Interview:Oliver Wang
[Ed. Note: Due to the sheer number of incredible people we've found to interview, contributor Emily Cox was asked to expand her interview to twice a week, Monday and Thursday. Enjoy!]
SFist recently went back to school for a Ph.D. (don’t worry, you’ve got at least 4-5 years before we demand to be known as Dr. SFist). As we stare down the coming years of educational opportunity, we’ve been wondering how anyone really does it. Interviewing Oliver Wang has forced us to wonder how anyone writes a dissertation, DJ’s, writes for various and sundry music publications, and maintains a kicking photo-blog.
When he’s not dissertating on Ethnic Studies at Berkeley, you can find Oliver dissertating on pop culture, Asian DJ’s, movies, cars and just about every other cool thing you might want to check out. SFist loves all of our interviews, but we are a little partial to those who have websites that help us procrastinate and or kill time at work. Oliver’s site fits the bill. We highly recommend it when next you have a term paper due.
Name: Oliver Wang
Introduce yourself in one sentence
I'm a disk junkie and that helps explain why I'm music journalist, DJ, scholar and audioblogger.
Age and Occupation
32 - I wear two hats: one as a music journalist/cultural critic, the other as a graduate student, finishing up my PhD at UC Berkeley in Ethnic Studies. Come this spring, we'll have to see which way I ultimately lean, career-wise.
Home Town
Hard to pin down: I've lived in nearly a dozen cities over my life but I "grew up" in San Marino (in Los Angeles) for junior high and high school.
How long have you lived in the Bay Area and Where
I've been in the Bay since 1990 and have lived in...Southside Berkeley, North Berkeley, Emeryville and North Oakland. This summer, I just moved to the Inner Sunset in San Francisco because my partner started a job at Apple in Cupertino and wasn't into the idea of having to commute from the East Bay. Besides that though, this is the first time I've lived in a CITY environment, I've always lived in and around cities but not in the heart of one...and frankly, it's great (parking troubles excepted).
Favorite website
Craigslist. Brilliant in its simplicitly but incredibly useful for everything. I literally live down the block from their main office and I'm always thinking, "wow, this is Craigslist...hmm...doesn't look like much though."
Favorite or local business
Groove Merchant Records in the Lower Haight. My musical education has expanded exponentially just by shopping there once a week and chopping it up with "Cool" Chris Veltri who runs the store.
What I’m currently Reading
Nothing - I'm trying to finish up a dissertation so all my pleasure reading is being shunted to the side.
Best Deal in San Francisco
I already plugged Craigslist. Beyond that, I'd have to say the natural beauty of this city: to me, it's a most impractical place to put a city - all the hills can't be easy to build on, but for all the challenges of packing in all these people into such a dense space, S.F. is a spectacularly beautiful city. I never get tired of looking at it - either from the East Bay - or just being in the midst of its neighborhoods and contours.
Favorite mode of transportation
Car. Sorry - you can take the boy out of L.A. but you can't take L.A. out of the boy. In my defense, I do drive a Prius so at least I'm in a zero emissions vehicle.
Best Band or Musician to come out of the Bay Area
Tough call but right off the bat: you can't deny Sly and the Family Stone as these amazing soul, funk. rock, etc. talents.
Favorite local hangout
*laugh* Groove Merchant though it's only a hangout for other record geeks like me. Outside of that, I really like the Milk Bar: good use of space, especially from a DJ perspective.
SF has the BEST: record stores. Not even NYC can hang when you have some place like Amoeba on your side.
You’ve never lived in SF until: you've spent 40 minutes trying to find a parking spot that you can only have overnight anyways.
You can tell someone is a local here IF: they're wearing the worst outfit you've ever seen.
SF would be soooo much better if only: it had a transit system as convenient, affordable and useful as the NYC, Chicago or Boston rail systems. I wouldn't drive as much as I do if I could get around via Muni easier.
Best Burrito: Cancun. Their chips are wack though.
Best Restaurant: That changes every few months - right now, I'd have to give it up to San Tung on Irving @ 13th. I dislike 99% of the Chinese food I've had in the City and I still find them to be worth the long wait that's outside the door. It's like what House of Nanking wishes it could be.
Best movie scene filmed in or about SF: Wayne Wang's "Chan is Missing"
(1982)
Tell us a San Francisco Story: I came up to the Bay in 1990, visiting potential colleges. At the time, I was deciding between Berkeley and the Univ. of Michigan (Ann Arbor) and I visited Berkeley first. My cousin, who was already going to school here, took me around and did the cliche S.F. experience: Powell St, the cable cars, Fisherman's Wharf, etc. etc. I ate it up and never even bothered to visit Ann Arbor. There was just no way Michigan could be better than S.F. (I've since visited Ann Arbor and confirmed that fact).
Question you'd ask if you were doing this interview: What would convince you to move OUT of S.F.?