Just 4 1/2 years ago, Nic Harcourt was happily running a small station in Woodstock, N.Y., living on seven acres atop a mountain, and unsure that he wanted to accept the offer to move to Los Angeles and oversee the music at KCRW-FM (89.9).
But--because he said he never wanted to ask himself, "what if?"--he accepted the job from general manager Ruth Seymour, took over the music show "Morning Becomes Eclectic," and has expanded the visibility and influence of the program and the station alike.
"Since Nic has been in Los Angeles, the show has become more sophisticated, more open to different kinds of music," Seymour said of the program, which airs weekdays from 9 a.m. to noon, and which takes in more money during pledge drives than all other shows on the public station. And with its exposure on the World Wide Web and other venues, she said, the show and the bands that Harcourt plays are reaching far beyond KCRW's signal area.
On Tuesday, the seventh compilation CD of songs from his program, "Sounds Eclectic Too," went on sale, with live performances by Dido, R.E.M. and Norah Jones, and proceeds benefiting the station.
On Saturday, Harcourt hosts "Unsigned Indies," the station's second annual concert of local unsigned bands, scheduled for 5 to 7 p.m. at Town Center Park in Costa Mesa.
His two-hour weekly program, "Sounds Eclectic," featuring the best of the KCRW show, is syndicated to about 30 stations nationwide, including stations in Seattle, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Portland, Ore. Its 100th episode airs Sunday at 6 p.m. on KCRW.
The first major film for which he supervised the music, "Igby Goes Down," is in wide release, featuring songs from "Morning Becomes Eclectic" regulars Coldplay, Travis and the Dandy Warhols.
And Nissan even hired Harcourt to emcee a compact disc of alternative artists that the company gives out with new cars and promotional materials.
In less than five years, he's gone from "Nic who?" to Nic Inc.
"I'm totally overworked. I look at my calendar, and it's like, 'Oh my God, how did I create all this?' " Harcourt said this week. He and his staff look at their schedules and realize, "We can't do it all. You always want to please, but at the end of the day, there's only so much you can do."
But what drives him is his desire to expose an ever-expanding audience to the music he thinks is worthwhile.
"There's a passion for spreading the word, in whatever way you can," he said.
