KCRW (89.9 MHz FM) is a public radio station broadcasting from the campus of Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California, carrying a mix of National Public Radio news, talk radio and freeform music format. A network of repeaters and broadcast translators allows the station to serve the Los Angeles metropolitan area and other communities in Southern California. The station has also become widely known because of nationally distributed programming, streaming Internet radio broadcasts, and podcasts^{[citation needed]}.

KCRW is known for broadcast of cutting edge music,^{[citation needed]} as well as originating numerous news-talk-information and cultural programs that are distributed nationwide.

KCRW was founded as the College Radio Workshop in 1945 to train servicemen returning from World War II in the then-new technology, FM broadcasting. Ruth Hirschman, who changed her name to Ruth Seymour, became General Manager in 1978 and developed a mix of music, news, and other spoken-word programming that now attracts over 500,000 listeners each week. Seymour retired in February 2010. The new General Manager is Jennifer Ferro.

Jon Hopkins (born 1979) is a London-based producer and musician who writes and performs his own melodic electronica and dance music. After starting his career performing keyboard for Imogen Heap, he's produced or contributed to albums by Brian Eno, Coldplay, David Holmes, and others. Hopkins composed the soundtrack for the 2010 film Monsters, which was nominated for an Ivor Novello Award for Best Original Score. His third solo album, Insides, reached #15 on the Dance/Electronic Album Chart in 2009,. His collaborations on Small Craft on a Milk Sea with Brian Eno and Leo Abrahams and Diamond Mine with King Creosote both reached #82 on the UK Albums Chart. In 2011 Diamond Mine was nominated for a Mercury Prize, which is annually awarded for best album from the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Jon Hopkins was born in 1979 in Wimbledon in the South of London, where he was raised. He first became aware of electronic music after hearing early house music on the radio at the age of seven or eight, and also became an avid fan of Depeche Mode and the Pet Shop Boys. These records inspired an early fascination with synths.

Johnny Marr (born John Martin Maher; 31 October 1963) is an English musician and songwriter. Marr rose to fame in the 1980s as the guitarist in The Smiths, with whom he formed a prolific songwriting partnership with Morrissey. Marr has been a member of Electronic, The The, and Modest Mouse. In 2008, he joined The Cribs after touring with them on 2008's NME Awards Tour, a group in which he would remain until 2011.

Marr's jangly Rickenbacker guitar-playing in The Smiths proved to be popular among other musicians and has influenced many guitarists that followed particularly in the Britpop era.

Marr was voted the fourth best guitarist of the last 30 years in a poll conducted by the BBC in 2010.

Marr was born in Ardwick, Manchester, the son of Irish immigrants. His parents came from Athy in County Kildare. In 1975 he attended the Roman Catholic St Augustine's Grammar School, which in 1977 merged with other schools to form a comprehensive school, St John Plessington High School. Marr had aspirations to be a professional football player, and was approached by Nottingham Forest and had trials with Manchester City (which he supports). In an interview with FourFourTwo magazine, Marr said "I was good enough for City, but they didn't follow up because I was probably the only player out there wearing eyeliner."^{[citation needed]} He currently resides in Manchester with his wife Angie and their children, daughter Sonny and son Nile. Johnny is an honorary board member of Rock For Kids. He is also teetotal and vegan, and runs regularly.

Manu Chao (born José-Manuel Thomas Arthur Chao on June 21, 1961), is a French singer of Spanish roots (Basque and Galician). He sings in French, Spanish, English, Italian, Galician, Arabic and Portuguese and occasionally in other languages. Chao began his musical career in Paris, busking and playing with groups such as Hot Pants and Los Carayos, which combined a variety of languages and musical styles. With friends and his brother Antoine Chao, he founded the band Mano Negra in 1987, achieving considerable success, particularly in Europe. He became a solo artist after its breakup in 1995, and since then tours regularly with his live band, Radio Bemba.

Chao was born to Spanish parents. His mother, Felisa Ortega, is from Bilbao, Basque country and his father, writer and journalist Ramón Chao, is from Vilalba, Galicia. They emigrated to Paris to avoid Francisco Franco's dictatorship—Manu's grandfather had been sentenced to death. Shortly after Manu's birth, the Chao family moved to the outskirts of Paris, and Manu spent most of his childhood in Boulogne-Billancourt and Sèvres. As he grew up he was surrounded by many artists and intellectuals, most of whom were acquaintances of his father. Chao cites much of his childhood experience as inspiration for some songs.

Tame Impala is the psychedelic rock project of Kevin Parker from Perth, Australia. They are signed to Modular Records. The band came to prominence in 2010 with the release of their debut album, Innerspeaker. Their name refers to the impala, a medium sized antelope. They like to see themselves as "a steady flowing psychedelic groove rock band that emphasizes dream-like melody."

Tame Impala were formed from Kevin Parker's original blues/jazz/psychedelic band, the Dee Dee Dums. The Dee Dee Dums consisted of Parker (drums ) and Luke Epstein (guitar), with the band getting second place at the 2005 AmpFest and winning third place that year in the state final of The Next Big Thing. In October 2006 Epstein was replaced by drummer Sam Devenport, Epstein going on to play with Sugarpuss. The Dee Dee Dums went on to win the WA state final of the National Campus Band Competition. In late 2007 the band renamed to Tame Impala unveiling another new drummer and replacing the two-guitar attack for the more traditional guitar/bass/drums format. Devenport went on to pursue an acting career.