quite some time.

It had been a music venue prior to that.

It was a father so team, Bobby Cardillo and his dad and, Harry, and they, you know, did dueling piano.

So it had a music background.

And prior to that, it was a sort of a shot and a beer place all the way back to the 40s.

And it had a nice, colorful history, but it was dark when we saw it in late 1999 and we just said, hey, wouldn't it be fun to go fire that place up and make a music venue?

And that was probably the worst thing we could do.

But we did it.

No, it was, you know, we and a lot of other people that helped us, some of them are in the room here tonight and, you know, it was it was it was a sort of a passion for us because we loved music.

And what we really love was small, intimate nightclubs where, you know, some of the best shows we had ever seen in our lives were not in stadiums, but they were in these small, little intimate rooms.

And that's what we wanted to recreate there.

And because I was also in the media business, we felt like we should capture that magic because it happens onc and then you never see it again.

And so we designed the whole place, we gutted it, and we set up, you know, a sort of vide and audio capture environment.

My partners, Barney the audio producer and Clay Kisker, Barney Lee and other sort of built this environment.

That was where the technolog was totally in the background.

The artists on stage didn't know it was really there and it wasn't happening.

So they weren't conscious of cameras and that sort of thing.

There weren't people running around.

They just got on the small stage and they saw a bunch of people in the room and they did their thing.

And that's really where the magic happens.

And if you're lucky enough to have the capturing device, then you can actually preserv that and share it with people.

And that's what we did.

And we did it for five years and it was a grind.

But we got some great stuff and I'm sorry, David.

And from that you had a television show.

Yeah, we did like so we started that in 1999 and we recorded for about five years, and that culminate in a television show with KDKA for a 12 part, 30 minute episode called live a Club Cafe, the Next Stage in music.

And we aired it there and then we also aired Comcast was a cable sponsor.

They were just starting to roll out their video on demand in the early 2000s.

And so we had a channel on the Comcast cable on demand service and we, you know, put the main sho on at 11:00 on Saturday nights and then outtakes from the show, like behind the scenes extended interviews, that sor of thing on the Comcast channel.

So but we have 200 shows that are now however, what is it 25 years ag and there's some amazing shows.

Wow.

I bet I'm trying to think about how to rerelease them.

Yeah, so I remember and maybe I'm maybe it's just oversized in my head.

But I was interning for a jazz statio actually, for a syndicated jazz show, and I used to go to Club Cafe and see a lot of Pittsburgh artists.

They didn't have many other places to play at the time, jazz.

And that was Kenny Blake and Jimmy Ponder.

And there was like a little scene that seemed to develop around there.

Am I correct about that?

Yeah I would say our initial booking agent was one of the waiters at Cafe Allegro and was really into jazz.

Jay Koval was his name, and Jay and Sean and writers sitting in the room here were kind of, you know, partnering up, as you know, two of the early people that helped us program some of the early shows in the club and jazz was a real focus.

Jazz was really tough, though because, you know, it was hard for people to come out for jazz.

So, you know, it was always a it was just a tougher, tougher game.

You know, a lot of the gigs were tough, you know, just to get an audit.

You see some of the best shows with two people in the room.

You mentioned John Mayer.

It was like February 6th 19, whatever.

It was like 2001.

He had just broken out.

It was freezing outside.

He was an opening act for Glenn Phillips from Toad the Wet Sprocket.

And, you know, Glenn called u and said, I'm puking in my room.

I've got a flu.

John, you're going to have to take the whole show.

And there were like six people in the club, and John Mayer did this incredible show.

We were just sitting there getting drunk, and we said, let's go upstairs and flip on the cameras.

And we did.

And we had like an hour and a half of John Mayer tearing it up.

But, you know, in terms of like how hard it was to build a crowd and make a business out of that model, you know, you needed people to show up and pay for tickets and buy drinks and eat, you know, food and stuff like that.

But, you know, we learned it over the wall and all that kind of make it happen.

So Glenn Phillips must have bee very sick because I used to work for a, a audio distribution comp And so we were in LA on a business trip, and he was driving from San Francisco to L and had been stuck in traffic.

He was supposed to play at like six.

And he called again this is for cell phones, right?

So he pulled over on a pay phone and called.

The company was like, I'm going to be there, but don't let people leave.

It's just going to take me a while.

And it was 11:00 and showed up, came to the pool, played for all 50 of us and then stayed all night, you know, signing autographs and talk.

Yeah, yeah.

That's cool.

He must have been sick.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So your time at Allegro and Club Cafe, this is when technology i changing and growing like crazy.

Yeah Did you keep up on everything?

How did you go onto your next?

We were a little ahead on the Allegro on the Club Cafe thing.

Because our idea wa to not just capture this stuff, but to stream it live to the world.

So it's like small club you know, global distribution.

But we, you know, the technology wasn't able to stream.

It was 2000, 2001, 2002 and three.

So streaming wasn't really happening then.

And multimedia on the web, you know, broadband wasn't really there.

So, you know, we were jus kind of stuck in a capture mode and hoping at one point that that would catch up and we'd be able to becom a digitally wired watch it now, kind of like you can do now, now, now it would work.

But that's 25 years later.

Yeah.

So it was a little premature in a way, but there was lots of stuff changing and it was moving quickly.

But you know, timing i sort of everything in business.

So it was you know, we were a little early on that one.

Yeah.

But.

Because of your Pittsburgh roots and because of your involvement with media and sort of an early entrepreneur, you were able to sort of shift into not exclusively, obviously, but working on a lot of not for profit boards and making some important decisions to help a lot of Pittsburgh institutions.

Right.

Like, I know youre on the board at YEP.

Yeah.

And especially when DUQ was leaving Duquesne University, right.

Yeah.

So there was another phase of my life where I, you know, went to do some public service stuff.

And I just got, you know, asked to be on a certain board this or that.

Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation, which was a group I really cared about, and then WYEP.

So I served on that board, the green building alliances or institutions that I, you know, nonprofit that I kind of dug their mission and what they were all about but especially YEP and YEP, was, you know, the scrappy little independent radio station that had been around since the 70s.

But they were really kind of you know, solid audience, solid kind of positioning in the market.

But the big public radio station in the market was WDUQ, which was tied to Duquesne University, excuse me, and had been for forever.

And while I was on the board of WYEP, Duquesne University sor of made the decision that they no longer wanted to have WDUQ under their umbrella.

And so an opportunity arose.

And, you know WYEP was the least likely group in term of having the cachet or the cash or the wherewithal to to really, you know, step up and say, hey, we could help out other bigger players, you know, like QED and some of the other players in town, even even the management team of WDUQ, all wanted to sort of do their own thing, but it wasn't really working.

And WYEP had a vision and the board had a vision, and we sai we could take this radio station and we could bring the first 24 hour news and information service.

NPR News and Information Service to Pittsburgh.

Pittsburgh was only one of 50 markets, one of two markets out of the top 50 markets, that did not yet have a 24 hour NPR news and information station So that really became our focus.

We loved jazz, but, you know, it wasn't a sustainable business model.

So we could do jazz, but that wasn't really what our vision was for DUQ so we ended up, you know, convincing the foundations.

They liked the idea They helped us raise $6 million.

And we went and acquired the station from Duquesne University.

We brought it into this new building that we had built on the Southside for WYEP that had excess capacity to host and house other radio professionals.

And that was sort of the launch of WESA which reall has been a great success story and a great asset to the city of Pittsburgh, I think.

Yeah, I was working at KQV at the time, which was 24 hour all news back then.

And I remember when talk first started circulating that DUQ, that Duquesne was getting rid of the station.

I kept trying to convince everyone at KQV we need to buy the station, right.

Because in addition to the jazz, they were doing long form news programing different from KQV that was doing half hour format, right, like CNN.

But no, I was going to say, did anybody, did anybody even think?

A couple of people thought, hey, this is a great I think it's a time PJ Maloney like the idea and a few of us that were sort of working in it, but the management was like, get the hell out of here.

We're not doing this.

And the reason is because it was public radio, right?

There's a distinctio between public and commercial.

So there would be no profit motive and there is no profi motive in public radio.

Right.

But your signal was really, really good.

It takes you the which was the first radio station in the country, not the first commercial station, but the first station had probably the worst signal in the in the country.

Right?

I mean, I didn't know that.

Oh, yeah.

1410 AM is, it's a horrible I mean, if you go into the bathroom, you lose the signal.

Right.

And so and the fact that KQV was a lot like Pittsburg in that it was a small station, but it always punched above its weight right?

I mean, I think when I left KQV, I think, don't quote me on this, but it was billing $1 million a year, which for a signal that, you know, couldn't get outside of downtown at times, that wa an amazing amount of money for, for well, it had a great audience.

It did.

It really did.

You know, it was like the station for for news.

Right But that was Pittsburgh, right?

I mean, Pittsburgh had these.

It was a media hub.

It was a technology hub.

And that's what' so fascinating to me about you.

And that's wh I was so adamant to get you on.

In her because I think you're sort of right in the middle of what was happening in the 80s and 90s here in Pittsburgh, 90s especially, you know, to to really move beyond the steel mills and the, you know, the coal industry and everything else to what Pittsburgh is today.

I mean, I don't know if you get the credit, you deserve it.

Well, I mean, to take so many people to do all of what you just described.

But again, timing was critical when I said that I left when I was 18 years old to go to school in Boston, I meant I left.

I had no like looking back.

So 1973, Pittsburgh was kind of dark.

It was at the point where the, you know, the mills were closing, the dislocation, the whole it had not really figured out its future.

And I wasn't certainly going to stick around and try to figure out my future in that environment.

But coming back, you know, in mid 80s it started to turn a little bit.

And we rooted ourselves in the Southside with the restaurant in Bedford Square.

Plus I was down in the terminal buildings, which was the other end of the Southside.

And the Southside had been designated a historic district by the Pittsburgh Histor and Landmarks and by a National Historic Preservation Society.

So they didn't tear down all of the great buildings on the Southside.

So at the time we came or I came back, you know, it was starting to turn.

So you start a restaurant, you start other kinds of, you know, clubs and businesses and, you know, you you sort of ride right a curve there so you're making little changes, but it's all this other stuff that's coming together to at the same time that's really creating this, this big, massive sort of change.

Can you talk to us about Awesome Pittsburgh?

Awesome Pittsburgh.

Yeah.

I wish I could give you the quick little elevator pitch like they do there So they're so eloquent with it.

So Awesome Pittsburgh is a nonprofit organization.

They give out monthly grants of $1,000 to people that submit proposals for awesome ideas.

That's the only criteria.

And they have a grou of trustees who give, you know, $100 a month.

They have ten trustees, so they come up with $1,000 every month.

And those trustees get to you know, review these awesome ideas and say, we like that on and give the recipient $1,000.

And I've been with them for I don't know, ten years or so.

I don't vote anymore because it's a lot of work to actually revie all of that stuff every month.

So I do mostly the billing work for them and make sure all the trustees are billed at the right point and that the recipients, the award winners, get their money.

But I check out all these projects and I'm, you know, they're just cool.

And the only criteria is that it has to be awesome to them, you know, and you know, they've done a great job with that.

So yeah, that's that's fascinating.

I know that my wife is involved with Dormont Arts and they received one of the grants.

Oh okay.

Yeah.

So she she loves Awesome Pittsburgh.

How long ago was that?

I don't know.

Yeah.

I was going to say I don't remember that recently, but you know, definitely for sure.

Yeah.

Do you know Amy Klein?

Does that name sound familiar?

Yeah.

Because she was.

Maybe that's.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think it was Dormont Arts, I mean, it could have been, she did the parking chair.

Yes.

And so maybe that's what that's what it was.

That was the project that.

Yeah.

That was and I should say that my wife is working in a documentary about that.

So maybe that's the connectio that in my head I screwed it up.

Yeah.

Which isn't surprising if you know me at all.

So what is Marco Cardamone doing these days?

Oh, goodness.

Well, I'm retired, so I'm, you know, not really doing commercial work.

I still have a company called Merging Media, but we're just doing our own own sort of projects.

Some pro bono work, but mostly our own stuff.

And I'll tell you, you know, my wife and I, I mentioned before were musicians were written a lot of songs.

I got to this point where it's like, it's now or never.

So I'm just collecting all of the stuff we did, and we're still writing stuff and still recording, bu it's time to get it out there.

So Thursday of this week, I'm launching on Substack, our little band project.

We have a virtual band sort of thing.

So that's what's the name?

Yeah, it's called Three Musicians.

Yeah, there's a there's a third one.

Yeah.

Up in New York is his name is Steve Perillo.

Steve.

Right.

He has a company called Perillo Tours which is a. Yeah I know that for sure.

Yeah.

Very large Italian travel agency.

Steve's my college buddy.

We're all friends, and we've been writing and recording music since the 80s.

We got a body of work, and we're just, you know, it's like, hey, before we die let's get this crap out there.

So how do you describe it?

Is it acoustic?

Is it retro pop rock?

Yeah.

Why not?

That's how I describe it I love it, I can't wait to hear.

Until then, we're going to play a game with you.

Yes.

David and I are going to ask you questions, and it's very simple.

All you have to do is answer it.

They didn't tell me about this part.

Thanks, guys.

All right.

First question.

Iron City or Rolling Rock?

Probably neither, but Rolling Ro I think we know the answer to this one, but Three Rivers or Heinz Field?

Three Rivers.

Favorite alternative band?

The Clarks.

Would they be considered alternative?

If you say so.

Yeah, yeah, well in my in my generation, I guess.

But maybe not.

Maybe not.

The Clarks, The Affordable Floors.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Are they still together?

No, I mean, they do an occasional show, I think like once a year.

He said.

Yeah, something like that.

That's cool.

Yeah.

I have to check that out.

Yes.

Yeah.

I think your next Turner's or Schneider's tea?

Schneider's.

Favorite 90s movie?

Oh, now you're going to get me.

The last movie I saw was in a theater was Toy Story, and that was in the 90s, wasn't it?

So I'll go with, let's say yes twice.

Okay.

Digital animation.

So yeah, I don't I don't go to movies.

Okay.

Donzis and Chaunceys or Metropol and Rosebud?

Definitely.

Rosebud, Metropol.

Is Die Hard, a Christmas movie?

Was that Bruce Willis?

Yeah.

Is it a Christmas movie?

Yeah.

I don't know because I never saw it.

Youve never seen Die Hard?

No.

It's okay, I say no.

No, it's not.

Okay.

Valerie believes it is.

No, no, it is not.

I say it not a Christmas movie.

I'd have to see it Oh, yeah.

Now that's something.

You have to watch this again.

Culturally deprived.

Nirvana or Pearl Jam?

That's tough.

Nirvana.

Okay, my last question.

Which character from The Breakfast Club can you relate to most?

Youre going to have to tell me what The Breakfast Club was.

My gosh, Marco.

I know I told you I'm culturally deprived.

So that was a movie in the 80s.

Yeah, yeah.

Maybe I saw it, waht was it about?

Molly Ringwald, they all got detention It was a Gen X movie, but it wa written by a bunch of Boomers.

Sorry.

Sorry to let you down.

Now make sure you edit that Actually keep it, itll be funny Last question.

Southside Beehive or the Oakland Beehive?

Southside.

Yeah, that's what we all said.

Scott Kramer is joining us here tonight, so maybe we'll open up another Beehive.

Scott.

Yeah.

Well, Marco, thank you so much for joining us tonight.

This was great.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thanks, the audience, for listening to all of this.

Yes.

And thanks guys for checking us out tonight.

We'll see you guys next week.

Have a great one.

The Gen X Pittsburgh Podcast hosts are David Rullo and Valeri Christofel.

Executive producer, David Rullo.

Producer and graphic designer, Kim Rullo.

Producer, Valerie Christofel.

Video production and editor Brent Isaac.

Music by NeoStem.