Michael: What initially brought you to WUVT?
Cozette: I was a freshman when I joined, but it was my second semester; the spring semester, and I knew that college radio was a thing, and that WUVT existed from doing research, and thought “Ooh, there’s a radio station! That’s so cool!” I knew I wanted to join, and tried to join in the fall semester, but I couldn’t because the semester was already halfway through, so I trained in the spring. I lived in a hall with a bunch of people that I didn’t totally relate to, and they were all joining sororities and stuff, and I was like “I need to get involved with stuff too, I need to take advantage of my college experience,” so that’s how I chose to do so.
M: And how long have you been with WUVT?
C: I guess it’s been… 5 years? Approximately 5 years.
M: So you’re the sales manager, right?
C: Yes, I am.
M: What exactly do you do in that position?
C: So, we [WUVT] make money in a few different ways, but the thing that I specifically handle is underwriting. Underwriting is the non-promotional - I call them publicity statements, read at the top and bottom of the hour that the clients purchase. So I sell those to businesses and we have underwriters from all over, as in Floyd, Roanoke, and then a lot of underwriters from downtown Blacksburg. So what my job really involves is creating relationships with businesses. In contrast to, for example, outreach who’s trying to create relationships on campus, I’m creating relationships with the community through the business world in Blacksburg.
M: What was it that made you decide to go with sales instead of a different position?
C: I came in as, well, obviously as nothing, but I befriended the general manager who was in power during my second year here, and I had mentioned to him that I wanted to get more involved, so he was like “Oh, well our office manager position is open!” So he put me on as office manager; that was my first position. After that, I was looking for more responsibility, and I was friends with the girl who was doing sales, and she didn’t want to do it anymore, and I knew that I wanted a more challenging position, but I wanted to make sure I had a position, so part of the reason I did it was because it was basically an unopposed position, but also I have my undergraduate degree in business management and I honestly thought that sales would look good on my resume.
M: Definitely understandable.
C: Yeah! And I thought I’d be good at it, and a lot of people were like “Yeah, you’d be really good in the sales position!” so, I took their word for it and so far so good! I’ve made some really good strides in that.
M: So, how have your music tastes changed since joining WUVT?
C: I was – and still am – awful at finding new music. I’m one of those people who loves to listen to what I love to listen to; I’ve been that person who listens to the same song on repeat for an hour because I’m just like “Ah, this song’s so amazing!” I was really into basic classic rock, and didn’t understand jazz that much, and was really into classical music because I have a background in opera, but other than that, the new music stuff was very… new to me, like the idea of new music was new to me. It took me a long time to get used to listening to new things that I didn’t always like immediately, but they put me as new music DJ, so I started doing that a lot more. I actually had a different experience from a lot of people here because I got moved to Local Zone for two years – again, an unopposed position, so they were just like “do you want it?” and I was like “yeah, sure!” So I listened to a lot of local music for a while. Which, there is some reeeally good stuff. But then there’s also some really not great stuff. So, my music taste has expanded exponentially, I definitely have a ton of local bands in my music repertoire now, and I now DJ jazz, so I have a ton of jazz under my belt too, and also genres I never would have given a second listen to, like shoegaze and dreampop, and stuff like that. And even some older stuff that I didn’t think to search as much. So yeah, my tastes have changed a lot.
M: So, what are your top 3 favorite bands, or albums?
C: So it has nothing to do with WUVT, but my favorite album ever is Elephant, by The White Stripes, because it was the first album I really got into, so I can never replace that one. And then… No BS Brass is a jazz group that was introduced to me by WUVT, and uhh… Let’s go with The Shins. The Shins, yeah.
M: What’s the best live show you’ve ever been to, and who would you really like to see live?
C: Do you mean local, or in general?
M: In general.
C: See, I’m not a huge concert person…
M: Well then, local.
C: Yeah, which is ironic because I did the Local Zone for two years and got a concert every week, but I don’t go to concerts very often. Ripe Jive is one of my favorite bands in the area, and then I saw Supatight at 622, they’re definitely the best one.
M: If you had to listen to just one song for the rest of your life, what would it be?
C: There’s this song by The Kooks, See the Sun, but it’s the alternate version, and I think that I could actually listen to that for the rest of my life. When I said earlier that I listen to songs on repeat sometimes, that’s one that I still do it, and I’ve never gotten tired of it. It’s, like, one of the most beautiful things ever, and it’s just like, the content of the lyrics, but its coupled really well with the guitar, and I think that’s difficult to find in a song - Not that there aren’t a lot of songs that have great lyrics and music, but… yeah, that’s a hard question, I don’t think I could listen to one song forever.
M: And, who’s an artist you listen to that would be considered uncharacteristic of you?
C: Britney Spears, she’s way on the traditional pop side. I was going to say Lady Gaga, but she does some weird things, and some classical jazz stuff too. Definitely Britney Spears.
M: If you could trade places with any other staff member, who would it be, and why?
C: Probably Clare, because she’s so outrageous, like, she’s one of my idols for who she is. She makes people feel more uncomfortable than I make people feel, which is my goal all the time.
M: What’s your default dance move?
C: Oh god, I don’t know if this is appropriate! Well, I make up a lot of my own dance moves, but I guess, what Shaun and I call my dance move is the [redacted for sensitive readers] so this is definitely my go to, but I don’t know if you can put down the name of it. [laughing]
M: So, a common question in old interviews was about having unicorns or pegasi pulling your chariot, but I’m going to open that up a bit. If you could have any mythological animal pulling your chariot, or to coexist with, what would it be?
C: Ideally, it would be a water chariot, so, like, the Loch Ness Monster would be my transportation. But, just to coexist with, I would probably choose something less reptilian… I’m not a horse person, so not a unicorn… A dragon would be pretty cool. It is a reptile though.
M: It’s hard to argue with dragons though.
C: It really is, I’d be like the dragon queen in Game of Thrones.
M: Okay, just one more, really important one. What’s your favorite pop-tart flavor?
C: [laughing] I hate to say it, but the s’mores. I know they’re like the most rich, disgusting one, but it’s my secret. Because everyone’s always like “Oh I like the lighter ones, oh I like the fruity ones!”